Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire

Subject: Homage to a broken man
From: GUEST,Peter T.
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 02:34 PM

Please indulge me, friends.

Yesterday, Lieutenant-General Romeo Dallaire, was found dead drunk and unconscious in a park in Hull, Quebec. He was taken to hospital, and later released. Dallaire was the Commander (Canadian) of the United Nations Mission in Rwanda in 1994, and was betrayed by the United Nations (and the Western powers specifically) when he desperately warned them of the impending massacre of the few Belgian troops he had charge of and the nearly a million Hutus and Tutsis that he was supposed to protect with totally inadequate resources.

This warning was ignored, and the small contingent of Belgian troops (out in the jungle) were macheted to death by a mob, followed by the eruption of the feared massacre of a million people. It is now widely accepted that if Dallaire's plea for reinforcements had been answered at that critical moment, hundreds of thousands of people might have lived. Later on, various people, including the Belgian government, attempted to pin the blame on him personally for the deaths of the troops involved. He has since been completely exonerated, but was put through bureaucratic hell, to match the physical hell he had witnessed. He has been tormented with a sense of personal guilt and horror ever since he returned from Rwanda.

In April of this year he announced that he was taking early retirement, because he could not cope with his memories, the piles of bodies, and the rest -- "hearing people die at the end of the phone because I could not send troops in to reinforce them. There are many days in the past, less so now, when I wish I had died there too". Friends say that the now retired General has simply been unable to cope, and is in near constant turmoil. He has tried to commit suicide a couple of times, and is so traumatized by the sights that he witnessed -- the smell of fresh fruit in a supermarket once triggered a seizure -- that he suffers from flashbacks and overwhelming grief.

A news cameraperson who came on the scene when he was found said that she refused to take his picture -- "I didn't shoot it because I was depressed that a man like him could be there and not have help. He was so important for Canada when he was in good shape."

This story won't perhaps mean anything to non-Canadians, but it is devastating to us to see such an honourable man, who was trying to do his best in the midst of a primeval horror, now, so swiftly, broken down. I just wanted to pay homage to him among friends -- some of whom have had some similar griefs -- and wish him whatever healing there is.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: katlaughing
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 02:43 PM

Oh, Peter, thank you, that just brings tears to my eyes and heart....reminds me of my uncle whom I've mentioend before, who finally couldn't live with what he witnessed for too many months while stuck in a foxhole at Guadacanal...he finally did commit suicide after years of trying to drink himself to death...another uncle who'd also been a witness to the atrocities of war, did manage to drink himself to death, quite literally.

No wonder I get upset at the History Channel and others...everytime I turn them on, I see our history defined by "war" stories and it makes me despair...is this really how we want to define humankind, by the sloughing off of men like Lieutenant-General Romeo Dallaire, and the constant rehashing of battles which can never show the highest/finest of our species?

May he find peace and healing in whatever way possible. And, shame on the governments who've treated him and others so poorly.

kat

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amergin
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 02:49 PM

Peter,

I don't agree with your assumption that just because I'm American, this won't mean much to me. It means alot. It deeply saddens me that this could happen to a man that tried desperately to save thousands and thousands of lives. Especially since saving lives was the reason he was there in the first place and the damn bureaucrats wouldn't let him do his job. Then, they stabbed him in the back to cover up their uncaring fuckered up mess. This sickens me. Thank you for sharing.

Amergin

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: M. Ted (inactive)
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 03:09 PM

Peter,

Thank you for this post--I am thankful that he was only dead drunk, not dead. We should all pray that he will be able to find the strength to work his way through the personal hell that he is suffering--and that someday he will be able to tell the full story of what he has seen and experienced, in all it's implications.

The Holocaust survivors told their story, and keep telling it, so that the world will not forget, and allow it to happen again, and yet there have been more holocausts, in Cambodia, in Bosnia, in Rwanda--only people who have seen and understand the process by which seemingly civilized humans turn their social institutions into machines of mass murder can help us see when it is beginning to happen again--

In this way, his survival is one of the few hopes that humanity has.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 03:12 PM

An honourable man driven to despair by the ignorance and stupidity of the United Nations. Never wear the light blue beret of the UN. That organization should be charged with murder. Romeo Dallaire is an honourable military commander, and a decent man. I wish I could help him. Yours, Aye. Dave (Black Beret Only)

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 03:13 PM

Peter,

We are surrounded by "broken men and women" who went to Viet Nam whole and came back disfunctional and unwanted. I suspect Dallaire's story is appreciated by every parent who ever sent a son to war.

