Genocide in the modern era - Is the West responsible?

     The term genocide was first used by Raphael Lemkin in the 1944 book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. Lemkin was a Polish Jew who managed to reach the United States in 1942. Although at the time, the Holocaust was considered by most to be the only known genocide, by 2013 the existence of many other cases has become known, including the modern Darfur genocide, Rwanda and the former Bosnia in the 1990s, Cambodia in the 1970s and the Ukrainian famine perpetrated by Stalin in 1932-33. Not surprisingly, the Western and American forces who claim to be the leaders of the international community failed to act effectively to prevent genocide on all of these occasions.

     Although one might argue that Western forces have no duty to intervene in the actions of problematic third world countries, one can easily trace the causes of genocide in the third world back to colonial times, when artificial borders were created and the possibility of tension between ethnic groups after independence and of independence, for that matter, were considered completely irrelevant as preventing future problems represented no benefit for Western powers. However, today these same nations argue for a “stable” world, apparently without realizing they are the ones who destabilized it. As long as Western and P5 leaders do not realize the importance of their nations on the global stage and the consequences of its actions, genocide will continue to happen.

Among recent genocides, the slaughter of 100,000 Mayan Native Americans in Guatemala during the Reagan administration surprised me due to direct involvement of the American government.

     Recently, I learned that doing nothing in face of another human being’s suffering is denominated “bystanding”, a term usually associated to incidents between citizens. However, it is my belief that this term can also be applied to nation-states, especially to the Western powers who failed to act in so many cases. Some will argue, of course, that I as an individual person should try to do something to prevent and stop genocides in the 21^st century. Considering my power today as a 15 year-old student, however, I do believe bystanding is, in my case, justified. While I alone am almost irrelevant, the leaders of Western powers and P5 nations are not. Theoretically, I could perhaps convince a maximum of fifty Brazilian students, teenagers, to fly to Sudan and try to stop the genocide in Darfur. Barack Obama, on the other hand, could send in the US Marines. If he used special forces to topple the regime in North Sudan, casualties would be kept to a minimum, while my 50 teenagers would be almost inevitably captured and executed or traded for ransom. The individual human being cannot be expected to act and effectively prevent or stop crimes occurring on another continent. In my case, the chances of success are so low that it is simply not worth a shot.

     The following image is the entrance of the Nazi extermination camp of Auschwitz, one of the most famous sites where genocide was committed by the SS.

     

     I believe that the average citizen, Western or otherwise, does not have the duty to intervene in order to prevent or stop genocide in nations other than the one where he lives. However, it is my belief that Western and P5 governments have indeed the duty to intervene, even though intervention will likely always involve breaching the sovereignty of another state. As the former Imperialist ambitions of the West created genocide, now the West must do all that it can in order to prevent such crimes.

The Rwandan genocide, when Western powers failed to intervene once again.

     However, each and every human being does have the duty to prevent and stop genocide, or at least try, when it occurs in one's homeland or when one perceives the chance to successfully intervene. Although the majority of individuals who did not intervene in the past did so because of fear, it is fear that allows genocide to be committed. When the population fears the government, the government is able to do whatever it wants, including all sorts of crimes against humanity.