# The Rwanda genocide. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 19, 2003, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634 "2003-01-19T13:37:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 10:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/41 "2003-01-21T10:51:38Z")
Indeed, **ralph** , Somalia was and still is a mess, without any government whatsoever. The only economic or political structure in existence, then or now, was the price of hiring a youth and his gun (a fine advert for _laissez-faire_ economics run wild). I agree that Somalia was a difficult, perhaps even impossible scenario to deal with, but I would still suggest that its utter breakdown in civil order and sheer number of competing factions made it a different case to Rwanda, where there were substantially only two factions, one of which was supported by a functioning government. That said, I also think there is a great distinction between Rwanda 1992 and what **I Know Lots** suggests are comparable regimes or situations. Rwandas _do not_ happen once a fortnight. While I agree that an “ultra-consistent” philosophy would require immediate interference in dozens of states worldwide, including China, the UN can only do what is feasible, and I would suggest that _the very least_ it can do is try to prevent widespread atrocities against civilians when they happen. Otherwise, it is equivalent to doing nothing solely because _everything_ cannot be done. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/42 "2003-01-21T10:53:56Z")
Make that Rwanda **1994** ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/43 "2003-01-21T11:20:28Z")
Another thought did occur to me. I believe the Rwandan genocide was the most one-sided campaign of deliberate mass-murder of a strictly civilian population, and the most brutal and horrific illustration of human inhumanity, that the world has seen since WWII. Even if we could go back in time and interfere, _perhaps we should not_. Rather, it should be left as the most terrible lesson imaginable about what happens when the world does nothing: The most appalling, atrocious abomination of a control experiment we must remember for the rest of our lives. Any thoughts? ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/44 "2003-01-21T12:28:23Z")
> [@](#): > > Even if we could go back in time and interfere, perhaps we should not. Rather, it should be left as the most terrible lesson imaginable about what happens when the world does nothing: The most appalling, atrocious abomination of a control experiment we must remember for the rest of our lives. Mmmmm… no. And had I been president, I still would not have done anything. I might have sold the Tutsis some Browning .50 cal’s and AK-47’s. > [@](#): > > Guns have to be reloaded,machetes dont. As soon as they had run low on ammo the peace keeping force would have been cut up like chunks of bush meat. Methink someone has been playing too many first-person shooters. Half-Life perhaps? Maybe Jedi Knight II? ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/45 "2003-01-21T12:41:18Z")
> [@](#): > > I might have sold the Tutsis some Browning .50 cal’s and AK-47’s. Thereby turning Rwanda into Somalia/Angola/Zaire/Congo/Eritrea/Chad at a stroke? Helpful only in that the million deaths would then be spread over years or decades of civil war, I venture. Just as many dead, but not in quite so horrific or memorable a manner, and a healthy payoff for the country whose factories made the guns. Such a “solution” only drawers me nearer to the notion of keeping Rwanda as a grisly monument to trading compassion for firepower. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/46 "2003-01-21T13:04:34Z")
[QUOTE] \*Originally posted by I Know Lots \* \*\*Apos, I am sure that at any given moment since 1945 there has been at least one genocide going on somewhere on the planet.(/b) Depends on how loosely you define “genocide.” Some acts of genocide take decades or centuries, like what happened to the American Indians, but there are generally points during the genocide, like Wounded Knee or the Trail of Tears, that are so horrible that they provide an opportunity for outside forces to intervene, or at the very least, put pressure on the government or groups responsible. **As regrettable as this is, no power, the United States included, can afford to put a stop to every single one of these genocides by force.** As has been pointed out, the argument here seems to be, “because we cannot do everything, we need do nothing.” It seems very possible that something effective and useful COULD have been done in Rwanda, once again, from a position of 20/20 hindsight. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/47 "2003-01-21T13:07:15Z")
Just one fine point - it has been alleged by [some historians](http://www.chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/stalintalk.html) that rather than going back into the “mists of time”, rivalry between the Hutus and the Tutsis was fostered deliberately by successive colonists: > [@](#): > > The German imperialists – racist to the core, like all imperialists – thought the taller Tutsis were the “superior race”, and chose them to be their lieutenants in imperialism. This is the “divide-and-conquer” strategy of all imperialists since the Roman Empire. However, differences between Tutsis and Hutus are minimal – they speak the same language – and there has been much intermarriage. Whatever their distant origins, they were and are, like the French or English, basically one people. > > The Belgian imperialists, who took over the colony after Germany lost it in WWI, realized the difference between Hutu and Tutsi would have to be emphasized, if the “divide-and-conquer” strategy were to be effective. So they declared any wealthy person a Tutsi, any poor one a Hutu. To underscore the ethnic differences they were creating, the Belgians issued identity cards marking someone forever as either “Hutu” or “Tutsi.” They long favored the Tutsis, but just before independence switched to favoring the Hutus, who were naturally more numerous, as the poor are always much more numerous than the rich. They then turned the countries of Rwanda and Burundi over to the chiefs they had educated, trained, and pitted against one another. Sounds like some form of European culpability to me. ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/48 "2003-01-21T13:33:37Z")
