I must apologize that my miniseries is off to a late start this year. I'm in my final university term, so life is a bit hectic. But, better late than not at all to get this going, right?
I thought I would start off this year's series with an essay I wrote for a Canadian history class I took in the summer. If you've noticed the title of this post, then you just might know what my essay was inspired by: The book
Shake Hands with the Devil by Lt. Gen Romeo Dallaire.
He was the Canadian general heading the peacekeeping mission in Rwanda back in the early nineties, a mission that was set up to fail before he was even given the command. My essay, which I have copied below for you, is about this man, this mission, and the bureaucratic attitudes that led to the massacre of nearly one million people. Dallaire shook hands with the devil... I sought the devil out.
Sought
out the Devil: Canadian Peacekeeping Efforts in Rwanda, Focusing on
Major-General Roméo Dallaire and the UNAMIR Task Force
“...cut down the tall trees...”
Canada has long held a reputation as being keepers of the
peace in areas that are rife with turmoil. However, in Rwanda, Canada was set
to learn that it would never be able to keep the peace if the areas in conflict
did not want it themselves. This mission in Rwanda, which Canadian peacekeepers
entered with the United Nations in 1993, was destined to end badly, as Canada’s
Major-General Roméo Dallaire was unfortunately set to learn. Despite this
mission quickly going to Hell in a hand basket, the failure to secure peace in
Rwanda is not a negative mark against our country’s peacekeeping efforts.
Instead, we might view the mission as a lesson of what happens when the odds
and allies are against those commanding the mission, an education that
Major-General Dallaire with his UNAMIR task force was set to gain. The
aftermath of this mission still lingers with Dallaire, while changing Canada’s
attitudes and outlooks on peacekeeping efforts in hostile areas. The “Pearson
Age” of peacekeeping as Canada knew it, no longer exists.
I was six-years-old when Canadian peacekeepers joined the
United Nations efforts in Rwanda. I was old enough that I have a few memories
of the situation being discussed, but I was still too young to actually grasp
the gravity of what was going on. Twenty years later, the blanks are slowly
filling in, with the results being equal parts infuriating and disheartening.
Multiple parts came together to make up the perfect storm that led to the
Rwandan genocide, which Dallaire, with UNAMIR, tried desperately to prevent.
Four major factors contributed to this perfect storm, as sourced from the
Government of Canada’s Veteran’s Affairs, various areas of the United Nations,
a 1999 Independent Inquiry, the American Society of International Law, and from
Dallaire himself through his publications, along with other academic journals.
Every source adds crucial information to each of the four points. First, a look
into Rwanda’s background is necessary as a means to understand what led the
Hutu and Tutsi tribes to civil war. Like many other facets in life, a power
struggle between these two tribes was at the core of the massacre. Second,
looking at the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) is
crucial, because it was the task force sent into the combat zone in the midst
of an already-raging civil war. UNAMIR was also under the command of two
Canadians. Major-General Roméo Dallaire held command from 1993-1994, while
Major-General Guy Tousignant was the UNAMIR commander from 1994-1995. Though
Major-General Tousignant worked with the Rwandan government to facilitate safe
return for thousands of refugees, most of the focus will be
surrounding Dallaire’s time in Rwanda. Dallaire himself is the third area of
focus. Despite having a military career that had a span of three decades, he
was still fresh to peacekeeping, which leads into the fourth point. Not only
did Major-General Dallaire face challenges as a peacekeeper, but he also
struggled with nearly a thousand UNAMIR soldiers and UN officials showing
disrespect toward him and his role as commander. These four factors were what
caused a Canadian-led peacekeeping mission to fight an already-losing battle.
Rwanda, a small rural nation in Central Africa with a
population of approximately 8 million, was mostly made up of two tribes. These
were the Hutus and the Tutsis. The Tutsis were the minority tribe, however,
they held the bulk of the power in the country, especially with politics and
the economy. In 1960, the Hutus, who were displeased with this situation, rose
up, and forced the Tutsis and their king out of Rwanda toward Uganda. From 1918 to 1962, Rwanda
had been under Belgian trusteeship, but once they gained their independence in
1962, the Tutsis chose to rebel. This led the Tutsis to create the Rwandese
Patriotic Front (RPF). Come October 1990, fighting broke out along the border
of Rwanda and Uganda between the RPF, and Government Armed Forces, which was
led by the Hutus. The two tribes eventually agreed to a cease-fire, but by
February 1993, the hostilities and fighting resumed. However, a plane crash on
April 6, 1994 that killed the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi was the spark
that started the mass-murder spree in Rwanda. Militants and civilians alike
were killed by shooting, rockets and grenades, hacked apart by machete, and
were buried or burned alive. Even churches were unable to escape unscathed,
being disrespected as places of refuge. With that plane crash, the
Tutsi genocide had begun. To this day, the country is still devastated, and
continues to experience a lack of stability, along with violent outbreaks.
