Shake Hands With the Devil

by Roméo Dallaire

The Canadians stepped into the breach to become the sole French speakers in my headquarters, but their effectiveness was somewhat limited by the fact that all Canadians were under attack on hate radio, because of me and because of Canada’s initiative to launch the full-scale human rights investigation into the Rwandan war. In my note to the DPKO about bringing in the new UNMOs, I warned that “FC will be forced to move [the Canadian] contingent out also, if situation does not improve. At this time FC is about to restrict their movement to RPF territory only.” I concluded: “This Mission will not be able to sustain its rhythm of activities, let alone see any increase of work. . . . FC cannot make this point more emphatically.” In those days after the announcement of Opération Turquoise, I came very close to saying, “Pull us out, we capitulate, we can’t go on.” My soldiers were being tested under conditions that never would occur in a standard peacekeeping operation, and they survived circumstances we wouldn’t even have wanted to read about. Serving with them, I was a constant witness to extraordinary displays of commitment, determination and raw courage.

  On June 21 the RPF’s New York office issued a press release and a letter to the new president of the Security Council, Salim Bin Mohammed Al-Khussaiby. If the council approved the French mission, the RPF requested that it should “simultaneously authorize the withdrawal of the existing contingent of UNAMIR. The Rwandese Patriotic Front is concerned that its personnel may not always be in a position to make a dear distinction between UNAMIR and other foreign forces in the event of an escalation of hostilities. We have, regrettably, come to the conclusion that it is necessary that UNAMIR personnel be withdrawn to safety, at least on a temporary basis.” The powers-that-be ignored the RPF position and carried on. The next day, the UN Security Council approved Resolution 929, which provided France with a chapter-seven mandate to assemble a coalition and intervene in Rwanda. The OAU initially opposed the intervention but, under pressure from the Franco-African states, changed its mind. At the vote, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, Brazil and China had abstained. The council tied its approval of Opération Turquoise to two conditions: the mission was limited to sixty days, and the secretariat had to make every effort to get UNAMIR 2 deployed by then. From his refuge in Belgium, Prime Minister Designate Faustin Twagiramungu issued a public statement condemning the French intervention, but then added that since the French were going in, he hoped that they would attempt to achieve the ends outlined for UNAMIR 2.

  That night I got a code cable from the DPKO giving me some very limited guidance. The French had promised to avoid the conflict lines between the RGF and RPF. The cable read, “We don’t expect the French to propose a presence in Kigali, but if they do please inform us immediately and we shall try to persuade them, given RPF sensitivities and other problems such a presence may cause.” To me it looked like the French were still thinking about coming into Kigali, and I imagined what it would be like if French paratroopers landed here. I had to get our withdrawal plans finalized. Reading between the lines of the code cable, with its reiteration that I should sit tight in Kigali, I saw that the DPKO was under enormous pressure from nations with troops already serving in UNAMIR, and that the recent casualties we’d suffered must have been making it even harder to come up with enough troops for the new deployment. (In the cable, Maurice Baril also asked me in a very diplomatic way to curb the enthusiasm of my media liaison officer, who in his attempt to respect the transparency I had mandated with the media, was causing problems with both the RPF and the RGF by much too accurately describing the ebbs and flows of the front lines.)

  And here was my superiors’ attempt to improve my morale: “Nevertheless you are likely to face unanticipated problems and we shall depend on your good judgment to deal with them, along with the assurance that we always are available for consultation at any hour.”

  The last paragraph of the code cable informed me that Booh-Booh’s replacement, a Pakistani career diplomat named Shaharyar Khan, was “stopping in various capitals for consultations” at the request of Boutros-Ghali while on his way to UNAMIR.

  By now French flags draped every street corner in the capital. “Vive la France” was heard more often in Kigali than it was in Paris. RTLM was continuing to tell the population that the French were on the way to join them to fight the RPF. It seemed to me that for every life that Opération Turquoise would save, it would cost at least another because of the resurgence of the genocide.

