17.478 Reading Notes Week 9 - October 30, 2008 Rwanda

One Case, Four Subcases: 1. UN intervention to keep the peace established by the 1993 Arusha accords (UNAMIR) 2. Western interventions to evacuate their civilians early in the conflict 3. France’s intervention and the establishment of a safe zone in Southwestern Rwanda (Operation Turquoise) 4. The U.S. decision not to intervene

Discussion Questions:

1. What were the important events and developments in Rwanda’s history that contributed to the genocide? To what extent, if any, did Rwanda’s history make genocide probable or even inevitable?

2. Was there a strategic logic to the Rwandan genocide, or is it better understood as a decentralized groundswell of ethnic hatred and violence? If it was strategic, what was the strategy?

3. Barbara Walter has argued that commitment problems, specifically rebel fears that the government will rescind concessions after rebel disarmament, are the main factor behind the intractability and longevity of civil wars. What insight does the Rwandan case shed on this argument? Do the terms of the 1993 Arusha accords, which permitted the RPF to remain intact, join the national army, and maintain a battalion in Kigali in the interim, contradict an underlying assumption of her argument?

4. Several theorists of emphasize the role of elites, leaders, or thugs in causing ethnic conflict (e.g., Mueller, Brown). How do such arguments fare with regard to the Rwandan case?

5. What explains the U.S. decision not to intervene in Rwanda? Where was the vaunted CNN effect? How significant was Somalia? How significant was the lack of national interests at stake? 6. What motivated the French intervention? What national or bureaucratic interests were at stake? What were the effects on the humanitarian situation and on the stability of the region over the next several years?

7. How do Kuperman’s conclusions as to the limits of a potential intervention stand up against Feil’s conclusion that a feasible intervention “could have stemmed the violence in and around the capital, prevented its spread to the countryside, and created conditions conducive to the cessation of the civil war between the RPF and RGF”?

8. What are the key similarities and differences between the Rwandan case, the Somali case, and the Bosnian case? Can comparisons between the three yield any insights, or is each a fundamentally different type of conflict and intervention (or non-intervention)?

The Readings: Key Points

Samantha Power, “Bystanders to Genocide: Why the United States Let the Rwandan Genocide Happen”  Main question: why did the United States not do more to stop genocide in Rwanda?  Competing types of explanations: US did not know, US did not care, US could not have done very much about it  Research: numerous interviews (60 interviews with US officials, additional interviews with UN officials, Rwandans, and Europeans) and a review of declassified documents  Criticizes Clinton apology for understating US failure to act and to avert deaths  Claims the US not only failed to send troops but blocked UN efforts, led efforts to remove UNAMIR forces, blocked reauthorizations, and refused to jam hate radio transmissions  Suggests that US policy-makers should have known genocide was occurring almost immediately  Background: Clinton administration (and especially Congress) became increasingly frustrated with the number, cost, and risk of UN interventions in the early 1990s. Somalia was the main precedent.  Simultaneity of “two tracks,” war and genocide, confused policy-makers  3 flaws in preventive diplomacy efforts: main threat was to withdraw UN forces (which Hutu extremists in fact wanted), “natural bias towards states and negotiations” that led to trusting Rwandan government statements, and over- familiarity leading analysts to conclude violence was merely a continuation of longstanding moderate levels of ethnic conflict  Argues UNAMIR forces and the forces used to evacuate Westerners could have sufficed to “have numbers on [their] side.” Total: approx. 4,000  Criticizes “acts of genocide” vs. “genocide” distinction  In first three months Clinton never assembled top advisors to discuss Rwanda  Circular relationship between low public arousal and absence of political leadership  Morality should trump realpolitik

Tom Ross, “President Clinton Signs PDD Establishing ‘U.S. Policy on Reforming Multilateral Peace Operations.’”  PDD25, product of year long interagency review of peacekeeping initiated by President Clinton in 1995  Report calls for: 1. “Making disciplined and coherent choices about which peace operations to support” as “both U.S. and UN involvement in peacekeeping must be selective and more effective.” 2. “Reducing U.S. costs for UN peace operations” 3. “Any large scale participation of U.S. forces in a major peace enforcement operation that is likely to involve combat should ordinarily be conducted under U.S. command” 4. “Reforming and improving the UN's capability to manage peace operations.” 5. “a new "shared responsibility" approach to managing and funding UN peace operations within the U.S. Government” (essentially: DoD funds combat interventions, DoS traditional peacekeeping) 6. “Creating better forms of cooperation between the Executive, the Congress and the American public on peace operations.”  Emphasis on clear objectives, clear exit criteria, military feasibility, public support, etc.

