The First Casualty Of War

Rabid Dogs On All Sides
(PLUCK series)

'Among the calamities of war may be jointly numbered the diminution of the love of truth, by the falsehoods which interest dictates and credulity encourages.' 

~Samuel Johnson, 'The Idler' 1758

It is the common narrative of those who side with the rebels, often blindly, in Syria that these gun toting militants are somehow valiant characters in the overall plot. They have been cast as the defenders of the downtrodden and oppressed Syrian civilians. They have been painted as noble warriors who arose to take a stand against the savage tyrant in command of Syria. Yet the war which they wage has been brutal in it's depiction of reality. With every massacre there comes the picture of rabid dogs surrounding the citizenry of Syria on all sides. Assad's barbarians remain frothing at the mouth as they clamor for new atrocities. And, contrary to their online propagandists, the rebels are equally savage in their attempts to assert authority in reclaimed areas.

It is the common narrative of the blind support that what you are reading here is wrong. By looking beyond the partisanship of either side we are somehow committing an offense. By sifting through the lies, often pitting them against one another, we are somehow wrong for seeking the hard facts behind the fog of war. If you believe that, if you are so vehemently biased, then this is your chance to leave and go back to the media that feeds your glutinous appetite for lies.

We don't claim to know everything. This isn't a blog to tell you what to think, we didn't start this to make you believe. This is a blog that simply exists so as to make you ask questions. Our only goal here is to make you question everything you have been told. Our mission is to create screamers by unbinding the blindfolds that have covered peoples' eyes for far too long. We don't always have the answers, but we'll be damned if we would ever cease in trying to find them.

Devoured 

Syria's crisis began when Assad violently attempted to crush the spirit which we seek for all mankind. It was in Syria's underclass that the masses began to question the legitimacy of Assad's rule. From the ground up the threat was rising to a tyrant who had held power for generations. Syria's crisis began because the leader of Syria felt his dogs were turning in upon him. 

A system in which the majority of the citizenry do not belong to the same class or religion of the ruling party, is a system that becomes to top heavy to survive. When the masses began to realize that Syria's fighter jets, it's tanks, it's helicopters, and it's savage army were no longer meant to protect them but rather to dominate them... it was already too late.

Guerrilla warfare became the only method by which the underclass could rise up to challenge the bigger dog in this fight. Through ambushing, hit and run, and by utilizing rolling battles to engage the regime; the rebels were seen as fighting for their homes and their people. In the beginning this was symbolic in the fact that it made outsiders believe that Syria's masses were in open rebellion. And yet the people of Syria were not yet ready to sacrifice everything for the whims of this ragtag band of rebels. 

Assad, in all his barbaric glory, launched all out war upon his own nation. Cluster bombs, incendiaries, mortars, heavy artillery, tanks, helicopters, and jets were all thrown into the fight to stop the rebellion his own savagery had inspired. Entire villages were laid to waste as Assad sought to bring Syria back under his control. Nothing was sacred to the now rabid leader as he challenged all conventions of warfare by openly targeting civilians. 

This is how the war began. And in it's own right, this is how Syria was devoured from within. Blood spilled on one side was immediately rectified, if ever it could be, by more blood spilled on the opposing side. And eye for an eye rapidly made all of Syria blind. 

Yet it was the bitterness of war that devoured Syria completely. Rebels who had boasted about their restraint in battle quickly gave into the temptations of war. Retaliatory attacks on citizens who remained loyal to Assad began to mount the death toll on the other side. Men that online supporters claimed were somehow noble turned out to be no less barbaric than the savage they claimed to fight. Leaving many to wonder how the rebels could be praised for fighting Assad when they have mirrored their enemies own sins.

Genocide Produces Yet More Genocides

(A History) 

Namibia, the land of the 20th century's first genocide. It is a country in which the German Second Reich began it's experiments with lebensraum and eugenic philosophies. This is the place where a modern nation imposed race laws, built concentration camps, used chemicals to kill their victims, used slave labor to cause death, and committed outright mass executions of the Herero and Namaqua peoples. All of which occurred a decade prior to the Armenian Genocide. 

Turkish leaders would look back upon their German ally's success in Namibia and learn from the Second Reich what it meant to exterminate an entire ethnicity of man. In Ottoman eyes the colonization of Namibia by Germany was seen as a success because the German people never once said a word against it. Instead the German populace was seen as supportive and as willing participants in their government's atrocities. Thus, without little questioning by Turkish citizens, the Ottomans began their genocides in an attempt to maintain their crumbling empire. 

The Assyrians, the Pontic Greeks, and the Armenians would all suffer the wrath of a failing empire. 1.5 million Armenians would perish as Turkey fought to enforce "Turkification" across their territories. There was no limit to the barbarism that the Ottomans would utilize in their attempts to either deport or kill their victims. 

“Who today still talks about the annihilation of the Armenians?”

~ Adolf Hitler, August 22, 1939

Deir-es-Zor, the Turkish death camp to which Armenians were sent, is to the Armenian people today what Auschwitz is to the Jews. The extermination of the Armenian people was so vast and rapidly committed that Hitler himself referenced it while preparing the Holocaust. It was only 24 years after the Armenian Genocide that the next dictator was preparing to unleash the hell of genocide upon Europe once again. And just as with the Turks, the Nazis were simply expanding upon what their predecessors had done before them. 

Six million Jews would pay with their lives for what Hitler had unleashed upon Europe. My ancestors were taken into the mountains and shot by Hitler's dogs in Croatia. Like the Armenians who were marched away from their homes to die, my ancestors looked back upon their village and knew that they would never return home again. From their blood, from those who clung to life in our darkest hour, I'm here today. 

The suffering of my people was the playbook from which dictators like Idi Amin and Pol Pot took their instructions. Acting in the same savage spirit that had inspired hellish acts like that of the Holocaust and the Armenian Genocide, these modern heathens unleashed genocides across the world. In Cambodia about a quarter of the population would perish as Pol Pot recreated the crimes committed by the Germans in Namibia. Idi Amin, who admitted to adoring Hitler, attempted to recreate the Holocaust as he plunged Uganda into a hell from which it has yet to recover from. 

Genocide has been looked upon by governments as the perfect crime because it is supposed to destroy the "problem" at it's root. Yet there are always those who survive. There are always those who watch the crimes and record them in their hearts and souls. These survivors and onlookers are the ones who refuse to let the sins of the past die in the killing fields. And thus, genocide for all it's absolutes, is never a crime that is easily forgotten. 

It is a crime that breeds more of it's own horrific acts in every generation to follow. In cases like that of Rwanda there is the immediate threat of the victimized community retaliating, and thus perpetrating genocide, once the killing stops. The bitterness that remains once the killings end is the seed that genocide sows wherever and whenever genocide occurs. If it does not obtain fruition in one culture it will seek out another in which to grow. It knows and respects no borders society has attempted to create. Every society is vulnerable to it's lures. 

And this is where we are today in Syria.

The brink of allowing one genocide to breed another. 

A War With No Victors

Assad watched other dictators across the Middle East get away with the very sins he has committed. It was only in recent history that Assad has seen tyrants fall to the hangman's knot. And therefore it may be this reality of repercussions for his actions that keeps the dictator clinging to power. He has nowhere left to run. His followers have nowhere left to cast their support. The battle lines are so deeply drawn that there is no crossing over. There will be no forgiveness, there will be no repentance, this is a fight to the death.