SS

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: canoer
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 03:25 PM

Peter T.,

An enormous thank you. One of the hopes we have of ending wars is that we come face to face with the human cost, in vivid personal stories like this.

"Teach your children well."

I can't help but reflect that the officer's worst enemies were in the rear.

Thanks once again. -- Larry C.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Kim C
Date: 29 Jun 00 - 04:05 PM

History being my hobby and avocation, the study of war is a daily thing at my house. I have reached this conclusion: wars are all the same, it's only technology that makes them different. No matter what time period you're talking about, people die, people suffer, soldiers leave behind families and widows and orphans, and bureaucracy prevents the good guys from doing their job.

KFC

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Bugsy
Date: 30 Jun 00 - 03:05 AM

It is a shame that cowards and braggarts so often steal the honour and credit that true heroes deserve, yet seldom get.

I hope that someone offers support to this brave man.

CHeers

Bugsy

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: sian, west wales
Date: 30 Jun 00 - 04:44 AM

Peter, thank you for that. I read an article about this man some months ago and was sickened by what he has had to face. I wish, as a Canadian (overseas), there was something concrete which I could do to offer support...

sian

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Dharmabum
Date: 30 Jun 00 - 06:20 PM

Thanks for sharing that Peter. Acually, I see two heros in this story, The General & the news woman who refused to further degrade this already fallen hero.

Every now & then there is a little ray of hope for us.

Ron.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 01 Jul 00 - 02:31 PM

Peter. Thank you so much for posting this. When I see the talking Ministerial Heads (like Art Eggleton, among others) blatantly lying to a poplulation so ignorant, that they apparently believe everything Government tells them, it makes me ill.

And VERY helpless.

Rick

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: sledge
Date: 02 Jul 00 - 09:50 AM

The temptation to rant uncontrollably here is very strong.

I just hope for the sake of the Canadian Government that all possible help is offered to this man that THEY put in harms way.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 02 Jul 00 - 01:37 PM

Be very certain that it WON'T sledge. Politicians protect themselves and their own jobs first. Just another example of why I hold them in contempt. Oh, for just ONE Minister to stand up and risk (lose) his/her job by telling the truth, when it goes against Government interests.

Rick

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amergin
Date: 02 Jul 00 - 04:05 PM

I hope you don't find this inappropriate of me, and if you do please forgive me. But here's this song I just wrote:

Whispers In the Breeze

He sat within Kigali town
His heart was being torn
For his reports of coming genocide
His superiors they had scorned
With callous uncaring hearts
They ignored his pleas
While soft the voices came to him
Awhisperin in the breeze

T'was hard the woeful sights to see
Of his men dying all around
But harder still to bear the shame
Of the UN chains around
And so he cried to an angry god
"Oh, please stop this mad disease"
As he heard the cries of his dying men
Awhisperin in the breeze

While sad he heard the phones go dead
The lines all soaked in blood
Children heads rolled down the street
Carried in a crimson flood
The machete blades gleamed with red
As his soul began to freeze
800,000 Tutsis cried
Awhisperin in the breeze

The UN bastards they turned their backs
Upon this sad heroic man
They said it was his lone fault
The massacres did begin
Eventually he cleared his name
But his mind was not appeased
800,000 Tutsis cry
Awhisperin in the breeze

He was found in a park in Hull
With a bottle in his hand
Drenched from his liquid meds
This once glorious man
He drinks the liquor everyday
His broken mind to appease
And to deaden the ghostly Tutsis cry
Awhisperin in the breeze

Amergin

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Sailor Dan
Date: 02 Jul 00 - 07:52 PM

Someone with more knowledge then I have of the Canadian Government and Media should post Amergin song to them. With the Media if it could get written just might start a movement for some help. If it could be put to music and taped and sent to a radio station some DJ might play it, who knows, strange things do happen.

