2023 – Present
ONGOINGSudan's war began on April 15, 2023, when two generals who had jointly seized power turned on each other: Abdel Fattah al-Burhan's Sudanese Armed Forces and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo's Rapid Support Forces, the paramilitary descended from the Janjaweed militias that carried out the Darfur genocide two decades earlier. Fighting erupted inside Khartoum, a city of six million, and the RSF held most of the capital for nearly two years before an SAF counteroffensive retook Omdurman, the Presidential Palace, and finally Khartoum itself in March 2025. In Darfur the RSF went the other way, besieging El Fasher for eighteen months and taking it on October 27, 2025 — the UN documented more than 6,000 killings in the first three days and later found the conduct amounted to war crimes. Since then the war has moved into Kordofan, and Sudan has settled into a de facto partition: the army holding the center and east, the RSF holding Darfur. It is the largest displacement crisis in the world and the worst hunger emergency, with famine confirmed in El Fasher and Kadugli — and among the least reported wars of its scale anywhere.
Colonial Legacy
Britain's post-WWII withdrawal from Sudan — independence came in 1956 — left behind borders and governance structures that ignored centuries of ethnic, tribal, and religious divisions. The divide between Arab northern elites and African communities in Darfur, Nuba Mountains, and the south was carved into law by colonial administration.
Proxy Roots
Sudan was a Cold War battleground where the US, USSR, Libya, and Egypt all backed competing Sudanese factions, militarizing groups that would later fracture the state. The RSF itself descends from the Janjaweed militias — armed and funded during decades of proxy conflict — that carried out the Darfur genocide of 2003–08.
Chapter-by-chapter narrative with maps, primary sources, and key events.
Explore battles on a live map with a timeline slider and territory overlays.
Deep-dive into every major engagement — commanders, casualties, significance.
Biographical flip cards with real portraits, facts, and full biography pages.
Trace each figure's full life journey — birth, education, battles, and death — on a live map.
Scroll-driven visualization of casualties — each dot a thousand lives.
Weapons, war machines, and the military innovations that defined how this conflict was fought.
Cause-and-effect chains tracing the war's long shadow on history.
War crimes, massacres, and the darkest chapters of this conflict — documented for history.
Sudan's war began on April 15, 2023, when two generals who had jointly seized power turned on each other: Abdel Fattah al-Burhan's Sudanese Armed Forces and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo's Rapid Support Forces, the paramilitary descended from the Janjaweed militias that carried out the Darfur genocide two decades earlier. Fighting erupted inside Khartoum, a city of six million, and the RSF held most of the capital for nearly two years before an SAF counteroffensive retook Omdurman, the Presidential Palace, and finally Khartoum itself in March 2025. In Darfur the RSF went the other way, besieging El Fasher for eighteen months and taking it on October 27, 2025 — the UN documented more than 6,000 killings in the first three days and later found the conduct amounted to war crimes. Since then the war has moved into Kordofan, and Sudan has settled into a de facto partition: the army holding the center and east, the RSF holding Darfur. It is the largest displacement crisis in the world and the worst hunger emergency, with famine confirmed in El Fasher and Kadugli — and among the least reported wars of its scale anywhere.
Sudan Civil War was fought from 2023 to the present day.
Sudan Civil War was fought between Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
An estimated 250,000 people died in Sudan Civil War, including roughly 50,000 military and 200,000 civilian deaths. Figures are scholarly estimates and vary by source.
Major engagements included Battle of Khartoum, Battle of El Fasher, Massacre at El Geneina, and RSF Darfur Offensive.