Nuer White Army
| Nuer White Army | |
|---|---|
| Participant in the Second Sudanese Civil War and the South Sudanese Civil War | |
 |
|
| Active | 1991–present |
| Leaders | Bordoang Leah |
| Headquarters | Yuai Uror County, South Sudan |
| Area of operations | South Sudan |
| Strength | 105,000 |
| Allies |
 South Sudan Liberation Movement
|
| Opponents |
 Government of South Sudan
|
The Nuer White Army, sometimes decapitalised as the "white army", is a semi-official name for a militant organisation formed by the Nuer people of central and eastern Greater Upper Nile in modern-day South Sudan as early as 1991. According to the Small Arms Survey, it arose from the 1991 schism within the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) for the dual purpose of defending Nuer cattle herds from neighbouring groups and fighting in the Second Sudanese Civil War between the SPLM/A and the Sudanese government.
The White Army was so named due to the Nuer practice of smearing one's skin with a light-coloured ash as a protection against biting insects, according to a Small Arms Survey report published in June 2007, though other sources contend the name was merely intended to draw a distinction between the Nuer militia and the Sudan Armed Forces.
During the Second Sudanese Civil War, White Army fighters mainly from the Lou Nuer subtribe backed the breakaway SPLM/A faction led by Riek Machar, known as SPLA-Nasir, in attacks on the Dinka majority. They were partly responsible for the Bor massacre, in which at least 2000 people were killed in 1991. However, the fighters never formed long-term alliances with other factions in the war, acting for short-term benefit only. Among their most regular enemies were the Murle people, a rival tribe competing for land and cattle in the states of Jonglei and Upper Nile.
During the war, though the term "White Army" could refer collectively to Nuer youth militants, there was rarely any functioning central authority for the disparate fighters, and a number of White Army factions based around different cattle camps operated autonomously or semi-autonomously of one another. The ranks of leadership had a reportedly high rate of turnover.
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