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Girl Soldiers: Forgotten Casualties of War
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Posted on Oct 19, 2016
By Pat Hynes
A 14-year-old female soldier from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia rides in a military helicopter along with other captured rebels.
(Scott Dalton / AP)
As secretary of State, Hillary Clinton was visibly shaken by sexual crimes
against women and girls when she visited the Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC) in 2009. Sexual crimes in this central African country, known
as(http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/24/world/africa/democratic-congo-rape/) the
"rape capital of the world," include the sexual exploitation of tens of
thousands of girls abducted and trapped as child soldiers. Nonetheless,
since 2010, President Obama has waived a congressionally mandated ban on
military aid to countries known to exploit child soldiers, among them the
DRC.
The DRC's eastern region is exceedingly rich in rare minerals and
exceedingly rife with decades of brutal war over those minerals. This
country and three others-Nigeria, Somalia and South Sudan-each of which
exploits thousands of child soldiers, will
receive(http://www.vocativ.com/236726/obama-waives-sanctions-5-straight-year
s-for-countries-using-child-soldiers/) more than $161 million in U.S.
military
aid(https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/10/01/dispatches-obama-still-arms-governme
nts-using-child-soldiers) in fiscal year 2016.
The Child Soldier Prevention Act of 2008 bans the U.S. government from
providing military resources and aid to countries that use soldiers younger
than 18; it allows a presidential waiver in cases of "national interest,"
however. But what possible "national interest" can override the lives of
tens of thousands of children shattered in the worst of childhood
nightmares-lives of being forced to torture, kill and rape, and in the case
of girls, lives of being serially raped and impregnated?
The Reality
At any given time, about 300,000 children between the ages of 8 and 18 are
exploited as child soldiers in scores of civil and international conflicts
in Africa, Asia and Colombia. In Sierra Leone's civil war (1991-2001), 80
percent of fighters were between 7 and 15 years old; in Liberia's conflict
(1989-2003), up to 70 percent of government and rebel troops were children.
Forty percent of soldiers slain in Colombia were children; the Lord's
Resistance Army in Uganda is mainly composed of children. They are abducted
from agricultural fields, or taken en route to school or market, or when
their village is attacked. Others join for reasons of extreme poverty and
hunger; fleeing family abuse; revenge for enemy brutality upon their family;
being drawn to a popular cause; and, in the case of some boys, as a way to
garner respect from male elders. In-depth investigators of child soldiers
conclude(https://www.thenation.com/article/new-face-warfare/) , ". never
before in the history of warfare have children been so exploited on such a
vast scale."
What most people do not realize is how many child soldiers are girls-an
estimated 40 percent, who are exploited, like boy soldiers, as servants,
cooks, porters, spies, human shields, suicide bombers and fighters. In Sri
Lanka, more than 43 percent of 50,000 children in armed groups were girls, a
finding determined during peace talks between warring parties and UNICEF and
documented by journalist Jimmie
Briggs(http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4791597) .
Deepening their trauma, girls are taken into sexual slavery by boy soldiers,
adult soldiers and commanders and, in some cases, sold in exchange for
weapons. Given the popular image of boys as child soldiers, hundreds of
thousands of girls constitute an invisible
army(http://www.peacewomen.org/assets/file/Resources/NGO/HR_ForgottenGirls_S
C_2005.pdf ) and "forgotten casualties of war" in the rehabilitation
process following the cessation of armed conflict.
Armed groups target children for wars because children-and particularly
girls, because of sex discrimination-are obedient, vulnerable and malleable.
Children can be more easily indoctrinated into being the next generation of
armed rebels and terrorists. Child soldiers are cheap because they are
unpaid and eat less than adults; and they provide functions such as cooking,
cleaning and portering, thus freeing up adult soldiers for more rigorous
fighting. With the prevalence of light but deadly weapons, both girls and
boys are trained for combat. In a 2002 survey, nearly half the interviewed
girls in armed groups described their primary
role(http://www.au.af.mil/au/afri/aspj/apjinternational/apj-s/2008/1tri08/mo
raleseng.htm ) as "fighter."
Despite their utility as fighters and servants, girl soldiers are raped,
prostituted, mutilated, infected with sexually transmitted diseases
including HIV/AIDS, and made pregnant by soldiers. Many are permanently
injured and will suffer lifelong pain as a result of multiple rapes and
untreated infections. Returning to their villages and homes, numerous girls
have reported that they are rejected as filthy and immoral, and they are
blamed for disgracing family and community honor. Even more shunned are
girls who return pregnant or with children born of rape. Losing family and
social support, they are compelled to turn to prostitution or stay with an
abusive ex-soldier "husband" in order to raise their child and survive.
Moreover, even after commitments to release child soldiers, armed groups
often refuse to give up girls, holding
them(https://childrenandarmedconflict.un.org/effects-of-conflict/six-grave-v
iolations/sexual-violence/ ) captive as "wives." Thus, the full cycle of
misogyny entraps girls: ruthlessly violated as child soldiers, ostracized
when returning home and often not released in the "peace" process.
