A New Era: Iraq War Facts and Common Misconceptions

The Iraq War began in 2003 under the Bush administration. A common misconception among the Iraq War facts is that the war was a response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks; however, there was no evidence of Iraq’s connection with the attack. The United States intended to abolish Saddam Hussein’s regime and confiscate any weapons of mass destruction.

The war went on for eight years until President Obama officially announced that he would be withdrawing troops from Iraq in 2011. However, when ISIL began taking control of Iraqi land in 2014, U.S. military advisors returned to the country to combat the spread of the Islamic State. To understand the return and current presence of the United States in Iraq, it is important to know the following Iraq War facts.

Purpose

When the U.S. began the war with Iraq in 2003, the purpose was to take down Saddam Hussein from the Iraqi government; however, the United States’ current presence in Iraq is largely due to the permanent threat of terrorism in the Middle East caused by terrorist groups such as ISIL.

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant is a terrorist organization that follows radical Sunni Islam. It first gained global attention in 2014 with its presence in Iraq and Syria but also spread around the world to countries like Afghanistan, Egypt, Bangladesh and Pakistan.

ISIL initiatives were largely funded by oil revenue made on the black market. The group took control of oil fields in both Syria and Iraq and would sell this oil to fund their activities. Since then, they have lost much of their control of these oil fields to the Iraqi army and their revenue has decreased.

Troops

Although troops were withdrawn from Iraq in 2014, there are still over 5,000 American soldiers in Iraq due to the ongoing “war on terror” in the Middle East. Interestingly, though, it was found that these numbers were not exactly accurate. Pentagon officials acknowledged only over half of the troops are actually present in Iraq — one of the most shocking Iraq war facts as a report found that the actual amount was 8,892.

This number is more than 75 percent more than originally stated. While these figures could seem high, they are relatively small when compared to the number of troops present under the Bush administration. A decade ago, the combined troop total approached 200,000.

The War

Since their return in August 2014, the U.S.-led coalition has conducted more than 13,300 airstrikes against ISIL targets in the area. Through the years, these airstrikes have led to the Iraqi military regaining much of its land from ISIL. Iraq’s government announced the end of the war against the Islamic State in December 2017, over three years after they first began taking control of Iraqi land.

The Islamic State has now lost most of the territory they once took control of. In a statement, the military said it “fully liberated” all of Iraq’s territory and retook full control of the border. According to the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State, 98 percent of territory once claimed by the jihadist group has been reclaimed.

Moving Forward

Since the victory over the Islamic State, the U.S. has announced that it will reduce the number of troops in Iraq. That being said, the United States will not fully leave Iraq despite the fact that ISIL no longer controls Iraqi land.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis issued a statement saying, “Despite these successes, our fight is not over. Even without a physical caliphate, ISIS remains a threat to stability in the recently liberated areas, as well as in our homelands.” This belief is largely due to the terror that has been created through attacks around the world. Today, the goal is to fight the Islamic State from spreading its influence.

– Luz Solano-Flórez
Photo: Flickr

Top 10 Bosnian War Facts

Below are 10 important Bosnian War facts: how it began, what happened and how it ended.

