1. Humanitarian Intervention: An Analysis between the Rwanda and Darfur Genocides
Cooper P. Carriger
International Studies 101-003
Dr. Günes Tezcür
April 24th, 2012
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2. In 1945 the world experienced one of the most horrific human rights atrocities of
all time in which a government was systematically murdering specific populations with
the intent of completely eliminating them from the planet. The crimes of World War II
became the first to ever be categorized as “genocide.” After WWII, the international
community vowed to never let something like this occur again through the Convention on
the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948.
However, genocide became even more prevalent through the rest of the 20th
century, leading into the new millennium, signifying a failing promise from the
international community. Most recently the genocides of Rwanda and Darfur have gained
critical attention—but mostly for the lack of the world’s attention. While Rwanda
completely was completely void of any humanitarian intervention or relief, Darfur
received significant public interest. This is because in hindsight the United Nations and
United States regretted their inaction towards Rwanda. Nonetheless, publicity and
intervention in Darfur were overall unsuccessful, seeing as thousands of people are still
currently suffering from human rights violations. If strong powers such as the United
Nations or United States were adamant about stopping genocides from occurring, it is
unlikely they would be unsuccessful in doing so.
In 1959, Ethnic tensions between the Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups arose as a
byproduct of the Rwandan Revolution, where the Hutus overthrew the Tutsi Monarchy.
Before this, Hutus and Tutsis lived peacefully together. Throughout the second half of the
twentieth century these tensions grew to intense hatred and hostility. The Hutu majority
of 84% viewed the Tutsi minority (15%) as “racial aliens.” The government legally
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3. classified Tutsis as a separate race from the Hutu ruling society.i The Hutus view
themselves as the only “authentic” Rwandans. What was once a simple ethnic identity
became socially and politically charged.
In 1990 civil war broke out in Rwanda between the two groups, but ended in 1993
with the signing of the Arusha Accords by the Rwandan Government and the Rwandan
Patriotic Font (a Tutsi political party). On the surface this seemed to pave the path for
peace between the two groups, but in reality it only had a Band-Aid effect. At this time
the United Nations created the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda
(UNAMIR), a mission for fostering peace between the Hutus and Tutsis. On April 6th,
1994, the Hutu President of Rwanda was assassinated when his plane was shot down; this
is widely observed as the catalyst for the immediately following genocide. At the time,
this was the third assassination of a Hutu president killed in the past six months.ii
Although the responsibility of the shooting remains a mystery, the Hutu government
never had the slightest doubt that the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) was directly
involved.
The Rwandan genocide began within 48 hours of the crash. The government at
once began using media, such as radio stations, to command the nation to completely
eliminate the entire Tutsi population. Although the government orchestrated the
genocide, ordinary civilians carried about the actual massacres. Any Hutu that refused
that refused to kill their Tutsi neighbor was murdered with their family. The message was
“kill of be killed.” In a report issued by Physicians for Human Rights:
The interhamwe used the following methods for killing: machetes, massues (clubs
studded with nails), small axes, knives, grenades, guns, fragmentation grenades,
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4. beatings to death, amputations with exsanguination, buried alive, drowned or
raped and killed later. Many victims had both their Achilles tendons cut with
machetes as they ran away, to immobilize them so that they could be finished off
later.iii
Also due to Rwanda being one of the most densely populated countries in Africa,
diseases like cholera went untreated and added to the overall death count of Hutus and
Tutsis alike. Throughout the next 100 days more than 800,000 people would be killed.iv
Estimates range up to 1,000,000 people—which would be roughly 20% of the country’s
overall population.v
Unlike past 20th century massacres the Rwandan genocide was carried out in the
open, whereas the Nazi regime systematically took their victims to the countryside in
order to maintain secrecy and anonymity. The 100-day genocide was very publically
executed. Surely, this human rights atrocity would have garnished wide international
support for humanitarian intervention, especially since the conflict was widely
acknowledged.
However, this was not the case. The United Nations Security Council was
extremely reluctant to take any intervention. Belgium was the only nation that advocated
for a stronger UNAMIR mandate. At the time the genocide broke out, there were United
Nations peacekeepers present in Rwanda due to UNAMIR. Be that as it may, United
Nations peacekeepers do not have sufficient resources, nor is it their mission to use force.
Essentially, the only United Nations presence in Rwanda didn’t even have the capacity to
stop the violence. The United Nations Security Council is the only vehicle of the United
Nations authorized to use force.vi To make matters worse, the United Nations reduced the
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5. amount of UNAMIR presence in Rwanda. Belgium pulled out all of their forces, due to
the escalating violence and murder of ten Belgium United Nations peacekeepers. The
United States followed suit and evacuated all Americans from the country immediately.
Like the United Nations, the United States was incredibly reluctant to intervene.
Reports show that the United States used its influence within the United Nations Security
Council to discourage a robust United Nations response.vii Independently, the United
States viewed genocide as a local conflict and a civil war. This is credited to the
Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, as one of the worst foreign policy mistakes in the
20th century. Christopher dramatically downplayed the conflict in his reports to the
Clinton administration, and refused to classify this “local conflict” as genocide.
