Sudan's Civil War: What It Is and Why It Matters

The World's Largest Ignored Crisis

Sudan is home to what the United Nations calls the largest humanitarian emergency on the planet — yet it rarely dominates international headlines. Since April 2023, two rival military factions have been fighting a devastating war across the country, killing hundreds of thousands, displacing over 13 million people, and pushing millions more toward famine. Understanding how this conflict started requires looking back decades at Sudan's turbulent history.

The Two Forces Tearing Sudan Apart

The war pits two powerful military organizations against each other. On one side is the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), the country's official national army, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. On the other is the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary group commanded by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, widely known as Hemedti. Until 2023, the two men were allies who had jointly seized power in a 2021 coup that derailed Sudan's fragile democratic transition. What transformed allies into enemies was a bitter dispute over who would control Sudan's future — and its army.

The RSF's Bloody Origins

The RSF did not emerge from nowhere. Its roots lie in the Janjaweed, the Arab militias that became notorious during the Darfur genocide of 2003–2005, when the Sudanese government armed them to crush rebel movements in western Sudan. The resulting campaign of mass killing, rape, and village burning left an estimated 300,000 people dead and 2.5 million displaced.

In 2013, President Omar al-Bashir formalized these fighters into the RSF and appointed Hemedti as their commander. Over the following decade, the RSF grew into a well-funded force with its own economic empire — particularly in Sudan's lucrative gold-mining sector — and deployed fighters to conflicts in Libya and Yemen, building international leverage. By 2023, the RSF was no longer just a paramilitary auxiliary; it was a rival army.

What Sparked the 2023 War

The immediate trigger was a dispute over the integration of the RSF into the regular army. As Sudan attempted a transition back to civilian governance, international partners pressed for the RSF to be absorbed into the SAF. The two sides could not agree on timing or terms: the SAF demanded integration within two years; Hemedti insisted on ten. Each feared what losing autonomous command would mean for their power and wealth.

On April 15, 2023, explosions and gunfire erupted across Khartoum. RSF fighters attacked the presidential palace, the national television headquarters, and military bases simultaneously. The SAF struck back from the air. Within hours, a country of 48 million people was at war with itself.

The Human Cost: Displacement, Famine, and Genocide

The scale of suffering in Sudan is staggering. According to the United Nations, an estimated 33.7 million people — roughly two-thirds of Sudan's population — need humanitarian assistance. More than 13.6 million people have been displaced, making Sudan's displacement crisis the largest in the world, surpassing even Ukraine and Gaza.

Famine has taken hold in parts of Darfur and South Kordofan. The UN estimates that 21 million people face acute food insecurity, with some 375,000 experiencing famine-level hunger. Sudan's health system has been pushed to near-collapse, with more than a third of all health facilities no longer functioning.

The situation in Darfur has drawn the gravest condemnation. In January 2025, the U.S. State Department formally determined that the RSF had committed genocide against non-Arab communities in the region. A UN Fact-Finding Mission separately found "hallmarks of genocide" in the RSF's conduct — including the systematic killing of men and boys based on ethnicity and the widespread use of sexual violence as a weapon of war.

Why the World Isn't Watching

Despite its scale, Sudan's war has struggled to capture sustained global attention. Several factors contribute to this: the conflict lacks a simple narrative villain recognizable to Western audiences; access for journalists and aid workers has been severely restricted by both sides; and simultaneous crises in Ukraine, Gaza, and elsewhere compete for media space and donor funding.

International mediation efforts — led at various points by the African Union, Saudi Arabia, and the United States — have repeatedly stalled. Neither the SAF nor the RSF has shown willingness to negotiate in good faith, and external powers have complicated the picture by quietly supplying weapons to their preferred side.

What Comes Next

Sudan's war has no clear end in sight. The SAF has made territorial gains in some areas, including breaking a long-running RSF siege of the city of El Obeid in early 2026. But the RSF continues to hold large swathes of Darfur and other western regions. For millions of Sudanese civilians, the immediate reality is hunger, displacement, and danger — in a crisis the world has yet to fully reckon with.