The Effects of War on Child Soldiers in Sierra Leone

2374 Words5 Pages

History and Prevalence of Child Soldiers in Sierra Leone

In the early 1990s, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) of Sierra Leone, led by former military agents invaded Sierra Leone from Liberia. The RUF initially said they were leading a political movement. Their main goals were to promote liberation, democracy, and freedom. They said they wanted justice and equality for all civilians living in Sierra Leone. In spite of what the RUF said they were doing, they were forceful and left trails of murder in their path. When civilians lacked support for the “political revolution”, the RUF started a decade long war that ravaged the country as a whole. The RUF developed a sense of structured, militarized violence. It created a climate of opportunities for average civilians to obtain cheap weapons. With the greater access to weapons for civilians and the RUF, the politics became more militarized also. As the war waged on, poverty rose and people began to resort to looting of national resources. Laws diminished and seemed to lack any strength against the brute force of the RUF and their civilian followers (Denov, 2010).

These conditions, caused by structural violence and weakened social systems, had severe consequences for all, but more so for children the children of Sierra Leone. Children make up the mass majority of the population of Sierra Leone. Because of the war, children had even less access to standardized education, they suffered immensely because of the unemploy¬ment of their parents, and thousands of children resorted to the struggle of surviving on the street (Zack-Williams, 2001). Children were preyed on by “thugs”. Soon children were unknowingly recruited as “child soldiers.” (It must be known that the term child soldier ...

... middle of paper ...

...rs in Post-Conflict Sierra Leone. Interantional Social Work , 53 (6), 791-806.

Drumbl, M. B. (2007). International Decisions. American Society of International Law , 101 (4), 841-848.

Everett, J. (2008). The Battle Continues: Fighting for a more Child-Sensitive Approach to Asylum for Child Soldiers. Florida Journal of International Law , 21, 286-355.

Kimmel, C. R. (2007). Institutionalized Child Abuse: The Use of Child Soldiers. Interantional Social Work , 50 (6), 740-754.

Klasen, F. O. (2010). Multiple Trauma and Mental Health in Former Ugandan Child Soldiers. Journal of Traumatic Stress , 23 (5), 573-581.

Laird, S. (2004). Inter-ethnic Conflict: A Role for Social Work in Sub-Saharan Africa. Social Work Education, 23(6), 693–709.

Zack-Williams, A.B. (2001). Child Soldiers in the Civil War in Sierra Leone. Review of African Political Economy, 28 (87), 73–82.

Show More
Related

  • A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah

    1199 Words  | 3 Pages

    During the author’s life in New York and Oberlin College, he understood that people who have not experienced being in a war do not understand what the chaos of a war does to a human being. And once the western media started sensationalizing the violence in Sierra Leone without any human context, people started relating Sierra Leone to civil war, madness and amputations only as that was all that was spoken about. So he wrote this book out o...

    Read More

  • Sierra Leone and the Blood Diamonds: Civil War and Children

    524 Words  | 2 Pages

    Think about how your life was when you were ten. For most people, the only worries were whether you finished your homework and if you’ve been recently updated for new games. Unfortunately, in Sierra Leone, kids at the age of ten were worried about if that day was the only day they’d be able to breathe. The cause of one of this devastating outcome is Sierra Leone’s Civil War. This war was a long bloody fight that took many lives and hopes of children and families.

    Read More

  • Compare and Contrast A Long Way Gone and The Bite of the Mango

    879 Words  | 2 Pages

    There was a war in Sierra Leone, Africa, from 1991 to 2002 where a rebel army stormed through African villages amputating and raping citizens left and right (“Sierra Leone Profile”). Adebunmi Savage, a former citizen of Sierra Leone, describes the reality of this civil war: In 1996 the war in Sierra Leone was becoming a horrific catastrophe. Children were recruited to be soldiers, families were murdered, death came easily, and staying alive was a privilege. Torture became the favorite pastime of the Revolutionary United Front rebel movement, which was against the citizens who supported Sierra Leone’s president, Ahmad Tejan Kabbah.

    Read More

  • Child Soldiers In A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah

    1105 Words  | 3 Pages

    Capturing children and turning them into child soldiers is an increasing epidemic in Sierra Leone. Ishmael Beah, author of the memoir A Long Way Gone, speaks of his time as a child soldier. Beah was born in Sierra Leone and at only thirteen years old he was captured by the national army and turned into a “vicious soldier.” (Beah, Bio Ref Bank) During the time of Beah’s childhood, a civil war had erupted between a rebel group known as the Revolutionary United Front and the corrupt Sierra Leone government. It was during this time when the recruitment of child soldiers began in the war. Ishmael Beah recalls that when he was only twelve years old his parents and two brothers were killed by the rebel group and he fled his village. While he and his friends were on a journey for a period of months, Beah was captured by the Sierra Leonean Army. The army brainwashed him, as well as other children, with “various drugs that included amphetamines, marijuana, and brown brown.” (Beah, Bio Ref Bank) The child soldiers were taught to fight viciously and the effects of the drugs forced them to carry out kill orders. Beah was released from the army after three years of fighting and dozens of murders. Ishmael Beah’s memoir of his time as a child soldier expresses the deep struggle between his survival and any gleam of hope for the future.

