Poll of the Day > My class watched this movie called Hotel Rwanda today

(+) Yeah! (+)

about the Rwandan genocide, starring War Machine

Honestly, this movie is proof that the United Nations is useless garbage that talks big game but does nothing in the end. It is also evidence that American intervention is a positive thing.
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Apparently watching a movie in high school makes you an expert on diplomacy
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Apparently you have a lot in common with the United Nations.
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You might actually want to do some research on the Rwandan Civil War before assuming that watching a movie makes you an expert on it...
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CacciatoPart3 posted...

Apparently you have a lot in common with the United Nations.

lmao
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CacciatoPart3 posted...

Apparently you have a lot in common with the United Nations.

10/10 roast.
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I was going to show my class that movie last month but I instead opted to show a documentary on it called "Shake Hands with the Devil". It tells the truth straight from Romeo Dallaire himself. Hotel Rwanda is too fictionalized.

Good movie, though. The UN is useless, but having a commander that actually cares makes a big difference.
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people misattribute what the UN is meant to do. The UN is just face-time with politicians so they can all be friends. They don't actually have to do anything
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I remember when that movie was being drummed up fo awards season and lots of ads kept highlighting Joaquin Phoenixs scenes and lines, which was dumb considering some of the other performances but it came across as them just trying to get white people to give the film a shot in a really weird way.
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Impavid54 posted...

about the Rwandan genocide, starring War Machine

Honestly, this movie is proof that the United Nations is useless garbage that talks big game but does nothing in the end. It is also evidence that American intervention is a positive thing.

Damn War Machine must have really fucked up some people in that movie. I mean most people don't want to mess with War Machine.
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https://qz.com/1418293/what-countries-are-on-the-un-human-rights-council/
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Lokarin posted...

people misattribute what the UN is meant to do. The UN is just face-time with politicians so they can all be friends. They don't actually have to do anything

That's not what it's supposed to be for though.
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CacciatoPart3 posted...

Apparently you have a lot in common with the United Nations.

get off the weenis?

darkknight109 posted...

You might actually want to do some research on the Rwandan Civil War before assuming that watching a movie makes you an expert on it...

I mean, of course we actually did research on what actually happened,
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I thought it was a great movie. Joaquin Phoenix is great in it too
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Impavid54 posted...

I mean, of course we actually did research on what actually happened,

You clearly did not, or else you would understand that the movie (the one you stated was "proof" of your beliefs) was a work of fiction.

It's like saying that "Apocalypse Now" was proof of how bad the Vietnam war was.
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Impavid54 posted...

Honestly, this movie is proof that the United Nations is useless garbage that talks big game but does nothing in the end. It is also evidence that American intervention is a positive thing.

- Only, it was the American government that wanted UNAMIR run on a shoestring. Originally the US wanted a token UN force of no more than 500 peacekeepers in Rwanda. The Secretariat had to keep the ceiling on UNAMIR I's strength down to 2,548 troops instead of the 5,500 recommended as the "ideal" size, in order to get the mission proposal past US objections in the Security Council.

- It was the American government that voted (along with the other members of the Security Council, admittedly) on April 21, 1994 to evacuate almost all UNAMIR troops from Rwanda and leave behind only a token force of 270 men. It voted to do this in the midst of the genocide.

- It was the American goverment that refused to acknowledge that was happening in Rwanda was a genocide. It wasn't until June 10, when most of the killing was over, that Secretary of State Warren Christopher finally used the word "genocide". Even UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali had called it a "genocide" on May 4 in a Nightline broadcast, while the US government denied it.

- It was the American government that objected to the use of the word "genocide" during the Security Council debate on April 29, and insisted that the draft text of SC Resolution 918 be watered down by deleting the offending word. It wanted to wriggle out of the obligation to act as implied in Article I of the Genocide Convention of 1948.
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There were a number of options available to the Clinton administration, relatively low-cost attempts that it could have made to at least disrupt the organization of the massacres.