One thing I learned in the military is a death of a comrade, shipmate known to you never leaves ever.

A truly moving song Amergin, thanks for your efforts

Sailor Dan

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amergin
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 12:27 AM

Thanks, Sailor Dan, glad you liked it. Not glad I wrote it though....

I kinda had Wind That Shakes the Barley in mind when I wrote it, unless some one has a better idea....

Amergin

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 12:40 AM

I agree, Amergin, it should be sent out and hopefully garner some publicity for the shameful way he has been treated. Perhaps you could contact the woman who refused to photograph him that way and see what she might be able to do.

katwhohopestohearyousometimeinHearMe

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amergin
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 01:31 AM

Ok, I'm searching for some articles about it and various station sites. If anyone has any idea on how to find these on the net, please let me know.

BTW, Kat and Sailor Dan, thank you so much for the idea. I wouldn't have thought of it....

Amerginwhomayshowupandactuallysingonhearmesometime

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 01:38 AM

Sure thing, Amergin, I am counting on it!**BG**

Anyway..you can probably find most of the media links you need at Editor& Publisher Media Links. If you don't find something there, you can also do an AP, Reuters and other searches at www.drudgereport.com...if not, let me knwo and I'll look through my other sources.

Good luck,

katwhowillbelisteningforyou!

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amergin
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 03:37 AM

Thanks, Kat, I sent it off to a paper called the National Post. I'll probably send more to other papers tomorrow....

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Escamillo
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 05:00 AM

May I wish you the best luck, Amergin. People like him deserve that we make a move, if we do not, who will?
Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 12:44 PM

Amergin. Fine and touching song.

Please send it anywhere BUT the National Post. This paper is run by the notorious Conrad Black, a far-right pro-establishment, media baron. One broken soldier would mean nothing to him or the people who are forced to toe the "arch-conservative line" on his paper. Much better you send it to "The Toronto Star" or the (reasonably) independant "Now" magazine.

Rick

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amergin
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 01:03 PM

Rick,

Thanks, I just sent it to the Toronto Star.

Boy, I'm so glad you all liked it. I'm sitting here preening like a peacock filled with pride. Thanks all.

Amergin

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Willie-O
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 01:08 PM

Bourque NewsWatch is the Canadian answer to Drudge--tons of mostly Canadian media links, plus toadys insider political info.

Rick's right about the National Post, the absolutely worst of Conrad Black's many publications. One that you might try though is the Ottawa Citizen, which although a Southam (=Black) paper publishes a wide spectrum of opinions, some of which occasionally make sense.

CBC radio replayed an earlier interview with Dallaire about Rwanda this morning. He sure sounded depressed.

The Canadian military is confused as to its primary mission, mainly because we have a kind of national ambivalence about it. Are they for defense of our borders (against whom?), international goodwill efforts, domestic search and rescue, or what? None of these missions can claim enough support that they get adequate funding for equipment and training, and the military has rolled itself into a myopic, defensive bureaucratic culture which is mostly notable for throwing to the wolves any member who dares to try to improve things.

Sad, true though.

W-O

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: GUEST,Peter T.
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 02:03 PM

Thanks Amergin greatly for the song. I hope they publish it. The more I think about him, the sadder and angrier I get.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Jul 00 - 07:50 PM

Willie-O, thanks for posting that information. When I get to feeling more up to it, I will see about writing an op/ed piece for the Liberal Opinion Week and the state rag here....can't hurt for Canada's neighbour to the south knowing about this, too.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: sian, west wales
Date: 24 Mar 05 - 11:59 AM

I know this is a very old thread but I have just seen this in the
Globe and Mail online. I had heard a rumour that the man might be up for Governor General but this is good too.

In the snippets I've picked up over the years, it would seem that Britain and the US - possibly France as well - knew more than they revealed to the UN prior to the genocide. Information which could have made a difference to Dallaire's freedom to respond. I've come close to buying his (auto?)-biography but I'm not sure that I'd have the strength of character to read it to the end.