Top 10 Bosnian War Facts

1. The state of affairs in Bosnia and Herzegovina began declining when politics became chaotic with the rapid decline of the Yugoslavian economy. Also playing a role was the collapse of communism and a structured government and various ethnic groups vying for control of the area. The Serbs, Muslims and Croats living in Bosnia each desired to appropriate Bosnia and Herzegovina’s territory for their own countries and take control of the government and political field.
2. Bosnian Croats and Muslims feared that Milošević, the leader of the Socialist Party of Serbia, would take their land, so they called for the independence of Herzeg-Bosnia. The Serbs, however, had the same idea. Bosnia and Herzegovina’s independence was declared on March 3, 1992, and was recognized by the U.S. and the European Community on April 6, 1992.
3. On April 6, 1992, the Serbs began the Siege of Sarajevo, which lasted until Feb. 29, 1996. The Serbian paramilitary forces began the siege by holding positions inside the city and in the hills surrounding Sarajevo. By the first week of May, the Serbs had surrounded the whole city, which cut Sarajevo off from food, medicine, water, electricity, fuel and other supplies. The Serbs began firing on Sarajevo with advanced artillery but faced heavy defense from those mobilized with weapons within the city. Because the Serbs were facing opposition, they began to terrorize the city with intense gunfire and snipers. The Siege of Sarajevo lasted for 47 months and remains the longest siege in modern history.
4. With Sarajevo, as well as several other cities isolated by force, the supply of food, utilities and communication became extremely limited and spread thin throughout the territory. This caused many cases of malnutrition and many citizens lost an average of up to 33 pounds while some others lost their lives due to lack of access to supplies.
5. Bosnian Serbs began ethnic cleansing of large areas occupied by non-Serbs. The genocide destroyed entire villages and thousands of Bosnians were forced out of their homes and taken to detention camps where they were raped, tortured, deported or killed. The Serbians used rape in the Bosnian War as a tactic to destroy relationships, families and communities.
6. One of the most lethal Bosnian War facts came when Gen. Ratko Mladic led Serbian troops in capturing Srebrenica, previously declared by the U.N. as a safe area, and killed almost 8,000 Muslim men. The U.N. later indicted Radovan Karadžić, orchestrator of the attack on Sarajevo, and General Mladic for genocidal war crimes.
7. The Bosnian government was prohibited from providing updated and necessary weaponry that the Serbian and Croatian armies maintained due to an international arms embargo imposed throughout the Bosnian War.
8. Although the U.N. Protection Force sent troops to supervise humanitarian aid and protect declared safe areas, the U.N. overall refused to intercede in the Bosnian War.
9. After NATO’s negotiations in Dayton, Ohio, in 1995, a final ceasefire was imposed and declared to bring an end to the Bosnian War. NATO enforced this through air strikes until the leaders agreed to the ceasefire and signed the Dayton Peace Accords in Paris on Dec. 14, 1995. The agreement allowed for a NATO peacekeeping enforcement group to maintain a permanent presence and oversight in the country.
10. Throughout the Bosnian War, more than 250,000 people lost their lives and many more were displaced from their homes.

Even today, as a result of these Bosnian War facts, the territory remains highly divided between two sections: Muslim-Croat and the Serbian Republic. Both sections face a continuous fight against poverty, unemployment and ethnic discord.

Photo: Flickr

Struggle and Sanctuary: How the Media Misrepresents Burundi

The general public is unable to form any positive conclusions from media sources due to how the media misrepresents Burundi. Through closer analysis, however, the public may see a shimmer of hope behind all the destruction that the media portrays is occurring in Burundi.

How Does the Media Portray Burundi?

The media portrays Burundi as economically unstable; however, this fact is only partially true. Population growth in Burundi continues to rapidly increase, leaving the nation fighting to support their growing nation.

Burundi’s economy is lacking in their growth rate with the population growth rate at 3.1 percent annually, and the GDP per capita not growing more than 1.5 percent even in the best of recent years. Because of these economic difficulties the country has endured, Burundi’s economy relies 49 percent on international financial aid.

International Aid

The media states that Western donors are in the process of cutting support towards Burundi, pushing the nation even more towards intolerable levels of poverty; however, in the past three years alone, the United States has donated over $135 million in foreign aid towards the country of Burundi.

Other organizations such as the World Bank pledged $440 million towards helping the country’s financial crisis, and the EU has already made firm commitments towards achieving this goal. Overall, donors have pledged over $2 billion for Burundi’s development strategy in order to rebuild the nation after its civil war and national political crises.

Internal Controversy

How the media misrepresents Burundi can also be seen in the violence occurring in the country due to political turmoil. Burundi’s president, Pierre Nkurunziza, who has been in office since 2005, released a referendum date for May 17 for a controversial constitutional reform. If this reform is passed, it would allow President Nkurunziza to remain in power until 2034 — an unjust situation that would cause public uproar.

The violence has increased to such a degree that the U.S. State Department has warned Americans not to travel to Burundi, and that Burundi citizens are trained to promote violence and on the path towards another civil war. However, this media representation fails to mention measures taken within the nation to ensure the people of Burundi have alternative methods to violence.

New Generation

Diedonné Nahimana, an award-winning Burundi citizen, created the program of New Generation in Bujumbura to coach victims of war to become ambassadors for peace. New Generation was created to provide victims or orphans of war with alternative opportunities for a successful life rather than turning to violence.

This program develops a new generation of leaders who will restore Burundi after their 12-year civil war, and hopefully prevent the return of war. The foundation of their teaching is based upon non-violence as in the steps of Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr.

The dream is that by 2020, this new generation will control leadership positions in the country and teach this method of non-violence to others and ensure peace in the country. Due to all of this violence, more than a quarter of a million people have Burundi in terror, seeking refuge in other countries.