Clinton could have severed diplomatic relations with Rwanda. This would have helped clear the legal hurdles to a proposal developed by Alison des Forges (a senior consultant for Human Rights Watch and a widely recognized expert on Rwanda) to jam the radio broadcasts of Radio Television Libre Milles Colines, or RTLM. This Hutu Power hate radio station facilitated the killings by broadcasting where specific Tutsis were hiding, living, and trying to escape to, and then ordering their deaths on air. Although des Forges appealed to the NSC, the State Department and the Pentagon, the requests were ultimately turned down. The Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, Walt Slocombe, was unhappy that the overflights needed to jam the broadcasts would cost around $8,500 per flight hour, and because the assets would have to be peeled from Haiti he expected resistance from the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Even more knotty were the legal wrangles over Rwandan sovereignty, which would have been infringed by the jamming. The State Department could have cut through the Gordian knot by severing diplomatic relations with Rwanda, and this it did not do. The Clinton administration made no attempt to encourage the UN to restrict the representation of the genocidal government in UN agencies, organizations and institutions; Rwandan ministers were still free to travel to and from the US, and the Rwandan diplomatic mission in Washington remained open. It wasn't until July 15 that Clinton finally gave the order to freeze Rwandan assets and close the embassy in the US -- eleven days after the end of the genocide.

Clinton could have backed efforts to launch a second, reinforced UNAMIR mission earlier. Lt.-Gen. Romo Dallaire, the force commander of the token UNAMIR presence left behind after the initial evacuation, pleaded to the UN that with reinforcement of just 5,000 well-equipped troops he could protect the lives of thousands of people; Dallaire had managed to work small miracles with around 500 men. By May 11, the Interagency Working Group (IWG) was discussing developments that put the prospect of a new UN "coalition of the willing" on the table: troop offers by Nigeria, Ghana, Tanzania, Canada and Namibia. But the momentum died down five days later because, as Slocombe explained in a secret memo to the Secretary for Defense and Deputy Secretary for Defense, the IWG and the Peacekeeping Core Group were opposed to the US providing a C-130 to fly missions into Kigali in support of a proposed 5,500-man UN peacekeeping force.

Even if it refused to lift a finger to help, the Clinton administration could at least have raised its voice against the genocide. But as I've said above, it refused to even call it a genocide. This had nothing to do with any American failure to grasp the scale of what was happening in Rwanda, either. A secret May 1 discussion paper for the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Middle East/Africa Region, Molly Williamson, advised her to be careful on the issue of discussing language that calls for an international investigation of human rights abuses and possible violations of the Genocide Convention. The underlying rationale behind this was the risk that the genocide finding could commit the USG [United States Government] to actually do something.

Neither Clinton nor National Security Adviser Tony Lake called a single senior-level meeting during the 100 days of the genocide to discuss the violence and the possibility of a response by the United States. There was simply no interest from the President, the National Security Adviser, the Secretary of State or senior officials to do anything about it.
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The UN is as powerful as the nations that fund it want it to be (not very). Blaming the UN itself is silly. They do what they can with the resources they are allocated.

American intervention can do some good, or it can be a disaster. It depends in the situation.
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It was mostly Obamas fault
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McSame_as_Bush posted...

The UN is as powerful as the nations that fund it want it to be (not very). Blaming the UN itself is silly. They do what they can with the resources they are allocated.

Exactly. The speed and strength of UN commitment in any situation around the world depends entirely upon the response from the governments of its member states. The Secretariat can condemn, plead, and press for action all it likes; but if member states aren't willing to stump up the cash to fund an operation or commit the troops to give it muscle, then the Secretariat has to water down its words because member states won't back them up. That's why "the UN doesn't seem to be doing anything about it." Before slagging off the UN because you can't see any action, first ask what your own country has offered to do because believe it or not, that's how the system actually works.
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If interested - the Myanmar genocide is STILL GOING
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