We know from the gun control debate that murder is to be blamed on the weapons. So, the group mainly at fault were those Merchants of Death, the Multinational Machete Manufacturers. Fault also arises from the sin of omission. We should blame those who didn’t do enough to prevent the tragedy. Who did the least to help? North America? Europe? No. It was Antarctica. There was not one penguin providing any sort of opposition to this horrendous genocide. :mad: P.S. I apologize if this satire was offensive. It was meant to express displeasure with the OP’s condition, “Aside from the killers themselves.” ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/49 "2003-01-21T13:46:54Z")
[http://www.amacad.org/news/scourge.htm](http://www.amacad.org/news/scourge.htm) Like I (and Scientific American) said, firearms played a major part in the Rwandan genocide. This article easily applies to other countries in the world, but I suggest we not wander OT. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/50 "2003-01-21T14:30:13Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by minega \* > \*\*No offense buddy but your attitude stinks. > \*\* No offense taken. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by minega \* > \*\* > If we follow your line of reasoning then all ethnic cleansing is permissible because it is the people killing themselves-those stupid Africans again!. your comments are just plain offensive. \*\* My line of reasoning is that the people responsible for the massacres are the ones who carried it out. How you get from that to me saying that “ethnic cleansing is permissible” is beyond me. The Rwandans kill each other, and say, “The West is responsible for this because they didn’t stop us.” If we had tried to stop you, you would have called it neo-colonialism, and condemned it. The problems of sub-Saharan Africa cannot be solved from without. Although I suppose I understand if you find my telling you that the massacres you commit are your own damn fault to be “just plain offensive”. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/51 "2003-01-21T14:39:52Z")
Jeez, **Shodan** , tone it down a bit, will you? Are you denying _any_ Western culpability/responsibility for what happened (I’m not saying the US, BTW, I’m saying Belgium)? Or could there possibly be some responsibility for power vacuums and divisions left behind by former colonial rulers? Are the East Timorese wholly responsible for their internal strife? The middle-easterners? The Irish? The peoples of the Balkans? ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/52 "2003-01-21T14:40:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Thereby turning Rwanda into Somalia/Angola/Zaire/Congo/Eritrea/Chad at a stroke? Helpful only in that the million deaths would then be spread over years or decades of civil war, I venture. Just as many dead, but not in quite so horrific or memorable a manner Sorry. I have no sympathy for those who butcher innocents to satisfy their own bloody desires. Let the Hutus learn what their victims feel, and perhaps they’d be less than likely to engage in such bloody business, neh? N, in truth I would not have done this. But it was an extreme reaction to exteme evil. Alas! Why should life not be so clear-cut as the dreams of men? WHen faced with choices that all are grey, can one wonder but at the cruelty of fate, and the unclean spirit that burns within mankind? ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/53 "2003-01-21T16:53:38Z")
> [@](#): > > Sorry. I have no sympathy for those who butcher innocents to satisfy their own bloody desires. Let the Hutus learn what their victims feel, and perhaps they’d be less than likely to engage in such bloody business, neh? Nor do I have any such shred of sympathy. But to look back upon the horror and reflect that the only thing you would have changed be that more Hutus died also? I do not believe this would have tempered their psychotic urges. Rather, like every other bloody mess in that beknighted continent, it would have led to a war lasting years (_cf._ Angola/Congo etc.). ---
**Author:** ![minega](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@minega](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minega)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/54 "2003-01-21T17:06:42Z")
first off i apologise for geting somewhat worked up with those who have expressed a ---
**Author:** ![minega](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@minega](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minega)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/55 "2003-01-21T17:09:59Z")
first off i apologise for geting somewhat worked up with those who have expressed a different opinion especially u shodan; Sorry i was kind of stressed. Now let me clear something up. Before the genocide occured,tehr was a rebel force fighting for the tutsis so when the genocide began they were rapidly advancing close to KIgali;UN forces would not have been alone for long;;the RPF as this army was known(now our government)captured the country 3 months later and too late unfortunately…so the idea of UN troops fighting off the killers for months on end is unrealistic. ---
