Chinese missiles and Houthi-style drones fuel Sudan’s escalating war
Seized weapons caches show Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) possess advanced Chinese surface-to-air missile systems and Houthi-style drones. U.S. officials warn abandoned MANPADS could threaten civilian aviation as Sudan’s civil war deepens.
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Sudan’s brutal war is being supercharged by an influx of advanced foreign weapons, including Chinese-made air defense systems and drones resembling those used by Yemen’s Houthis, according to weapons experts and Sudanese intelligence documents seen by The Washington Post. Analysts warn the arms race is prolonging a conflict that has already displaced over 12 million people and risks destabilizing the wider region.
“In 10 years, American and European leaders are going to regret their inaction on Sudan,” cautioned Justin Lynch, managing director of Conflict Insights Group. “A failed state on the Red Sea that is awash with predatory Islamist militias, advanced weapons, and genocidal leaders will imperil the region for generations.”
Advanced weapons on the battlefield
A Post correspondent recently inspected abandoned Rapid Support Forces (RSF) stockpiles in Khartoum containing SA-7 Man-Portable Air Defense Systems (MANPADS), drones, jamming devices, anti-tank missiles, and phosphorus rounds, many still in their packaging.
Sudanese officials said the RSF now operates a Chinese FK-2000 truck-mounted antiaircraft system. A TikTok video posted on September 14 appeared to confirm this, showing a rocket booster identical to those used in the FK-2000. “The technical proficiency that you are seeing is beyond RSF normal capabilities,” a former regional security official told The Post.
Weapons tracing group Conflict Armament Research documented 19 surface-to-air missiles seized from RSF fighters, made in China and Bulgaria. “Proliferation of MANPADS is a critical concern to the international community,” the group noted. The U.S. State Department has recorded 40 civilian aircraft downed by such systems globally since 1975, killing more than 800 people.
Evidence suggests weapons are flowing in through a complex web of foreign backers. Mortar shells found in RSF caches bore markings linked to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), though labels had been painted over. A separate batch of 81mm shells was manufactured in Bulgaria and exported to the UAE, according to U.N. investigators.
In 2024, the Emiratis built an airfield in Chad that was allegedly used by the RSF as a drone launchpad, reported The New York Times. While the UAE Foreign Ministry told The Post it “categorically rejects any claims of providing any form of support to either warring party,” Sudanese officials insist the RSF has benefitted from Emirati supplies.
The Sudanese military, meanwhile, has upgraded with Turkish drones, purchased directly from Turkey. But RSF fighters have claimed at least three successful shoot-downs of these drones in recent months. “You could get one lucky shot with a shoulder-mounted missile, but several would be unlikely,” a former U.S. official noted, pointing to “more advanced air defenses.”
Human cost and humanitarian collapse
The war, which began in April 2023 between General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan’s army and RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, has created what the U.N. calls the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. The U.S. envoy for Sudan put the death toll at around 150,000 by May 2024, though no credible updates have followed in the 16 months since.
Half of Sudan’s population now requires food aid, cholera and famine are spreading, and more than a quarter of a million people face starvation in the besieged city of El Fashir. Hospitals have been destroyed, volunteers tortured, and children raped, enslaved, and forced to fight, according to U.S. and U.N. investigators.
“The flow of weapons into Sudan is fueling this devastating war,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “The international community must do more to stop it.”
Sen. Chris Van Hollen echoed the warning: “Neither the global community nor the United States are doing nearly enough to stem the onslaught of foreign weapons and support going into Sudan. The U.S., the U.N. and other international monitors should be calling more attention to this matter.”
A widening threat
Conflict Armament Research also reported that RSF stockpiles included six “suicide drones” built in late 2023 and 2024, nearly identical to those used by Yemen’s Houthis, suggesting possible trafficking routes across the Red Sea. For more than two years, Houthi drones have targeted Israel and Red Sea shipping lanes, with backing from Iran — which also supports Sudan’s military.
That armed nonstate groups can deploy drones capable of striking thousands of kilometers from the frontlines “shows how difficult it will be to contain conflict in the next few decades,” Lynch said.
Sudan’s war has been increasingly shaped by the arrival of Chinese-origin weapons, many of which are alleged to have reached the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) through re-exports from the United Arab Emirates. Rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have documented evidence of advanced systems, including the FK-2000 short-range air defense platform, as well as anti-tank missiles, drones, and other recently manufactured equipment appearing on Sudan’s battlefields. The FK-2000, a mobile system combining vertically launched missiles and twin 30mm cannons, has been highlighted in battlefield footage and fragment analysis, though the scale of its deployment remains uncertain. Analysts caution that much of the evidence rests on booster fragments, videos, and forensic comparisons, with no direct sales from China to Sudan confirmed. The UAE has strongly denied supplying arms to the RSF, but reports suggest Emirati stockpiles may have been diverted into the conflict.