Good news for an Easter weekend, though. Or whatever you're celebrating this Spring.

siân

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Noreen
Date: 24 Mar 05 - 12:21 PM

Roméo Dallaire appointed by Martin to Senate

Thursday, March 24, 2005 Updated at 11:16 AM EST

Canadian Press with Globe and Mail Update


Ottawa — Prime Minister Paul Martin has named retired general Roméo Dallaire and eight others as new senators.

Thanks sian- I hadn't seen this thread before. My heart goes out to him.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 24 Mar 05 - 01:27 PM

With all due respect to the General, and to the initial poster, this thread should be put downstairs.

Dave Oesterreich

---

Good idea, Dave. When the thread was originated, there wasn't a "downstairs." Now there is, so downstairs is where it belongs.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Charmion
Date: 24 Mar 05 - 05:13 PM

Is it possible to change the title of this thread? Romeo Dallaire is not now and never has been a broken man! At his worst he was down but he was never out, and the way he has used his own troubles to help bring relief to others proves it. It takes a very big man to go public with such a struggle, accepting as a mission the task of being the poster child for post-traumatic stress disorder.

It is not an exaggeration to say that Lieutenant-General Dallaire is a friend of my family; both my brothers served under him, and my elder brother was his staff officer during his last military appointment, as Special Advisor on Professional Development to the Chief of the Defence Staff. Dai (my brother) also helped him with research and travel while he was writing his book.

Canadians are famously disparaging, but you would have to poll a hell of a lot of people here before you could find even one who would call Romeo Dallaire anything but a hero.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: alanabit
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 06:22 AM

Nicely put. His story reminds me of Felipe Morillon in Bosnia, who was another brave soldier, who was unable to help civilians, because the politicians sent in soldiers beore they had got their act together.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: kendall
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 06:32 AM

Definition of war: The ultimate failure.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Noreen
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 07:06 AM

Thank you Charmion, I have put a request in the Help forum to have this title changed. Any suggestions?

...go public with such a struggle, accepting as a mission the task of being the poster child for post-traumatic stress disorder.

Can you post more about this, for those of us who didn't know this and would like to know more?

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 11:18 AM

Read his book "Shake Hands With The Devil" also available a documentary of the same name on DVD. Both are well done. Yes he is a hero Charmion, and one I would be honoured to shake hands with anyday.

Yours, Aye. Dave

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man
From: Amos
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 11:58 AM

DTAM, it is wonderful to see you posting here again.


A

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: Amergin
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 02:36 PM

I havne't seen this thread in a long time...and yes everything I have read about Dallaire makes me think of what a great man he is.

nice to see you here Dave.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: Willie-O
Date: 25 Mar 05 - 03:31 PM

Whatever you think of the Canadian Senate, it can only be improved by this appointment.

I saw the TV version of "Shake Hands With The Devil" on CBC, and it was certainly moving but seemed oddly disjointed. Have to watch the longer version, the one that's on DVD and the film festival circuit. (Best Documentary at Sundance this year, mostly because Redford boosted it--something he almost never does at his own festival).

W-O

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: gnu
Date: 26 Mar 05 - 01:56 PM

This is one of the reasons we have a non-elected senate. And it's a damn good one.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: podman
Date: 26 Mar 05 - 02:18 PM

I've always liked Canada although sometimes I feel you guys are taking over our news anchormen and leading actors. No sooner am I praising a new young American on the scene then someone tells me they are Canadian like isn't it obvious and how dum are you not to know it already. And I know a lot of Canada people feel the same way about yanks.

There was a recent retrospective on the Rwanda massacres. A whole host of interviews were made, ex-President Clinton, then Secretary Albright, and Kofi Annan. Nobody came off of it looking good. I saw the General interviewed on his experiences. If I'm remembering him correctly he's a French Canadian and very eloquent. He was on site with a small force of UN soldiers from where I don't remember, dealing with a group of the leading killers and he felt he was looking into faces of evil. It was already apparent from the interview that he was emotionally scarred. I had seen him years before on TV and I thought he was French.