It is in the rigidness of Syria's war that the end has already been made clear. An end that will find both sides defeated in their own ways. Syria has no prize for the conquerors. It has nothing left to offer the side that claims victory. For this is a war that will have no victor. 

Far too much blood has been spilled by the true owners of Syria, it's citizenry. Too many young lives have been altered so drastically that there is no walking their hearts and minds back to civility. Young Syrians will now watch as others return home to families that they no longer have themselves. They will be left with the bitterness that comes with seeing a world move on as they remain in hell. Far too much has been taken from the true owners of Syria's hope... it's youth has been bled out. 

The rebels may be the lesser of two evils in this fight. But they are not the heroes. That is a title that they will never be able to claim. For there have been far too many innocent lives lost as their militants pulled triggers and planted bombs that should have never been. Their excesses have stripped them of any praise that civilized man could have ever offered. It is in their sins that they have been found unworthy of any support.

This brings us to the final point of this long winded method of asking...

If the rebels in Syria do manage to win their war and commit even more retaliatory reprisals against the Alawite minority, will their supporters call these acts genocide?

Just as not all Sunni Muslims have offered their support to the rebels (thus marking themselves for reprisals too), not all Alawites have offered their support to Assad's regime. Yet the genocide that has seen Assad targeting Sunni civilians has bred deep animosity against the Alawites as a whole. And it has already been made clear that the rebels exercise little restraint when claiming Alawite areas. They have often been recorded as targeting Alawite civilians trapped by the sudden shift in power. 

In areas where the population is considered traditionally loyal to Assad, the rebels have done little to stop elements of their forces from savagely attacking the unarmed populace. This occurs in all wars as attacking soldiers take casualties and find themselves unable to directly attack the enemy soldiers. It has always been the civilians who suffer the hatred that feeds the will to fight on both sides. Yet when it comes to the rebels these crimes are rarely admitted by their fiercely loyal followers and supporters online. 

Thus we ask once again... If the rebels do win, and they begin targeting supposed supporters of the old regime, will there be the same "humanitarian" outcry by supporters? 

The ground has already been prepared for the next genocide in Syria. Rebels, engulfed by bitterness and hatred, stand ready to commit massacres of their own in the absence of an enemy regime. Civilians who have been told that their neighbors supported the man who killed their families stand prepared to accept that these traitors deserve to die. All the elements are there. The ground has been salted in such a way that nothing but more genocidal acts can grow here. 

So when the rebels, who many of you reading this have so adamantly supported, do openly commit crimes against humanity... will you scream?

“…the Armenian massacre was the greatest crime of the war, and the failure to act against Turkey is to condone it… the failure to deal radically with the Turkish horror means that all talk of guaranteeing the future peace of the world is mischievous nonsense…”

~ Theodore Roosevelt, 1918 

In 1918 Theodore Roosevelt pointed out to the world what they all seemed to be missing as the fog of war began to clear. For all the deaths that had occurred there were still those that the world was ignoring. For all the governments that the world was punishing after the war, there was still one that remained free of society's outrage for it's crimes against humanity. 

In Syria there are still deaths that remain unanswered for. There are still factions within this war that remain free from the outrage of civilized society for their crimes against all of humanity. This is not a war where there is anyone left untainted by the blood that has been spilled. Each and every war criminal deserves to be dragged out and punished upon the world stage. And the fact that anyone who claims to be a "humanitarian" would turn a blind eye to one side while being so partisan as to attack the other... that is why genocide and crimes against humanity go unpunished today. The apathy of good men.

Occupied And Exploited

The Silent Genocide Of Ogaden
(Voiceless series)

Endless Suffering 

Time has shown that an occupying force has few options outside of military force and the endless committing of war crimes while attempting to subjugate native populations. No matter how beneficial the relationship may seem at first, the desire for self determination and self governance will rise to the surface when oppressive foreign rule is applied. Once these aspirations manifest the occupying force will rapidly find themselves unable to cling to power without compromising their ethics (if ever there could be while occupying another peoples' land). Mass arrests often slide into mass executions. What happens behind jail walls then often makes it's way out into the streets. And with one death comes an ocean of blood. One drop must be paid for with another.

When the Italians took possession of the Ogaden region of Ethiopia their military conquest was meant to, rather perversely, rebuild a Roma Empire of sorts. Just as with the first Romans in Africa, the Italians took what they wanted and killed those who dared to try and hold onto their resources. The native peoples of Ogaden were not regarded as equals to the invading Italians but rather treated as slaves in their own homeland. Anything that could be used to benefit Italy was taken at will.

This exploitation by Italy came to an end as Mussolini's fascist rule fell to the allied forces of World War Two. Yet the colonialist minds of Europe did not dare to leave Africa's resources to her own people. Instead the British stepped in and took control of Ogaden's resources and people. Just as with the Italians, the Brits plundered what they wanted and killed those they didn't. Resistance was met with the same oppressive methods used against any other native peoples that England had encountered all around the world.

European conquest of the world has been defined by the exploitation of native peoples and their natural resources. In Africa the idea that the Europeans were somehow bringing the native peoples out of the stone age and into the modern age was encouraged just as it had been in the Americas. The white European occupier was painted in Europe as bringing civilization to undeveloped people who just happened to be black. This allowed a disturbing, and racially based, rationale for the crimes against humanity committed by European colonial powers.

In Ogaden this conquest was further complicated by the lack of foresight shown by European colonial powers as they carved up the map of Africa. When Britain decided to consolidate power in the region they made plans to annex Ogaden into Ethiopia (a well controlled region of British influence). In 1954 the Brits forcibly annexed Ogaden into Ethiopia, thus keeping it out of reach of Somalia to the East. This permitted Britain the opportunity to dissolve a portion of it's empire and lessen the cost of controlling the region through military force.

Today Ogaden's largely ethnic Somali population (around 8 million) cling to existence rather than living. They have survived European conquest, a Soviet backed invasion, countless armed and unarmed uprisings, endless war, and Ethiopia's oppressive occupation. Their villages have been destroyed routinely. Their men and boys have been subjected to mass arrests and executions. Their women and children are vulnerable to rape, torture, and violent deaths of all sorts. Today Ogaden's native population faces what many might call ethnic cleansing... what Alder's Ledge would call genocide.

Why Genocide?

Genocide is defined as:

Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948) as "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."

Every time the word genocide makes it's first appearance in a conversation there is a rapid reaction amongst many to cringe. Images of death camps in Poland or streets filled with dead bodies in Rwanda come to mind. So it is needless to say that the word itself as certain emotional responses. Yet it is the legal liability the word carries that makes governments across the world uneasy when using the word. For if and when it is applied to a humanitarian crisis there are supposed to be very clear and decisive actions taken to stop it. This is, after all, the UN's legal response to what was an emotional response to the Holocaust... our promise of "never again".

In a perfect world application of the word genocide to such events would trigger an immediate response. In a perfect world there wouldn't be a need for such a vile word in the first place. Yet it is precisely the lack of response to every genocide (both recognized and unrecognized) since the Holocaust that has led to a lack of concern by those who perpetrate it. Impunity for their actions has led to a certain level of comfort for those who would exercise such heinous crimes.

