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Darfur indicative of trend toward genocidal wars
5:45 p.m., Nov. 15, 2006--Darfur will not be the last war of its kind, Scott Anderson, war correspondent and contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, said Tuesday evening, Nov. 14, in Mitchell Hall. “It's to me, personally, perhaps the doomsday of wars,” Anderson said. “It is a version of what war has become. I think we're going to see more Darfurs.” During his lecture, “With the Whole World Watching: The Genocide in Darfur,” Anderson said he first went to Darfur in fall of 2004. He said the problems in Darfur were first caused by a drought which increased tensions among farming groups. In 2003, two rebel groups gave the Sudanese government a list of grievances. When they were ignored, Anderson said, they began attacking government outposts. The government, located in the capital, Khartoum, turned to local nomadic tribes, armed them and the Janjaweed began to kill villagers and burn their homes. “The problem with violent cultures that are so poor,” Anderson said, “is that it takes very little for people to lose everything.” His first experience with war was in 1983, he said, when he spent a month in West Beirut, Lebanon. After his experience in Lebanon, Anderson said he began writing nonfiction books and magazine pieces about war zones. “In the time I've been covering war, war has really fundamentally changed,” he said. “It's actually changed over the past hundred years, but really dramatically in the past 15 years.” Anderson said the rate of civilian deaths has increased from about 5 percent of those killed in World War I to more than 40 percent in World War II. “Today, in almost every war around the world, it's more than 90 percent,” he said. “In some cases, upwards of 99 percent. Even in Iraq, which we can think of as a more conventional war, probably about 95 percent of the people who are killed are not combatants, they are not insurgents, they are not soldiers. They are Iraqi civilians.” Anderson said modern wars also are more dangerous for reporters and photographers. When he was in Bosnia, he said the Russian army was targeting journalists, and in Iraq more than 90 journalists have been killed. Anderson showed the audience a series of black-and-white photos of people he met and villages he visited during his trip to Darfur. He said the Janjaweed come to the villages on horseback or in cars and burn village huts by setting fire to the thatched roofs while chasing families out of their homes. The Janjaweed then dispose of the bodies by throwing them down the village well, contaminating the water. Anderson said the Janjaweed have succeeded in depopulating the villages. “How do you destroy a village of 600 to 1,000 people?” he said. “Well you don't need to kill anyone, you can literally destroy a village in half an hour with six men.”
“Once a relief efforts starts, it becomes an excuse not to do anything more,” he said. “The fact they are able to get supplies in with the permission of the Sudan government means if the American government or any government tried to do the next thing, the Sudan government can threaten to cut off supplies.” Anderson said he met a Dutch doctor, a member of the organization Doctors Without Borders, who set up a crude medical clinic in one of the villages. The refugees were so numbed, he said, that he had to convince one family to take their dying daughter to the doctor. “The refugees were in such a state of shock and were so apathetic, they wouldn't take the basic steps to take care of themselves or their families,” he said, and many people die in the refugee camps every day. Although there are currently 7,000 African Union troops in Sudan, Anderson said there has been limited aid to Sudan, especially from the United States. While the United States has placed economic sanctions on Sudan since the mid-1980s, neighboring countries have supported Sudan's economy because of its oil. Anderson said the problems in Darfur are especially disastrous because there is no one person who can be forced to an agreement. “If you look at most conflicts in war you [know] where you can apply pressure,” he said. “The problem in Darfur is that it's very hard to figure out who that might be.” Anderson said the United Nations needs to commit a peacekeeping force but will face difficulty in getting countries to actually send troops to Sudan. “To my mind, the possible lesson we learn from Darfur is the need for a real U.N. peacekeeping force around the world,” he said, “to have weapons to defend themselves and to go after the people who slaughter.” Anderson said the initiative to help Darfur must come from different sources. “I know that very recently the issue of Darfur has become an issue on college campuses, and I think that's wonderful,” he said. “My worry is that it may be too late to save Darfur.” More then 400,000 people have died and between 2.5-3 million are now refugees, Anderson said. The talk was sponsored by UD's Global Community Initiative [www.udel.edu/global/] and General Education Initiative [www.ugs.udel.edu/gened]. Article by Julia Parmley
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