The Rwandan Genocide,

Reconstruction, and United States Involvement

Allegra Jones
Word Count- 1982
The Rwandan genocide took place over a mere hundred days, yet hundreds of thousands

were killed and many families were affected for generations. Only 23 years later, the effects of

the genocide are still felt throughout the Great Lakes region of Africa; the flood of refugees who

fled Rwanda to escape death and persecution, or the economical and political problems that were

caused, have led to two Civil Wars in neighboring Congo. Even though there was rampant

murder and acts of hate, the US and other global powers decided not to intervene, but after the

damage had been done to the country and population, they came together to try and rebuild the

economy and morale of the people. It was one of the most deadly genocides of the 90’s, but

communities and countries have been able to come together to help the victims and heal the deep

wounds left by its devastation.

Before the genocide, there had been growing tension between the two major ethnic

groups in Rwanda, the Tutsi and Hutu. The conflict started when Belgium assumed control of

Rwanda in 1918, and installed a Tutsi as the monarch. Tutsis made up a small minority (9%) of

the Rwandan population; however, they were seen as superior to Hutus by the Europeans

because they had more European physical traits. During this time the Belgians also instituted a

law that required every Rwandan citizen to wear an identification tag classifying them as a Tutsi,

Hutu, or Twa (aboriginal people who make up 1% of the population).

In 1959 the Hutus rebelled, leading to the abolition of the Tutsi monarchy in 1961. The

Hutu revolution was carried out with the approval of Belgian authorities. After this, Rwanda

became a republic under the rule of Hutus, and the country gained its independence from
Belgium in 1962. During the transition of power there was a lot of violence; approximately

20,000 Tutsis were killed from 1959 to 1961, and 150,000 Tutsis sought refuge in the

neighboring countries. There were also mass killings of the Tutsi in the years to follow: 1963,

1967 and 1973. In 1965 a group of 1,000 Tutsis and Hutus were killed by radical Hutu police,

when they refused to join the extreme Hutu rebellion operating out of Tanzania. During this time

Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, was put in power, and he founded a new political party, the

National Revolutionary Movement for Development. He was elected president in 1978 when a

new constitution was ratified, and re-elected in 1983 and 1988. Tensions continued to flare in the

following years, such as when the Rwandan Patriotic Front (a Tutsi group), invaded Rwanda

from the bordering country of Uganda in 1990, but a ceasefire between the RPF and the

government was agreed upon in 1991. After that, negotiations were led by the moderate Hutu

president Juvenal Habyarimana. In 1992 the discussion of an agreement that would transition

the government to include the RPF began.

In August 1993 the Arusha Tanz Agreement was signed by President Habyarimana, but

many Hutus were extremely opposed to the inclusion of Tutsis in the government, afraid of

giving them power again. On April 6, 1994, a plane carrying Habyarimana and the president of

Burundi, Cyprien Ntaryamira, was shot down over Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, leaving no

survivors. The culprits have been widely disputed, many believing them to be a part of one of the

radical Hutu groups; others believe that it was one of the leaders of the RPF. Not half an hour

after the plane crash, barricades had been set up all around Kigali by the Presidential Guard,

Rwandan Armed Forces, and some Hutu militia groups known as the Interahamwe (translation:

Those Who Attack Together) and Impuzamugambi (translation: Those who have the same goal),
and had begun to slaughter Tutsis and moderate Hutus. Among the first victims was moderate

Hutu Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana and her 10 Belgian bodyguards, killed on April 7.

During the Rwandan Genocide an estimated 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutus were

killed, and it happened in only a span of 100 days. The identification tag law created by the

Belgians back in 1918 was still in place, making it easier for Hutus to target Tutsis.The preferred

weapons used by average Hutus were bats, machetes, and other weapons that didn’t require

expensive ammunition. Some victims were given the choice of paying for a bullet, as it was a

quicker death, opposed to the torture that most victims endured. An estimated 200,000 Hutus

participated in the killings.

One of the most tragic examples of the violence was displayed by the Hutu extremists

actions from April 15-16, in the small town of Nyarubuye, 60 miles away from Kigali. A group

of Tutsi had come into the town to seek refuge from the Hutus. The mayor of the town directed

them to the church, and told them that they would be safe there. But the mayor betrayed their

place of refuge to the radical Hutus, who trapped them inside the church, and started bombarding

the group of thousands of Tutsis with grenades and open gun fire. After a few hours the Hutus

resorted to using machetes and clubs. The slaughter took two days; there were no survivors.

Along with the mass killings throughout the genocide, there was also a strong inclusion

of systematic rape; conservatively, 250,000-500,00 women were raped. This was seen as another

way to exterminate the Tutsi, by breaking their spirit, and causing great emotional pain, so that

the women would “die of sadness”, along with the negative health effects that rape can have.

Even though there were many health effects that could surface after a woman was raped, often

they did not face them as they were usually killed immediately afterwards.
 To further degrade the Tutsis, their dead bodies were not allowed to be buried, but left

out to be scavenged by dogs or ravens; others were cast into rivers and streams so they could “go

back to Ethiopia”, a reference to the myth that Tutsis originally came from there.