Global Priority

Despite this, sources claim that the world doesn’t seem to notice this violence occurring in Burundi and thus serve as another example of how the media misrepresents Burundi.

The people of Burundi are under constant persecution and live in terror in their country due to the political crises and increased poverty conditions; however, it is not the case that the world has turned their back on this African country. Since 2015, over 300,000 people have fled the country of Burundi, many to refugee camps in neighboring African countries where unfortunately, persecution and inhumane actions still exist.

Struggle and Sanctuary

Other countries, such as Canada, have developed methods to ensure Burundi refugees are welcome in their countries. Canada has designated refugee claims from Burundi which welcomes refugees into their country. In fact, Canada proudly holds a Burundian community of roughly 10,000 and continues to allow refugees inside its borders. The United States has also welcomed over 2,000 Burundian refugees in the past two years and the numbers increase daily.

Although Burundi endures many hardships from political crises, poverty and population growth, there is more good occurring in the country than what the media showcases to the public.

– Adrienne Tauscheck

Photo: Flickr

Top 12 Most Deadliest Wars in History

As with most wars, the majority of people killed in the deadliest wars of all time are innocent civilians. Wars have been a part of human history since the dawn of time. The earliest recorded evidence of human warfare suggests that the first conflict took place around 13,000 years ago along the Egypt-Sudan border. It is believed that this conflicted erupted as a resulted of competition over resources — in this case, water. However, there are many reasons a war can develop: poverty, poor governmental leadership, civil unrest, religion, territory disputes, resources and a plethora of other factors are all responsible for most of the wars throughout human history. With that said, here is a look at the deadliest wars in history.

Top 12 Most Deadliest Wars in History

1. The Second Congo War
   The Second Congo War (1998-2003) was one of the deadliest wars in history and the deadliest in modern African history. This war spanned over a period of 5 years and caused the death of around 5.4 million people. Although the genocides accounted for a large number of casualties, diseases and famine caused by the war were also partially responsible.
2. Napoleonic Wars
   The Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815) pitted the French Empire and its allies against a coalition of European powers. The Napoleonic Wars refers to a series of conflicts between the French Empire and the coalitions that fought it: the War of the Third Coalition, the Fourth, the Fifth, the Sixth and the Seventh and final coalition. During this period, it is estimated that around 3.5-6 million people were killed as a direct or indirect result of the war.
3. The Thirty Years’ War
   As the name implies, the Thirty Years’ War was fought between Catholic and Protestant states in Central Europe from 1618 to 1648. The conflicts eventually drew in the great powers of Europe, resulting in one of the longest, most destructive and deadliest conflicts in European history. It is estimated that the war was responsible for the deaths of 8 million civilians and military personnel alike.
4. The Chinese Civil War
   The Chinese Civil War started in August of 1927 between the government-backed Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China. The massacres and mass atrocities carried out by both parties resulted in more than 8 million casualties by 1950.
5. The Russian Civil War
   The Russian Civil War claimed the lives of more than 9 million people — 8 million of whom were civilians. The war spanned from 1917-1922 — immediately after the Russian Revolutions of 1917 — and it was fought between opposing political factions, namely the Red Army and the White Army.
6. The Dungan Revolt
   The Dungan Revolt was a war fought between the Hans (Chinese ethnic group native to East Asia) and the Huis (Chinese Muslims) in 19th-century China during the Qing Dynasty. There were approximately 20 million war-related deaths, mostly caused by famine and migration brought about by the war.
7. An Lushan Rebellion
   The An Lushan Rebellion was a rebellion against the Tang Dynasty of China between 755 A.D. and 763 A.D. Although it is difficult to accurately report the death toll, census reports taken the years following the war imply that around 36 million people were killed, or about two-thirds of population of the empire.
8. World War I
   The First World War was fought between the Allies and the Central Powers. The war lasted 4 years — from 1914 to 1918 —but it was responsible for around 18 million deaths. Of the 18 million deaths, about 11 million were military personnel and about 7 million were civilians.
9. Taiping Rebellion
   Yet another war in China, the Taping Rebellion was another large-scale rebellion that was fought between 1850 and 1864. The war was fought between the Qing Dynasty and the Christian millenarian movement of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. Although there isn’t an exact number, most estimations have the Taiping Rebellion responsible for 20-30 million deaths.
10. The Qing Dynasty Conquest of the Ming Dynasty
    The transition from the Qing Dynasty to the Ming dynasty was anything but peaceful. The rebellion waged for over 60 years— from 1618 to 1683 — and resulted in the deaths of 25 million people. What started as a relatively small rebellion in northeastern China ultimately resulted in one of the country’s deadliest conflicts as well as one of the deadliest wars in history.
11. The Second Sino-Japanese War
    The Second Sino-Japanese War was waged between 1937 and 1945 between the Republic of China’s National Revolutionary Army and the Imperial Japanese Army. It is widely believed that the war began with the Marco Polo Bridge Incident and it later escalated to an all-out war that resulted in 25 million civilian deaths and over 4 million Chinese and Japanese military deaths.
12. World War II
    World War II was a global war that spanned from 1939 to 1945. The war pitted the Allies and the Axis power in the deadliest war in history, and was responsible for the deaths of over 70 million people. Known for its genocidal campaign against the Jewish people, the war was also responsible for the deaths of more than 50 million civilians.

