Ask a 17-year-old in Darfur why she did not sit her school-leaving exam this year, and she will not mention an American ceasefire text.
asserted
she → ask → text
The exam was held only in territory the army controls.
asserted
army → hold → territory
Ask a shopkeeper in Nyala why the banknotes in his drawer became worthless overnight, or a father in Kordofan why his newborn has no birth certificate, and the answer is the same: not a truce, but a decision by the SAF-appointed authorities in the middle of a war.
asserted
answer → ask → war
Sudan is living through a de facto partition.
asserted
Sudan → live → partition
Its territory is divided between two armed forces, each of which has built its own governing authority.
asserted
each → divide → authority
Society is fractured along ethnic lines, and both sides recruit on that basis.
asserted
sides → fracture → basis
Hate speech and open calls for secession are heard on both sides.
asserted
speech → hear → sides
The army-appointed administration’s decisions on education, currency, and identity documents have hardened these divisions.
asserted
decisions → appoint → divisions
The rival administration’s parallel steps have driven them deeper.
asserted
steps → drive → them
The danger goes beyond a split between east and west.
asserted
danger → go → east
If the war continues, Sudan could fracture into fiefdoms ruled by warlords, threatening the state’s very existence and the region’s stability for years.
uncertain
Sudan → continue → years
It is the war, not a ceasefire, that has brought Sudan to this point, and only a peace process can reverse the descent.
asserted
process → bring → descent
It came in response to mounting American pressure: in September, Washington withheld General Burhan’s United Nations visa, reportedly pending his acceptance of a 90-day ceasefire, and the State Department declared that neither the SAF nor the RSF represents legitimate governance.
uncertain
SAF → come → governance
For those resisting an end to the fighting, the war has become an end in itself: It keeps them in power, enriches them, and lets them crush their civilian opponents.
asserted
them → resist → opponents
They are buying time until those aims are secured.
asserted
aims → buy → time
No party should be allowed to treat delay as strategy, because ordinary Sudanese pay for every day without a ceasefire.
asserted
Sudanese → allow → ceasefire
U.N. relief chief Tom Fletcher says more than two-thirds of the population urgently need aid, with services in El Obeid at a breaking point.
asserted
thirds → say → point
The World Food Program reports some 20 million people facing acute hunger, while displaced families in Tawila receive half rations.
asserted
families → report → rations
The International Organization for Migration warns that the aid pipeline could collapse without urgent funding.
uncertain
pipeline → warn → funding
The costs no longer stop at Sudan’s borders.
asserted
costs → stop → borders
As a recent report by The Century Foundation shows, the war is becoming entangled with the turmoil around Bab el Mandeb, one of the world’s most vital shipping lanes, and with the conflict that has erupted in Ethiopia.
asserted
that → show → Ethiopia
Sudan’s war is now part of a wider regional confrontation, one that threatens international peace and security.
asserted
that → threaten → peace
None of this would matter if either side could actually win.
uncertain
side → matter → this
The first civil war began in 1955 and lasted 17 years before ending with the Addis Ababa Agreement of 1972.
asserted
war → begin → 1972
The second lasted 22 years, killed some 2 million people, and ended with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement in 2005.
asserted
second → last → 2005
Darfur went through Abuja and Doha before the Juba Peace Agreement of 2020.
asserted
Darfur → go → 2020
Each of these wars was fought for military victory.
asserted
Each → fight → victory
Each ended in a negotiated settlement, reached only after years of avoidable death.
asserted
Each → end → death
It declared jihad in the South and staked everything on total victory, then signed the CPA 16 years later.
asserted
It → declare → CPA
In 2011, the country lost a quarter of its territory.
asserted
country → lose → territory
That is the real content of today’s “military victory” project: restoring the Islamist order whose 30 years in power gave Sudan the secession of the South, atrocities in Darfur that led the ICC to indict its president, international isolation, economic collapse, and parallel armies such as the Rapid Support Forces, which it now fights by creating still more parallel armies.
asserted
it → restore → armies
It would be the return of the regime that created the conditions for this war.
asserted
that → create → war
History offers Sudan no war won by force.
asserted
History → offer → force
The only question is how many more must die before the inevitable settlement, and whether the country will still be whole when it comes.
asserted
it → die → settlement
Over more than three years, Sudan’s warring parties have shown that they do not respond to appeals and diplomatic courtesies.
asserted
they → war → appeals
They respond to costs.
asserted
They → respond → costs
What is needed now is a coherent pressure package: an expanded arms embargo that shuts off the foreign supply lines fueling the war; the delegitimization of both warring parties, ending any hope that the war can serve as a ladder to power; and sanctions on any actor, inside or outside Sudan, that obstructs a ceasefire or humanitarian access.
asserted
that → need → ceasefire
Pressure alone will not end the war, but pressure tied to a coordinated process for a ceasefire and a political settlement can.
asserted
pressure → end → ceasefire
That is why Massad Boulos’s current effort to bring the Quad and the Quintet behind a single track matters.
asserted
effort → bring → track
If Washington holds this course, the Trump administration can be the one that ends the world’s largest humanitarian catastrophe.
asserted
that → hold → catastrophe
…and 4 more, not listed.
The Aporia