This may be hard to put in a proper context:
The fact that he was obviously very distressed over events and felt guilt at his involvement made me think more of him as a person, but my memory is that he and his force were almost entirely ineffective at saving Rwandan lives because although he had a small force of UN soldiers, he was vastly outnumbered. So his force was transformed from 'player' to 'hostage'. I was struck with the contrast between willingness and effectiveness in this case. I believe the General regrets that he didn't put his forces more at risk, which was his big choice to make at the time. Unfortunately, he knows now things he could not have known then.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: meself
Date: 14 May 08 - 10:53 PM

I didn't see this thread before, but just linked to it from another. ... I had the honour of meeting (briefly) Sen. Dallaire last year, and shaking his hand. He was MCing a banquet at the Pugwash Conference, and he did as fine a job as you could wish - he seemed completely at ease, comfortable with the introductions and thank-yous, lots of little self-deprecating quips, kept things moving along, but at the same time covered all the appropriate etiquette; he clearly had the air of a man in command who deserved to be in command. It was heart-warming really ...

Like someone who posted above, I too would like to see him appointed Governor-General when the post next comes open. (And I agree with gnu about the senate - but we don't want to open that can of worms!).

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: GUEST
Date: 14 May 08 - 11:41 PM

A fine man and a hero. I feel I can be proud that Canadians never faulted him for the event that prompted this thread, recognizing a man pushed to the edge of strength by his experiences. I'm glad he's still doing well.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: Charley Noble
Date: 15 May 08 - 09:48 AM

I do like the progress in this thread.

There is still all the pain and personal anguish but Dallaire is now engaged in working beyond it. I do hope he succeeds and that Canadians will continue to benefit from his success.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: Peace
Date: 15 May 08 - 09:57 AM

He is a remarkable man and a great Canadian. Pardon me for posting this article in its entirety, but I could not get a link to work.

General Romeo Dallaire - United Nations/Canada

The General and the Genocide
by Terry Allen
Amnesty International NOW magazine, Winter 2002

Gen. Romeo Dallaire defied U.N. orders to withdraw from Rwanda. Without the authority, manpower, or equipment to stop the slaughter, he saved the lives he could but nearly lost his sanity.
***
In an indifferent world, Gen. Romeo Dallaire and a few thousand ill-equipped U.N. peacekeepers were all that stood between Rwandans and genocide. The Canadian commander did what he could-did more than anyone else-but he sees his mission as a terrible failure and counts himself among its casualties.
After a 100-day reign of terror, some 800,000 Rwandan civilians were dead, most killed by their machete-wielding neighbors. Dallaire had sounded the alarm. He'd begged. He'd bellowed. He'd even disobeyed orders. "l was ordered to withdraw...by [then-U.N. Sec. Gen. Boutros] Boutros Ghali about seven, eight days into it. .. and I said to him, 'I can't, I've got thousands' -by then we had over 20,000 people-'in areas under our control,"' Dallaire said in a recent interview with Amnesty Now. The general's hands, always moving, rose beside his face as if to block the memories. "The situation was going to shit....And, I said, 'No, I can't leave."'
The U.N. had sent Dallaire and 2,600 troops, mainly from Bangladesh and Ghana, to Rwanda to oversee a peace accord between the region's two main groups, Hutus and Tutsis. But on April 6,1994, eight months after the peacekeepers arrived, a plane carrying the Rwandan and Burundian presidents, both Hutus, was shot down over Kigali, the Rwandan capital. Hutu-controlled radio blamed the Tutsis and immediately began calling for their extermination, as well as for the murder of moderate Hutus considered friendly to the Tutsi "cockroaches." The broadcasts gave details on whom to kill and where to find them.

Dallaire and his troops were about to become spectators to genocide. As bodies filled the streets and rivers, the general, backed by a U.N. mandate that didn't even allow him to disarm the militias, pleaded with his U.N. superiors for additional troops, ammunition, and the authority to seize Hutu arms caches. In an assessment that military experts now accept as realistic, Dallaire argued that with 5,000 well-equipped soldiers and a free hand to fight Hutu power, he could bring the genocide to a rapid halt.

The U.N. turned him down. He asked the U.S. to block the Hutu radio transmissions. The Clinton administration refused to do even that. Gun-shy after a humiliating retreat from Somalia, Washington saw nothing to gain from another intervention in Africa, and the Defense Department, according to a memo, assessed the cost of jamming the Hutu hate broadcasts at $8,500 per flight-hour.

