This is a research paper I wrote for class on Joseph Kony. Just thought I would share along with this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc
(Note: left out the opening paragraph as it didn't really pertain)
The first matter of business to cover is the “what”? What is the LRA, why is it in existence and who exactly does it affect? We must answer these questions if we wish to go any farther. Joseph Kony is a Ugandan citizen who is also the founder of the LRA. Kony believed that he was a prophet sent by God to “purify the people of Uganda and to create a bastion of peace.” [1] He first got involved in military affairs by being a soldier in the “Ugandan People’s Democratic Army” (UPDA). In 1988, the Ugandan government signed a peace accord that in which former rebels would be integrated into the UPDA. Kony refused and splintered off with his own set of soldiers. These soldiers had a common military background and religious beliefs, and in 1991, their name became the “Lord’s Resistance Army.” [2]
The LRA, still led by Kony, operated in Southern Sudan, and there committed horrible acts of violence and other atrocities. They have committed numerous of violent acts including abduction, rape, murder and slavery. The influence of the LRA grew in 1997 when they sought to overthrow the Ugandan government and committed horrible and brutal acts of violence on the Ugandan people.[3] On top of all of this, the LRA is maybe most infamous for their capture of thousands of children and force them to be slaves or concubines. The LRA, unfortunately, still continues to be a major factor in Africa. Joseph Kony has been able to elude capture and still remains at large. There are undoubtedly reasons for this. Kony is a smart strategist and uses terror strategically. He will use acts of madness to show that they are serious—one such act including this, reported from CNN: "In northern Uganda in 2004, they took some 20-odd women with their babies out of the displacement camp, laid them on the ground with their babies on their backs and smashed their brains in." They often carry out such acts in the open where all can see. [4] These kinds of acts of terror, sadly, often yield power and spread fear, making him much more difficult to catch. His barbaric tactics mixed with his smart strategy has allowed Kony and his group to still be in operation.
The group claims their purpose is religious. As mentioned before, Kony claims to be a prophet from God. The LRA rebels would tell you that they fight for the establishment of a nation based on the Bible’s Ten Commandments.[5] They are proclaimed to be a “Christian Fundamentalist Group” and a “Christian Cult.” There have been instances of Kony instructing his men to paint crosses on their chest to protect them from bullets.[6] It is clear Kony and his group believes they have the endorsement of God. I liken them to another “Christian cult” from America, the Klu Klux Klan. Though the KKK still exists, it reached it height after the civil war and has been a major factor until the civil rights movement. The KKK was responsible for plenty of baseless and horrible attacks on non-whites and did so “for religious reasons.” Unfortunately, the Bible is an important and amazing book that is often misinterpreted because they rarely give the time to research what they are reading and the context by which it is said. Sadly, I would not put Kony and the Klan under this category. I believe Kony is motivated by power and will stop at nothing to get it. Kony realizes that he can exploit religion to gain power and followers—Adolf Hitler did the same thing, as every Nazi belt buckle read “GOTT MIT UNS” meaning “God with us.” Unfortunately, people such as these are viewed as “Christians” and then make Christianity out to be a horrible religion. But I think it is clear that Jesus Christ is not the motivation of Kony and his followers.
Maybe most shocking from all of this is that the Lord’s Resistance Army still exists and is carrying out such attacks. This is a fact I cannot get passed. It is amazing that I live in a world where this is acceptable or ok. In American law, one can be considered guilty if one knows a crime is continually happening (or even happened once for that matter) and can be prosecuted. Yet, this seems to be the case with the developed world and the LRA in Uganda. Granted, there is violence everywhere and we unfortunately can’t stop it all. But this vigilante group has been at large for over twenty years and commits some of the worst acts a person can imagine. But the policy of many countries that could do something is to look the other way, or when they do help, not taking enough of a risk to actually end it. Luckily, America sees the problem and at least cares enough to take some action. Just as recent as October, President Barack Obama announced that about 100 U.S. troops are being deployed to Central Africa to help "apprehend and remove" the elusive Joseph Kony and his top commanders of the Lord's Resistance Army.[7] No word has come on whether this has been successful or whether or not there has been any progress made. While it is still 100 men and should go a long way to ending Kony’s group and stomping out the LRA for good and forever, it is only a start.
In America, ignorance about the Lord’s Resistance Army runs rampant. After President Obama ordered the troops to begin the removal of the LRA, conservative talk-show radio host Rush Limbaugh went on a tirade against the President attacking his decision to send troops to Uganda. In one of his talk shows in October, just after Obama sent the troops out, his show was named “Obama Invades Uganda, Targets Christians.” Mr. Limbaugh was sure to point out that the group’s first name “Lord” refers to God. He said of the LRA:
“Now, up until today, most Americans have never heard of the combat Lord’s Resistance Army. And here we are at war with them. Have you ever heard of Lord’s Resistance Army, Dawn? How about you, Brian? Snerdley, have you? You never heard of Lord’s Resistance Army? Well, proves my contention, most Americans have never heard of it, and here we are at war with them. Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. It means God.”[8]
Mr. Limbaugh was making the point that the LRA was clearly not a huge problem, since most Americans had never heard of them, and therefore really aren’t that much of a problem and therefore, the only reason the President was making this move was motivated by religion, and Obama was attacking them because ideologically, they were Christians. Limbaugh added: “They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan. And Obama has sent troops, United States troops, to remove them from the battlefield, which means kill them. So that’s a new war, a hundred troops to wipe out Christians in Sudan, Uganda.”[9] Clearly, Mr. Limbaugh is completely missing the reality of the LRA. Unfortunately, a large number of people actually listen to Mr. Limbaugh’s show and are actually hearing and believing what he has to say. I am actually a Christian and more on the conservative side of the political spectrum, but I can say that conservative leaders taking a stand against something for the sole reason of attacking President Obama are hurting America and hurting the world—and it has been a considerable problem recently.