  On June 22, the attitude of the RPF changed dramatically toward all of us. Hostility, rudeness, threats and direct attacks were the order of the day as the RPF accused us, as the representatives of the UN in Rwanda, of co-operating with the UN-mandated French intervention. Kagame’s position was that we should immediately withdraw because he could not guarantee our safety. It took several tries to arrange a meeting with him at which I explained the stated purpose of the French operation as loyally and directly as I could. I thought I persuaded him we were not part of some diabolical conspiracy to deny the RPF its victory or protect or promote genocide. Of course, I found out later that while the RPF publicly opposed the French intervention, privately it had reconciled itself to the French deployment while Kagame completed his campaign.3 It is extremely Byzantine that two former enemies had closer coordination and co-operation and better information than I had from either of them.

  I’ve spent much time since wondering why Kagame was happier to tolerate Opération Turquoise than a fully mandated UNAMIR 2. I can only assume that since the intention of UNAMIR 2 was to stop the genocide and establish protected sites that would keep the displaced millions from fleeing the RPF, I would have inevitably argued that the RPF’s advance should not exacerbate the humanitarian crisis, and that we would step in to provide protection until the situation stabilized. He knew that I regarded that task as my primary objective. But Kagame wanted all of the country, not parts of it. I came to believe he didn’t want the situation to stabilize until he had won.

  Operating in a void of information, I had to guess how the French would enter Rwanda and how they would conduct their operations. I knew Burundi had denied French transit and that Uganda would do the same. Tanzania had no infrastructure in the west that the French could use. I had denied entrance through Kigali. I told New York that if the French were permitted to enter that way, I would resign my command; if French planes appeared at the airport, I’d shoot them down. I also shot my mouth off on the subject to the media. To a certain extent, I meant it: if French troops landed in the middle of Kigali, it would set off a gigantic battle with the RPF and permit the RGF and the interim government to continue to function. I was assured by the DPKO that Kigali was out of the question.

  That left only Zaire (today the Republic of Congo). Goma, at the northern end of Lake Kivu, had a modern airport that needed repair but could support the French. There was also an airfield at Bukavu at the southern end of the lake. I decided that if they went only through Goma and Gisenyi, just inside the Rwandan border, that would confirm that they were really coming in to support the RGF. If so, I could expect them to enter combat operations against the RPF, which by default would drive a direct reprisal against UNAMIR and force our withdrawal. However, if the French entered through Bukavu, across the border from Cyangugu, to the west of where the vast majority of persons at risk were congregating, then their motives might be solely humanitarian and we could continue our mission.

  Even before the Security Council had taken its final decision on June 22, the French were already landing in Goma, which I found out through media reports on the morning of June 23. So much for the argument that the international community did not have the means to rapidly deploy UNAMIR 2. On the same day, the RPF announced that it was not opposed to a French operation if it was confined to humanitarian aims. And with our Franco-Africans gone, hostility toward UNAMIR immediately subsided, and we again began to push our patrols out from Kigali. Unfortunately almost all of the Hutu population, driven by RTLM, the RGF and the Interahamwe, were now moving to the west. E
ven more tragically, as the population moved it was again subjected to Interahamwe roadblocks, where not only surviving Tutsis were killed but also those without identity cards. Even a suspected “cockroach” had to die.

  On June 24 the French entered Rwanda in patrol strength and were reported in the media to be in Gisenyi in the north and Cyangugu in the south and pushing beyond those locations. I was sure that if the French got too close to the RPF, a firefight would ensue; I had to get to the French commander, General Jean-Claude Lafourcade, to confirm his intentions and exchange liaison officers with his force. I wasn’t going to wait for him to come and see me.

  I contacted New York to ask the DPKO to determine, through the French Mission staff, where the Turquoise headquarters was in the field and to secure a meeting for me with its commander. Again, the DPKO directed me to co-operate with the French, be patient and understand the realpolitik. I replied that I expected no good to come of Opération Turquoise. From my perspective it looked like a cynical exercise in furthering French self-interest at the expense of the ongoing genocide. I failed to get anything from my bosses but tepid promises to consider my views.

