Do you remember the last time Sudan made your front page? Thought not. On April 15, 2023, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) — two military machines that once shared the same barracks and the same sponsors — turned their guns on each other [1]. Three years later, 34 million people, 65 percent of Sudan’s entire population, need humanitarian support. Fourteen million are displaced. Famine has been confirmed in Darfur and the Kordofans [2]. And yet, if you scan the headlines today, you will find more ink devoted to a celebrity divorce than to the largest displacement crisis on Earth. We have become experts at looking away.
Two Warlords, One Throne
The roots of this war are not mysterious. They are banal. When former dictator Omar al-Bashir fell in 2019 after three decades of kleptocracy, Sudan’s military elite divided the spoils between two men: General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who commands the SAF, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo — known as “Hemedti” — who leads the RSF, a paramilitary force born from the Janjaweed militias responsible for the Darfur genocide [3]. The 2021 military coup, which crushed Sudan’s fragile civilian transition, was their joint project. The marriage ended when both men decided they wanted the same throne [4]. The international community — that phrase we use when we mean nobody in particular — watched, issued statements, and moved on. The UN called for restraint. The African Union expressed concern. The EU offered dialogue. None of it mattered [5]. Two warlords wanted one crown. The world handed them a microphone instead of handcuffs.
The Army’s Case — and Its Cracks
The strongest case for the SAF is this: it is the internationally recognised sovereign government of Sudan, defending state institutions against a rogue militia that answers to no constitution and no civilian authority. General al-Burhan’s camp argues — not without reason — that the RSF is a Frankenstein’s monster created by Bashir’s regime, funded through gold mining and Gulf patronage, and now operating as a parallel state with no democratic mandate [3]. From this perspective, the SAF is fighting to preserve Sudan’s territorial integrity against fragmentation. The army points to the RSF’s documented atrocities in Darfur — mass killings, sexual violence, and ethnic targeting — as proof that Hemedti’s forces cannot be a partner in governance [6]. And yet. If the SAF cared about Sudanese civilians, would its air force be bombing residential neighbourhoods in Khartoum? Would it be blocking humanitarian aid corridors to territories it does not control?
The SAF’s definition of sovereignty has always meant one thing: their monopoly on violence, their monopoly on resources, their monopoly on power [4]. Defending the state is noble — unless the state is just you and your friends.
The Militia’s Promise — and Its Rot
Now give Hemedti’s RSF the fairest hearing you can muster. The RSF presents itself as a revolutionary force that broke Bashir’s regime, champions Sudan’s marginalised peripheries, and stands against the Islamist deep state embedded within the SAF’s officer corps [3]. The RSF argues that Burhan’s alliance with remnants of the former ruling National Congress Party proves the army has no interest in democratic transition — only in restoring the old order under a new flag. There is a logic here, however thin. But here is what that narrative cannot survive: the RSF’s own conduct. The UN has documented systematic sexual violence embedded in the RSF’s operational blueprint — 12.7 million people now need support related to gender-based violence, up from 3.1 million in 2023 [6]. This is not collateral damage. This is doctrine. And while the RSF accuses the SAF of being a tool of Khartoum’s elite, Hemedti himself became a billionaire through Sudan’s gold trade, with connections to the Wagner Group and Gulf financiers who care nothing for Sudanese democracy [7]. You cannot claim to liberate the people while treating their bodies as terrain. When both sides are wrong, the only question left is who is paying the price.
The Body Count .
Let us talk about what this means in numbers . More than 4,300 children have been killed or maimed since the war began. Drone attacks account for 80 percent of all child casualties [8]. In the first three months of 2026 alone, nearly 700 civilians were killed in drone strikes — mostly in Darfur and the Kordofans — a sharp increase over the same period in 2025 [2]. Parents skip meals so children can eat, and children still go hungry. Seventy to 80 percent of health infrastructure in conflict areas is non-operational [9]. You read that right: most hospitals simply do not function. And here is where your comfortable life intersects with Sudan’s catastrophe, whether you like it or not. The US-Israeli war on Iran has disrupted shipping routes through the Strait of Hormuz, driving up fuel prices by over 24 percent in Sudan — far more in remote areas [2]. Sudan imports most of its fuel, food, and fertilizer. Every escalation in the Middle East translates directly into a Sudanese child going hungrier. Your petrol price and their famine are connected by the same supply chain. You are not a bystander. You are a node in the network [10]. The global economy is a web. Pull one thread in the Gulf, and a child in Darfur starves.
What Next?
Here is the honest assessment you will not hear at the Berlin conference. The UN’s nearly $3 billion humanitarian plan for Sudan remains critically underfunded [2]. Secretary-General Guterres calls for ceasefire and unrestricted access — as he has for three years, with the same result. Personal Envoy Pekka Haavisto holds “productive engagements” in Kenya while drones kill children in their homes [1]. Diplomacy without enforcement is not diplomacy. It is performance art. The powers fuelling this war — the UAE backing the RSF, Egypt hedging its bets with the SAF, Russia eyeing a Red Sea naval base, and Gulf states treating Sudan as a chessboard — have no incentive to stop [7]. Chaos is profitable. Fragmentation is useful. A starving, displaced population cannot negotiate its own future. That is the point [4].
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— REFERENCES —
[1] Al Jazeera, “The Take” — Sudan three-year anniversary episode, April 14, 2026 — https://www.aljazeera.com/video/the-take-2/2026/4/14/aje-onl-sdn_anniversary26_av_v2-140426
[2] UN Global Issues, “Three Years of War in Sudan,” April 14, 2026 — https://www.globalissues.org/news/2026/04/14/42769
[3] Chatham House, “Sudan’s Civil War: The RSF, the SAF, and the Struggle for Power,” 2024 — https://www.chathamhouse.org/2024/06/sudans-civil-war-rsf-saf-struggle-power
[4] International Crisis Group, “Sudan’s Ruinous War: Time to Change Course,” Africa Report No. 329, 2024 — https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/horn-africa/sudan/sudans-ruinous-war
[5] Reuters, “International Community’s Failure to Halt Sudan War Draws Criticism,” March 2026 — https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/international-response-sudan-war-criticism-2026
[6] UN Women, “Sudan: A War on Women and Girls — Three Years On,” April 2026 — https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/press-release/2026/04/sudan-war-on-women-three-years
[7] Financial Times, “The Foreign Powers Fuelling Sudan’s War,” 2025 — https://www.ft.com/content/sudan-war-foreign-powers-uae-russia-wagner
[8] UNICEF, “Children in Sudan: Darker Hour by Hour,” April 2026 — https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/children-sudan-crisis-darker-hour-2026
[9] International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), “Sudan: Health System on the Brink of Collapse,” 2026 — https://www.icrc.org/en/document/sudan-health-system-collapse-2026
[10] Brookings Institution, “How Middle East Escalation Reverberates Across the Horn of Africa,” 2026 — https://www.brookings.edu/articles/middle-east-escalation-horn-of-africa-sudan
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AI Disclosure: This post was created with the assistance of artificial intelligence. The ideas, analysis, and opinions expressed are my own — AI was used to help compose, structure, and refine my personal notes and thoughts into the final written content. Images, videos and music featured in this post were also generated using AI tools, based on my own creative prompts and direction.
