Shake Hands with the Devil

“I used to wonder how it was that Dallaire, the man who did the most during the genocide, could feel the worst. But this is not a paradox. The man who would try to do the most would inevitably be the man least capable of making excuses for himself, his men, his country, or his planet. The only way risky action is ever taken on behalf of mere principle is when feeling—a hugely discredited quality in military and political life—overpowers reasoned self-interest.”

Power echoes what will become an important point for Dallaire. In order to prevent future atrocities, nation-states must be willing to set aside their self-interest—even to the point that they risk their own soldiers’ well-being and lives—to intervene in conflicts in foreign nations.

“Dallaire is not naïve. He knows that states pursue their interests and rarely exert themselves on behalf of strangers […] But Dallaire demands tangible action. Using the word [genocide], he says, ‘is nothing more than political semantics.’ They are using the term ‘nearly flippantly,’ he says, while doing ‘absolutely nothing on the ground in regards to conducting an operation to stop genocide.’”

What constitutes a genocide is more than just an academic issue. Often, it is a political problem involving debates over history and the accountability of nations for past crimes. However, Dallaire (and Power as well) argues that the question of what constitutes a genocide is almost a distraction from real action, which affected the world’s response to the Rwandan Genocide.

“The following is my story of what happened in Rwanda in 1994. It's a story of betrayal, failure, naiveté, indifference, hatred, genocide, war, inhumanity and evil.”

This is, in a way, Dallaire’s summary of Rwanda. His memoir is not an impersonal history of the genocide, but a recounting of an event that he was actively involved in and that scarred him deeply.

“My story is not a strictly military account nor a clinical, academic study of the breakdown of Rwanda [ . . . ] lt is the story of a commander who, faced with a challenge that didn't fit the classic Cold War-era peacekeeper's rule book, failed to find an effective solution and witnessed, as if in punishment, the loss of some of his own troops, the attempted annihilation of an ethnicity, the butchery of children barely out of the womb, the stacking of severed limbs like cordwood, the mounds of decomposing bodies being eaten by the sun.”

One of the reasons Dallaire invokes for why his experiences in Rwanda were so difficult is that he was not prepared for it. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the world had moved on from the usual Cold War tactics. The tactics and mindset his military training had given Dallaire had not prepared him for the kind of warfare and atrocities taking place in Rwanda.

“Though our education was supposed to be bilingual, there was a deep divide between anglophones and francophones. The Quebeckers formed a tight clique and socialized amongst ourselves […] Still, we were probably among the most confident French Canadians that the extremely conservative institution had ever encountered. We did not back down and become assimilated. Seized by the spirit of the times, we fought the sometimes petty battles required to achieve equity.”

This passage not only reflects Dallaire’s experience of the 1960s—a politically and socially turbulent era—but hints at how his experiences facing discrimination and interpersonal conflict as a French Canadian would give him some insight later into the conflicts between the Tutsis and the Hutus in Rwanda.

“Rwanda had never been considered important enough by scholars in the West to warrant extensive study. Brent [Beardsley] and I managed to piece together a rough history from newspaper accounts and a few scholarly articles, which reduced a highly complex social and political situation to a simple inter-tribal conflict. With a confidence born of ignorance, we soldiered on.”

One of the ongoing problems Dallaire had before (and often during) his mission was a lack of knowledge provided by nation-states or by the diplomats and politicians involved with Rwanda. This problem with knowledge began with the lack of scholarly material on Rwandan history and politics he could find, reflecting how Rwanda had been ignored by the international community.

“I found the circuitous talk of the Rwandan politicians whom I met a little trying at times, but I soon realized that if I stopped asking questions and listened, I was often rewarded with amazing insights into the history and culture of the country and what ailed it [ . . . ]Overall they were a people suffering from psychological depression because of legitimate or imagined past grievances. They had a pessimistic, though perhaps realistic, view of the future.”

The impact of trauma from historical and political themes is one of the recurring themes in Shake Hands With The Devil. Dallaire suggests that the harsh history of Rwanda shaped the perspective of Rwandan leaders, but not entirely in a negative way.

“Chapter seven scared the war-allergic liberals who dominated the governments of the major powers; it reeked of colonialism and violated national sovereignty; it would ultimately cost vast amounts of resources and blood.”

