We Have Always Been Here - Samra Habib - Part 1 of 4

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 201

July 21, 2020

Book 56 - We Have Always Been Here
Samra Habib
 Part 1 - pages 1-42
Reading Time - 60 minutes

I was actually reading this book at the same time as I was reading portions of Dallaire's book. Habib's book was my evening reading and part of a BIPOC book club that my partner and I joined on Facebook. It was a fairly "light" book compared to Dallaire's and I found echoes of my own life in its pages. Samra Habib, a Pakistani-Canadian, emigrated to Canada with her family as a child. She eventually came out as queer to her family and documents her own struggles with finding a place of belonging. An excellent book and an easy read.

The first two chapters document Samra's early childhood in Lahore, Pakistan where here family was moderately well-to-do. Her father was an engineer and built houses which sold for a good profit. The family belonged to a Muslim sect (Ahmadi)and experienced persecution from mainstream Muslims.

Reading about her early life in Lahore was like getting a window into a different world, one where women are valued only for their fertility, beauty and purity. And while women in the West tend to have more freedoms and rights, I wonder if we too are not often more valued for our beauty, subservience and politeness. Familiar as I am with the Christian tradition, the Bible does tend to emphasize those aspects of a "good woman" or a "good wife"... and it's not that  far off from the Muslim tradition as narrated by Samra. We just fool ourselves into thinking that we have handled it... but when the shit hits the fan, those deeply held prejudices still surface.

Shake Hands with the Devil - Roméo Dallaire - Part 10 of 10

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 200

July 20, 2020

Book 55 - Shake Hands with the Devil
Roméo Dallaire
 Part 10 - pages 448-505 (e-book)
Reading Time - 60 minutes

And we're in the final stretch. This last chapter seemed quite disjointed and I can only guess that it's meant to reflect Dallaire's own mental decline at the time or... it's due to the fact that his ghost writer committed suicide in the late stage of drafting the book. Either way, it's a tragedy.

Chapter 15 - Too Much, Too Late

Dallaire finally received a new political liaison guy, Khan, from Pakistan, and took him on a tour which included hospitals where dead and dying were packed in. Khan was utterly shocked and wrote in his own book: "The fact is that never in living history has such wanton brutality been inflicted by human beings on their fellow creatures [as in Rwanda]... even the killing fields of Cambodia and Bosnia pale before the gruesome, awful depravity of massacres in Rwanda." Khan was brilliant and Dallaire wondered how different things might have been had he been with them since the start.

The RPF wanted to set up a ceasefire after they had essentially won the war. They set up a new government minus the extremists. Millions of Rwandans fled to Zaire creating a whole new humanitarian crisis as Zaire was unable to handle the influx of refugees. And there were refugees still in Rwanda. Dallaire and Khan feared that the RGF, the génocidaires and the extremists would just set up shop in Zaire, strengthen themselves and resume the war in a few years. Millions in aid flowed into Zaire and hardly anything into Rwanda. RPF government in Kigali was trying to get refugees to come back. Some tried to leave the camps and were attacked by extremists with machetes. When others came into RPF territory, Dallaire suspected that there were secret tribunals as people were summarily executed by the RPF.

Thirty days after the reinforcements were to have been deployed, Dallaire was still waiting. He met with the American military who promised help in supporting refugees to come back... but the American administration pulled back. They didn't want to help if there was a risk of American casualties. All they did was help unload aircraft at Kigali and refused to leave the airfield.

Finally some reinforcements started arriving but they were outsiders and had not been part of what the others had witnessed. French implied that the UN mission had failed and laid blame at Dallaire's feet. The months of stress were taking its toll on Dallaire and on August 3, he asked to be relieved of his command. He had planned for his second-in-command, a Ghanaian, to take over, but learned that another Canadian would be appointed to replace him. Felt incredibly guilty for abandoning mission before it was done, but he had become a casualty. He left Rwanda almost a year to the day after he had arrived.