For the regime in Ethiopia the practice of committing endless crimes against the people of Ogaden has been reinforced by the responses given by the outside world. When Ethiopia uses the excuse of "fighting the war on terror" they are given a pass for destroying entire villages. When the government in Ethiopia refuses to allow journalists access by labeling them terrorists the outside world looks the other way. These two responses alone create a vacuum in which Ethiopia's military is allowed to operate without criticism or accountability.

With impunity for their actions the government of Ethiopia has allowed it's military (of which nearly half occupies Ogaden) to utilize Ogaden's people as slave labor, kill civilians at will, commit forced evictions, demolish homes and villages, rape and torture, and otherwise keep Ogaden under Ethiopian control. Each of these actions can easily be classified as "crimes against humanity" by even the most casual of observers. These crimes can then be further scrutinized, and with intent proven, only to be labeled for what they are: acts of genocide.

The forced removal of villagers from their homes falls under the legal perimeters of genocide itself. The intent is obvious once looked at and can only be justified through the targeting of the villagers due to their ethnicity and perceived nationality. Since Ethiopia's military does not treat the Ogaden people in the same way as they do other Ethiopians, nationality is part of this discriminatory and exploitative practice. Their Somali ethnicity is on the other hand the major reason as to why Ethiopia's leadership shows no remorse or intent upon reconciling their actions with the people of Ogaden.

The mass arrests, the use of torture, rape, and especially the executions of ethnic Somali civilians all also contribute to the classification of the greater crime here as genocide. Each of these crimes either directly or indirectly lend themselves to the completion of ethnic cleansing (a form of genocide) within the Ogaden region of Ethiopia. Through mass arrest, torture, and outright killings of ethnic Somalis the government weakens the targeted community and creates areas in Ogaden where life is made impossible.

Within areas of occupation by Ethiopian military forces the conditions to which the people of the Ogaden are subjected can only be described as; "inflicting on the group living conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction in part or in whole..." This is made evident through Ethiopia's policy of confiscating livestock and other necessities that the native population must have to survive in Ogaden's desert climate. Access to natural resources vital to survival, such as water and grazing lands, is also deliberately hindered by Ethiopia's military presence in Ogaden. Conditions are only made more dire by Ethiopia's denial of adequate access to healthcare and humanitarian aid across the region.

When the sum of Ethiopia's crimes against the people of Ogaden are all put together there is reason to believe that Ethiopia's regime intends to either push the Ogaden Somalis out or drastically decrease their population. But why?

As with most genocides throughout history, those perpetrating this one utilize ethnic hatred to gain access to profit. In this case it is the exploitation of Ogaden's oil reserves. The fact that the Ogaden Somali community happens to set atop that oil does not seem to deter the leaders of Ethiopia. By killing the ethnic Somali community they gain both profit and rid themselves of an ethnic group they perceive to be undesirable.

The Cost Of Ogaden's Oil

The native population of any colonized area always pay the price for the gains made by the colonial power. Their quality of life, their national or social aspirations, their very existence; all of these are placed into question as the exploitation of their community and property is carried out. The lives they could have had are all stolen from them by the greed and lust of the occupier. Those dreams that all mankind has are all placed out of reach by the exploitation they suffer. 

Oil could had been a blessing to the desperately impoverished region. It could had been used to lift the Ogaden Somali community out of life of just surviving from day to day. But alas it has been made a curse for those who rightfully have claim to it. 

With international oil companies pouring into the region the quality of life has been made worse for Ogaden's Somali community. Ethiopia defends the so called "right" of these oil giants to take what they want as long as Ethiopia's government profits from it. To maintain this source of income the government has utilized genocide and other crimes against humanity to assure their flow of cash survives. 

For the Somali community in Ogaden this means that life itself is not guaranteed from one day to the next. This has led to thousands of Ogaden's Somali community seeking refuge in Kenya, South Africa, and Yemen. Fleeing their homeland has become a better option for some than to stay and die at the hands of Ethiopian soldiers. 

This is the cost of oil in Ethiopia's Ogaden region. Each drop of petrol from the area is matched by the pools of blood spilled getting them. And yet, while Ogaden's Somali community pays in blood, the outside world has yet to ask if this price is worth "cheap gasoline". 

Source Documents
(not all listed)

MLA of South Africa
http://www.mlajhb.com/ogaden-docket

UNPO
http://www.unpo.org/article/16791

Somaliland Sun
http://somalilandsun.com/index.php/regional/4832-ethiopia-how-foreign-oil-companies-annihilated-the-lives-of-ordinary-african-population-in-ogaden-region-

UN.org
https://www.un.org/en/preventgenocide/adviser/pdf/osapg_analysis_framework.pdf

The Elephant's Crushing Weight

India's Attempts To Subdue Kashmir

Indian police officers arrest a Kashmiri boy protesting during curfew in Srinagar, India, Saturday, July 20, 2013. (AP Photo/Dar Yasin)

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/07/20/3511480/the-daily-edit-072113.html#storylink=cpy

It is the long held tradition in human history that given members of society have painted conflicts in the light of an oppressor (aggressor) and the underdog. Yet in most fights that have taken place throughout history there has rarely been a clear cut aggressor and a pure victim. When the facts are laid out there are often reasons for why and how a conflict has played out. The side that has had the upper hand is rarely as evil as the sympathetic onlooker might paint them. And likewise, the apparently victimized side is rarely innocent in the overall scheme of the conflict.

This generalization of war can be applied to most conflicts between organized states. A certain level of antagonism takes place as the two sides size one another up like grade school boys. The larger one generally attempts to flaunt it's muscles like a bull pacing the fence. While the smaller challenger more often than not just tries to save face as it puffs up it's chest and prepares to attempt to outlast it's foe. It is this simplistic approach to generalizing war between states that can be given to outdated battles and wars of days now past. It can't however be applied to modern crises where a third party finds themselves trapped between old world style conflicts.

In Kashmir the third party happens to be the people who lived upon the land prior to the development of the two rivaling states. They are an innocent bystander in a conflict that places two egotistical foes against one another. Leaving the Kashmiri people trapped between two sides that so selfishly utilize the land and it's people as pawns in a power struggle from which no one will ever benefit.

In a simplified version of war the Kashmiri people just simply wouldn't exist. Either they would be Pakistani or Indian. And that bloody, densely militarized, zone of "control" would be void of life. That would be the portrayal of war with which the Western world is familiar. A landscape of no-man's lands where only the dogs of war dare stray.

But Kashmir isn't a land of burnt foliage and bomb craters. It is a land of rich and deep heritage that fills the Kashmiri people to the brim. It is a land where dusty roads and green trees hide in the shadows of looming mountains. It is a land of picturesque waters dotted with houseboats and old men wasting the days away at the water's edge. And yet for all it's beauty, Kashmir is also a land where Islam and Hinduism have been forced to violently butt their heads like rams.

This struggle is one in which the two sides, India and Pakistan, are forced to hold their positions while keeping the Kashmiri people in check. To do so India has relied upon some of the most heinous of atrocities and tactics to keep the will of a broken nation beneath it's heel.

