This was gleaned from Saving Darfur or Salvation Delusion? by Steve Fake and Kevin Funk

1. Assume the U.S. Government will act in the interest of the Sudanese people

The contradiction is striking – on one hand, the United States highly prizes Khartoum for its key role in intelligence-sharing in the supposed “War on Terror,” yet simultaneously Washington has taken the lead in declaring (for domestic political reasons) that the Sudanese government is carrying out “genocide” in Darfur. Adding fuel to the fire, Sudan is an area of great to the United States, as it seeks to both prevent the consolidation of Chinese influence in Africa and gain control over Sudan’s substantial oil reserves.

2. Oversimplify the problem by silencing the voices of Darfurians and Muslims

Most prominently, the Coalition has at times been guilty of sidetracking Darfurian and Muslim activists, describing the conflict in harshly oversimplified ethnic terms, receiving official sanction from and doling out praise to the Bush administration, and failing to consider Washington’s potential interest in a UN deployment or “humanitarian intervention” – or the potentially dangerous outcomes of such actions.

3. Blindly support militaristic intervention

The real world demands not allowing genuine concern for victims of atrocities to be transmuted by interventionist hypocrites into apologetics for an imperialism that will ultimately produce more victims of more atrocities. But those same victims deserve better than mere denunciations of intervention and its apologists as hypocrites and warmongers…. Even if well-intentioned, it is entirely possible that an intervening force would cause more harm than it could potentially alleviate, especially given Khartoum’s disapproval of its deployment, and the possibility of an insurgent movement rising against it.

4. Ignore the role of humanitarian funds in Darfur

To take but the most elementary point of departure, one would expect that if actually concerned with Darfur, the United States and the rest of the West more generally would shower humanitarian funds onto the aid organizations operating in the region. This, of course, is consonant with the wishes of Darfur activist groups, and is the bare minimum that could be expected of the munificent leaders of Western Civilization….

5. Marginalize the African Union

Tellingly, less noted has been the West’s position towards the African Union (AU) forces already on the ground in Darfur. Again, if the heated rhetoric from Western capitals contained any meaningful shreds of reality, the AU troops shouldS enjoy boundless support–especially from those declaring “genocide” in the region.

6. Give up on diplomacy

Aside from the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA), which was heavily backed by the United States and deeply unpopular amongst Darfurians, remarkably little interest has been shown in developing a political solution by the United States, nor the Save Darfur movement, which has instead latched onto its cure-all of UN troops. Commenting that those seeking an intervention “are suffering from a salvation delusion,” Alex de Waal, a fellow of the Global Equity Initiative at Harvard and a director of Justice Africa, London, criticizes the framing of the entire debate about Darfur, arguing that: “A political settlement has been completely overlooked or downplayed by the U.S…The whole debate has gone off on a red herring—UN troops.”