Conclusion

For Dallaire, one of the biggest impacts of such a civil war, is its effect on children - the ones killed or injured, the ones turned into child soldiers or soldier wives. In visiting Sierra Leone, he came to question the impossible task of disarming and reintegrating child soldiers. In his mind, the best way to avoid such a situation was to prevent future Rwandas.

Dallaire believes his UN mission could have prevented the resumption of the civil war and the genocide - with enough troops and logistical/administrative support. He believes that France and the US held the solution for the Rwanda crisis. They also did not help the refugee issue but worsened it.

As for his own role: "I was unable to persuade the international community that this tiny, poor, overpopulated country and its people were worth saving from the horror of genocide--even when the measures needed for success were relatively small."

Since 1994-2003, 4 million human beings have died in the Congo and Great Lakes region as a direct result of the Rwandan crisis. UN needs a renaissance from the Secretariat down to the member nations.

The youth of the developing world won't tolerate it anymore - Dallaire saw so much rage and it won't go away when human beings have no rights, no security, no future, no hope, no means to survive. Do we believe that all humans are equal? Or are some better than others. An American officer told Dallaire that 85,000 dead Rwandans were worth one dead American soldier. We have to move beyond national self-interest to human interest. We have to move from the 20th century (century of genocide) to the 21st century (century of humanity) when we can rise above race, creed, colour, religion and national self-interest.

And it's true... it's what needs to happen. Inequality is rampant, within countries and around the world. Something needs to shift as the rich get infinitely richer and the poor get poorer. And we can't be part of the solution if we are, inherently, part of the problem.

Shake Hands with the Devil - Roméo Dallaire - Part 9 of 10

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 199

July 19, 2020

Book 55 - Shake Hands with the Devil
Roméo Dallaire
 Part 9 - pages 412-448 (e-book)
Reading Time - 60 minutes

There was a tonne of information in this chapter as events sped up exponentially. When I saw the title of this chapter in the Table of Contents, I thought the Turquoise referred to the blue berets that the UN troops wore. Nope... it was Operation Turquoise by the French.

Chapter 14 - The Turquoise Invasion

France suggested that they lead a coalition force to stop the genocide and deliver humanitarian aid. Given that they had long been supporters of the RGF and that many extremist leaders had fled to France... Dallaire was less than enthused with the idea. But he wasn't really consulted.  High level talks had happened, unbeknownst to Dallaire and the French were not going to reinforce his mission but rather set up a Chapter 7 mission in the rapidly shrinking RGF-held territory.

When French media announced France's plan to deploy troops, the RGF and militia were overjoyed at the thought that the French were coming to save them. This gave them carte blanche to finish their gruesome work. Which did not just include massacres. At one point, Dallaire admits that he had been desperately trying not to see the obvious signs of whole-scale rape and sexual mutilation of girls and women.

As for the RPF, they would now have to distinguish between UN troops (the French) who were essentially supporting the RGF and UN troops who were desperately trying to stay neutral (Dallaire's mission). The RPF actually suggested that Dallaire's mission should be withdrawn but the UN completely ignored that request.

Reinforcements for Dallaire's UN mission would take two or three months to arrive but slowly some began to show up. His mission was a pittance compared with the well-equipped French forces in Operation Turquoise. As his reinforcements came in, Dallaire planned to put them along Operation Turquoise zone as a relief-in-place. He didn't expect French to last long as thousands of Rwandas fled to French area.

It's pretty clear to me that when Western powers meddle in other countries, things don't go well... from colonial days to the present. We might go in with the best of intentions but... ultimately, things will go sideways and it's usually the locals who pay the highest price.

Shake Hands with the Devil - Roméo Dallaire - Part 8 of 10

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 199

July 18, 2020

Book 55 - Shake Hands with the Devil
Roméo Dallaire
 Part 8 - pages 369-411 (e-book)
Reading Time - 60 minutes

The more I read this book, the more disgusted I am with the United States and former President Bill Clinton. Their inability/unwillingness to step into Rwanda resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands and suffering for millions. It is unconscionable.

