Book excerpt: Sudan, the largest country in Africa, became independent in 1956, to find it had a foot in both the Arab Muslim and the Black African camps. Almost immediately a sixteen year civil war began, ending with autonomy for the South, which devolved into chaos. A second southern revolution broke out in 1983 when the government introduced the Sharia law, which is still in progress, the impasse halted only by an uneasy cease-fire. Central governments have been mainly military dictatorships, plagued by plots, quarrels with adjacent countries, and involvement in international terrorism.