An End to War

As John F. Kennedy famously said, “Mankind must put an end to war before war puts an end to mankind.” The deadliest wars in history are all a testament to that sentiment — it is a repeating pattern with very costly end results. The last large-scale war, World War II, was responsible for the deaths of nearly 70 million people.

With the ever-advancing technology in the modern world and a booming population, the next war will undoubtedly bring about an unprecedented amount of deaths. Let history be a teacher so that we can avoid committing the same mistakes, and put an end to conflict once and for all.

– Brandon Cerda

Photo: Flickr

The Theory of How to End Genocides

During the Holocaust, more than six million people lost their lives because of their religion, ethnicity, sexuality or other characteristics. To this day, the Holocaust is still one of history’s most devastating genocides. As a direct response, in 1948, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was established to focus on how to end genocides and atrocities.

Genocide is described as killing members of a targeted group, causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group, consciously inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part, preventing births within the group and taking children away from the group.

Since World War II, genocides have taken place in disparate areas of the world. From Cambodia and Rwanda to Bosnia and Sudan, genocides have often occurred in poverty-stricken countries. So the question is, how to end genocides?

The Stages of Genocide

First, it is essential to recognize the signs leading up to these targeted killings. Being aware of the different steps taken in committing these atrocities is an essential step in how to end genocides.

• Classification
  This is a division between “us” and “them”. A country that lacks interaction between its population’s races and cultures is especially susceptible to genocide. A preventive action of classification is mixing different cultures and races. This promotes appreciation, acceptance, tolerance and understanding among diverse groups.
• Symbolization
  A targeted group is given a distinguishing name, symbol or color in order to set them apart. Discouraging hate speech and outlawing distinctive symbols such as the swastika are measures to counter symbolization. Coupled with hatred, symbolization can be a dangerous tactic, especially when it is followed by the third stage.
• Dehumanization
  This occurs when one group strips away the humanity of another group. The group is compared to animals, diseases or insects. This stage is vital because propaganda comes into play, which justifies the mistreatment of a group. To combat this stage, propaganda media should be banned and hate crimes should be punished.
• Organization
  This a dangerous stage because this is when mass killings are planned. An organized group or individual militias will become trained and armed. These groups are usually terrorist groups who should not only be outlawed, but should also be banned from foreign travel.
• Extermination
  At this point is when the genocide commences. Mass killings will take place in hopes of “exterminating” the unwanted group. The killers justify their actions because they do not believe their victims are human and that they have little to no worth. At this stage, drastic measures should be taken. Institutions should be set up for groups to hide in safety and they should also be heavily armed. A higher authority such as the national government or the U.N. Security Council should intervene.

How to End Genocide: Address the Root Cause

Being able to recognize the signs of genocide is only the first part of how to end genocides. It is also important to take action when any of these steps are underway in order to prevent the progression to full-blown mass killing.

Genocides usually take place during wartime, so to prevent a massacre, it is essential to find the causes. Many conflicts stem from racism, intolerance, discrimination, dehumanization and hatred of others. Addressing these issues should be a primary goal because it can prevent armed conflict.

Utilize the Judicial System

In times of genocide, using the government is essential. When the government is involved, specific measures can be taken. For example, the deployment of military forces and arrests of those committing genocide can help stop the killings. International interventional may be necessary if the country’s government is complicit in the genocide.

Ultimately, the goal is to prevent genocides before they happen. To do this, it is important to address the thoughts and beliefs that allow some groups to devalue others in order to justify their crimes. Emphasizing the value of all human life is key to ending violence and genocides worldwide.

– Cassidy Dyce

Photo: Flickr