According to the National Security Archive at the George Washington University, it
wasn’t until June that the United States classified the massacres as genocide.vi It wasn’t
until five years after the genocide that President Bill Clinton stated in a Frontline
interview:
I sort of started focusing on this and seeing the news reports coming out of it, it
was too late to do anything about it. And I feel terrible about it because I think we
could have sent 5,000, 10,000 troops there and saved a couple hundred thousand
lives. I think we could have saved about half of them. But I'll always regret that
Rwandan thing. I will always feel terrible about it.viii
Although it is a weak claim, one could argue that the United States and other powers
“just didn’t know” the severity of the state of Rwanda, and therefore cannot bear the
entire burden of guilt. But this is completely unacceptable because the United States had
knowledge of a possible massacre before the genocide had begun. In 1994, just before the
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6. genocide began, a high-ranking Hutu sent a cable to both the United States and the
United Nations intricately detailing the plans of genocide against the Tutsis.viii This was
revealed in the same PBS Frontline documentary, Ghosts of Rwanda. Unfortunately this
information never solicited action from the United States nor the United Nations Security
Council (UNSC).
Contrasting to the United State’s failure, on June 22nd (with approval from the
UNSC) French forces spread throughout southwest Rwanda to stop the genocide.
Although their humanitarian intervention could have been used earlier, the French are
credited with successfully stopping violence and saving thousands of lives in the zones
they were patrolling. Controversially, France is also credited to successfully helping
former Hutu genociders flee to neighboring Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the
Congo) when RPF took power of the Rwandan government.ix
It is now unanimously recognized that the international community completely
failed in their response to the genocide that occurred. As being one of the most influential
nations in the world, the United States played a crucial role in the severity of the
genocide: their complete lack of action, ignorance of the issue, and downplaying of the
brutality prolonged the genocide. If the Unites States had acted hundreds of thousands of
people would not have been ruthlessly tortured and murdered. The United States is
incredibly influential in the international arena and could have easily garnished support
for intervention if they would have tried. The genocide could have been easily avoided if
the international community had provided military forces paired with humanitarian
intervention. Inaction is sometimes the worst action and definitively was in the case of
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7. Rwanda. Human rights atrocities happened right before the eyes of the world, and
nothing was done.
When a similar conflict began to arise in Sudan only nine years later, the United
States and the international community had the opportunity to apply what they learned
from their initial disregard of the Rwandan genocide.
Much like the genocide that took place in Rwanda in 1994, the current genocide
that is occurring in the Darfur region of Sudan is based upon racism and ethnocentrism.
Even though the majority of Sudan is Muslim, the country has divided into two different
racial identities: African or Arab. In 2003, two African-identifying Sudanese rebel
groups, the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) and Justice and Equality
Movement (JEM), obtained weapons and used them against the Sudanese government
because of state sponsored oppression of the non-Arab Sudanese population. The
Sudanese government, in response, began systematically ethnically cleansing the non-
Arabs of Sudan. However, the government indirectly did this by providing weapons and
finances to the Janjaweed, a Sudanese militia group composed of nomadic Arab (of
course, the government denies supporting said militia). The Sudanese government also
argues that they had no intention of exterminating a population; they were just simply
surpassing a rebellion. Since the beginning of the conflict, there are estimates that over
400,000 people have died, and more than 2,500,000 displaced and relocated into refugee
camps.x These refugee camps become targets for attack and systematic rape. The high
casualties, identical to the Rwanda genocide, are also a result of non-direct violence like
mass starvation, malnutrition, and disease epidemics that encompass the refugee camps.
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8. In order to avoid another situation similar to Rwanda’s, the United States and the
international community has taken actions to relieve Sudanese victims by creating a
worldwide movement advocating for humanitarian intervention.
Although the United Nations Security Council did not find that the conflict in
Darfur qualifies as genocide they did release a report containing the following statement
that it is clear that the UNSC finds the conflict as horrific:
"The conclusion that no genocidal policy has been pursued and implemented in
Darfur by the Government authorities, directly or through the militias under their
control, should not be taken in any way as detracting from the gravity of the
crimes perpetrated in that region. International offences such as the crimes against
humanity and war crimes that have been committed in Darfur may be no less
serious and heinous than genocide.xi
In 2004, shortly after the report, the United Nations Security Council referred the
situation in Darfur to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC). By 2008
many Sudanese government leaders, including the president, Omar al-Bashir, were
indicted by the ICC for numerous counts of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against
humanity. However, the Sudanese government has refused to hand over these leaders
because they believe that the ICC has no jurisdiction because Sudan is not a member of
the ICC.xii Then In 2007 the UNSC unanimously approve the authorization of 26,000 UN
peacekeepers to be stationed in Darfur, in hope to provide humanitarian relief.xiii The
UNSC continues to renew this authorization, and still current today. The peacekeeping
presence in Darfur has been criticized as not effective enough, but one can argue that any
aid or relief is better than none at all.