Holding The Line

Violently

Unending Ambush

From the moment the British left the Kashmir valley has been plagued by death and destruction. This bitter legacy of bloody hands on both sides has left the valley divided and distributed amongst three glutenous countries. The hellish fighting that led up to this modern "cease fire" culminated in countless stalemates. In the end the main scar that has remained upon the land itself is the "Line of Control" (LOC), or "Asia's Berlin Wall". 

Much like Korea's divide, Kashmir's scar is pot-marked with guns, soldiers, tanks, planes, and anything that can kill. Most horrifically however are the weapons that don't simply walk away if the war was ended tomorrow. One silent killer, the ever present stalker, will live well past the end of Kashmir's divide. The landmine. 

Placed by the two brutal armies of India and Pakistan, the landmine is a weapon that is impossible to keep track of and contain. In Kashmir these weapons of war have, as they always do, killed an maimed countless civilians as the two armies place the blame on the opposite side. And yet regardless of who places them, these weapons continue to claim more lives even when relative peace is established along the LOC.

Landmines are a weapon that have long been utilized due to their ability to hinder the advancement or movement of an enemy combatant. Yet with every weapon there are trade offs that the military often callously labels as "collateral damage". For the landmine the trade off is the inability of the device to determine who exactly it is about to kill once the bomb becomes active. It has no ability to determine if the victim is a fully armed combatant or just a child running past. Either way, the damage is unable of being stopped once the weapon has been triggered. And it is for this reason that the landmine is often deployed... there is no escape. 

For the civilian population along the LOC in Kashmir the threat of landmines lingers well after the threat of war has passed. In 2002 the area was flooded with landmines as India and Pakistan began to prepare for open conflict over the disputed region. India is believed to have placed just over 200 thousand landmines in the area along the LOC in Jammu region alone as a response to the Pakistani troop surge along there. One can only guess as to how many more were placed in Kashmir as the Indian Army prepared for invasion along the LOC fences in the Kashmir region. 

Today the Indian Army claims to have cleared at least 80% of the landmines it placed in 2002 when it prepared for a war that fizzled out. However in 2007 a rash of landmine explosions plagued the Jammu region as wildfires, cattle, and civilians all triggered the deadly sentinels. This outbreak of death and destruction highlighted the fact that (then) 16,000 acres of mine-affected land in Jammu and 173,000 acres in Kashmir were still extremely lethal killing fields. 

India currently, as it has for the past decade, resisted identifying ares afflicted with mines and disclosing just how many mines it has laid along the LOC. Instead of warning civilians in the region, India allows civilians to live in afflicted areas so as to conceal the locations from Pakistani intelligence. This means that India permits innocent civilians to be maimed and killed by it's mines so as to hide the locations from an enemy it has yet to openly fight. 

In 1997 the world was given the Mine Ban Treaty. 158 countries became signatories to an international agreement that would officially ban the use and maintaining of landmines and mine fields. India and Pakistan have refused to sign the treaty (along with Russia and China). Despite 40% of the signatories showing that you can sign the treaty and simply create laws of your own to permit domestic use of mines, India refuses to sign the treaty.

Instead India continues to place hundreds of thousands of it's four to five million mines along the LOC dividing line. Instead of taking a step toward peace, India continues to place these gatekeepers to hell along the LOC. With no regard to the safety of the Kashmiri civilians, India actively places and maintains it's landmines in Kashmir. 

Striking At The Soul Of Kashmir

February, 1991 a detachment of Indian soldiers in Kunan Poshpura, Kashmir gang-rape at least 53 Kashmiri women. Accounts of this incident are varied in numbers. Witnesses to the crime have at times disappeared. And those who dare speak out are routinely threatened or made to be quite by the Indian military. 

Officially, according to the Indian government, the mass gang-rape in Kunan Poshpura did not happen. Despite countless credible accounts and documented evidence of the crime, India's government refuses to investigate or hold the soldiers accountable. Like so many other such cases the Indian government has taken a stance of silence in the face of absolute barbarism. 

You only have to step far enough back to realize that rape cases like this one are not spontaneous acts of sexual deviancy perpetrated by hormone driven savages. To rape 53 (possibly more) women a group of men must have the apparent authority over their victims and/or the threat of immediate death to subdue their victims. The crime must be organized and orchestrated in such a manner as to prevent the act from being interrupted or discovered at the time it is being perpetrated. The victims must be restrained or confined in such a manner as to keep the assailants from sustaining bodily harm while inflicting it upon the victims. And the officials in charge must be informed of the crime so as not to end it unintentionally.

These are obviously sanctioned crimes in the fact that they are rarely if ever punished by the government or military itself. The fact that they are targeted at communities that have shown resistance to the weight of India's government upon the backs of the Kashmiri people. Where signs of resistance emerge the use of rape as a weapon has often followed in India's occupied areas of Kashmir. Thus it is undeniable that this crime is not only directed and encouraged but an intrinsic part of the Indian strategy to demoralize the Kashmiri people. 

In war the use of rape is usually defined as a method of conducting psychological warfare. Many voices on the use of rape as a weapon often state that its use is meant to inflict pain on the targeted society by humiliating and shaming the community at large. It is also classified by the United Nations, in accordance to the relationship to it and the conflict at large, as either an act of war, crime against humanity, war crime, or a constitutive act with regards to genocide. Thus meaning that it's intent is in direct relation with the intended outcome of the crime genocide given the nature of the Indian occupation of Kashmir itself.

“It has probably become more dangerous to be a woman than a soldier in armed conflict.”

~ Major-General Patrick Cammaert, former UN Peacekeeper Commander DRC

One of the most horrific aspects of the rapes being committed by India's troops is the tragic affects they have on the community at large. Punishing the men by forcing them to watch and punishing the women though it's application; rape destroys the community at as a whole. Even when the women are killed in mass after being gang-raped (sometimes dieing during the attacks) the mental wounds are permanently affixed to the victimized community. Children who have had to see their parents made helpless, having to see their sister and mothers raped, do not forget these grotesque crimes.

In Bosnia the scars that were left behind due to the extensive application of rape as a weapon have remained open for decades after the genocide there. Cambodia's rape victims were even more ignored as the genocide there came to a close and Vietnamese troops began to apply rape during their advances into Cambodia. The crime was even less mentioned or recognized as we go back to World War Two and see how Japan's victims were marginalized as the Japanese were removed from their occupied territories (especially Nanjing).

One can only attempt to imagine what nearly 60 years of rape in Kashmir will leave upon the fabric of Kashmiri society. Entire generations have grown up in a time and place where rape has been an ever lingering threat hanging over their heads. Women, girls, and even boys have been victimized in ways that the Delhi government has refused to recognize or even prosecute.

The Mouse Under A Box

Crimes committed against an entire community are crimes that cannot be forgiven by the individual. These are crimes that if left unaddressed will continually come to the surface, and often violently. The urge to fight back against an aggressor is a motivation that will persist even after the aggressor has ended their attacks. It is for this reason that India's persistent application of brutal means of oppression only serve to fill the lungs of Kashmiri youth with screams... bloody cries of resistance. 

It can be compared to a mouse trapped beneath the weight of a box. Unable to move on it's own the mouse will continue to gasp for air as the box pushes each breath from it's lungs. Slowly suffering from asphyxiation the mouse will fight for each next breath as it twists and turns to find an advantageous position from which to draw it's next breath. The fight wears at the muscles as oxygen slips away and the trapped mouse uses more strength to push back against the crushing weight upon it's back. Yet despite all this the fight continues on and on as the mouse flares it's nostrils and attempts to find each next breath. 