Fifteen-year-old Grace Akallo was abducted in 1996 with 29 other high school
girls from her boarding school dormitory at St. Mary's College Kisubi in
northern Uganda by warlord Joseph Kony and rebel soldiers of the Lord's
Resistance Army. Physically, the girls were pushed to the point of death,
walking barefoot, given little food and water and beaten with sticks and the
butts of rifles. And spiritually, they were driven to the point of death,
forced to torture and kill other children-sometimes a sibling-in a seasoning
process designed to dehumanize them, extinguish their consciences and break
their wills. Kony forced the girls to train with AK-47s. He also distributed
them among his commanders as "wives." They were expected to fight even with
babies strapped to their backs.
Akallo was given to a man "older than her father," who on first encounter
seized her and raped her. "I felt like a thorn was in my skin as my
innocence was destroyed," she wrote of his sexual violence. In her
community, the stigma of rape is so extreme that ex-girl soldiers will admit
to murder(http://blogcritics.org/book-review-girl-soldier-a-story/) before
they will admit to having been raped.
In contrast to the outcast plight of girl soldiers, many boy soldiers earn a
manly status in their communities. Leymah Gbowee, the Liberian Nobel Peace
Prize laureate, works with ex-child soldiers from Charles Taylor's army
during Liberia's civil war. Joseph, a boy she counseled,
explained(https://www.opendemocracy.net/5050/leymah-gbowee/child-soldiers-ch
ild-wives-wounded-for-life) that he became a child soldier because "boys
who joined the rebellion came back and were really respected and were often
seen in the company of the elders and community leaders."
Gbowee is convinced that the nexus between violence, weapons and manhood is
responsible for drawing many former boy soldiers into the brutal, macho
cycle of war. Many of the girls she assisted were "child wives" of the
ex-soldiers and had been abducted, raped and beaten into submission. With no
exit(https://www.opendemocracy.net/5050/leymah-gbowee/child-soldiers-child-w
ives-wounded-for-life ) , each girl was "caught up in a spiral of one
individual trying to prove his maleness. . The abuse women suffer during
conflict is a reflection of the interaction between men and women, boys and
girls, during peace time."
Compounding the excruciating burdens of girl soldiers is the failure of the
disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programs of the United Nations
and international nongovernmental organizations-programs intended to help
former child soldiers with education, job skills and fitting back into
society. Save the Children's 2005 report, "Forgotten Casualties of War:
Girls in Armed Conflict,"
concludes(http://www.peacewomen.org/assets/file/Resources/NGO/HR_ForgottenGi
rls_SC_2005.pdf ) that girls are caught between "recrimination from the
armed group if they leave and from the community if they return home" and
are invisible in the reintegration programs. The misogyny and neglect on all
sides has sent many of them into prostitution for survival or resulted in
their suicides. Former girl soldiers are more than twice as likely to commit
suicide(https://www.thenation.com/article/new-face-warfare/ ;) as their male
counterparts.
The Fiction
For an exercise in unreality and moral depravity, Google images of "girl
soldiers." You will find a garbage heap of pornographic pictures: cartoons
of large-breasted women with big thighs and some muscles, barely clothed,
wielding a gun in each hand, looking like (so-called) "happy hookers"
costumed for Armed Services Day. Sprinkled among these are photos of young
female soldiers, hanging out passively, like decorations, among male
soldiers. Of the first 200 images I perused, a handful portrayed real girl
soldiers-serious beyond years with sad-to-death eyes. Yet even these photos
lacked the gruesome
reality(https://www.google.com/search?q=Girl+Soldiers&client=safari&rls=en&t
bm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj3tI726tDNAhWIKCYKHZdYDc4QsAQIHQ&b
iw=1039&bih=625) of the tens of thousands of girls entrapped in armies and
militias.
For contrast, Google images of "child soldiers." Ninety-five percent of
these images are boys. All are realistic war photos: children carrying,
aiming and shooting weapons sometimes taller than they are; roaming streets
in search of prey; poised to kill, faces deadly serious, some hardened, some
older than their years, others still bearing traces of their stolen
childhood. No airbrushed or pornographic reality on this site. Only a
crucial omission: Real girl soldiers-who constitute up to 40 percent of
child soldiers and suffer the most vile sexual violation and rejection-are
missing(https://www.google.com/search?q=Child+Soldiers&client=safari&rls=en&;
tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjdufih69DNAhVGeCYKHTOpBN0QsAQISg&
biw=1039&bih=625 ) .
We in the United States need a national floodlight on the issue of child
soldiers. Employing children, by whatever means, in armed conflict is an
crime against humanity recognized by the International Criminal Court. Forty
percent of funding available for the rehabilitation of child soldiers should
be
dedicated(http://www.peacewomen.org/assets/file/Resources/NGO/HR_ForgottenGi
rls_SC_2005.pdf ) to the reintegration of girls within their communities.
Leaders who use child soldiers should be
prosecuted(http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2004/01/winter-humanrigh
ts-singer ) and indicted. We need to
research(http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2004/01/winter-humanrights
-singer ) countries that traffic in arms and whose businesses invest in or
conduct trade with countries that use child soldiers. And violators should
be publicized, stigmatized and boycotted.
We need to frame and shame the hypocrisy of passing a law to protect
children caught in conflict and then violating it for that morbid excuse of
"national security"-a coverall for American militarism, xenophobia, torture,
erasure of civil rights and sexual exploitation. Otherwise, political
statements that women's rights are human rights are a sham.
Pat Hynes, a retired professor of environmental health from Boston
University, directs the Traprock Center for Peace and
Justice(http://traprock.org) in western Massachusetts. She writes and
speaks on issues of feminism, climate justice, U.S. militarism and peace.
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