Chemical weapons, terrorists, and Iran: Trump is ignoring America’s next nightmare

In 2019, the most hopeful story on Earth was being written in Sudan. Millions of Sudanese — led, unforgettably, by their women — filled the streets and transformed Khartoum’s vast sit-in outside the military headquarters into a living symbol of freedom, where poetry, music, debate, and solidarity replaced fear.It was a peaceful revolution that captivated the world and proved that courage could defeat dictatorship without bullets. The world answered. Washington lifted the terrorism designation that had isolated Sudan for a generation. Creditors moved to cancel billions in debt. Sudan appointed its first female chief justice and its first female foreign minister, repealed repressive public-order laws that had long targeted women, signed onto the Abraham Accords, and began rejoining the world. A pariah was becoming a partner. Recommended Stories That story is now drowning in blood. Since April 2023, the war between General Abdel Fattah al Burhan’s army and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo’s Rapid Support Forces has killed an estimated 150,000 to 400,000 people. Fourteen million have been driven from their homes — the largest displacement crisis on the planet. More than 30 million, two-thirds of the population, need humanitarian aid, half of them children. Famine and cholera sweep through a health system in ruins. The warring parties have committed grave atrocities, extensively documented by international investigations led by the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission established by the United Nations Human Rights Council. Their crimes demand unequivocal condemnation — not political reward. The Trump administration must now act on what it already knows. In April 2025, the United States determined that SAF used chemical weapons in 2024 — investigations point to chlorine dropped north of Khartoum. Sanctions followed; a second, harsher round took effect this July after the army refused to comply. Meanwhile, the Sudanese Muslim Brotherhood has burrowed into the army’s command, fielding some tens of thousands of fighters, many trained and supplied by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, and carrying out mass executions. In March, the State Department designated it as a terrorist organization. Read that again: a chemical-weapons-using army, fused to a designated terrorist movement, armed by Tehran. The world cannot absorb such a precedent — and must not be asked to.For Americans, this is not a distant tragedy; it is a gathering strategic threat. Iran has repeatedly demonstrated how its ability to disrupt shipping around the Strait of Hormuz can send shockwaves through global energy markets, driving up prices and increasing costs for American families. Now imagine Tehran establishing a lasting foothold on Sudan’s nearly 800-kilometer Red Sea coast while its proxies already threaten shipping from the opposite shore in Yemen. An Iranian position on one side and its proxies on the other would place one of the world’s most vital maritime corridors under unprecedented pressure. A Muslim Brotherhood-run Sudan would offer jihadists what it once offered Osama bin Laden: sanctuary, on a continental scale. Wars like this do not stay contained. They drive mass immigration, fuel arms trafficking and extremist networks, and ultimately export their violence beyond their borders.OPINION: THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD REOPENED SUDAN’S DOOR TO IRAN. TRUMP CAN CLOSE ITThe remedy exists on paper. The Quad — the U.S., the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt — has laid out a road map: a three-month humanitarian truce hardening into a permanent ceasefire, then a nine-month transition to a civilian-led government controlled by neither warring party, with Muslim Brotherhood networks dismantled rather than accommodated. What is needed is enforcement: an immediate, monitored ceasefire; real, escalating penalties on whichever side obstructs it; and a political process that returns Sudan to the course its people chose in 2019 — civilian, sovereign, free of the generals and of the movement that burned it down. The missing ingredient is not leverage, but a strategy to translate that leverage into peace.The Sudanese are not asking for American troops. They are asking America to mean what it said. Seven years ago, unarmed young people stood before a military machine chanting one word — “peaceful” — and won. They believed courage would be answered with partnership. If that promise dies in Sudan, every autocrat will take note, and so will every young person weighing whether freedom is worth the risk. End the war. Enforce the road map. Prove that when a people chooses liberty over fear, America still shows up — not with statements of concern, but with resolve.Khalid Omer Yousif is a Sudanese political leader and former minister of Cabinet affairs in Sudan’s civilian-led transitional government (2019–2021). A longtime advocate of democracy, peace, and civilian rule, he has opposed Sudan’s Islamist regime since his student activism in the late 1990s. He played a leading role in the 2018-19 revolution, helped negotiate Sudan’s democratic transition, and has remained active in efforts to end the current war through a civilian-led political process. He writes and speaks regularly on Sudan, regional security, and countering extremist movements.