Dallaire's pain is palpable as he remembers his yearlong mission. His words, raw as a wound, make a grim contrast to the carefully parsed regrets of the world leaders who actually had the power to stop the genocide but turned away. He has just spoken at an Amnesty-sponsored conference in Atlanta on law and human rights, and he looks tired- older than his 56 years. His eyes are close set, raptor-like, but his gaze is warm and direct. "When you're in command, you are in command," he says. "There's 800,000 gone, the mission turned into catastrophe, and you're in command. I feel I did not convince my superiors and the international community," he says. "I didn't have enough of the skills to be able to influence that portion of the problem."

Three days after the Rwandan killings began, with Dallaire's troops running short of rations as well as ammunition, about l,000 European troops arrived in Kigali. The general watched with frustration as the well-armed, well-fed Westerners landed and left again as soon as they'd evacuated their own nationals. Then, after Hutu militias killed ~o Belgian paratroopers, Brussels withdrew all of its peacekeepers (the only significant Western contingent and the only one that was properly equipped) from the U.N. mission. Dallaire's depleted force was on its own.

Even as the already desperate situation worsened, Washington called for a complete withdrawal of peacekeepers. On April 21, after international pressure, the U.S. agreed to a limited force and supported a Security Council resolution slashing the force to 270 peacekeepers. U.S. Secretary of State Madeline Albright accurately described the tiny force as enough "to show the will of the international community."

Remarkably, with scant resources-indeed, with only one satellite telephone for the whole mission-Dallaire was able to maintain safe areas for those 20,000 terrorized Rwandans. But he could do little else, and the killing continued.

Eight years later, in daylight and in dreams, Dallaire still hears the cries of wounded children, the weeping of survivors, the voice of the man who died at the other end of a phone line as the general listened. He still can't escape the smell of death, the memories of hacked-off limbs scattered on the ground, and worst of all, he says, the "thousands upon thousands of sets of eyes in the night, in the dark, just floating and looking back" at him in anger, accusation, or eternal pleading.

With counseling for post-traumatic stress disorder, and a handful of pills a day, he is working to use his experiences to prevent another Rwanda. But the baleful ghosts remain, and the book he is writing about the slaughter is rousing them. "As I go over what I have written," he says, "more and more I see lost opportunities; more and more I see errors because of lack of intelligence or simply from mis-assessing a situation. I'd take a decision on the phone, and people would die within seconds. I was getting pressure from everybody not to use my soldiers." His voice fades to a whisper . "It's horrific because every day decisions were taken on life and death. Every day. Real people, real people."

We are sitting in a dark taxi and I can't see his face. He maybe remembering when the Belgian senate blamed him "at least partially" for the deaths of its paratroopers. Or he may be listening to his Rwandan voices. As we near his hotel, he says, "l always have people with me. Like tonight, I'll ask the guys at the desk to just check on me because I'm not supposed to be alone because it can go to extremes."

Dallaire says that about 20 percent of troops and humanitarian workers on missions like his suffer much the same thing, as do 5 to 10 percent of diplomats. "They are casualties," he tells me. "High suicide rates, booze, drugs, pornography, finding themselves on skid row."

When Dallaire returned to Canada from Rwanda, he tried to drink himself into a stupor of forgetfulness. He raged at his family. He tried to kill himself In 2000 a few months after he was medically released from the Canadian Forces, he was found passed out drunk under a park bench in Hull, Quebec. "He was curled up in a ball," photographer Stephane Beaudoin, alerted by a police report, later told the Ottawa Citizen. "I never took a photo. I felt sad for him. I thought, 'This man has done so much for us. How did he come to be here?"'

Dallaire's reluctance to give himself credit for what he managed to accomplish certainly contributed to his breakdown. Asked directly, he admits saving people, "sometimes by the thousands, you know, just by giving appropriate orders to my troops." Past and present merge as Dallaire remembers one day when he, his driver, and aide-de-camp "were making our way through a large population move in the hills. It was raining and cold because it's fairly high up. And there this woman was, right there by the road, and people are walking around her, and she is giving birth. And so, as we're inching, the child came out. The woman, already emaciated, sort of picked up the child and then fell back. So we jumped out, you know, because nobody was stopping. The mother was dead. We tried to wrap the baby up as best we could, brought it back, and then other people sorted it out."

