The United States' Humanitarian Hypocricies

The United States has enjoyed a long history of being the "city upon a hill" and the beacon of liberty for the free world. They have defeated tyranny abroad and have never fallen to the temptations of strong men or political oppression. In foreign affairs, the United States has boosted up liberal democracies and liberty-loving nations all the while making human rights one of the most prominent issues in their international diplomacy.

However, the United States does have a dark side to its past and present. As the sole remaining superpower from the end of the Second World War, the United States has had to balance its interests with the idealisms of liberty and freedom for all. The internal politics of the United States have prevented action where action was due and promoted action where action was not wanted. In an effort to appease the populace and maintain international stability, American foreign policy has been involved in propping up and supporting places where human rights are of no concern to the government.

Rwandan Genocide

In 1994, the Hutu majority in Rwanda began exacerbating the differences and conflicts between themselves and Rwanda's strongest political minority group, the Tutsi. In what became the international communities greatest failure to stop genocide since the end of World War 2, the Hutu murdered, raped, and destroyed Tutsi villages, Tutsi people, and Hutus who dared to stand against their murderous plans. The only nation to intervene was France, and it did so in the dying days of the war after a majority of the killing was over. Somewhere between 800,000 and 2 million Tutsi and opposition Hutus were murdered during 100 days starting in April of 1994.

The United States did not act and the US State Department Spokesperson went on to argue that Rwanda was not genocide. The Clinton administration did everything it could to avoid framing it as a genocide for if it did, the United States would be legally obligated to intervene.

Well, as I think you know, the use of the term "genocide" has a very prcise legal meaning..."- Christine Shelley, US State Department Spokesperson 1994

In its place in the UN, the United States prevented a large scale intervention in Rwanda and only played a supporting role in the humanitarian follow up following the victory of the Tutsi rebel group, the RPF. The United States has since admitted severe shortcomings in what it did in those short weeks in 1994, but the important point stayed, that the United States would not intervene unless its interests were involved. The United States would intervene in Bosnia in the following year once it became clear European security was becoming increasingly unstable. 

 

Saudi Arabia

In the modern world, the Middle East has become a hot spot for international action, destabilization, terrorism, and autocratic regimes. The West has being trying to fix a problem it helped to start, but is finding it increasingly difficult to stabilize the regime. Sunni Saudi Arabia has been the counterweight to Shi'a Iran ever since the revolution of 1979. Given Saudi Arabia's location at the crossroads of the Middle East and North Africa, its willingness to work with the West, as well as its vast oil production, the United States has found itself largely aiding the Saudi regime.

Saudi Arabia is by no means a humane society nor one that can even claim to being anywhere close to a western liberal democracy. Saudi Arabia continues to imprison political opposition, maintains freedom of religion only to Sunni Muslims, fails to protect its 9 million foreign workers, does not follow due process of law, executes homosexuals, forbids women from doing anything without a male's permission, and continues to execute people on the basis of practicing "sorcery". Yet in the interests of maintaining links to the only nation in the region large enough and powerful enough to counter Iran, the United States has remained largely silent on the issue.

The United States condemns nations around the world for their human rights abuses and their discriminatory practices against minorities. They demand other nations to cease their support of groups that break human rights and is not scared of taking action. The United States has criticized China's handling of Tibetans, Russia's handling of Chechnyans, and South Africa's policies of aparteid, but continues to militarily and politically support morally corrupt regimes like Saudi Arabia.

 

Operation Condor

In the late 1970's socialist and left-wing movements began popping up amongst the downtrodden and disillusioned in Latin America. Latin America being critical as a stable parter region in the hemisphere in the fight against Communism helped to create the idea that these countries had to be friendly to the United States no matter what. In Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Paraguay, Brazil, Peru, and Ecuador, right-wing governments (many of which placed there by CIA backed revolutionaries) were backed up by the United States governments. Further actions in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala in earlier years also followed these trends.

The actual operation allowed American-backed security forces to hunt down political dissidents and arrest them even if there were no laws violated. Abductions, interrogations, cross-border transfers, and political arrests were not uncommon and done with complete cooperation with American intelligence agencies. Their final mission, by far the most secret, was to establish commando teams to go around the world and assassinate expats and leaders who spoke out against the United States and were pro-left. Foreign ministers, former politicians, expat generals, and an ex-president were assassinated as a part of this plan to prevent them from spreading their "Marxist terrorist activity" (it wasn't).

The United States of the 1970's attempted to claim that it had pivoted its foreign affairs focus to human rights under the Carter administration, but completely failed to do so. This was the same country that called the Soviets an evil empire for oppressing and dominating their Eastern European satellites. In regards to its policy in Latin America, the United States of the 1970's was almost entirely hypocritical considering the accusations it levied against the Soviets.


In short, the United States is by far no saint and its foreign policy is driven by national interests rather than human rights or morality. It is important to realize this so that we may understand the world around us. We cannot change the past, but we can understand it so that we may move forward with a a more just cause and righteous foreign policy

Works Cited

McSherry, J. Patrice. "Global Policy Forum." Operation Condor: Deciphering the U.S. Role. Global Policy Forum, July 2001. Web. 12 May 2016.

"Refusing to Call It Genocide: Documents Show Clinton Administration Ignored Mass Killings in Rwanda." Democracy Now! N.p., 7 Apr. 2014. Web. 12 May 2016.

"Statistics | Survivors Fund." Statistics | Survivors Fund. Survivors Fund, n.d. Web. 12 May 2016.

"United Human Rights Council." United Human Rights Council. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 May 2016.

"The U.S. and the Genocide in Rwanda 1994: Evidence of Inaction." The U.S. and the Genocide in Rwanda 1994: Evidence of Inaction. Ed. William Ferroggiaro. National Security Archive, 20 Aug. 2001. Web. 12 May 2016.

"World Report 2015: Saudi Arabia." Human Rights Watch. Human Rights Watch, 29 Jan. 2015. Web. 12 May 2016.