In 1993, the United Nations became
involved in the Rwandan civil-unrest. Their task, initially, was to keep the
Rwanda-Uganda border from being used for military purposes by the RPF. This led
to the formation of the United Nations Observer Mission Uganda-Rwanda (UNOMUR)
in June 1993 on Uganda’s side of the border. The UNOMUR eventually led
to the formation of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR),
which was also the UN’s largest mission. Both of these task forces had spent
time under the command of Canadian Major-General Roméo Dallaire, who was in
Rwanda leading the force during the genocide. More than 400 Canadians
served on these task forces between 1993-1996 in an attempt to bring peace to
Rwanda, and end the violence. The UNAMIR mission was
supposed to last for a six-month period, and would be extended for 90 days only
upon review. On November 5, 1993, a Status of Forces Agreement was signed, with
the mission actually being granted a 90-day extension on April 5, 1994- one day
before the plane crash that ignited the genocide. Despite being strongly
outnumbered by Hutu militants, Canadians and other UNAMIR peacekeepers did what
they could in attempts to help the country regain some control. Though the
chaos between the Hutus and Tutsi RPF was more than the peacekeepers could
handle, they still believed in giving humanitarian aid, clearing the land of
underground mines, and resettling refugees as best they could. UNAMIR also focused its
efforts on ceasefires and political negotiations, but unfortunately, Government
Forces and the RPF had zero interest in a ceasefire. There was no desire for
peace. The UNAMIR, despite its best efforts, was forced to pull out of Rwanda
in 1996.
During the task force’s three-year mission, 27 peacekeepers were killed in
action. Of the 27, one was
Canadian.
I do not know the Canadian’s name, despite searching for it.
Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire, who was a
Major-General at the time of the mission, was the key Canadian figure in Rwanda
from 1993-1994. On October 22, 1993, Major-General Dallaire, who referred to
himself as “the least experienced member on [the] UN team,” despite a having a
30-year career with the Canadian Forces, took command of the
UNAMIR task force, with an additional 21 military personnel to follow on
October 27.
When Major-General Dallaire was called upon to serve as the UNAMIR commander,
he thought he was going to be leading a straightforward peacekeeping mission. Despite putting forth
every effort he could muster, Major-General Dallaire was forced to take on
challenges and scenarios that were beyond his scope of expertise. Major-General
Dalliare, having an idea as to what the mission in Rwanda would entail, requested
that the UN provide him with 4500 soldiers, though he had serious doubts that
he could get that many. The United States, feeling lackadaisical about the
situation facing the commander, only wanted give him 500 troops. He was
eventually given 2548 soldiers. Another challenge that
Major-General Dallaire faced was that he was not given a briefing on what was
actually going on in Rwanda. He was also left unaware of a report from the
Commission on Human Rights claiming that genocide was imminent if immediate
action wasn’t taken. Major-General Dallaire
would also regularly receive conflicting advice from various diplomats who
thought they knew best just how to keep the peace. Yet, despite the
aforementioned issues, they were not as horrific as the one problem that he
would not be able to prevent. Major-General Dallaire was the commander who
witnessed the Tutsi genocide in Rwanda. The UN allowed this to
happen.
Apart from witnessing the mass murder of hundreds of
thousands of men, women, and children, Major-General Dallaire was faced with
other issues that may have either prevented the genocide, or led to fewer
killings. According to a report done by the American
Society of International Law, the UN headquarters would often receive
cables from the UNAMIR task force relaying crucial information that could have
prevented the genocide. Though the report states that, “the lack of determined
action to deal with the Dallaire cable,” after the April 6, 1994 plane crash,
the UN instructed Major-General Dallaire to leave in the midst of the genocide,
and help the French evacuate the few foreign nationals who were in the vicinity
of the plane crash. This gave the impression
that few Western lives were more important than the throngs of African ones that
were being ruthlessly wiped out, and brought forth other questions surrounding
human rights. Of course, he and his soldiers were unable to do much good in
fighting against those committing genocide as they lacked equipment; not even
the minimal amount of necessary gear to take on such a task was issued to him
and his troops. Major-General Dallaire was also unable to have confidential
conversations with all parties involved. He was denied a translator from the
UN, and therefore had to rely on locals who would later leak information to the
media, specifically anything sent back to government officials at the UNAMIR
headquarters.
Major-General Dallaire, trying to do what those who wear the Maple Leaf were
known for, was set up for failure from the beginning.
Post-command, Major-General Dallaire was still faced with
an abundance of problems, even though he had already returned to Canada. While
in command of the UNAMIR force, he was constantly faced with disrespect of his
role from 424 Belgian and 564 Bangladeshi soldiers. They refused to take orders
from him, regardless of Major-General Dallaire’s rank and role. The Belgians
and Bangladeshi would only listen to those of their own nationality. In total, under Major-General
Dallaire’s command, ten Belgian soldiers were killed, and the Belgian
government had decided that their deaths were either his fault, or that he was
at the very least an accomplice in their deaths. He had unwillingly become
their scapegoat. In his publications, Lieutenant-General Dallaire also speaks
of the struggles of understanding what he calls a peacekeeper’s “moral
minefield.”