Chapter 13 - Accountants of the Slaughter

Finally, in mid May, the UN Security Council passed a resolution to strengthen the UN mission but the resolution had been gutted by the US. Dallaire was expecting 5500 troops but days went by and no troops arrived. It would take months for troops to arrive, long past the point when they were needed. The soldiers of the UN mission were reduced to the role of accountants keeping track of how many were being killed. The US and UK resisted the use of the term "genocide" but with every day, new reports reinforced what was happening. When troops did start coming in, the burden fell to countries like Ghana, Ethiopia, Zambia, India, Nigeria and Canada. All of them, with the exception of Canada, were too weak logistically to deploy without First World assistance. The US graciously offered 50 cold-war era APCs (Dallaire had asked for hundreds) for a price (millions) and when they were arrived, they were stripped of everything useful - tools, radios, manuals, spare parts.

It was also clear, the more territory the RPF acquired, that they were conducting their own massacres, on Hutus that were isolated behind their lines. Both sides were complicit in the genocide but an even greater humanitarian crisis was building as over two million Hutus, egged on by extremist radio, fled westward in front of the retreating RGF forces. Thousands had already fled into Tanzania where extremist leaders kept them in the throes of fear. The same was likely to happen with the westward fleeing refugees who would end up in Zaire. This would create a huge regional problem in central Africa and Dallaire warned the US but... it came to nothing.

Finally, some reconnaissance officers from the second wave of troops started appearing, some of them Canadians. Dallaire expressed gratitude for the two Canadian Hercules aircraft who had ferried in supplies (water, food, medical supplies) while shuttling wounded UN troops out to safety. Until the airport had to be shut down due to bombardment by the belligerents. Meanwhile, the killings continued.

Dallaire began to suspect that the UN mission was a distraction which allowed the UN and its member countries to say that they were doing something. But... the UN mission was saving dozens, or maybe hundreds, while hundreds of thousands were massacred and millions became refugees.

I honestly don't know how the UN troops kept going and it's clear why so many of them were psychologically damaged by their time in Rwanda. The human psyche can only handle so much and those troops were pushed beyond that...

Shake Hands with the Devil - Roméo Dallaire - Part 7 of 10

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 198

July 17, 2020

Book 55 - Shake Hands with the Devil
Roméo Dallaire
 Part 7 - pages 327-368 (e-book)
Reading Time - 60 minutes

Had a minor hiccup here when the ebook expired from the library! Had to sign it out again and that took a bit of time... but, hopefully back on track. I am not taking such detailed notes on the book anymore... suffice to say... the genocide was horrendous.

Chapter 12. Lack of Resolution

With the departure of most of his troops, Dallaire decided to step up the media campaign, as any sort of media can be worth a battalion of soldiers. He offered a BBC reporter full access to all of the UN mission activities as long as he gave an accurate and truthful story. Other journalists noticed the BBC's stories and started to flow into Rwanda to document the slaughter. Dallaire wanted to use the media to try to prod the international community into action. And, on April 24, Oxfam was the first organization to use the term genocide to describe what was happening in Rwanda.

The killing continued and the Red Cross and Doctors without Borders were continually threatened. The extremist radio station broadcast a message to "kill Dallaire", the "white man with the moustache". Dallaire still tried to negotiate a ceasefire but nothing seemed to work. His troops continued to do rescue missions - a family here, a few nuns there but they were getting shot at by both sides, even though both sides said that they wanted the UN mission in Rwanda. At several points he met with leaders of the militia, the machete wielding génocidaires, and felt like he had shaken hands with the devil.

Dallaire submitted a plan for reinforcements and, had it been followed in a timely manner, experts later agreed, it would have stopped the killing. But while the UN debated, and the US stalled, the killings continued. Dallaire mused: "What was the spark that lit the fuse that blew up into all this degradation and perversion? And why were we so feeble, fearful and self-centred in the face of atrocities committed against the innocent?" Even after the high commissioner for human rights arrived and deemed what was happening a genocide, the Security Council did nothing.

It's depressing to read about such inaction on the part of an organization tasked with maintaining peace and order in the world. And, as I read this chapter, I found it much more disjointed than the preceding chapters, a reflection of the disjointed events from that time and Dallaire's own slow descent.