America and other developed countries wield significant power on the world scale. These countries, especially ours, hold the power and resources to end such violence in Uganda as well as other violence problems in Africa. However, that will never been the case if there is ignorance among the leaders of political movements. A man like Rush Limbaugh effects (in this case, corrupts) the way that people think. If a considerable amount of Americans think and act the way Mr. Limbaugh did, the hope for help in this and other violent cases decreases. America is run by politicians who feed off public opinion and they will do what the citizens tell them in order to keep their jobs. Our first challenge is to end this type of thought. We need to be able to distinguish, first and foremost, between a Christian cult (and men who use God to gain power, not actually follow God) and actual Christians. This distinction has already caused damage due to Mr. Limbaugh’s tirade. Not only that, we need to learn to put religion aside in a case like this. I am a Christian and honestly believe that Jesus Christ should be the center of everything in my life. But regardless of what this group is claiming to be, they are really murderers, rapists, terrorists and slave drivers. Mr. Limbaugh has seemed to completely let this fact slip from his mind as he attacks President Obama in his policy in this matter. And regardless of your political or religious affiliation, we must stand against terrorists who are carrying out acts of violence on a defenseless people.
The United States has always been considered the police of the world and rightfully so—with great power comes great responsibility. We can stand for freedom or we cannot. But there is a reason Kony and his followers are still at large. The 100 troops sent to Uganda is not the first time the United States has attempted to intervene in this situation in Uganda. During George W. Bush’s administration, a team of 17 counterterrorism advisers were sent to Uganda to aid Ugandan troops by training them and providing millions of dollars worth of aid, including fuel trucks, satellite phones and night-vision goggles to the Ugandan army.[10] It seems this most recent deployment will even be an increase from the aid the Ugandan army has seen before. Tom Malinowski, the Washington Director of Human Rights Watch, said his group had been advocating for such a deployment. Putting more skilled advisers in the field with the armed forces of these countries would be a significant improvement over the previous level of assistance, he said. “I would not suggest that U.S. forces should be fighting the L.R.A. themselves,” he said, but “there are lot of things they can do with this kind of deployment that they weren’t able to do previously.”[11]
While significant improvements have been made in the fight against the LRA, something about it all still doesn’t sit right with me. I am certainly happy with the fact that we at least care enough to commit troops. But I can’t help thinking what we would do if there was a similar situation in Europe. Imagine if there was, in fact, a religious extremist group who had been raping and murdering and using horrible acts of violence all over the country, even bashing in the heads of mothers and babies. If this was happening in, say, England, thousands of troops would have been immediately sent to end the atrocities and they would have been wiped from the earth immediately. What’s more, Mr. Limbaugh actually did bring up one interesting point—no one in America has ever heard of them. There is a terrorist group that simply walks around unscathed and militarily, dominates a country and is continually committing acts of violence and enslaves thousands of children in this world we live in right now—and no one has ever heard of them! Clearly we see were priorities lie. I believe a major issue here is there is a certainly a feeling that a continent like Africa is actually inferior to America, which of course is absurd. We feel, because we are technologically, intellectually and financially advanced that we are somehow better.
As an American, I definitely hope for the success of America and want to see it succeed. But I am a human being first. If the success of America comes at the expense of other countries and peoples, we have sorely lost our way. America fashions itself an “idea” rather than a piece of land, an idea where “all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Due to the atrocities of the LRA, there are Africans who have not been given such rights. When your neighbor’s house is on fire, you don’t haggle over how much water to use to put it out—you go put it out. There is a fire in Uganda. In America, we have the mightiest military in the entire world and it would take, relatively, very little resources to put this fire out. We must stop haggling about how much water to use and simply go put the fire out. We can commit the resources necessary to end this and allow Africans to begin to live with “live, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
In conclusion, the Lord’s Resistance Army is not just a thing of the past—it is a thing of now, but with some help we can make sure it is not a thing of the future. I wish I could say Uganda was the only African country with a serious violence problem—but I can’t. If anything, I hope that the Lord’s Resistance Army can serve as an example to the developed world to show just how bad it can be in some African countries. Religion in Africa, as well as in other countries and continents as well, has been used in a negative way. It has been skewed and used (and abused) and transformed into a horror that can be used against a defenseless people. The LRA is definitely a sad example of what happens when violence and (bad) religion mixes. If we can take away one thing from this case study of the Lord’s Resistance Movement, I hope it will be that there is something that needs to be done and can be done. As much as I would like to blame others, the blame starts with us. As Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi said: “be the change you want to see in the world.” We must be the change.
[1] http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/lra.htm
[2] ibid
[3] ibid
[4] http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/31/world/africa/lra-5-reasons/index.html
[5] http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/lra.htm
[6] http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19960401&slug=2321945
[7] http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/31/world/africa/lra-5-reasons/index.html
[8] http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/17/limbaugh-defends-lords-resistance-army/
[9] Ibid
[10] http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/world/africa/barack-obama-sending-100-armed-advisers-to-africa-to-help-fight-lords-resistance-army.html?_r=1&ref=lordsresistancearmy
[11] Ibid
No comments:
Post a Comment