  With the RPF apparently calmed down about the French presence, I briefed Henry on the need to get the civilian transfers going again and to arrange for the moving of RGF prisoners of war from the Red Cross and King Faisal hospitals. I also told him that we had to regain contact with the interim government to restart the ceasefire negotiations that had come crashing to a halt after the hostage-taking in our compound, and keep an eye on its relationship with the French. We also needed to liaise with the interim government wherever it was in order to keep up our humanitarian efforts; the aid groups, with their increasing burden of displaced people, needed a conduit to the shrinking RGF zones.

  That afternoon, Don MacNeil chaired a meeting in the HQ between Frank Kamenzi and Dr. James Orbinski, the Rwandan team leader of Médecins Sans Frontières and the head of the King Faisal Hospital.4 Armed RPF soldiers kept invading the hospital to take medical supplies, despite the fact that the site was UN-protected. The blue berets stationed there were itching to sort these guys out with “minimum use of force,” and the situation was becoming very dangerous.

  Orbinski protested to Kamenzi that under the Geneva Convention, which Rwanda had signed, armed troops were not allowed in any hospital, let alone in one operating under the overarching protection of the Red Cross. Kamenzi replied that he had reason to believe there were militiamen and RGF personnel among the eight thousand or so protected civilians at the King Faisal, and that the RPF troops needed their weapons to protect themselves. At a checkpoint search during a recent transfer of injured persons, under the banner of the Red Cross, the RPF had discovered grenades. As far as the RPF was concerned, the hospital belonged to them and the people of Rwanda. They were at war, and were justified in taking what they needed.

  MacNeil then pointed out that everyone needed the medical resources, but that the displaced persons at the hospital were getting nervous about a possible massacre at the hands of the RPF. Using the Faisal to house thousands of displaced people hampered the medical staff’s efforts to treat the never-ending flow of casualties. He proposed making a new compound for the Faisal refugees on a nearby golf course, which would give us the opportunity to conduct a total weapons check when they were moved. This would eliminate the need for the RPF to come into the hospital armed. Once UNAMIR 2 was up and running, we would have more medical supplies and a dedicated field hospital, and the RPF could take over the Faisal. This solution was acceptable to everyone.

  Don MacNeil achieved such results constantly in his humanitarian duties. He showed no fear (as the incident with the first disastrous transfer showed) and had imagination and a solid dose of common sense. His call sign on the radio net was MamaPapa One, and he lived up to it with his dedication to others and the example he set.5 He was committed but also fun-loving, and his spirit, along with the steady resolve of his commander, Clayton Yaache, welded the humanitarian action cell of UNAMIR into a unit where others hoped to serve, no matter how dangerous and thankless the tasks. MacNeil got along particularly well with the Polish officers, including the hardbitten Marek Pazik, who carried an AK-47, which he had lifted from a militiaman, wherever he went. Pazik’s room became the focal point for entertainment and discussion, usually organized by MacNeil. Those gatherings were an escape valve for our humanitarian warriors. They faced down the militias to help people to safety. They risked their lives every day in tense confrontations, any one of which would have weakened the resolve of most other people. They carried blood-soaked elders, women and children to aid stations. As with Pazik, who witnessed one of the first instances of the genocide at the Polish Mission, they were haunted by what they’d experienced, but they carried on.

  The RPF was mounting its assault on Kigali with renewed vigour. I hadn’t seen too much of Ndindiliyimana lately, but Kouchner and the Gendarmerie were doing good work in moving and protecting some of the orphans caught in the RGF zones of Kigali. Other moderate RGF leaders had disappeared from the capital over the last week. They must have been worried about what might happen to them given the renewal of purpose that the French arrival was inspiring in the extremists.

  Henry’s father died, and as a result he needed to go on compassionate leave to Ghana for much of July. On June 26, I sent him to meet with Bizimungu at the Meridien hotel to lay the groundwork for resuming the ceasefire negotiations. I also wanted Henry to raise again the issue of how to stop RTLM from inciting the militias and the population to kill me. I was not directly blaming Bizimungu or the RGF. But they had to know the threats weren’t working. I was not leaving. No one in New York was calling me back. If we were to go forward, the threats had to stop.