Shake Hands with the Devil - Roméo Dallaire - Part 6 of 10

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 197

July 16, 2020

Book 55 - Shake Hands with the Devil
Roméo Dallaire
 Part 6 - pages 268-326 (e-book)
Reading Time - 90 minutes

We're into the heart of it now... the massacres ramp up and the UN troops are witnesses to unspeakable horror. I've been reading some other news articles and watching some videos and it is incomprehensible. How could this have happened? After the Holocaust? And the Killing Fields. Whatever happened to "never again"...

Chapter 11 - To Go or to Stay

The UN compounds sheltered about 30,000 fearful Rwandans but were not equipped to act as refugee centres. There was no food, no water, few latrines. Some inevitable succumbed to dehydration, disease or hunger. The telephones, electricity and water system went down as well. If they ran out of fuel for the generator, they would be completely cut off, with no way to operate the satellite radio. The compounds had no supplies and no way to medi-evac the wounded.

Dallaire met with the Crisis Committee again who said that the swearing in of the BBTG would happen the next day and would include the extremist political parties. The same extremists who were hunting people down. Dallaire still hoped that he could broker a cease-fire or even a truce so that expats could be extracted, but both sides were dug in.

Some Polish officers from the UN mission drove to a Polish church to get some expats and military observers. The found a scene of unimaginable horror. Hundreds of men, women and children had been massacred in the church. The RGF had rounded up the people, herded them into the church, and then let the militia, armed with machetes, into the church. There was no mercy, no hesitation, no compassion. There were a few wounded survivors who would be cared for by the priests. But, the next day, after the mission had left, the militia came back and killed the rest and burned the bodies.

The massacred was not a spontaneous act but a well-executed operation that involved the army, the militia and other groups.

The French arrived to evacuate their expats and callously pushed aside black Rwandans seeking asylum. "A sense of shame overcame me. The whites, who had made their money in Rwanda and who had hired so many Rwandans to be their servants and labourers, were now abandoning them. Self-interest and self-preservation ruled".

The Belgians arrived to evacuate their troops and in one case, a group of Belgian soldiers were guarding a school where two thousand Rwandans had sought refuge. The Belgian soldiers were ordered to pull back to the airport. The Rwandans in the school were left to their fate.

The peace-keeping department at the UN apparently questioned if protecting civilians was the mandate of the UN peacekeeping troops. But no country wanted to send troops to Rwanda at that point... there were too many risks. The only person who though that the UN should strengthen its mission in Rwanda was the president of the Security Council, New Zealand's Colin Keating. The US wanted the mission pulled out immediately. Only Canada sent two planes and several staff officers.

Dallaire still tried to broker a ceasefire, even as the RPF slowly, calmly, coolly, gained territory. But they would only agree to a ceasefire if the killing ceased... bu the killing wouldn't cease without a ceasefire. The UN argued that if there was no ceasefire, then the mission had to withdraw. Dallaire argued for keeping a force on the ground, if only to bear witness.

Dallaire speaks highly of the Tunisian and Ghanaian troops - all of whom were spectacularly brave and never shirked their duty. He muses on the fact that his own father, a Canadian, fought to liberate Belgium. Decades later, the Belgians abandoned his son (Dallaire).

Ultimately the UN decided to leave a skeleton force, 250 troops, keeping 30,000 Rwandans in safety. "Ultimately, led by the United States, France and the United Kingdom, this world body aided and abetted genocide in Rwanda".

I sit here, and I read that last sentence and I think... how did this happen? How did countries, renowned the world over for being "First World", for being democratic, for being humanitarian... end up abandoning 800,000 Rwandans to their deaths? How can those same countries look in the mirror every morning and consider themselves to be anything other than butchers?

Shake Hands with the Devil - Romeo Dallaire - Part 5 of 10

2020 Reading Challenge - Day 196

July 15, 2020

Book 55 - Shake Hands with the Devil
Roméo Dallaire
 Part 5 - pages 210-268 (e-book)
Reading Time - 60 minutes

Reading the next two chapters in this book, I kept gearing myself up for the start of the genocide... And while there was no major killing, no genocide... it was the start of the genocide, which began long before there were massacres.