    Read More

  • Cause And Effect Essay: A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah

    1112 Words  | 3 Pages

    The lack of parenting during the civil war in Sierra Leone is a major cause that leads to the use of child soldiers during the war. The outbreak of the war in Sierra Leone caused everyone to run for their lives, leaving behind loved ones. Due to the sudden outbreak, many children were split apart from their parents leaving them abandoned. Wen the war began “fathers had come running from their workplaces, only to stand in front of their empty houses with no indication of where their families had gone. Mothers wept as they ran towards schools, rivers and water taps to look for their children. Children ran home to look for their parents who were wandering the streets in search of them. As the gunfire intensified, people gave up looking for their loved ones and ran out of town” (Beah 9). Ishmael realizes that he will be alone without his family and begins to feel as if a part of his is lost. As for the separation of families, the children in Sierra Leone were forced to make their own sensible decisions in order to stay alive during that time. Young children who lost their families were brainwashed into believing that fighting in the war was the right thing to do. Correspondingly, the lack of parenting during this difficult...

    Read More

  • Sierra Leone's Revolutionary United Front

    860 Words  | 2 Pages

    “Child Soldiers Global Report 2001- Sierra Leone.” refworld. Child Soldiers International, 2001. Web. 4 Dec. 2013.

    Read More

  • Globalization Increases Child Soldiery

    2629 Words  | 6 Pages

    Since the end of the Cold War, the recruitment of child soldiers has been recognized as an increasingly global phenomenon. Although the majority of the relatively recent child soldier recruitment cases have developed from armed conflicts in Africa, by the beginning of the new millennium the trend increased globally, appearing on nearly every continent, including Asia, Europe and the Americas. The prevalence of this practice has turned it into a much talked about international issue. The aim of this paper is to look at how this issue is influenced and even aggravated by globalization. More specifically, it will be argued that globalization, expressed through the existence of international organizations, such as the United Nations, have been ineffective in putting a stop to child soldiery and that globalization, defined by the interconnectedness of world economies has lead to underdevelopment and therefore exasperated conflict and as a result child soldiery.

    Read More

  • Child Soldiers: Kill or Be Killed

    1798 Words  | 4 Pages

    In order to understand the effects that come with being a child soldier, one must first understand how a child ends up in such a position. To three teenage boys living in a small Indian village, the hope of a better life for themselves and their families as well as the affirmation of employment seemed promising. So pr...

    Read More

  • Born into Brothels a Documentary by Zana Briski

    1192 Words  | 3 Pages

    Wells, Karen C.. "Children and youth at war." Childhood in a global perspective. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2009. 152. Print.

    Read More

  • The Conflict Diamonds of Africa

    1039 Words  | 3 Pages

    The acts of violence that were performed by rebels in Africa were horrific. Adults and children were murdered, mutilated, tortured, and raped. The Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in Sierra Leone performed despicable acts of cutting off a people's body parts with machetes to instill fear in the community. If you were working in the diamond mines and not performing up to the standards of the rebels you would lose a body part as punishment. Rebels would continue to do this from one village to another in order “to take control of the mines in the area” (Hoyt). It is estimated that in Sierra Leone that over 20,000 people suffered mutilation. The acts that the rebels performed to these innocent victims was clearly a violation to their human rights. The RUF collected 125 million a year to fund their war on the government and the people of Sierra Leone.

    Read More

  • The Sierra Leone Civil War

    2682 Words  | 6 Pages

    The Sierra Leone Civil War lasted eleven years and left Sierra Leone scared and unconstructed. The Revolutionary United Front (RUF) bombarded the country but faced constant resistance from the Sierra Leone Military. Both sides relied heavily on child soldiers throughout the war and a projected 5,000 to 10,000 child soldiers were collectively used by both the Sierra Leone government and the RUF. These children forcibly entered into a life of violence and oppression, and they have since struggled to reintegrate back into society. Child soldiers have returned home with no family or future and many still face severe complications.

    Read More

  • Child Soldiers in Africa

    803 Words  | 2 Pages

    Child soldier is a worldwide issue, but it became most critical in the Africa. Child soldiers are any children under the age of 18 who are recruited by some rebel groups and used as fighters, cooks, messengers, human shields and suicide bombers, some of them even under the aged 10 when they are forced to serve. Physically vulnerable and easily intimidated, children typically make obedient soldiers. Most of them are abducted or recruited by force, and often compelled to follow orders under threat of death. As society breaks down during conflict, leaving children no access to school, driving them from their homes, or separating them from family members, many children feel that rebel groups become their best chance for survival. Others seek escape from poverty or join military forces to avenge family members who have been killed by the war. Sometimes they even forced to commit atrocities against their own family (britjob p 4 ). The horrible and tragic fate of many unfortunate children is set on path of war murders and suffering, more nations should help to prevent these tragedies and to help stop the suffering of these poor, unfortunate an innocent children.

    Read More

  • Child Soldiers

    2240 Words  | 5 Pages

    Taylor, Rupert. “The Plight of Child Soldiers.” Suite 101. Media Inc., 11 May 2009. Web. 15 Feb. 2011. .

    Read More

  • Drug Trafficking and Its Effects on US Policy and Economy

    1558 Words  | 4 Pages

    Solution." Indiana Journal Of Global Legal Studies 18.2 (2011): 901-927. Academic Search Complete. Web. 26 Apr. 2014.

    Read More

  • The Ukranian Crisis: Extradition of Viktor Yanukovich

    1358 Words  | 3 Pages

    Von Galhn and Taulbee. 2013. Law Among Nations. An Introduction to Public International Law. Pearson Education.

    Read More

More about The Effects of War on Child Soldiers in Sierra Leone

Open Document