Argumentative Essay On Child Soldiers

Under international law, the use of children under 18 in any armed conflict is illegal, and under 15 is considered a war crime. This is to preserve the children's human rights, by protecting them from involvement in armed combat are ensuring their wellbeing and freedom. However, children in 30 different conflicts are sent to fight in various armed forces, some as young as 8 being put into life threatening and mentally damaging situations.

By internationally agreed definition, a child soldier is a "...Child associated with an armed force or armed group is any person below 18 years of age who is used by an armed force or armed group....It does not only refer to a child who is taking or has taken a direct part in hostilities."- Guidelines on Children Associated with Armed Forces. By this definition, there are some 300,000 child soldiers being used currently. Most of the children put into conflict are unlawfully recruited, either because they were forced or because they fall under the legal recruitment age. 2/3 nations agree that banning the use of children under 18 is necessary to their wellbeing. However, not all of the children are forced into conflict, and many join out of sheer desperation. As well as this, children aren't just solely on the front line. Many are given to the militants as wives, subjected to sexual assault or worst of all, the children are used for suicide

Sometimes, it is due to society of a nation decaying and social roles rendered irrelevant, but mostly children are used to save money. In the chaos of war, recourses often fall short and these corner-cuts are necessary despite their consequences . They require less food, they don’t require pay, they can be used when forces are dwindling in a drawn out fight, even after heavy casualties and finally because children have young, malleable minds which are easier to train into new, violent