If the weight on a people becomes so oppressive that they risk losing the very things they rely upon to bond them to one another, such as culture and shared customs; the people will push back. Even if the fight they choose is nothing more than pelting their aggressors with rocks; the people will find a way to fill their lives with a purpose... a common struggle... and a reason to take that next breath. 

For Kashmir the oppressive heel of the Indian government cannot keep them from pushing back against their oppressor's weight. They are a resilient people, a proud people, and despite all the atrocious acts committed against them; they are a people still united.

Want to learn more or reply to the author? 

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Source Documents:
*Not all sources listed

Greater Kashmir
http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Sep/16/day-2-kashmir-shuts-against-civilian-killings-27.asp
http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Sep/16/south-kashmir-townships-under-curfew-for-9th-day-28.asp

Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/09/13/323771/fresh-clashes-erupt-in-kashmir/
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/09/15/324125/kashmir-rape-victims-await-justice/

Kashmir Media Service
http://www.kmsnews.org/news/2013/09/15/kashmiris-being-brutalised-mirwaiz-petitions-envoys.html

Global Times
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/784243.shtml#.Uji-57ypYXw

Kashmir Times
http://www.kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=22791

Leave Nothing Behind

Rape, Pillage, and Plunder
(Part of The Darkness Visible series)

(The Defiant Ones)

In Myanmar's northern Kachin state there is a war that seems to never end. Generations of ethnic Kachin have come and gone as the war clouds continue to break up just enough to let a little hope in. Then just as the light of peace begins to shine down upon them, Burma's savage military darkens the sky with mortars and lights up the darkness with machine gun fire. For those who become trapped by the all encompassing hell that is this war the promise of peace is a faint memory now that the fighting has begun once more.

The level of brutality that the Kachin face as the Burmese military pushes them toward the border was once undocumented. It was intentionally kept from prying eyes as the Burmese pushed the Kachin refugees just within sight of the nation's borders. Yet today the barbarism that Myanmar has been practicing in the Kachin state can be hid no more.

The use of "black zones", established rape camps, mass executions, and slave labor have all been exposed as the most savage weapons that Myanmar has used against the Kachin people. These methodical tools of death have left the Kachin as a people without a homeland. When allowed to enter their lands they are treated as outsiders. In the few gaps of peace they have endured under Burma's regime the threat of these abuses has always lingered over their heads. Today these tools of war are back out and being used upon the killing fields that Thein Sein's military has prepared upon Kachin lands.

(Upon their backs, this war is fought. (Bodenham/AFP/Getty Images))

Black Zones

 The killers in black zones aren't always walking around stalking the prey. In these "no man's land" areas the most prolific killer doesn't even carry a gun. Instead it is buried just beneath the surface. Weeds and flowers can often grow up around it covering and concealing it's location. Yet once stepped upon this grotesque mangler of men arises in a ghastly eruption of sheer violence. 

Landmines kill and wound more civilians than any other form of explosive brought upon the battle field in the Burma's embattled northern states. These horrific weapons are the cornerstones of Burma's fatal grip upon lands where they have pushed ethnic minorities out. Through unrestricted placement the weapons make fields of death where crops once grew. Wherever they are placed they stay and wait to either be disarmed or detonated... there is nothing in-between the two.

Women and children who disperse at the sound of approaching soldiers are often the victims of these gruesome weapons. If they attempt to return to find anyone or anything the threat of military patrols, snipers, and the ever present landmine linger. Those who survive are left with scars, missing limbs, and trauma that plays itself out in their minds and dreams. 

Those who cannot flee the violence are treated as combatants regardless of their age or sex. Women and girls are traded as sexual slaves amongst the Burmese military till they are either killed or discarded. Men and boys are used as slave laborers if they are not first killed or killed after. Yet for the most part Kachin are able to flee since the Burmese military is slow and noisy in attempts to scare potential enemies off. 

Yet for all the Burmese military has to offer in these "conflict" (genocide) zones, the Kachin people also have to worry about rebel groups. Atrocities have been recorded on both sides of the battle lines. However for the most part the threat to Kachin civilians is not the gun or the bullet but once again the indiscriminate use of landmines by the rebel groups. 

Had this one weapon of war not been used there would be more Kachin men, women, and children alive today. Had the two sides refrained from this one form of barbarism there would be more children growing up today with parents, with all their limbs, without the trauma of watching people explode. Without this tool of torment the lives of hundreds of thousands of Kachin civilians would be better today. 

Of course the war would still be going on. The stubbornness of Myanmar's military regime and it's genocidal ambitions would not let the war end simply because mines were removed. Yet the ability of relief workers and aid agencies to reach the wounded would be drastically increased. Though the war would have continued to grind the Kachin peoples' hearts and souls the ability to provide hope would be much more available without the threat of landmines all across Northern Burma. 

Without the landmine the "black zones" would had been far more difficult to sustain. Without the ability to maim their victims endlessly the Burmese military would have had to extend itself far wider than it has. The demoralizing factor of endless war would have been far more affective had the landmine not filled the role of sentry on the lonely battle field. 

Yet all that is hard to prove and difficult to believe since we will never know for certain. All we know now is that Burma is continuing to use these black zones and supports them with continued placement of landmines across embattled regions. The silent killer that maims countless civilians remains upon the battlefield and new ones continue to join them there everyday. 

(The Most Vulnerable Victims Of War (Credit AP))

The Weapon Of Sex

In the Kachin State last June there were 18 reported rapes (some resulting in murder of the victim) committed by Myanmar's military against Kachin women. This was initially reported as an "up tick" in such sexual violence during the surge of battle in the Kachin State. However, with the continued violence that initial report has proven to be the least amount of such sexual violence that the Kachin women and girls could expect for the remaining duration of this genocide. 

Refugees across the region have reported either witnessing or being the victims of rape committed by the Burmese military. Their stories routinely indicate the use of gang rapes and organized rape camps by the Burmese soldiers. This form of torment, though at times ending in death, is meant to inflict generational scars upon the victims. And though the stories of survivors it is evident that the intent of the crime is not just effective but growing in the Kachin State. 

Rape as a weapon was well documented in Bosnia. The effects of the crime have been shown to last well after the genocide has been completed. No matter what the remaining portion of the victims life might bring, the rape at the hands of an enemy is both a personal and communal offense. If the woman is able to block the pain from her own mind the community often cannot. And regardless of the time that passes, the shame associated with the rape itself appears to linger in such a way that it can often be passed onto the next generation. 

In Bosnia rape was used to provide a cheap moral boost to the perverted ranks of the Serb militias. It offered the soldiers a chance to release their sexual desires while harnessing their aggression. The aggression came into the equation since rape is never simply about sex but also engages the desire of the attacker to dominate their victim. It then results into a barbaric display of sexualized violence that personalizes the entirety of the overall conflict and places the burden of the war upon the victim's flesh and spirit. 

