[Peace-discuss] Fwd: How dare Bush invoke Rwanda to justify his war.....

[Ricky Baldwin]

Is there, in this comparison, a corollary to the rule
that every time we go to war, it's always going to be
different this time?  ("And how many times are you
going to fall for that one?")  Or is it just another
example?

Ricky

--- Alfred Kagan <akagan at uiuc.edu> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>   *******************
> >>  How dare Bush invoke Rwanda to justify his war
> >>
> >>
> >>  By GERALD CAPLAN
> >>  Wednesday, March 12, 2003 -
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  Just about every day, George W. Bush or his
> acolytes lie about why his
> >>  administration is about to attack Iraq. Often
> these distortions are
> >>  preposterous. An obvious example is Mr. Bush's
> dismissal of the United
> >>  Nations as irrelevant because other Security
> Council members 
> >>refuse to buckle
> >>  under to U.S. demands. In fact, it's the United
> States that's done most to
> >>  undermine the UN in the recent past, not least
> by withholding hundreds of
> >>  millions of dollars that it's owed in dues.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  But there are depths even Mr. Bush shouldn't be
> allowed to plumb without
> >>  rebuttal. This week, his spokesman, Ari
> Fleischer, reached these limits.
> >>  Pouring contempt on the UN's record of inaction,
> Mr. Fleischer 
> >>said on Monday
> >>  that, "from the moral point of view, as the
> world witnessed in Rwanda . . .
> >>  the UN Security Council will have failed to act
> once again." In a literal
> >>  sense, he is dead right; the Security Council
> did fail miserably 
> >>in 1994. But
> >>  his insinuation distorts what happened. With the
> ninth anniversary of the
> >>  Rwanda genocide only weeks away, certain truths
> mustn't become casualties of
> >>  U.S. spin doctors.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  To begin, Mr. Fleischer should review an
> interview between ABC's Sam
> >>  Donaldson and Mr. Bush during the 2000
> presidential campaign. When Mr.
> >>  Donaldson asked him what he would do if "God
> forbid, another Rwanda should
> >>  take place," Mr. Bush replied: "We should not
> send our troops to stop ethnic
> >>  cleansing and genocide outside our strategic
> interests. . . . I would not
> >>  send the United States troops into Rwanda."
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  Second, as Mr. Fleischer must surely know, the
> Security Council failed to
> >>  intervene in Rwanda because Washington opposed
> any such intervention. This
> >>  was the stance pushed by UN ambassador Madeleine
> Albright on behalf of the
> >>  Clinton administration, and the position of
> Republicans in Congress. A rare
> >>  moment of U.S. political consensus allowed a
> clique of Rwandan extremists to
> >>  orchestrate one of the classical cases of
> genocide in the 20th century,
> >>  annihilating some 800,000 Tutsis and thousands
> of moderate Hutus.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  To highlight today's moral irony, America's
> efforts to prevent the Security
> >>  Council from intervening in Rwanda was fervently
> seconded by none other than
> >>  Britain, then led by John Major. No wonder the
> world cringes when Tony Blair
> >>  makes "the moral case" for invading Iraq and
> when Mr. Fleischer uses the
> >>  phrase "the moral point of view."
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  Let me stress that none of this is either
> esoteric or in dispute. Bill
> >>  Clinton himself later went to Rwanda and
> publicly apologized for his failure
> >>  to act, although he blamed his ignorance for his
> inaction. He was lying. The
> >>  truth has been thoroughly documented. A 1999 TV
> documentary by BBC/PBS
> >>  featured senior U.S. officials acknowledging
> that the administration had
> >>  known exactly what was happening in Rwanda
> throughout the months of the
> >>  genocide and deliberately chose to allow it to
> happen. A report I wrote the
> >>  following year expanded the evidence, and a
> knockout blow was delivered last
> >>  year in Samantha Power's formidable study, A
> Problem from Hell: America and
> >>  the Age of Genocide.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  It is true that many others abandoned Rwanda as
> well, most notably those
> >>  passionate opponents of the impending war
> against Iraq: France and the Roman
> >>  Catholic Church. Both, with unparalleled
> influence within Rwanda, could very
> >>  possibly have stopped the genocide before it
> began. Neither even tried.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  But once the genocide was launched, the U.S.
> role at the Security 
> >>Council was
> >>  decisive. America alone possessed the influence
> and the resources 
> >>to mobilize
> >>  the kind of military force that General Romeo
> Dallaire, sitting in Rwanda
> >>  commanding a puny UN military mission,
> repeatedly begged for. Coming as it
> >>  did only months after the humiliating deaths of
> 18 U.S. Rangers in Somalia,
> >>  with the Republicans denouncing the folly of
> foreign interventions, Mr.
> >>  Clinton wasn't prepared to risk losing a single
> vote over a mere genocide.
> >>  For domestic political reasons, his
> administration repeatedly made sure that
> >>  the Security Council delivered no reinforcements
> to the UN mission, even
> >>  going so far as to sabotage attempts to do so.
> As a result, during 
> >>the entire
> >>  100 days of slaughter, not a single extra
> soldier or bullet 
> >>arrived in Rwanda
> >>  to help Gen. Dallaire stop the slaughter.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  The world, led by the Americans, abandoned
> Rwanda at its time of peril. In
> >>  all decency, the least we can expect now is that
> Mr. Bush doesn't compound
> >>  the betrayal by invoking the genocide to justify
> his own unjust war.
> >>  Gerald Caplan is the author of Rwanda: The
> Preventable Genocide, the report
> >>  of the international panel of eminent persons
> that investigated the 1994
> >>  slaughter in Rwanda.
> 
> 
> -- 
> 
> 
> Al Kagan
> African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of
> Library Administration
> Africana Unit, Room 328
> University of Illinois Library
> 1408 W. Gregory Drive
> Urbana, IL 61801, USA
> 
> tel. 217-333-6519
> fax. 217-333-2214
> e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu
> 
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