On our last few trips together to visit the refugees and internally displaced on the Sudan-Chad border, nearly everyone we interviewed in the squalid camps identified the Sudanese regime as the main reason for their suffering. As the rainy season was ending in the fall of last year, camp residents warned us of a coming attack from across the Sudan border, in which Chadian rebels -- backed by the Sudanese government -- would try again to overthrow the government in Chad.

As we went to various embassies to warn of the coming attack, and then back home in Washington, officials told us that the threat was overstated, the Chadian rebels were too disorganized, and the European Union -- led by the French -- would rapidly deploy a force on the border that would by itself deter any attack.

Of course, they were wrong. Why?

Officials from governments all over Europe, Africa and North America did what they continuously have done for the last 20 years: They underestimated the regime in Khartoum and how far it is willing to go to maintain power.

Let's review the evidence:

Exhibit A:
A rebellion in southern Sudan since the 1980s led the regime to conduct a brutal scorched-earth campaign in which many of the genocidal tactics it has deployed in Darfur were perfected.

More than 2 million southern Sudanese civilians perished. Now a peace deal brokered in part by the U.S. is at risk, as the regime chooses to not implement key aspects of the agreement and to promote divisions in the south. In neither case were there consequences for the regime.

Exhibit B:
For six years in the 1990s, the Sudanese regime hosted Osama bin Laden and helped incubate the al Qaeda network. When there was finally a consequence from the international community, the regime booted bin Laden out. After 9-11, the regime intensified counterterrorism cooperation with the U.S., buying itself room to go after internal opponents with no consequence.

Exhibit C:
The Sudanese regime commits genocide in Darfur and is manipulating the deployment of a U.N.-led force to protect civilians and undermining peace efforts by further dividing rebel groups. Again, no consequences.

Exhibit D:
The regime has provided military backing to the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army, infamous for brainwashing kidnapped children to become cold killers. Now Sudan prepares once again to rescue the LRA from near-oblivion, as Khartoum will use the LRA's child soldiers in its efforts to disrupt Uganda's own peace process. Recently, reports emerged of a vicious LRA attack on civilians in southern Sudan. Yet again, no consequences.

Now, the latest exhibit in Chad.
The Sudanese regime seeks a military solution in Darfur; one element of its strategy is to cut off the supply lines through Chad to the Darfur rebels and to obstruct the deployment of a planned European Union force to the Sudan-Chad border. Overthrowing the Chadian government is the easiest way to do that. The result is another African capital on fire. With no consequences -- yet.

But this time there must be consequences. African governments won't countenance the toppling of one government by another. France will not sit idly by while its client government in Chad is under proxy attack. China, targeted by "Genocide Olympics" campaigners worldwide and stung by Steven Spielberg's resignation as artistic advisor to the Olympics, is rethinking its blind support for its commercial ally in Khartoum.

Even more important, the U.S. campaign season provides an opportunity for the remaining presidential candidates to elaborate on their more muscular approaches toward Sudan, influencing President Bush as he seeks to define his legacy. Remember, it was the pressures of the 2004 presidential campaign that in part led Bush to name what was happening in Darfur "genocide." The potential for the candidates to influence action in the White House on this issue is enormous, and Sens. John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama should use the bully pulpit of the campaign trail in the president's home state of Texas to call for more assertive action by the U.S.

What would that more assertive action look like?

The missing ingredient in the international approach to Sudan and its spillover in Chad is the imposition of consequences.

If the U.S., France and the U.K. can overcome Chinese and Russian objections and work with Beijing and Moscow to impose a series of targeted U.N. Security Council sanctions on responsible Sudanese officials, progress would be swift. If the U.S. and others can provide information to the International Criminal Court so that it can accelerate the bringing of indictments against orchestrators of the violence, and demand the arrest of those already indicted, this will provide leverage for the peace process and the deployment of the U.N.-led protection force.

If there is no cost to the Sudanese regime for attempting to overthrow neighboring governments, committing genocide, supporting child-abducting rebels, reneging on peace deals and blocking U.N. peacekeeping missions, it would be irrational for this regime -- using all these tactics to maintain power by any means necessary -- to change its behavior.

However, if the international community can finally stiffen its spine and create real consequences for the destruction of a country and the defiance of international norms, peace suddenly will have a chance in Sudan, Chad and northern Uganda.