But Dallaire quickly returns to the people he failed to save and to the limits of his skills. "Thirty years ago when I joined the army, if somebody mentioned human rights, we immediately equated them with communists," Dallaire now says. The former career officer has come to believe that, along with the ability to attack and kill, soldiers must learn peacekeeping, negotiation, and human rights preservation. That belief is reflected in the war stories he chooses to tell. Rather than tales of derring-do, he offers anecdotes that plumb the moral ambiguities of modern soldiering.

"A young officer is entering a village," Dallaire recounts. "The village has been wiped out except for a few women and children still alive [in a ditch filled with bodies]. There is 30 percent AIDS in that area. There is blood all over that place, no rubber gloves. Does the platoon commander order his troops to get in there, into the ditch risking AIDS, and help?" The question, it turns out, is not an exercise in armchair ethics. "When I asked the platoon commanders, those from 23 of the 26 nations that sent forces said they would order their troops to keep marching. Commanders from three nations- Holland, Ghana, and Canada-were saved the complexity of the question because by the time they turned around their troops were already in the ditch."

Dallaire continues, his hands alive, his eyes still, the Gallic-tinted accent of his native Quebec growing more pronounced. "Or a soldier is watching two girls, 13 or 14, both with children on their backs, with a crowd spurring on the one with a machete to kill the other girl because she is different. What does the soldier do? Shoot the girl with the machete, possibly killing her baby? Shoot into the crowd? Do nothing?"

"Should I myself," he asks, "negotiate with a militia commander with gore on his shirt and his hands from the morning's work, making a joke, to get him to withdraw his gang so I can move thousands of people [to safety] Or do I pull out my pistol and shoot him between the eyes?"

"The corporal," says; Dallaire, returning to the soldier watching the machete-wielding girl, "tried to negotiate his away through the crowd to stop the attack but headquarters in his home country ordered him not to intervene. That corporal is now an injured ex-corporal," Dallaire says, and like the ex-general himself, a casualty of post-traumatic stress.

For all the blame he heaps on himself, Dallaire also faults the strictures that bound him in 1994 and that will have to change if the world is to avoid another Rwanda. The institution of peacekeeping missions, he says, is deeply flawed. Even if he had received the political and humanitarian training the job demanded, the U.N.'s rules would have robbed him of the ability to use his military skills. With thousands of civilians begging for protection as they were hunted down in their homes and churches,
"I could tell [the peacekeepers] to do things," he says, "but they would check with their country. The troops are under my operational command, but they remained under the ultimate command of their nations, so. . . if a national capital feels that a [rescue] mission is unwarranted, or too risky, or something, the soldiers can turn around and say, 'No, I can't do it."'

Asked to name one of the countries that ordered its soldiers not to move injured Rwandans to safe areas, even when Dallaire told them to, the general hesitates for a long time before saying, "Bangladesh." It was the Ghanaians, he adds, who performed most humanely.

With the exception of the Red Cross, the non-governmental organizations were clueless, Dallaire says. "When they started sending people in, they kept sending me assessment teams. Assessment teams! 'Listen, I don't need a goddamn assessment team. I need food, medical supplies, water for 2 million people, and I've got to feed them twice a day. Get the shit in here. We'll sort out the distribution.' "

If Dallaire's anger at those who did too little is fierce, his fury at world leaders who feigned ignorance and did nothing is white hot. He cannot forget, for example, that President Clinton stopped for a few hours in Kigali in 1998, after it was all over, and with the engines of Air Force One running, said he was sorry; he didn't know.
Or that David Rawson, the U.S. ambassador to Rwanda at the time of the mass murders, waited a month before declaring a "state of disaster," and then dismissed the slaughter as "tribal killings." Calling what happened in Rwanda "tribal" conflict made intervention seem futile. U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Prudence Bushnell, who had pushed hard for the U.S. to "neutralize" Hutu hate radio, later explained to author Samantha Power, "What I was told was, 'Look, Pru, these people do this from time to time."'