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9. The United Nations has proactively reacted to the situation in Darfur, and has
clearly put far more effort into the issue of justice when compared to their reaction to the
genocide in Rwanda. The UNSC has not only provided relief efforts, but has acted to
combat the impunity of the Darfur situation by issuing an ICC referral, something that
was never resolved in Rwanda. Even though the implementations of these policies have
vast room for improvement, at least they bring the issue to the world’s attention.
Like the United Nations, the United States has also acted far more proactively in
the case of Darfur than that of Rwanda by showing that there have been some lessons
learned. The United States’ Congress issued a statement later signed by President George
W. Bush that qualified the situation in Darfur as a genocide, which is categorized as the
worst crime in the world. The United States also imposed sanctions on American
companies that work with Sudanese government, by taking away any federal contracts or
tax benefits. These sanctions are “designed to increase the political pressure on Khartoum
to end the violence, and supplement sanctions that the United States has maintained on
Sudan since 1997. Those sanctions include restrictions on imports from and exports to
Sudan, an asset freeze against the government of Sudan, and a prohibition on U.S. arms
sales or transfers to Sudan” as stated by US Department of State.xiv
More impressing than the United States government response to Darfur, is the
American activism that has taken place. Many celebrities, academics, policy makers, and
ordinary citizens have advocated for awareness and action. This unprecedented support is
often credited to pressuring the government to currently be the only nation to formally
recognize the massacres in Darfur as genocide, something the United States refused to do
for Rwanda. If the nation would have demonstrated this same interest and publicity for
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10. the genocide in Rwanda, then perhaps law makers and the president would have acted
differently.
It should be noted that in both the Rwanda and Darfur genocides, there are strong
allegations that the United States did intervene because they did not have any significant
economic or political interests at stake. This argument does have significant validity,
especially when contrasted with other United States humanitarian interventions. For
example, the United States quickly came to the defense of Kuwait in the early 1990s
when invaded by Iraq, providing advantageous military forces. Quickly and efficiently,
with the help of other industrialized states, the United States was able to successfully
protect the sovereignty of Kuwait. But the United States had a strategic interest in the
Kuwait and the Middle East: to keep the flow of oil into the United States. If the United
States had committed even half the amount of resources to Rwanda or Darfur then
undoubtedly hundreds of thousands of lives would have been saved. If the United States
were to do everything it could to stop genocide, it is likely that it would succeed in doing
so. Despite some key differences in the domestic and international dynamics today,
compared to twelve years ago during the Rwandan genocide, the United States’ response
on Darfur reveals that important lessons remain unlearned. Awareness without action
changes nothing.
i
United States of America. Central Intelligence Agency. The World Factbook. CIA. Web.
18 Apr. 2012. <https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-
factbook/geos/rw.html>.
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11.
ii
Lemarchand, René. "The Rwanda Genocide." Century of Genocide. 2nd ed. New York:
Routledge, 2004. 395-415. Print.
iii
“Rwanda 1994: A Report of the Genocide.” Physicians for Human Rights. London.
1994. Pg 11. Print.
iv
Des Forges, Alison. Leave No One to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda. 1999.
Human Rights Watch. Electronically published January 12, 2007.
v
"Rwanda: How the Genocide Happened." BBC News. BBC, 17 May 2011. Web. 19
Apr. 2012. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13431486>.
vi
Ferroggiaro, William. "The U.S. and the Genocide in Rwanda 1994: Evidence of
Inaction." The National Security Archive. The George Washington University, 20
Aug. 2001. Web. 19 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB53/index.html
vii
US Department of State. Cable Number 099440, to US Mission to the United Nations.
New York. “Talking Points for UNAMIR Withdrawal.” April 15.
1994.Confidential. Source: Freedom of Information Act release by Department of
State
viii
"Ghosts of Rwanda." Interview. Public Broadcasting Station. WGBH, Boston,
Massachusetts, 2004. Television. Transcript.
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12.
ix
Lichfield, John. "Sarkozy Admits France's Role in Rwandan Genocide." The
Independent. Independent Digital News and Media, 26 Feb. 2012. Web. 20 Apr.
2012. <http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sarkozy-admits-
frances-role-in-rwandan-genocide-1911272.html>.
x
"Genocide in Darfur, Sudan." Darfur Scorecard. Genocide Intervention Network. Web.
22 Apr. 2012. <http://www.darfurscores.org/Darfur>.
xi
International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur Report to the Secretary-General. Issue
brief. Geneva: International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur, 2005. Print.
xii
"Sudan Defiant on Darfur Suspects." BBC News. BBC, 27 Feb. 2007. Web. 23 Apr.
2012. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6402363.stm>.
xiii
"Darfur Peacekeeping Force Still Short of Members, Basic Equipment." Oxfam.
Oxfam America, Inc., 30 Dec. 2008. Web. 23 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.oxfamamerica.org/articles/darfur-peacekeeping-force-still-short-of-
members-and-basic-equipment>.
xiv
United States of America. Dept. of State. Bureau of Public Affairs. The United States
Response to the Darfur Crisis. Washington, D.C., 2007. Print.
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