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Headlines highlight the horrors of Gaza and Israel and the West's debate over support for Ukraine, but another brutal war is raging far off the radar in Sudan.
It's vulgar to compare the suffering. The unnecessary pain, trauma and loss in every conflict is tragic. These crises all call for action, but countries across the globe have mobilized to press for solutions for Ukraine and Gaza, while Sudan goes barely noticed. The scale and the nature of Sudan's war demand more.
Sudan hosts the largest displaced population on earth. Nearly 8 million people have fled their homes since the war began in April. Three million are children. More than 1.5 million Sudanese have left the country, though, as they are surrounded by other unstable countries, they have nowhere safe to go.
As in Gaza, starvation is stalking Sudan — but on a far bigger scale. More than 20 million people, or 10 times the population of Gaza, face acute or emergency levels of hunger now. The most vulnerable are trapped where humanitarian access is blocked by ongoing fighting. Left unaddressed, this situation will become famine on an epic scale.
How can the world be so attentive to the plight of Gaza's civilians and so unconcerned with those in Sudan? And what does the lack of attention mean?
As Gaza and Ukraine demonstrate, global attention doesn't mean a quick end to conflict. But the United States and others have led serious, sustained diplomatic and humanitarian responses in Gaza and Ukraine. Though not sufficient, they are necessary to reduce suffering and restore peace.
In Sudan, no such serious response is underway.
The war is a fight for total control between Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, who leads the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), and Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, the country's de facto leader who heads the Sudanese Armed Forces. The two conspired in 2019 to oust Omar al-Bashir in a coup and obstructed civilian leadership, but they couldn't agree on terms for unifying their forces and chose war instead.
In Khartoum, major landmarks and whole neighborhoods were leveled. The conflict then spread west to Darfur and then south. Crimes against humanity have been rampant.
The start of the war saw a flurry of diplomatic wrangling and uncoordinated attempts at peace. Saudi Arabia and the United States, the African Union and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development each led competing peace talks. None succeeded. Serious efforts would have coordinated and convened all interested and influential parties.
The U.S. response has not been serious at all, paling in comparison to prior responses even to crises in Sudan.
Take the conflict in Darfur two decades ago. Al-Bashir's government used the Janjaweed, a proxy Sudanese Arab militia, to fight rebellion, and it unleashed brutal violence against the non-Arab population, while the Sudanese military bombed civilians from the air.
Human rights groups and activists responded with horror to reports of genocide and organized large public protests and campaigns in the United States and around the world. These actions spurred hearings in Congress and the United Nations Security Council. U.S. diplomacy was led by envoys reporting to the White House, indicating high-level attention on the issue.
International partners worked closely to negotiate a cease-fire and establish peacekeeping missions, first led by the African Union and then with the United Nations. The U.N. Security Council even referred Sudan to the International Criminal Court in 2005. The response was delayed and often fell short, but international engagement and pressure ultimately helped secure more than a decade of fragile peace.
Even with that level of engagement, the war in Darfur lasted years and killed an estimated 300,000 people. Imagine the damage this war could do with no efforts to rein it in.
Countries more engaged on Sudan today only fuel conflict. The United Arab Emirates, a close U.S. military partner, is the gravest offender, as it bankrolls and arms the RSF. The RSF has been on the offensive for months, suggesting a victory for the rebel forces could be in sight.
This has led other countries in the region to provide unwarranted diplomatic support to Hemedti as well. Instead of making him a pariah for widespread crimes against humanity, war crimes and possibly even genocide, many have rolled out the red carpet to receive him with the flare of a head-of-state visit.
If the United States and others continue to look away, dire humanitarian conditions will precipitate unimaginable suffering, and ultimately, someone will be rewarded for seizing power by force, which could inspire other armed groups in the region.
After months of calls from Congress, the United States will finally appoint a new special envoy. While it isn't a cure-all, it's an opportunity to reinvigorate America's response and diplomacy on Sudan. We have influence with the UAE, should we choose to use it. Even if we can't secure a particularly palatable outcome at this stage, we should aim to minimize the suffering and help get assistance to those in need.
For those who agree, they might want to let their representatives in Washington know.
Elizabeth Shackelford is a senior fellow on U.S. foreign policy with the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. She was previously a U.S. diplomat and is author of "The Dissent Channel: American Diplomacy in a Dishonest Age."
Previously:
• 01/04/24 For a better foreign policy in 2024, let's be more like Taylor Swift
• 04/23/24 Turkey and the power of controlling the narrative
• 04/25/23 A bipartisan effort aims to stop arming human rights abusers like Saudi Arabia
• 02/27/23 Ukraine's outsized reliance on the US is a risk for the world
• 02/13/23 Is China really scarier than Zuckerberg?
• 02/28/22 If Putin doesn't fear Western sanctions, his cronies might
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