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Summary Of A Problem From Hell: America And The Age Of Genocide

1189 Words5 Pages

Brandon Jones
Professor Boeck
RWS 100
October 17, 2014

Prompt 1: Producing an Account and Evaluating an Argument The United States has a tendency to get involved with conflicts around the world, but this was not the case with the mass killings in Rwanda. In her essay, “A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide” Samantha Power goes into detail regarding the spring of 1994 when the Hutus begun killing the Tutsis, murdering men, women, children and the elderly by the masses. The Hutus used the media and Hutu leaders in the government to continue such attacks. The United Nations proceeded to send in peacekeeping support but after the death of several Belgian forces it pulled out leaving Canadian General Romeo Dallaire in charge …show more content…

During the events leading up to the killings in Rwanda the United States government exercised caution in becoming involved. Powers states, “The president could have deployed U.S. troops…” (154) once the killing of thousands of Rwandan citizens had begun regardless of congressional opposition, through the War Powers Act of 1973. Which states, the president has the power to send troops abroad for 60 days without congressional consent, and then after denial has 30 days to bring them back. The author feels that the president should have shown more initiative considering the country’s history of a strong presence and involvement around the world. Aside from sending military troops, the government had plenty of other options. To include, joining the United Nation’s and Dallaires’s forces and forces of other United Nation countries. Many options were at the hands of the leaders of the country yet for once they decided not to get involved. Many reasons for the lack of involvement put the blame on congress and the difficulty of overcoming the opposition in the houses. However, …show more content…

The author expresses that the government used several logical fallacies in order to provide reasons to stay away from Rwanda. Power states, “Most officials… define the decision not to stop the genocide as ethical and moral.” (155) U.S. officials provided a slippery slope that claimed involvement in Rwanda would lead to “…getting involved everywhere.” (155) However, this is a false dichotomy, involvement in one country does not guarantee involvement in another. Power uses this as an example to show how she feels the government wrong and again prove her point that they were avoiding involvement. Officials were grabbing for excuses left and right to stay out of Rwanda. Power goes on writing that humanitarians in America were concerned that involvement in Rwanda would put future relations with the United Nations at risk. Also, the United Nations claimed that there was more to lose by sending help into Rwanda than allowing the proceedings to continue. Why U.S. officials were avoiding the use of the word genocide in Rwanda is still unknown. They seemed to be using it as yet another excuse to stay away. To conclude, Power feels the United States as well as the United Nations could have done more to stop the killings in Rwanda and made vast attempts to avoid using the term “genocide” as an excuse to not get

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