For the Burmese military the use of rape as a weapon has been no different in the Kachin than it was for the Serbs in Bosnia. The delusion of "diluting the blood" of the ethnic minority still persist in Burmese soldiers as they target Kachin women in particular. The desire to inflict a lasting pain upon the targeted community is then personalized in such a way that the Kachin woman will bare the weight of societies hatred alone. She becomes powerless in a way that Burma's government would wish to apply to the Kachin people at large. 

The effects of rape upon the victim, their family, and community are the added bonus for the perverted society which perpetrates and harnesses this weapon. The scars that are affixed to the victim's flesh, spirit, and mind are the consequences that motivate generals to encourage the use of rape as a weapon of war. It is why the use of rape has been so prolific during broader acts of genocide. 

The Anchor Leg 

For over five decades the Kachin people have been running from these atrocities. Their parents, their grandparents, have run from these battles. Children have grown up and given birth to the next generation of battlefield children. Entire generations have grown up either displaced or continually running from battles imposed upon them by a government that was supposed to represent them. 

This endless war has been the anchor leg for a people that simply want the right to self-determination. They do not want to have their culture, their people, and their way of life taken from them at gun point. The only offense they have ever committed has been to cling to the desire to live free... to live in the way their ancestors had... to live upon the lands that their ancestors had fought to preserve for them. 

For five decades the world has looked away as the Kachin have struggled to cling to the fringes of Burmese society. For five decades the world has ignored the defiance in the voice of the Kachin people as they demand to be treated as humans and not the beasts of burden that Myanmar would make of them. Now they cling to existence as a supposedly reformed government commits the same sins against them that the last one did. Now they wait for the eyes of the world to turn to them, to open up our ears to listen to their cries, and see what they have suffered at the hands of tyrants. 

Once we have seen what they have had to bare under the heel of Myanmar will we look away? Will their cries have fallen upon deaf ears? Or will our hearts open to these oppressed and weary people? 

There are people who are working to bring relief to the Kachin people. Two of the organizations that most directly provide aid to the Kachin are Partners Relief and Development and The Free Burma Rangers. These two organizations provide for the Kachin people a sense of hope that shines through the dark clouds of war that continue to linger over the Kachin State. 

Alder's Ledge as an organization (small as we might be) openly donates to Partners Relief and Development through the pocketbook of the main author here. We donate monthly to the Arakan Relief to aid the Rohingya people. However we urge anyone who is reading this to visit the Partner's website and do your research. Then search your soul and decide how and if you would like to donate to their efforts. 

To donate directly to the Kachin you can select Partner's "Kachin Relief" in the donation tab. 

Doing this will allow you to join the Kachin in their anchor leg. It allows you to partner with the Kachin people and help ease their burden more directly than simply sending your best wishes. It gives you the chance to come alongside the Kachin people and take up a portion of their burden. It allows you to give them comfort in a time when they need it most. 

Want to do more? 

Scream for the Kachin people. By lending your voice to their cause you can spread awareness and increase the possibility that even more people will partner with the Kachin people. Your voice can bring more people into the race to save Kachin lives and ease their pain and suffering. 

All you have to do is share Partner's website and the stories you will find there. You can also share articles found here on Alder's Ledge on your social media outlets. This simple act can help you scream in such a way that those around you (and around the world) will have the chance to hear about the plight of the Kachin people. 

Still want to do more? 

Consider volunteering with Partners Relief and Development. By lending your skills, your talents, and your two hands to the cause you can help in ways that you might not imagine possible. It may very well get you into the race to help the Kachin people, literally.

Want to learn more about this issue or others covered by Alder's Ledge?

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Source Documents 

(note: not all sources listed)

IRIN Asia

http://www.irinnews.org/report/93822/myanmar-military-guilty-of-rape-activists-say 

Burma News International 

http://www.bnionline.net/index.php/news/kng/16116-burma-army-plunder-abandoned-kachin-farms.html 

http://www.bnionline.net/index.php/news/kng/16119-burmese-authorities-block-evacuating-kachin-war-refugees.html

Radio Free Asia

http://www.bnionline.net/index.php/news/kng/16116-burma-army-plunder-abandoned-kachin-farms.html

Times Colonist 

http://www.timescolonist.com/news/world/in-myanmar-s-north-a-persecuted-minority-dreams-of-canadian-style-federalism-1.615903

Kachin News

http://www.kachinnews.com/news/2557-burma-army-troops-plunder-abandoned-kachin-farms.html

http://www.kachinnews.com/news/2558-burmese-authorities-block-evacuating-kachin-war-refugees.html

http://www.kachinnews.com/news/2555-more-than-100-kachin-villagers-trapped-near-putao-after-heavy-fighting.html

Free Burma Rangers

http://www.freeburmarangers.org/reports/

http://www.freeburmarangers.org/2012/01/30/villager-shot-and-beaten-to-death-on-christmas-eve-as-burma-army-continues-to-oppress-people-in-northern-karen-state-2/

Asia Times

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/MB18Ae01.html

The Epoch Times

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/world/burmas-kachin-people-in-crisis-318035.html

Romanticized Barbarism

Sexual Violence As A Means Of Ethnic Cleansing
(Open Eyes series)

For as long as there has been war amongst nations of men the use of sexual violence as a method of breaking the will to fight of an opponent has been present on the battle field. As with all other forms of military excesses, rape and sexual violence have always been the burden of noncombatants and civilians. Women and children who have been unable to flee the advancing troops of an attacking army have always been the most targeted group of victims for sexual deviancy amongst soldiers and commandants. Their vulnerability, the lack of meaningful defenses, has always left these victims susceptible to rape, sexual slavery, forced marriages, and sexual mutilation.

This brutal reality of war is exactly why the international community created laws to prohibit such actions amongst the signatories of these laws. Nations who have wanted aid and trade agreements with members of these agreements have often been forced to agree to the conditions of existing laws and treaties that state the nature of such atrocities as being illegal and punishable through economic sanctions and judicial reprisals. Sadly however the reality of ethnic conflict and the wars that have spawned from such situations has not reflected the legal ramifications of such agreements. Sri Lanka is just such a case.

A Peace More Brutal Than War

On May 19Th of 2009 the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (aka: Tamil Tigers) were defeated by the Sri Lankan Military. The world watched as Sri Lanka promised to bring about peace across the country now that the Tamil Tigers had been militarily defeated. For the West it was a chance to applaud Sri Lanka for what many European countries and the United States referred to as "demonstrating restraint" in victory. The naive notion that Sri Lanka was going to allow the Tamil people to once again live in peace alongside Sinhalese people was prevalent amongst the US and EU. What little concern there was for the political prisoners, concentration camp inmates, and displaced civilians was quickly forgotten as Sri Lanka made one false promise after another. 

The forgotten people of the war was ironically the very people many outsiders viewed as the cause for the war, the Tamil people. These were the people who continued to suffer as "peace" ground their community down under the weight of Sri Lanka's political agendas. Retaliation and reprisals against Tamil civilians had not nor would not end with the coming of so called peace. Instead, police and other security forces took over the role that Sri Lanka's military had played in committing vast atrocities against the Tamil civilian population.

Home invasions, mass arrests, and police harassment began immediately in areas where Tamils had been seen by Sri Lankan officials as supporting the Tamil Tigers. Collective punishment became the trademark of Sri Lanka's politicians. It was the marching orders for police as they swept through Tamil neighborhoods casting a broad net. 