**Author:** ![BURNER](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@BURNER](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BURNER)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/56 "2003-01-21T17:14:42Z")
posted by smiling bandit: > [@](#): > > * * * > > ## Guns have to be reloaded,machetes dont. As soon as they had run low on ammo the peace keeping force would have been cut up like chunks of bush meat. > > Methink someone has been playing too many first-person shooters. Half-Life perhaps? Maybe Jedi Knight II? I wish!! I totaly suck at FPS games. That opinion comes from studieing martial arts for a while. To illustrate what I am talking about, have somene run towards you while you shout “bang”. From 10 feet away you might be able to get out 4 or 5 but then they are on top of you and your gun is useless. Now imagine there are 25 or 30 people running towards you. Also take into consideration that in a situation like that I realy doubt people are going to be takeing the time to realy aim. It would be more like “Oh shit here come 30 machete swinging loonies!” and then just fireing in their general direction. Then again I could be totaly wrong since I have never been in that kind of situation before. ---
**Author:** ![minega](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@minega](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minega)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/57 "2003-01-21T17:15:51Z")
As for worrying about the UN killing those bastards…lert me tell u something if i had my way i would condemmn them all to death(not the UN, the killers) and it wouldnt be pretty…yes i am bitter. in 1998 the government executed 21 of the ringleaders and the world was up in arms condemmning us. JUst put me in charge… And for those saying the UN wouldnt have handled the killers,dont let their efficincy at murder fool u…they were a shoddy bunch of undiscplined forces but killed so many because many were forced to kill for them.After all the war lasted only 3 months before they were driven out. Thanx for all those who participated in the debate;Sorry if i occaionaly get emotional about this,apologies once again. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/58 "2003-01-21T17:16:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jjimm \* > \*\*Jeez, **Shodan** , tone it down a bit, will you? > \*\* I’ve reread my own post. Did it really sound that hostile to you? As a rule, I’m much worse. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jjimm \* > \*\*Are you denying _any_ Western culpability/responsibility for what happened (I’m not saying the US, BTW, I’m saying Belgium)? Or could there possibly be some responsibility for power vacuums and divisions left behind by former colonial rulers? \*\* Frankly, no, I don’t blame any of it on power vacuums or colonialism. People in Africa are hardly unique in that they kill each other with enthusiasm. They were doing it before the Europeans assumed the White Man’s Burden (a lot of the slaves that Africans sold to the Muslim slave traders were prisoners of war), they did it during the colonial era (see Mau Mau), and they do it now (see Idi Amin, Mugabe, Mengistu, etc., etc., very literally _ad nauseum_). Don’t get me wrong, whites and Asians do the same stuff - they just don’t have colonialism to blame it on. If it helps, I will accept a proportion of the blame -say, .01% of it. The rest I leave to the people with the bloody machetes. After they are dealt with, we can talk about the rest. It seems a little hard to me that the West is blamed both for attempting to neutralize a threat in some region (see Somalia and Iraq), and when they don’t. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jjimm \* > \*\* > Are the East Timorese wholly responsible for their internal strife? The middle-easterners? The Irish? The peoples of the Balkans? \*\* I have no idea. Which of these, if any, are blaming the violence they commit against each other on Belgium? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/59 "2003-01-21T17:33:56Z")
> [@](#): > > wish!! I totaly suck at FPS games. That opinion comes from studieing martial arts for a while. To illustrate what I am talking about, have somene run towards you while you shout “bang”. From 10 feet away you might be able to get out 4 or 5 but then they are on top of you and your gun is useless. Now imagine there are 25 or 30 people running towards you. Also take into consideration that in a situation like that I realy doubt people are going to be takeing the time to realy aim. It would be more like “Oh shit here come 30 machete swinging loonies!” and then just fireing in their general direction. Then again I could be totaly wrong since I have never been in that kind of situation before. Sorry friend, but you need to take a good look at real combat. I’ve studied martial arts as well, and I will cheerfully inform you that going up against a man with a gun while wielding melee weaponry is so horrifically stupid… well, just look at the Order of th Righteous and Harmonious Fists. 1. Combat will begin at ranges of more than 10 feet. 2. Taking out 4 or 5 before they get up to you is a good way to win any fight. Particularly since in this case the Hutus didn’t have armies, but rather small groups of people. Had they tried this, they’d have been blown to smithereens. 3. Hi Opal! 4. The Hutus aren’t going to have 30 men to our one in any fight. 5. 10 men with semi-automatic rifles will at ranges as close as your talking about could tear apart a bunch of machette-wielding goons. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2003, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634/60 "2003-01-21T18:04:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Shodan \* > **I have no idea. Which of these, if any, are blaming the violence they commit against each other on Belgium?** Facetiousness aside, are you claiming that post-colonial societies’ internal conflicts, of which, IMO, there is almost a standard model following withdrawal, are not caused _in any part_ by the former colonials? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rwanda-genocide/149634.md?page=4)