The designation of "tribal" conflict also nicely avoided the word "genocide." Had a major power or the U.N. invoked that term in time, all states that were signatories of the 1948 convention on genocide would have been obliged to condemn the slaughter and act to stop it.

Avoiding the word did not however avoid the fact. "They knew how many people were dying," Dallaire says, no matter what word they used. "The world is racist," he says bitterly. ,' "Africans don't count; Yugoslavians do. More people were killed, injured, internally displaced, and refugeed in 100 days in Rwanda than in the whole eight to nine years of the Yugoslavia campaign," he says, and there are still peacekeeping troops in the former Yugoslavia while Rwanda is again off the radar. f "Why didn't the world react to scenes where women were held as shields so nobody could shoot back while the militia shot into the | crowd?" he asks. "Where... boys were drugged up and turned into child soldiers, slaughtering families?...Where girls and women were systematically raped before they were killed? Babies ripped out of their stomachs? ...Why didn't the world come?"

Dallaire supplies his own answer: "Because there was no self-interest....No oil. They didn't come because some humans are [considered] less human than others."

Nonetheless, Dallaire still calls himself an optimist. Despite its troubles, he believes that the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, which operates out of Arusha, Tanzania, "is one of those great potential instruments of the future." His own job, he says, won't be done until the tribunal finishes its investigation. "My duty as force commander who ultimately became head of mission will not end until the Arusha Tribunal says it doesn't need me to testify anymore, or when the tribunal decides to hold me accountable."
There is virtually no chance the international court will blame him. The question is whether he'll one day stop blaming himself. "The work I'm doing helps," he says, referring to his campaign to stop the use of children as soldiers. Counseling seems to be helping, too.
"One day after a couple hours of therapy," he says, "we're sitting there, and, you know, to-ing and fro-ing. I all of a sudden felt joy in my stomach. You know when you feel happy in your tummy? And I had not felt that in the seven years since Rwanda. All of a sudden I said, 'jeez, I feel, I feel better."' Dallaire stopped, tilted his head as if to listen to his own words and broke into a smile as sweet as warm winter sun. "My therapist let me savor that-and then we talked. And at the end of it, I said, I think I have moved from survival to living. And maybe to getting better."

The world, he knows, has not. Without the political will and institutional mechanisms to stop it, "Rwanda" will happen again.

Terry J. Allen is editor of Amnesty Now. She has reported for numerous U.S. and international newspapers and magazines, including the Boston Globe, American Prospect, and Salon.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: Peace
Date: 15 May 08 - 10:08 AM

If that article doesn't bring some tears to your eyes, I don't think anything ever will.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: Amos
Date: 15 May 08 - 10:22 AM

Thanks to Peter T for starting this historic thread.

Those who have been in the insanity of violence know better than to invite it again if it can be avoided...eh, Mister Bush?


A

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: alanabit
Date: 15 May 08 - 02:50 PM

It sounds like he is not "broken" any more. It is a hideous experience for anyone to have to recover from. Rwanda was probably the biggest single failure of humanity in my lifetime. We should have known beforehand that it was pointless sending in soldiers without any clear political decisions and without any real mandate to get the job done properly. "Great statesmen" often turn out to be mediocre politicians, whose soldiers have won battles for them. On the other hand, when the politicians fail, they can always pass the buck by crapping on the heads of their soldiers.

Subject: RE: Homage to a broken man: Lt.Gen. Romeo Dallaire
From: GUEST,Seiri Omaar
Date: 15 May 08 - 05:43 PM

I've watched both the documentary and the feature film about Dallaire, both entitled "Shake Hands with the Devil", like the book.
Documentary
Feature Film
Both are extremely good, and I recommend that you watch the feature first because it gives you a better understanding of what happened in what order if you're not intimately familiar with what he went through. It is based upon the book that Dallaire wrote. The documentary is Dallaire's return to Rwanda for the first time since he left and his reactions.
... Romeo Dallaire saved thousands of Rwandans, even with all the problems. He could have stopped the slaughter or at least minimized it if those supplying he and his troops had cared even remotely. He broke direct orders to save those lives that he did.
Watch the films. It gives one a far better impression of the horror he went through, and why it should never happen again.