America's Role In The Rwandan Genocide

As most of the world is aware, Syria has been suffering through four and a half years of civil war, during which 250,000 Syrians have been killed, according to Rodgers et al.. There doesn’t seem to be an end in sight, as both sides- the Syrian government and the rebels- refuse to ceasefire or compromise. In addition, ISIS is making the situation worse through their involvement and frequent use of the war for recruitment. Because civilians have been subject to bombing, sieges, and chemical warfare, about 4.8 million have fled their country (Rodgers et al.). This has caused tension in the global community, as countries attempt to figure out how to accommodate them, if at all. While most have fled to neighboring countries Turkey and Lebanon, other …show more content…
Because of this, Americans are wary of any incoming Muslims and middle-easterners, solely based on their religion and nationality. However, if we are acting based on history, a review of America’s role in the Rwandan genocide may be relevant. In the 1990s, the U.S. made the mistake of only removing Americans from Rwanda and then backing away from the situation. Because we only cared about the safety of Americans, we left hundreds of thousands of Rwandans to die with little effort on our part to intervene. With just a little more attention to the situation, the U.S. could have saved many more, but fear and the misplacement of priorities caused negligence. If we continue to ignore the suffering of humans because they don’t live in our great country, how many more will die that could have been saved? Of course, we should prioritize the safety of Americans. But once that is secured, we should divert our attention to the lives and quality of lives for the billions of others in the world, and do whatever is possible to ensure their …show more content…
Germany, a country 27.5 times smaller than the U.S., has vowed to accept 500,000 Syrian refugees annually- 50 times more than the U.S. has vowed- for as long as possible. Even France, a country recently affected by a terrorist attack, has pledged 12,000 refugees a year (Martinez). In comparison to these, with the size of the U.S. taken into account, our pledge seems embarrassingly inadequate. If America is one of the most powerful countries in the world, we should be playing one of the biggest roles in international crises, especially with our long-standing reputation as a safe haven. On the contrary, of those countries accepting Syrian refugees, we have welcomed close to the least amount relative to population. If we compare our .006 refugees per 1000 people to Sweden’s 1.377, as Gambino et al. has recorded, our lack of effort becomes more