The RSF Seizes El-Fasher: Assessing the Fallout
2025-10-2711 view
Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have achieved a key victory by capturing El-Fasher, the capital of the western state of North Darfur. On October 26, they seized the headquarters of the army’s Sixth Division as government forces retreated to the north and west of the city in a negotiated surrender.
The advance was months in the making. The RSF had put the city in its sights since mid-2024, besieging and launching dozens of attacks on government positions that had been cut off from their supply lines. Despite some airdrops of food and military supplies, months of attempts by the army to break the siege had failed.
An addition to its strategic importance, the RSF’s advance is symbolically significant. Controlling the headquarters of the Sixth Division amounts to control over largest city in the vast Darfur region.
The army is attempting to recoup its losses, but the situation on the ground is not in its favor. While the RSF has open supply lines, the army is struggling to provision its forces. Consequently, the RSF is in a better position, and is likely to capitalize on the opportunity and continue its offensive.
Solid RSF control of El-Fasher will place the RSF in a dominant position across the entire Darfur region, opening the way to an attack on Kordofan and potentially the border with Chad.
The RSF will also attempt to leverage its gains on the ground to bolster the parallel government it created in April, with the aim of strengthening its chances of participating in a political solution. Some members of the international quartet on ending the war in Sudan (made up of the U.S., Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt) are pushing for the RSF to be brought into the process.
For its part, the army is unlikely to simply accept the loss of El-Fasher. It will probably wage a long war of attrition to prevent the RSF from consolidating its control of the city and using that control as political leverage. The army may also open fronts in other areas, for the sake of symbolic and political wins, and to send a message that it has contained the RSF’s advance and rendered it meaningless.
