The New York Times and The Washington Post recently published investigations built on some 150 leaked documents, photographs, and intercepted messages from inside the Sudanese Armed Forces. The picture is chilling: a program, launched in mid-2024, to build chlorine bombs; a stockpile of roughly 290 munitions at Merowe air base; indications that more than 100 may already have been dropped. Most disturbing is where the chlorine came from.

Much of it was reportedly diverted from water-treatment plants in Sudan — chlorine that UNICEF, the Red Cross, and CARE had supplied to stop cholera from spreading among displaced families. When Washington imposed sanctions over chemical-weapons use last year, intercepted messages suggest the army’s commander, Gen. Abdel Fattah al Burhan, ordered his officers to “erase all traces.”