Alain Destexhe, “The Third Genocide”  Belgians turned Hutu-Tutsi divide from caste to ethnicity and created inter-group power hierarchy and therefore conflict  Emphasizes careful planning of the genocide well in advance  “The U.N. should have taken sides [with the RPF] as soon as it became clear that a genocide was being perpetrated”  American reluctance main obstacle to international action  France least appropriate country to intervene given ties to Hutu government  Main reason: Hutus speak mainly French, RPF mainly English. France aimed to keep Rwanda in Francophone sphere  Personnel relations between French and Hutu leaders and French elections also contributed  Operation Turquoise saved several thousand lives but did not improve political situation  West attempted to compensate for inaction by providing assistance to Hutu refugees heading to Goma  Endorses UN standing army

Gerard Prunier, “The Great Lakes Crisis”  Focuses on period after the genocide, around 1996  Regional dimension: similar conflicts in Zaire, Rwanda, Burundi, and Uganda with frequent spillovers  RPF government confronted threat from refugees camps, displaced soldiers, and reports of rearmament across the border in Zaire. This led to a decision to intervene militarily  Rwandan concern with events in Burundi, potential Tutsi refugee exodus  Attacks by RPF proxies on Burundian and Rwandan Hutu refugee camps, eventually caused mass refugee flow of Hutus back to Rwanda  France promotes intervention to secure French-speaking Zaire from collapse  Four conflicts in one: Burundian civil war, Rwandan conflict between RPF government and Hutu refugees, Ugandan conflict with rebel groups armed from Sudan partly through Zaire, Kabila vs. Mobutu civil war in Zaire  UN efforts ineffective, steered by great powers’ inaccurate frames of the conflicts and region

Gerard Prunier, The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide  History of Habyarimana regime and Arusha negotiations  RPF first invaded in 1990 in part due to perceived weakening of Rwandan government and belief that outside push could topple the regime  French supported Hutu regime, trained its military, ended up training future Hutu extremist militia members  As Habyarimana negotiated with the RPF, Hutu factions upset by Arusha radicalized and began preparations  Notion of solving the power-sharing problem with a genocide, to include Hutu opposition  Breakdown in Arusha talks led to renewed, successful RPF invasion  Doubt about RPF intentions a key factor  Government initially wanted 80%Hutu/20%RPF breakdown in military, eventually reduced to 60%/40%, but the RPF demanded 50%/50%  August, 1993 Arusha agreement signed (though fragile) setting up the Broad Based Transitional Government (BBGT) and united armed forces

Scott Feil, Preventing Genocide: How the Early Use of Force Might Have Succeeded in Rwanda  “A modern force of 5,000 troops, drawn primarily from one country and sent to Rwanda sometime between April 7 and 21, 1994, could have significantly altered the outcome of the conflict.”  Intervention “could have stemmed the violence in and around the capital, prevented its spread to the countryside, and created conditions conducive to the cessation of the civil war between the RPF and RGF”  Safe sites rather than havens, often at the village level, would have worked  US force required if either faction fully opposed intervention (militarily), but otherwise multinational force could have sufficed  Possible that a modestly reinforced UNAMIR would have been sufficient  Window of opportunity to intervene, coerce end to genocide was April 7 to April 21

Alan Kuperman, The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention  Challenges argument that early intervention to prevent most of the genocide was possible had there been sufficient political will  Fewer than half, probably 75,000-125,000, could have realistically been saved  Counterfactual analysis requiring cotenability (looking at all effects of a change) and legitimacy (change must be plausible).  Key points: timing (when did the genocide become clear to Washington?), force deployment (particularly strategic airlift), force requirements (how many forces required for safe and effective conduct of the mission), and what these forces could reasonably have been expected to achieve  Violence began nationwide almost immediately after the downing of President Habyarimana’s plane, not just in the capital from which it later spread as has often been claimed  Genocide remarkable for its speed, most of the killings occurred before April 21 having started April 7.  Small numbers of foreign observers did often deter genocide against Tutsi civilians at the same sites  Violence did take some time to spread to two prefectures where Hutu opposition had been strong, but spread around April 21.  U.S. intelligence and media reports were ambiguous, even reported declines in violence as it peaked, often confusing genocide and civil war. Aside from lone DIA reports, genocide was not apparent in Washington or the U.S. press until around April 20. Early death estimates were an order of magnitude low and contained little information beyond Kigali, where only 4% of the population lived  Early warnings and reports of genocide, including the Dallaire fax, were isolated, unverified, and lacking in credibility  UNAMIR was not nearly sufficient in strength to directly engage either side militarily  Operation Turquoise (3,000 French troops) may have saved up to 20,000, and French troops allowed Hutu extremists freedom of movement in the safe zone.  An airlift required U.S. assets but was constrained by the distance, lack of local airfields, poor quality of local infrastructure, low local fuel supplies, etc.  3 intervention scenarios for the U.S. 1. Maximal: 3 brigades, 15,000 troops, occupy capital before fanning out to secure countryside and interposing forces between RPF and government to halt the civil war. 33 days of total airlift required. Predicts 125,000 lives saved at most. 2. Moderate: 6,000 troops, reduces costs and casualties by not intervening in the civil war, required 21 days, predicts 100,000 lives saved 3. Minimal: Use of airpower instead of ground troops, threats of punitive coercion against Hutu extremist targets and coercion by denial through tactical support of the RPF, radio jamming, requires 14 days, predicts 75,000 lives saved  Argues coercion would have been difficult because those guilty of genocide had little reason to expect leniency regardless.  Early warning and preventive intervention would have been the key to averting most of the casualties