Shake Hands with the Devil

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2003

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Foreword

Preface-Introduction

Chapters 1-3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-9

Chapters 10-12

Chapters 13-15

Conclusion

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Background

Historical Context: The Hutus and the Tutsis

When the Kingdom of Rwanda formed in the 15th century, there were two groups divided by both ethnicity and class. The Hutus were primarily (but not completely) a peasant class that provided agricultural labor, and the Tutsis were a class of warriors that included the kingdom’s rulers and much of its nobility. Generally, Tutsis ruled over the Hutus in a system much like feudalism in medieval Europe, with new people conquered by the Kingdom of Rwanda usually considered Hutus. After Germany colonized Rwanda at the end of the 19th century, with Belgium later taking control over Rwanda in 1916, the monarchy and social structure of Rwanda were largely left intact. In fact, the Belgian rulers of Rwanda supported the existing monarchy and favored the Tutsis, in order to help them preserve their own domination over the country. Under Belgian influence, Rwanda became a devoutly Catholic country where French was spoken along with the native Bantu languages of Kinyarwanda and Swahili.

As anti-colonial movements spread across Africa following World War II, Hutu resistance grew. The Tutsis became associated with oppression under European colonial rule. Also, the Catholic Church in Rwanda became staunch supporters of the Hutu cause. As a result, during the Rwandan Revolution (1959-1962) that ended in full national independence, many Tutsis were killed or driven out of the country and the monarchy was abolished to make way for a Hutu-dominated republic. A Hutu general, Juvénal Habyarimana, overthrew the government in 1973, making himself dictator. Eventually, Habyarimana’s government began to discriminate against Tutsi citizens who remained in Rwanda and forbade the return of many Tutsi refugees who fled to neighboring countries during the Rwandan Revolution.

Many of the Tutsi refugees continued agitating to one day return to Rwanda. In Uganda, where a large number of Tutsi refugees had relocated, Tutsis formed what would become the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). In 1990, the RPF started making military incursions into Rwanda, with the goal of overthrowing Habyarimana’s government and allowing the Tutsi expatriates to return. This began the Rwandan Civil War, fought between the RPF and the Rwandan Government Forces (RGF), who fought on behalf of Habyarimana’s government and were trained and supported by the government of France. Despite this, eventually the RPF was victorious, forcing Habyarimana to sign the Arusha Peace Agreement on August 4, 1993, paving the way for a new democratic government that would ideally respect the rights of both Hutus and Tutsis. This was the political situation that Roméo Dallaire and UNAMIR became involved in.

Socio-Historical Context: Post-Cold War Geopolitics

The world politics that affected Roméo Dallaire’s experiences and struggles in Rwanda were shaped by the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991, only about two years before UNAMIR was established. The end of the Soviet Union concluded the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, a complex conflict that had dominated world politics since 1947. The end of the Soviet Union left the United States as the world’s only superpower. This new political situation raised the problem of what the role of the United States should be in a U.S.-dominated world order. Should the United States maintain the massive military it built up during World War II and the Cold War? If so, should the United States become the “world’s policeman,” using its military and economic power to intervene in politically destabilizing and humanitarian crises around the globe, even if these crises did not actually directly threaten U.S. interests?

The question of the United States as the world’s policeman was no longer theoretical when, in April 1992, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) under United States leadership intervened in the Bosnian War, a territorial and ethnic conflict in Europe between the countries of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia and Serbia. U.S. and NATO involvement was justified based on reports of the ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Croats and Muslims. This intervention set a precedent for further interventions by the United States in conjunction with NATO and the UN.

In 1992 and 1993, the UN launched a peacekeeping operation in the eastern African country of Somalia, where the government had totally collapsed, leaving the country in a state of anarchy and civil war. When 18 U.S. soldiers were killed at the Battle of Mogadishu, public outcry led the United States to withdraw its forces from Somalia. This event established what became known as the “Mogadishu Line,” which is when a peacekeeping operation becomes a military conflict. It became a line the United States and other Western countries became reluctant to cross in future peacekeeping missions—a stance that would later play an important role in the Rwandan Genocide.