One of the recurring problems Dallaire wrestles with is the reluctance of Western governments to commit military forces to regions of the world experiencing instability and violence. One reason was the fear of appearing to return to the age of colonialism, when the nations of Europe and North America dominated the peoples of Africa, Asia, and elsewhere. Another reason—and the one Dallaire addresses more thoroughly throughout Shake Hands With The Devil—is that nations are unwilling to risk the well-being of their soldiers or public outcry in order to deal with humanitarian crises abroad. This is a tendency that Dallaire clearly criticizes and rejects.

“I did not understand that I had just met men in Rwanda who would become genocidaires [. . .] I still thought that for the most part people said what they meant; I had no reason to think otherwise. Were the hard-liners playing us, and me, for fools? I think so. I believe they had already concluded that the West did not have the will, as it had already demonstrated in Bosnia, Croatia and Somalia, to police the world, to expend the resources or to take the necessary casualties [ . . . ] They knew us better than we knew ourselves.”

One of the insidious parts of the beginnings of genocide is that the people who will carry it out do not always make their true intentions obvious. Furthermore, Dallaire argues that the politicians who would order the genocide understood perfectly well that the Western countries were reluctant to commit their forces to help a place like Rwanda.

“Rwanda was on nobody’s radar as a place of strategic interest. It had no natural resources and no geographical significance.”

The self-interest of nations that prevents them from getting involved in humanitarian crises is not just about avoiding endangering their soldiers. It is also motivated by a practical or cynical view that nations should only act in ways that benefit that nation’s strategic and economic interests.

“I was in uncharted waters—the geography, the culture, the politics, the brutality, the extremism, the depths of deception practised almost as a Rwandan art form—all were new to me. However, I knew about the sensitivities of minorities, of the weight of being different in style and attitude; by nature I was a moderate and a conciliator.”

This passage ties together Dallaire’s time in Rwanda with his autobiographical experiences as a French-Canadian and bringing the gap between the Francophone community in his home country with Anglophones.

“Jean-Pierre suspected that these lists were being made so that, when the time came, the Tutsis, or the Inyenzi as Rwandan hate radio called them—the ward means "cockroaches" in Kinyarwanda—could easily be rounded up and exterminated. Jean-Pierre said he hated the RPF and saw them as the enemy of Rwanda, but he was horrified that he had been drawn into a plan to create a series of highly efficient death squads that, when turned loose on the population, could kill a thousand Tutsis in Kigali within twenty minutes of receiving the order.”

This is an important passage for understanding the build-up to the Rwandan Genocide since it describes the messages given to UNAMIR by their informant “Jean-Pierre.” Jean-Pierre’s own attitude here is also significant: although he admits to hating the RPF, his conscience compels him to warn against the oncoming genocide—an example of someone putting the needs of the wider community above his own self-interested beliefs.

“In the end, Booh-Booh and the clique became isolated from the rest of the mission; the right hand never knew, let alone understood, what the left hand was doing.”

One of the major problems that undermined UNAMIR that Dallaire discussed was the inability of different agencies to cooperate together. Also, this forms one of Dallaire’s criticisms of Jacques-Roger Booh-Booh.

“The people of Rwanda were not an insignificant black mass living in abject poverty in a place of no consequence. They were individuals like myself, like my family, with every right and expectation of any human who is a member of our tortured race.”

This is perhaps Dallaire’s ultimate response to those who would argue that Rwanda’s geopolitical place in the world did not merit intervention. Instead, Dallaire views Rwandans as human beings first and foremost, and therefore worthy of aid regardless of circumstances and the potential benefits or downsides of intervention.

“Here is what my experience in Rwanda has done: I am unable to remember the serenity, order and beauty of that scene without it being overlaid with vivid scenes of horror. Extremists, moderates, simple villagers and fervent worshippers were all in church that day, singing the message of Christ's resurrection. One week later, the same devout Christians would become murderers and victims, and the churches the sites of calculated butchery.”

Despite Dallaire’s sincere and immediate love of Rwanda, the traumas he experienced during the Rwandan Genocide ruined his memories of the country. Also, this passage illustrates the possible suddenness of mass violence and how it can happen without much warning for both perpetrators and victims.