For the Tamil people what followed May of 2009 was a peace more brutal than war. The actions used by Sri Lankan military personnel to crush their will to resist were being ramped up as though to boast the hollow victory. People who had lost everything to two decades of war were now expected to surrender their dignity as well. 

Sodomy and Genital Mutilation

When male combatants are taken by enemy soldiers they naturally expect some abuse. For most it these expectations are limited to verbal and mild physical abuse. A kick or jab of the fists is as much physical contact one might expect. At worst the defeated soldier might expect to be shot or stabbed to death. Sexual violence is usually not the first thing one might fear from an enemy.

It is even more unexpected when the person being taken into custody is a civilian. People in our Western world would be appalled by any form to sexual misconduct by police, military, or government official. We only have to look back at Abu Ghraib to note that, at very least, many in American society find it disturbing and disgusting for our men and women in uniform to use sex as a method of warfare. We here in America typically don't even condone torture (most of us at least). So it would be expected that general outrage would sweep the country if a situation that paralleled the nature of Abu Ghraib had happened to American prisoners here on American soil.

For Tamil men who are rounded up by Sri Lankan security forces this is exactly the sort of thing that they are forced to fear. In Human Rights Watch's "We Will Teach You A Lesson" report the human rights group documents cases of such violence being committed against Tamil men. In a few such cases Tamil men have had sharp needles inserted in their genitals and small metal balls inserted into their urethra. And in each case it has been documented that the security officers have utilized sodomy, rape, genital mutilation, and other sexual acts of violence against Tamil men kept in police custody.

The reason: they are Tamil men accused of, yet not proven to be, supporting the Tamil Tigers.

Yet despite the release of this report in February of 2013 there has been little discussion about these crimes amongst the media, governments, and NGOs across the globe. Even when foreign doctors have had to perform surgery to remove foreign objects from the genitals of Tamil refugees and asylum seekers (thus documenting the crime) the outside world has remained silent.

Despite the ethnicity of the victims being a clear motivation for the heinous crimes being committed against them, these Tamil men are left voiceless by the silence of the outside world. When sexually molested, raped, or sexually tortured these men have few options but to remain silent themselves. By speaking out they risk being ostracized by their own community while making themselves larger targets for other forms of attack by Sri Lankan police. And yet when faced with the reality of why and how these crimes take place the UN and it's member states have refused to take legal actions against the government of Sri Lanka.

Gang Rape And Blindfolds

For Tamil women on the other hand it is almost always expected that sex will be involved when dealing with Sri Lanka's security forces. Whether they are being detained, abducted, or incarcerated long-term; Tamil women are always subjected to some form of sexual violence. The most common however is rape. 

In areas where Sri Lanka wants to drive Tamil civilians out the most prevalent use of sex as a weapon is the abduction of young Tamil women and any lone Tamil woman. Once abducted the victim is taken to either a "black prison" (unofficial detention center) or a local police station where they are raped constantly for days. In addition to rape and gang rapes these victims are sexually tormented by having their breasts and buttocks bitten, burnt, stabbed, and mutilated. Their genital regions are often sodomized and abused even while the official act of rape is not being conducted. This form of sexual abuse can last for days on end, and in some cases weeks. 

Yet it isn't only male Sri Lankan police that conduct such violence against abducted Tamil women and girls. Female Sri Lankan police officers have been reported to have "prepped" the Tamil victims for rape and even taken part in sexual acts of torture on the Tamil victims. These female assailants also are reported to use asphyxiation as a method of subduing a victim by placing plastic bags over the victims' heads till they pass out. 

Once the police are finished with their victim the Tamil women are blindfolded and taken back to their villages or the internally displaced peoples' camp from which they were abducted. The abuse they suffered is apparent by both the wounds inflicted and the infamy the Sri Lankan police have accumulated for themselves.

The guilt and shame that is often associated with such crimes is one of the most lasting scars that these victims will carry. Their nightmares of such events is another. These emotional burdens inevitably drive some victims to self-destruction. While at other times these scars act as constant reminders; reminders that often bring about depression and isolation. 

Once again the outside world has had every opportunity to come along side these victims and rally around them in defense of their basic human rights. With countless organizations documenting the crimes and large international ones like Human Rights Watch releasing documentation on such incidents there can be no meaningful excuse for inaction. After the Bosnian Genocide, in which rape was extensively used as a weapon of genocide, we as a world community did far too little to help the victims. Those that were helped were often given recognition not for the crime itself but for the sad reality that they were the first such victims to receive such attention. Now with Sri Lanka's victims before us the world must ask itself if we can afford to turn away these individuals like we did so many other victims of sexual abuse during times of war and/or ethnic cleansing.

Sex To Survive

One of the most perverse uses of rape as weapon is that when used upon already displaced people. Many of these victims have already been victimized during the conflict and now fact further victimization by so called security personnel. One of the most prolific ways in which sexual abuse is applied by the Sri Lankan security forces in IDP camps and amongst refugees is that of utilizing a perverted practice often referred to as "survival sex". 

Survival sex can most adequately be described as the withholding of basic needs for survival by the authoritarian figure unless sexual services are given in exchange. While some in Sri Lanka's government have accused the victims of prostitution the reality of the sexual violence is that it is committed against them, not by them. Soldiers, police, and government officials in Sri Lanka have all utilized this heinous act of barbarism to fulfill their deviant sexual desires in regions where Tamil families have been displaced. It is so common in fact that Tamil refugees often surprise interviewers by just how easily the topic is addressed in comparison to the what many consider more violent sexual abuses. 

This method becomes efficient in pushing Tamils out of areas by acting upon the nature of the family unit in its desire to safeguard it's youth from sexual and physical abuse. When sex is demanded in exchange for the "right to stay" put in the area it is inevitable that some (and at times, all) Tamil families would prefer to leave rather than have their youth utilized as sexual slaves. At other times when sex is demanded in exchange for food or water the situation is created where Tamil families face illegal actions to obtain such necessities or submit their wives, daughters, or even sons to dehumanizing acts of violence. 

In the end the goal of survival sex is not the obtaining of sexual pleasure but the dehumanizing of the targeted community. It is utilized so as to force the community to pull up its root, no matter how temporary they might be, and move out of a desired location. By attacking the family unit itself instead of the communal bond between families the aggressor aims to destroy the foundation of the targeted society. For this reason violent application of sex in conflict can be seen as objectively aiming for the destruction of a community's unity long term rather than the immediate annihilation of the community itself. It rips away at the fabric of both the community and the structure of the family unit within it. 

No Sex In Violence

Sex in violent conflict has nearly always been a checkpoint on the path to victory for waring states and tribes. From the time of the initial founding of nation states to our modern day the act of rape by soldiers and warriors has far often been overlooked. In the West the act of raping another man or boy has been the line in the sand. It is a point we don't readily accept. Yet we far too often look the other way as our boys in arms still commit violent sexual acts against our enemies. 

This cultural acceptance of sex in war has eroded in recent generations. But for all our moral outrage against the acts we have yet to bring the full weight of justice against those who commit these war crimes. We have in recent years established laws for both ourselves and the international community at large that prohibit the use of sex as a weapon of war. But for all our efforts the act itself has not yet had the full weight of the international community applied to it. 