Chapter 9 - Easter without a Resurrection of Hope

As march flowed by, it was clear that both sides were digging in and that arms were still flowing across the border. On top of that, Dallaire still had problems with logistics, communications, vehicles and helicopters, not to mention troops. The Bangladeshi troops were only there to gain experience. Their army chief of staff had visited in February and told Dallaire that he needed to make sure all of those men made it home safely.

In mid-March, Dallaire went home for a two week leave, stopping in at the UN on his way back. It was clear that the growing crisis on Rwanda was on the back-burner, overshadowed by Yugoslavia, Mozambique, Haiti, Cambodia and Somalia. The US wanted the mission pulled out if the BBTG was not installed within the next two weeks. Essentially, the United States was willing to pull the mission out of the country and let it sink back into civil war and chaos.

When Dallaire arrived back in Rwanda on March 31, the BBTG was still not installed, mostly because the President had insisted on including an extremist political party into the agreement. The RPF was not pleased and refused to attend the installation. Things were beginning to fall apart and Dallaire had only 40-60 rounds/soldier which wouldn't last long in a sustained fire fight. But no country seemed to care that the country was headed for civil war.

As Dallaire noted: "The people of Rwanda were not an insignificant black mass living in abject poverty in a place of no consequence. they were individuals like myself, like my family, with every right and expectation of any human who is a member of our tortured race."

On Easter Sunday, Dallaire was still trying to broker talks for the BBTG installation. His helicopter flew over a village as crowds gathered for Easter Sunday services. A week later, those same devout Christians would become murders and victims, and the places of prayer, sites of calculated butchery.

The UN Security Council granted the mission a six week extension at which point the mission would be "reviewed" (i.e. pulled). Their decision confirmed for all Rwandans that the world didn't give a damn about Rwanda. And when the killing started, every nation, with the exception of Canada, declined to reinforce his mission. In April and May, Canada supplied two Hercules aircraft to the mission, as well as excellent staff officers and military observers.

Chapter 10 - An Explosion at Kigali Airport

On April 6, the president's plane crashed near Kigali airport. The Prime Minister was next in line but all of the moderate politicians had gone into hiding and the extremist ones had disappeared.

A Crisis Committee of army officers took control of the country due to the uncertainty and Dallaire wondered if their actions did not constitute a coup. The army officers said that the Prime Minister did not enjoy the confidence of the Rwandan people and was incapable of governing the nation.

The Presidential Guard carried out attacks and assainations and the army officers professed themselves unable to control them. Barricades were set up the Presidential Guard and UN vehicles were often prevented from going through. Officials at the UN repeatedly stressed to Dallaire that he could only fire if fired upon and was not to use weapons to prevent crimes against humanity, even though that was allowed under the rules of engagement.

The next day, Dallaire sought out the military officers again in a meeting at Camp Kigali (army base). On his way there, he saw some of his soldiers on the ground but the driver refused to stop. He would later learn that ten Belgian soldiers were executed at Camp Kigali that day, the same soldiers who had been guarding the Prime Minister, who was also executed at a UN compound earlier. Kigali's "hate radio" had been broadcasting inflammatory statements which said that the Belgians had shot down the President's plane.

Dozens of Rwandans came to the UN compounds, seeking refuge and many more phoned for help. Dallaire tried to send out patrols to bring desperate civilian staff and moderate politicians back to their buildings but was hampered by some of his own troops. The Bangladeshis were ineffective and disobeyed orders, having orders from Dhaka (capital of Bangladesh) to avoid all risk.

Dallaire was ordered not to take sides, not to try to coalesce the moderates... it was up to the Rwandans to sort things out themselves.

This is an extremely hard book to read... not that it's not readable... it is... it's just hard to read about a slow motion train wreck and know that 800,000 human beings lost their lives because some bureaucrats deemed their lives to be worthless. Ten Belgian soldiers were executed... and that prompted the Belgians to pull their entire contingent. The Bangladeshis were not far behind. Dallaire would be left with 250 soldiers (more or less) to be a witness to the horror that was to come.