A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah

Loss, anger, violence “I imagined capturing several rebels at once, locking them inside a house, sprinkling gasoline on it, and tossing a match” (Beah 113). In Sierra Leone’s civil war, families were torn apart, entire generations lost, these events caused strife in the hearts of the survivors, who searched for revenge. In the memoir A Long Way Gone, a young boy named Ishmael Beah, has his life turned inside out as he tries to survive the civil war in his country. In the country Sierra Leone, Ismael Beah has decided to travel to a nearby town to perform in a talent show when he gets news of a rebel attack on his home. His brother Junior, friends Gibrilla, Talloi, Khalilou and Kaloko and him try to get back, but it is too dangerous to go back

In the beginning of his journey, Ishmael believes he will be able to find his family, but when he finds out they are all dead, the losses he endured crash against his wall of resistance and his mind floods with violence and anger. Explain how he dies. “I felt as if we were denying Saidu, our friend, our traveling companion. He had become our friend” (Beah 86). This helps prove my claim as it shows how Ismael felt that his family was also his friends and that each friend that he lost was like losing a family member, thus making the impact of the loss greater and his spirit growing ever more tired of his burden. Another event that was probably his final turn before deciding to become a violent child soldier. In chapter 11, Ishmael has just lost his family and blames Gasemu and tries to kill him, “walked behind Gasemu and locked his neck under my arm. I squeezed him as hard as I could” (Beah 96). this quote demonstrates how Ishmael is willing to kill now for revenge as the quote did not show any hesitation from Ishmael. As shown in the article Child soldiers battle traumas in Congo rehab, it reads, “the children, they go back to their villages and they tell other children carrying a gun is not the way” (Nima). This helps prove my claim as it shows that people are trying to reverse the effects of being a child

In the end, when the conflict has cooled, the question rises, who was to blame for all the death? Most obviously were the leaders of each army and/or the source of the disturbance of peace, but can you blame an ex-child-soldier for their atrocities? People can’t simply accuse a former child soldier for crimes that they suffered a “childhood” where there was no other choice. There are probably many variables that went into making a child into a killer as proven in the article, a former child soldier will stand trial in The Hague for war crimes, “Clearly, the traumatized psychology of the child soldier will be part of Ongwen's defense when his trial begins at the ICC” (3), as this quote demonstrates how very little children probably ever joined the army willfully without trauma or fear for one’s self or someone close to them. The only time that a child soldier can be justifiably accused of war crimes is if they killed without trauma or fear and/or a continuous record of violence even after the