<p><span style="background-color: initial;"><strong>Sudan's new defense minister walks into a firestorm: </strong></span><span style="background-color: initial;">Sudan has sworn in a new defense minister, just days after Sudanese forces </span><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/05/sudan-summons-ethiopia-envoy-deadly-cross-border-attack-200530154306068.html" target="_blank">clashed</a><span style="background-color: initial;"> with militias from neighboring Ethiopia, sparking a diplomatic standoff between the two states. The two countries have l</span><span style="background-color: initial;">ong</span><span style="background-color: initial;"> been locked in a bitter border dispute that's given rise to sporadic bursts of violence. More than 1,700 Ethiopians live on Sudanese farmland, a source of tension that the two sides had hoped to settle as part of a border demarcation process to be completed in March 2021. But tensions have resurfaced during thorny negotiations over Ethiopia's planned construction of the </span><a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ethiopia-dam-factbox/factbox-key-facts-about-ethiopias-giant-nile-dam-idUSKBN1XG21L" target="_blank">Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam</a><span style="background-color: initial;">.</span><span style="background-color: initial;"> The hydropower project, which would draw </span><span style="background-color: initial;">waters from the Nile, </span><span style="background-color: initial;">is largely opposed by both Egypt and Sudan, which are downstream from Addis Ababa.</span><br/></p><p><strong>The Pentagon checks Trump: </strong>President Trump has repeatedly threatened to deploy the US military to quell unrest in American cities, after 10-days of both peaceful anti-racism protests and some riots. In recent days, however, pushback against the president's proposal has come from a powerful source: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/despite-suggestions-from-trump-pentagon-chief-says-he-does-not-support-invoking-insurrection-act/2020/06/03/8e8dad2e-a59e-11ea-8681-7d471bf20207_story.html" target="_blank">the Pentagon</a> itself. After Trump floated using the Insurrection Act, which allows the US president to use active-duty troops domestically, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/03/us/politics/esper-milley-trump-protest.html" target="_blank">distanced himself</a> from his boss, saying that such a move would be misguided as anything but a far-off last resort – a position also supported by the current chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/06/02/867565338/governors-push-back-on-trumps-threat-to-deploy-federal-troops-to-quell-unrest" target="_blank">many of the nation's governors</a>. Meanwhile, Esper's predecessor, retired general Jim Mattis, who has refrained from weighing in on politics since leaving the Pentagon 18-months ago, penned a searing <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/06/james-mattis-denounces-trump-protests-militarization/612640/" target="_blank">op-ed</a> Wednesday, where he warned that calling in US troops would cause "chaos" and accused President Trump of trying "to divide us." The ensuing debate over the army's proper role in American politics has exposed a growing rift between the White House and the Pentagon, as an increasing number of armed forces personnel accuse the president of politicizing the military.</p>
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