The Causes of the Rwandan Genocide Were Hatred, Civil War And Group Mentality.

A civil war began in Rwanda in 1990. The war was fought between two Hutu militias backed by the French, and a Tutsi rebel group backed by Uganda.

Four years into the war, a genocide was started against the Tutsi people. In April of 1994, a plane was shot down in Kigali. The plane was carrying as passengers, both the president of Rwanda and the president of Burundi.

This event may have been the trigger, but it was not one of the causes of the Rwandan genocide. Following that event, the Hutu rounded up and killed the Tutsi people. Nearly one million people of Tutsi decent were killed in the following three months.

During this time, the Hutu were not killing Tutsi soldiers, they were killing any Tutsi they could find, they were not limiting this to men who could fight, but also killing women and children.

Rwandan Genocide

Environment

For a genocide to occur, the environment has to be manipulated in the direction the planners of the genocide want it to go. They need to have the backing of the people.

The people promoting the genocide need to get the public into a group mentality, which was one of the causes of the Rwandan genocide. The genocide was reportedly discussed openly in meetings of the Rwandan government.

One government official supposedly made a statement that if the Tutsi were gone, there would be no more problems for Rwanda. The news media in the country openly condoned and promoted the killings of the Tutsi people.

The hatred of these people was fostered in all others by the government and the media, the hatred of the Tutsi was part of life, and was one of the causes of the Rwandan genocide.

Genocide

The genocide in Rwanda started in April 1994 and lasted until July 1994. nearly one million Tutsi were killed during those months. Men, women and children were all killed. The killers were not limited to militia soldiers.

Allegedly, average citizens were instructed to kill their neighbors during that period if the neighbors were Tutsi. On April 6th, the mayor of a town called Gisenyi, distributed weapons to militia members and instructed them to begin killing Tutsi.

This was the first large scale, organized killing of the genocide. The weapon of choice, but not the only one used during the genocide was a machete. Whatever the causes of the Rwandan genocide were, the results were atrocious.

The killings were occurring at unheard of rates. When citizens were called on to kill neighbors or coworkers, and refused, they were killed for refusing.

In the middle of April 1994, over 1000 Tutsi hid in a church. The government learned of their hiding place and arrived there with bulldozers.

The bulldozers were used to demolish the church with the people in it. If any tried to escape, they were killed by other means. The hatred and group mentality which were the causes of the Rwandan genocide are what allowed it to become so horrific.

The atrocities which were committed against the Tutsi people in 1994 only occurred because of this hatred and group mentality which allowed the population to think that this was needed.