Throughout the course of the genocide media played an influential role, mostly through

the radio. The major radio station broadcasted hate, but encrypted in such a way so that it

appealed to the masses, playing popular music and casual talk shows. They told the Hutu to cut

down “tall trees”, the Tutsi, and crush the “ cockroaches”, also a metaphor for the Hutus

extermination of the Tutsi. In the heat of the genocide, radio announcers started becoming more

blatant, giving full names and addresses of Tutsis, and in some cases license plate numbers for

those trying to flee by car. Rwandans were encouraged to kill their Tutsi neighbors and anyone

who matched the description of the people described on the radio broadcasts. The radios not only

convinced many Hutus to commit murder, but they also tried justifying the reasons for the

genocide. The talked about the oppression faced by the Hutus under the Tutsi rein, and likened

the treatment to slavery. The genocide was equated to a slave rebellion.

Not only radios spread messages of hate and violence. Newspapers such as the Kangura,

which was controlled by Hutu extremists, published articles such as “The Ten Commandments

for a Hutu” that declared any Hutu who married or did business with a Tutsi was a traitor. Since

1990, four years precursing the genocide, such articles also said that Hutus should have all the

strategic and military positions in the government, and that Hutus needed to band together and

stop pitying the Tutsi.

By the end of July 1994 the Tutsi-led opposition RPF had control of most of Kigali,

prompting around two million Hutus to flee the country, running from the inevitable retribution.
Soon after, the genocide ended when the RPF overthrew the Hutu regime, and overtook the

government, which throughout the killings had been supplying the Hutus with resources, such as

arms, the planning of their attacks, and leadership in the militias.

After the genocide, the justice system took over. Three courts were involved: the United

Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the National Court System, and the Gacaca

courts. The Gacaca courts were opened in 2001, to help get all of the people accused of a crime

tried. Communities at the local level elected judges to hear all crimes related to the genocide

except for planning genocide; 120,000 people have been tried for acts of genocide and criminal

participation in the killings.

The international community’s response to the genocide has been fairly criticized. The

United Nations received a “genocide” fax from the commander of its own peacekeeping force in

Rwanda, “UNAMIR”, warning of the Hutus “anti-Tutsi extermination” months before the

genocide actually broke out. It was ignored. UNAMIR was in Rwanda throughout the genocide,

but the UN didn’t act until mid-May, after 500,000 Rwandans had been slaughtered. At this point

the UN pledged 5,500 troops and 50 armored personal carriers. But even these supplies did not

arrive in time due to arguing between the US and UN over who would pay for the costs. The UN

intervention never came. By the time they were ready, the RPF, led by Paul Kagame, had taken

back Rwanda from the radical Hutus. Even though the UN didn’t help the Rwandese during the

actual genocide, it has helped in the efforts of reconstruction and has tried many of the

genocide’s leaders for crimes against humanity in its court.

Rwanda’s road to reconstruction has been complicated. Because of the West’s long

colonial presence in African affairs, major world powers supported different sides during the

genocide. There were worries that British and French interventions in Rwanda would continue to
be divisive, and that there would never be a consensus. Three major things that needed to be

done to heal Rwanda and Burundi were agreement amongst the major powers on a common

approach to help Rwanda, to get the other countries in the region to agree on a strategy to

promote political reconciliation and help the refugees.

The US wanted to strengthen bonds with Rwanda after the genocide, to make sure the

process of reconstruction went smoothly. The UN and US’s approach to help heal the broken

country has been to support the Democratic process, and focus on protecting minority rights and

giving equal rights to both Tutsis and Hutus, to cease any future tension caused by an unbalanced

division of power. After the genocide the major global powers have become much more active in

helping to stabilize African countries, especially in the Great Lakes region. Rwandan refugees in

the Congo and Western Tanzania have been a cause of the instability in the region, so relocating

refugees is another strategy that the US and UN want to utilize.

The Rwandan Genocide left an estimated 100,000 children orphaned or abandoned, left

26% of the Rwandan population with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and around 800,000

deaths. In its aftermath, the region and world have tried to help Rwanda rebuild. Today, Rwanda

has a balanced government that protects the rights of everyone. The Rwandan people have

banded together to help heal broken and decimated communities. These are positive steps but

they don’t erase memories of the stark lack of compassion from the international community or

its leader, the United States, which could have easily helped and stopped hundreds of thousands

of deaths. The Rwandan Genocide will be an example for future generations to intervene on

behalf of those in need. The genocide was a reminder to the world of the advancements that still

need to be made in the fight for human rights. “Rwanda can be a paradise again, but it will take
the love of the entire world…and that’s as it should be, for what happened in Rwanda happened

to us all – humanity was wounded by the genocide.”

– Immacuée Ilibagiza, Rwandan author

Bibliography
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This source was the first that I looked at, and gave a detailed who, what where, and why. It
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