Conflicts do not arise by chance, but from root causes, some concrete such as territorial disputes or power rivalries, others more abstract such as ideological differences or identity tensions.

The territory remains at the core of prolonged conflicts, much more than power or economic interests, as for the resolution, it is rarely immediate; it depends on major changes in the decision-making structures of the protagonists, such as a change of regime, at the diplomatic level, at the strategic level (a new international order) or even the depletion of the resources of one of the protagonists.

Some so-called “frozen” conflicts, inherited from decolonization and the post-USSR period, are characterized by the absence of a lasting political settlement despite the cessation of hostilities, they persist in a state of latency, reflecting an unstable balance of divergent interests. In light of game theory, they can be interpreted as Nash equilibrium conflicts where each actor prefers to maintain the status quo rather than risk a costly and uncertain escalation.

Although the Sahara conflict has some features of frozen conflicts, it is fundamentally different from them by its nature: first , it is indeed a conflict of decolonization of the Saharan provinces claimed by Morocco since forties by late King Mohammed V (notably in the late monarch’s speech in Mhameed Al Guizlane in 1958) and His Successor late King HASSAN II as part of the progressive completion of its territorial integrity (Tarfaya recovered in 1958, Sidi Ifni in 1969 and the Sahara in 1975), historically fragmented by several colonial powers – Spain in the north and south, France in the center, while Tangier was placed under international status; secondly , a deep geographical, cultural and ethnic similarity links these provinces to the rest of the moroccan territory, giving this claim a robust legal, historical, identity and territorial legitimacy that is not shared by the other frozen conflicts, thirdly if the frozen conflicts stagnate, with the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 2797 on October 31, 2025, Morocco breaks the Nash equilibrium and moves to a phase of strategic supremacy.

The convergence of the strategic interests of the great powers could play a decisive role in the dynamics an