“We began to get ever more disturbing phone calls reporting that elements of the Presidential Guard, the army, the Gendarmerie and the lnterahamwe were going from house to house with a list of names. Shots and screaming had been heard. lt was terrifying and surreal to be talking to someone […] and then to hear screams, shots and the silence of a dead line.”

Dallaire’s description of the first day of the Rwandan Genocide, of course, emphasizes the horror of the event. However, his description also calls attention to the helplessness of the situation, even for someone like himself who holds some authority and resources.

“In Rwanda the radio was akin to the voice of God, and if the radio called for violence, many Rwandans would respond, believing they were being sanctioned to commit these actions.”

One of the interesting elements of Dallaire’s perspective on Rwanda and the Rwandan Genocide is that he frequently shows an awareness of the power of media. The negative side of this was how RTLM played a pivotal role in stoking violence during the Rwandan Genocide.

“The massacre was not a spontaneous act. lt was a well-executed operation involving the army, Gendarmerie, Interahamwe and civil service […] The men who organized and perpetrated these crimes knew they were crimes and not acts justified by war, and that they could be held accountable for them. The Interahamwe returned to destroy the evidence. The faceless bureaucrats who fed the names to the militias and destroyed the records also played a part.”

Unlike mob violence, which Dallaire also encounters in this time with UNAMIR, he makes it clear that the Rwandan Genocide was a calculated event, coordinated between killers and bureaucrats. It was also carried out with an awareness that it would be seen as a crime by the rest of the world, hence the destruction of the evidence.

“lt wasn't shock any more at the horrific descriptions. Instead I now entered a sort of trance state when I heard such information; I'd heard so much of it over the past two weeks that it simply seemed to pile up in my mind. No reaction any more. No tears, no vomit, no apparent disgust. Just more cords of wood piling up waiting to be sawed into pieces in my mind.”

This refers to an incident that Dallaire describes after this passage where, while on vacation in Canada, seeing some timber next to the road made him think of piles of human bodies in a village (314-315). It is one of the examples of how Dallaire himself was traumatized by his experiences in Rwanda.

“On the way back to the Force HQ, I felt that I had shaken hands with the devil. We had actually exchanged pleasantries. I had given him an opportunity to take pride in his disgusting work. I felt guilty of evil deeds myself since I had actually negotiated with him. My stomach was ripping me apart about whether I had done the right thing. I would only know when the first transfer happened.”

This passage describes the incident that would give Shake Hands With The Devil its title. The encounter forced Dallaire to negotiate with the perpetrators of the Rwandan Genocide, leaving him to reflect on the problem of moral culpability.

“The road back was just as difficult and circuitous as the road in, but it did provide me with time to think with bitterness about how slow the humanitarian response had been. Rome, Paris, Geneva and New York were still demanding assessment upon assessment. Instead of coming to the aid of roughly two million people, the international community and aid groups were still conducting analyses of what was really needed.”

In another example of Dallaire’s criticisms of the United Nations’ bureaucracy, Dallaire describes how he was pressured to provide constant assessments. This is in sharp contrast to Dallaire’s own experience, where the same bureaucracies generally failed to provide Dallaire with the information he needed.

“lt was the expressions on their dead faces that assaulted me the most, a frieze of shock, pain and humiliation. For many years after I came home, I banished the memories of those faces from my mind, but they have come back, all too clearly.”

Dallaire notes here that the crimes of the Rwandan Genocide did not just involve murder, but also sexual assault. He is haunted by not only the signs of death, but also the evidence of sexual violence on the corpses he found.

"I rejected the picture of the genocidaires as ordinary human beings who had performed evil acts. To my mind, their crimes had made them inhuman, turned them into machines made of flesh that imitated the motions of being human. The perpetrators on both sides had their ‘justifications.’ For the Hutus, insecurity and racism had been artfully engineered into hate and violent reaction. In the RPF's case, it was willing to fight to win a homeland at all costs, and its soldiers' rage against the genocide transformed them into machines. And what of the witnesses-what drove us? Had the scenes we'd waded through frayed our humanity, turned us into numbed-out machines too?”

To cope with the horrors he witnessed, Dallaire dehumanizes the perpetrators of the genocide. However, when contemplating the matter, he concludes that even the people behind the genocide had “justifications” that were based in hate and rage, much like the motivations of the people fighting them. Dallaire invokes similar ideas when he blames “rage” that motivates genocide and terrorism.