US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s recent remarks on Sudan appear empathetic – but they may reveal more about strategic positioning than genuine concern.

On 12 November, during a press stop following a G7 meeting in Canada, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the following in relation to Rapid Support Forces (RSF) atrocities in Sudan:

“….you know the humanitarian groups are telling us that some of the levels of malnutrition and suffering that they’re seeing in some of these people – who have been able to flee – is unprecedented. They’ve recorded things they’ve never recorded before. And I think even more troubling is that they didn’t have the number of refugees they expected to receive because they assume either that many of them are dead, or so sick and malnourished they can’t move anymore. So what’s happening there is horrifying."

He went on to say of the RSF:

“They’re committing acts of sexual violence and atrocities, just horrifying atrocities, against women, children, innocent civilians of the most horrific kind. And it needs to end immediately.”

It’s a curious psychological phenomenon that a bad person doing a good deed elicits a greater response in the observer than a good person doing a good deed. The latter adheres to a stereotype. The former’s violation of an expected behaviour has the strange effect of boosting the praiseworthiness of the deed.

So when I heard Rubio speak those words, and the seemingly sincere tone of his voice, my initial response was to think: ‘what a decent thing for him to say’. Part of me wanted to believe that Rubio was expressing a genuinely held feeling of human empathy. I briefly entertained the notion that he might, in fact, be a good person.

But then critical thinking kicked in and I realised exactly what I was listening to: a first-class communications professional trying to launder his reputation and the reputation of the United States by evincing concern about atrocities in Sudan. Presumably, many others had the same pre-rational impulse to Rubio’s words that I did, whether it was tempered subsequently by cynicism or not.

Readers might say in response to this characterisation that I’m being cynical, and that what matters, ultimately, is that the US uses its influence to stop UAE-sponsored killing in Sudan. They’d be right on both fronts. It goes without saying – but I’ll say it to avoid charges that I am in any way minimising the situation in Sudan vis-à-vis Gaza – that if US power can be leveraged to stop atrocities in Sudan and help arrest the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, that would be a very welcome and commendable outcome.

Let there be no doubt that this is all that matters.

That said, you’ll have to forgive me for doubting Rubio’s sincerity when he gave the impression that he listens to humanitarian organisations, and expressed concern about RSF atrocities and sexual violence in Sudan. I’m not one to read nefarious intent into the every utterance of public officials – though it’s a healthy disposition in respect to US foreign policymakers – but when an official has championed a genocide for two years, ignored the pleadings of the UN and international humanitarian agencies in relation to Gaza, vindictively sanctioned UN special rapporteurs, and said nothing about the sexual violence committed by the IDF against Palestinians, it makes you wonder what’s really at play.

There are clues to what’s really at play in comments Rubio made during his January confirmation hearing, which came eight days after former US secretary of state Anthony Blinken declared that the RSF was committing a genocide in Sudan. In response to a question from Democrat Senator Corey Booker (famous for his 25 hour-long speech railing against the Trump administration in which he failed to mention Gaza once), then Senator Rubio said the following:

“In an era in which the term genocide has been misappropriated to almost a global slander, and international slander, this is a real genocide. By its very definition, this is a real genocide. This is the ethnic targeting of specific groups for extermination…And I think, for those that are interested in going out and protesting a real genocide, this should be the one, and I just don’t see it”

A real genocide worth protesting about. And yet, despite claiming to take Sudan seriously, it seems that Rubio forgot to tell the president just how serious it was when he got his feet under the desk at the state department. On 19 November, during a visit to the US by Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (who apparently pressed Trump to take action on Sudan), Trump said:

“It was not on my charts to be involved in, I thought it was just something that was crazy and out of control. But I just see how important that is to you [bin Salman], and to a lot of your friends in the room, Sudan. And we’re going to start working on Sudan.”

Not on my charts! That’s a pretty big F for Fail for Rubio. He’s meant to be Trump’s chief foreign policy advisor. A real genocide worth protesting about in January, but 11 months later and the president still doesn’t have it on his radar? Where have you been, Marco?

Rubio tried to position Sudan as a discursive competitor case to Gaza in an attempt to regain the rhetorical high ground. In the post Gaza ceasefire climate, in which the Western media has largely reverted to its pre-7 October posture of ignoring Israel’s crimes, there is now enough clean air for the US to reactivate language that it has long used to try and sell the idea that it cares about human rights. Rubio’s comments on 12 November were a case in point.

We should welcome any US intervention that helps stop UAE-sponsored killing in Sudan. But let’s not be fooled into thinking there’s a shred of humanity behind any of it. Being alive to US hypocrisy on Gaza and Sudan, and calling it out, should be a key priority for media outlets that want to live up to their duty to hold power to account.

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.