If we; as a people who value liberty, honor, dignity, and the sanctity of human life, are to end the use of sex as a weapon in both war and peace we must first realize the vigilance it requires. Sri Lanka has unfortunately provided such an opportunity to exercise the vigilance. In cases such as this the world community must be seen as tenacious in our efforts to both end the use of sex as a weapon and ruthless in our efforts to punish those responsible. We must be tireless in our pursuit of justice for all victims of these barbaric acts. 

In the end we must make a break with our romanticized views of war. The aspects of it that our ancestors accepted as necessary evils can no longer be allowed to prevail in our time nor should they be permitted to enter our children's era. Unlike our parents' generation, we have the ability to unite through the technology they made possible. We have the ability to maintain solidarity with the victims through the connections we have forged. All we have to do now is breathe life into the idea that romanticized barbarism has no place in the modern world.

Want to learn more about this topic and others covered by Alder's Ledge?

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Source Documents

(note not all sources are listed)

International Committee of The Red Cross

http://www.icrc.org/customary-ihl/eng/docs/v2_cou_lk_rule150

Human Rights Watch

http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/02/26/sri-lanka-rape-tamil-detainees

http://www.hrw.org/reports/2013/02/26/we-will-teach-you-lesson-0

Tamil News

http://www.tamilnewsnetwork.com/2013/07/15/sri-lanka-rape-and-other-crimes-against-women-on-the-increase/

Women Under Siege Project 

http://www.womenundersiegeproject.org/conflicts/profile/sri-lanka#reasons

Christian Science Monitor 

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Making-a-difference/Change-Agent/2013/0308/Bosnian-woman-helped-make-rape-a-war-crime

The Devil Amongst Us

Going Back To The Devil's Playground
(Devil's Due series)

(one simple hand gesture...)

When President Nixon gave the peace sign as he left the office a lot of Americans cheered. It wasn't because he was well liked or that he had done a good job. It wasn't that America had become a better place due to his leadership. It was simply a show of how much the man had become villain to the people who had elected him into office. It was this show of disgust for the man that made the act of lifting your hands and giving the peace sign a symbol that would give generations flashbacks to the devil of the White House.

It is amazing what a simple gesture of the hand can do in our world. When we are in traffic and somebody cuts us off only to stop short right in front of us we often are tempted to "give them the bird" by simply raising our middle finger. When somebody does a good job and we want to show them so we sometimes give them the "thumbs-up" to show them with just a movement of the hand. It is stunning how these little gestures can elicit rather complex responses from the person they are directed at. It is even more astounding how the same simple gesture can elicit dramatic responses in large crowds when just one person gives one of these simple hand gestures.

On February 4th Jamaat leader, Abdul Quader Mollah, gave a hand gesture that would shake a nation. Upon receiving a life sentence for his role in the Bangladesh Genocide, Mollah left the court to an awaiting public. There, before the entire nation, Mollah flashed the "V for victory" sign... the same sign that Nixon had flashed when leaving office. Yet this would not be a sign of peace. It instead would recreate the devil's playground by resurrecting Shahbag Square (a scene of an infamous massacre in 1971).

Life in prison? Yet he took the lives of so many.

What kind of prison? How can a man who created hellish conditions be fit for even the worst of prisons? Is there truly a prison wretched enough, tormenting enough, to lock this monster away in?

Abdul Quader Mollah had made a name for himself in 1971. Across his neighborhood of Dhaka, Mollah was known as "The Butcher of Mirpur". He had earned this name by collaborating with the Pakistani Army and leading his own band of thugs. His actions in Mirpur directly led to the death of a confirmed 344 innocent people. In addition Mollah's contributions to the genocide of his own people included the rapes of women and children, burning of Hindu homes, and the destruction of opposition homes and businesses.

Despite the litany of crimes this wretched man was charged with the International Criminal Tribunal somehow could not find it within itself to issue the death sentence. A man who had terrorized his neighbors, his countrymen, and the world was surprised by the reaction Bengali youth had to his less than favorable jail sentence. This seems odd when you think about it from a Westerners' point of view. For the rest of the world it appeared that justice had finally been served. And yet here we are today. Shahbag Square is still the scene of a nation's unrest when faced with living with the devil for any more length of time than they already have. 

So let's take a look at this from halfway around the world.

In 1971 Abdul Mollah violently raped an 11 year old girl. For most this would be reason enough to face a criminal charge. Then you add on the fact that this man committed the rape under the assumption that the war would cover his transgression. It is a common aspect of war after all, the penis is far worse a weapon than the bullet... it destroys the life of the victim and leaves them to suffer. Yet for this Mollah was not brought to justice. He still had other crimes to commit before being charged.

A typical soldier can't account for the number of people he has killed. A stray bullet here and there may add up the number of deaths. The spray and pray method used by soldiers for multiple of reasons can tick the death toll higher. Yet in 1971 Abdul Mollah racked up a known 344 victims. How many soldiers do you know that can count the number of people they killed? Let alone any that can count up even close to 344?

For most people in the West it would only take one innocent victim's death to warrant bringing the murderer to justice. For the ICT in Dhaka it wasn't till decades had passed that the 344 confirmed victims warranted such a case. And yet when Abdul Mollah was brought before them the ICT could not find it within itself to pull the lever and let the criminal hang for his sins.

As a head member of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, Abdul Mollah carried out a policy of ethnic cleansing in his part of Dhaka. Using religion and politics as excuses for his crimes, Mollah targeted Hindus for extermination. Old religious divides that were left from British occupation were used in attempts to drive the Hindu population out of Bangladesh. When religion failed as an excuse for ethnic cleansing, Abdul Mollah used political allegiances to further drive a wedge in his community and exploit the divides he created to help create violent pogroms. According to the Genocide Convention adopted by the United Nations these all are acts that define genocide. And yet for this the ICT in Dhaka could not find it within itself to hang Abdul Quader Mollah.

For the world to ignore the outrage of the protesters in Shahbag Square is to ignore the open wound the genocide left upon Bengali society. This is a festering wound that has been ripped wide open by the lack of justice in the International Criminal Tribunal's decisions. This is a wretched agony that families across Bangladesh have to live with as they watch the men who perpetrated genocide give the "V for victory" upon learning the devil will not pay his due.

If Hitler had lived to face trial would we have ignored the ruling of a court that only gave him life in prison of the deaths of 6 million innocent Jews?

If Stalin had been brought to trial and the court only gave him life in prison for the starvation and slaughter of 7.5 million Ukrainians would we ignore it?

So why is the world so willing to ignore the voice of a nation as they scream for the rightful justice they deserve? When will Bangladesh be able to say that it's Hitler, it's Stalin, it's Talat Pasha have been brought to justice and killed... just as they did to their victims. Or has the world decided on Bangladesh's behalf that "an eye for and eye" is simply out of the question when dealing with the legacy of genocide? 

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Source Documents
(note: not all sources are listed)

The National
http://www.thenational.ae/thenationalconversation/comment/war-crimes-of-1971-still-reverberate-in-todays-bangladesh

Alder's Ledge
http://aldersledge.blogspot.com/2013/06/the-devil-to-pay.html

Guava Puree
http://guavapuree.wordpress.com/2013/05/06/bangladesh-at-a-precipice-a-tale-of-two-massacres/