He has said of his role as a peacekeeping commander, “the hardest demand on a
commander is to send men on tasks that may take their lives, and then the next
day to send others to face possibly similar fates. Losing a soldier is the
hardest memory to live with. Such decisions and actions are the ultimate
responsibility of command.” This Canadian’s
post-peacekeeping moral minefield has caused him to ask one crucial question:
“Are all humans human? Or... Are some humans more human than others?”
This mission in Rwanda has definitely changed how people
view peacekeeping, something that has long been a source of Canadian pride,
compliments of former Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson. Jennie Ruby, who
reviewed Samantha Power’s A Problem from
Hell, speaks strongly of Major-General Dallaire and his desperate requests
to the United Nations to give him more soldiers to try to put an end to the
genocide, only to be ordered to leave and let the killing continue. Such an act makes a
person wonder why a peacekeeping mission, especially one of Rwanda’s calibre,
would even be established if it’s going only going to be disregarded and
disrespected anyway. Yet, we Canadians still feel a certain national pride
surrounding this role. Sean M. Maloney wrote a book titled Canada and UN Peacekeeping: Cold War by Other Means, which was
reviewed by Desmond Morton in The
International History Review. In the review, Morton informs the reader on
Maloney’s interpretations and ideas surrounding Canada’s roles as peacekeepers.
To coincide with the idea that Canadians are welcomed and adored everywhere, he
states that there was a, “widespread belief that peacekeeping is Canada’s only
legitimate military role” to be conducted under the guidance of the United
Nations.
Peacekeeping was seen as safe, easy, and not “real soldiering,” like what those
who belonged to NATO would encounter. As this form of military
service was perceived as lesser and more cute, understanding why UNAMIR’s
Canadian commanders in Rwanda were constantly undercut and disrespected becomes
clear. According to Maloney, in Morton’s review, Canada’s peacekeepers were
highly skilled, professional, and had a far-reaching respect and reputation,
but with a little help from Pierre Trudeau’s government, plus a romanticized
mythology surrounding the Canadian peacekeeper, they were de-skilled, disarmed,
and downgraded.
With an attitude like this, it is no wonder that Lieutenant-General Roméo
Dallaire was disrespected, disregarded, and discouraged from doing what was
right in Rwanada. His own government, with its romanticized ideals, contributed
to his and UNAMIR’s failure, which Lieutenant-General Dallaire still carries as
his personal burden to this day.
Canada’s military role, especially where issues of
peacekeeping are involved, has changed since Rwanda. Canadian Forces serving on
missions in Afghanistan, as a more recent venture, makes for a worthwhile
comparison. Media, teachers, peers, family, all of them would have opinions on
whether Canada ought to get involved in the Middle East, and many of them had a
solid knowledge and understanding of what happened in Rwanda. Should we throw
our hat into the ring, as the saying goes, or should we adopt an attitude
similar to the United Nations regarding Rwanda, and stick with fighting the
concepts of war over issues of human rights? Many opinions were
against Canada going to Afghanistan; Afghan problems aren’t our problems, so
why should we get ourselves involved? On the other hand, one of my peers, who
is an infantry officer with the Canadian Forces, served in Afghanistan, because
he believes in peace and freedom.
As for peace and freedom, Lieutenant-General Dallaire
still battles his own personal Hell every single day as the result of what he
had experienced in Rwanda. He, like many others who have seen humanity at its
worst, suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Yet he still pushes
forward, writing Shake Hands with the
Devil in 2003, recounting his experience in Rwanda so that others may be
aware of what actually happened, and why the Canadian-led UNAMIR task force was
never going to be able to bring peace to the torn African nation. Though he
carries the failure in Rwanda with him, the now-retired Lieutenant-General used the
experience to bring good back into the world by founding the All-Party
Parliamentary Group for the Prevention of Genocide and Other Crimes against
Humanity.
He believes that “the genocide in Rwanda was a failure of humanity that could
easily happen again,” but through his
humanitarian organization, and his book, he aims to educate the public as a
means of preventing history from repeating itself. Lieutenant-General
Dallaire’s career with the military and as a Canadian peacekeeper with the
United Nations may be over, but in his own way, the now-Senator is still
finding other ways to bring people a form of peace. As for this Canadian? I
still believe in our Blue Berets, and I refuse to let the peacekeeping failure
in Rwanda tarnish anything that they have ever stood for.
Bibliography
Dallaire, Roméo Lt. General.
Last modified 2013.
Dallaire, Roméo Lt. General.
Shake hands with the Devil: The Failure
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Sections).” 2001. International Legal Materials 40 (1). American
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Morton, Desmond. “Reviewed
Work: Canadan and UN Peacekeeping: Cold
War by Other Means, 1945-1970.”
The International History Review Vol.
25, No, 1 (2003): 200-202. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40110331
Oliner, Samuel P., and Gunn, Jeffrey R., “Manifestations of Radical
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Date accessed May 14, 2016.
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