  Henry filled Bizimungu in on the reasons why we had sent the Franco-Africans to Nairobi, and also on the status of the bodies of the churchmen killed by the RPF at Kabgayi. The RPF had buried the bishops and the priests themselves, and were not in favour of releasing them to the interim government. He also requested that Bizimungu and the defence minister meet with me as soon as possible after I had seen the French commander, to clarify exactly what our roles were to be. Henry also informed Bizimungu that because of his father’s death, he would be gone for a while, and that I would take over the ceasefire negotiations.

  When he got back to Force HQ, Henry told me that Bizimungu had been in exceptionally good spirits and was serene and even friendly. (This was a major shift from the week before, when Bizimungu had behaved as though his cause was totally lost.) His condolences to Henry seemed genuine, which struck Henry as truly bizarre considering the army chief’s apparent indifference to the hundreds of thousands of deaths all around him. Henry had also finally confirmed through Bizimungu that the interim government was holed up in Gisenyi, with some ministers possibly even in Goma; Bizimungu had told him that my upcoming trip to Goma to see General Lafourcade was an excellent opportunity to meet the minister of defence there.

  Things were bustling in my headquarters now as reconnaissance parties from the various UNAMIR 2 contingents began to arrive by the long land route from Entebbe to Kigali. The RPF border guards were not making life any easier on these incoming troops, insisting on inspecting them and all their gear as though they were tourists, not UN peacekeepers. UNOMUR was helpful in guiding and assisting these convoys through the hills and through the Ugandan side of the border; and after more interminable negotiations, we worked out a protocol with the RPF that smoothed the way. With the APCs and other force and humanitarian resources starting to move down the pipeline from Kampala, another company of the Ghanaian battalion arriving in a week or so, the Canadian Signals Regiment and the Ethiopian battalion reconnaissance parties already on the ground, the British Para field hospital and the Australian field hospital and protection force recce teams set to come in quick succession, and a possible Canadian field hospital also in the wings, Force HQ was absolutely awash with new people. We were no longer alone—which
was both exhilarating and impossibly draining, since we had become used to being the embattled few.

  Nothing was easy, of course. The CAO and UN bureaucratic procedures were still obdurate in the face of our needs. All kinds of logistics and infrastructure problems required extensive negotiations with both the RPF and the RGF. The mission was still without supply and transport contracts or an increased budget, let alone enough food, water and fuel. The Canadians, under Colonel Mike Hanrahan, would arrive fully equipped, as was the norm for developed countries with professional armies. For the next six to eight weeks at least, we would have to rely on the engineers, logisticians and support personnel of this experienced and professional contingent, and on the British as well, to tide the whole mission over.

  The Ethiopians were at the other extreme of preparedness. They had just finished a protracted civil war, and the reconnaissance party, which included the chief of staff of the Ethiopian army, was clearly ill at ease in brand new uniforms. As I wrote earlier, this was their first experience in peacekeeping and they had no equipment to sustain themselves, let alone conduct operations. (However, these soldiers were incredibly resourceful. I once watched them use only long wooden switches to restrain a crowd that was trying to surge across the bridge at Cyangugu into Zaire. The switches were the kind that might have been used to herd cattle. The soldiers also had no compunction about getting into the fields to help local farmers harvest the rare planted field.) Most of the other African units were not much better off.

  My days started to fill up with innumerable administrative demands, and we had even fewer HQ staff than we had had last November. We were in the centre of an ongoing genocide, and we could not let up at all. As the reconnaissance parties came through, I emphasized over and over again the sense of urgency in the acrid, often putrid, air. They were already late, I said—and we had been late all along. I know that Mike Hanrahan at least carried the urgency of my plea back to Canada; instead of deploying slowly by ship, as his commanders had intended, the Canadian contingent took commercial flights to Nairobi in order to get here faster.