The best answer may be the most obvious when it comes to the origins of the coup in Sudan

I am confident that international actors play at most a marginal role in such domestic upheavals, writes Borzou Daragahi

Demonstrators gather at a protest in Khartoum (Getty)

What was behind the recent coup in Sudan? There has been plenty of contradictory and restless intrigue-mongering about Lt Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan’s putsch, which involved quashing the civilian government of prime minister Abdalla Hamdok and detaining his courts.

A number of nations have been talked about but having lived through and covered coups in Egypt and Turkey, Iran and throughout the Arab world, and studied them in other countries, I am confident that international actors play at most a teeny, marginal role in such domestic upheavals.

Typically in such confrontations, governments blame “invisible hands” of foreign actors for stirring up unrest, and there is always blame for some – America, Israel and the Gulf – for backing the autocrats or coup plotters, even if it isn’t substantiated.