Child Soldiers
“all across somalia, smooth hairless faces peek out from behind enormous guns. In blown out buildings children load bullets twice the size of their fingers. In neighborhoods by the sea they run checkpoints and stop four by fours trucks though they can barely see over there hoods.” That quote from new york times upfront armed and underage article shows how much of a problem child soldiers are and are becoming as the use of child soldiers becomes a more widespread practice.
Now that you realise how much of a problem child soldiers are allowed me to give you some background. Children have been in the military all throughout history but as drummer boys or the girls as chefs. This quickly evolved until boys were marching into a
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firefight with a knife in there pocket and an ak47 or m16 slung over their soldier with grenades and ammo strapped to there waist. This has only gotten worse through the years and it took until 1970 before the usa even realised that it had gotten out of hand. Since then several more laws have been passed regarding this but that has not stopped rebels from using them. Some people believe that the child soldiers should be prosecuted but I strongly believe that child soldiers should be given amnesty because they are victimised, Have their humanity and sense of right and wrong striped from them and giving them amnesty is better for the future of the usa. First of all child soldiers are victimised because of many reasons.
The first reason as stated by debatewise.org “Once children are recruted it is also difficult for them to leave because they become dependant on their commanders for drugs, alcohol money and ood.” allow me to explain this quote deeper. once they are “recruited” or in reality when they are kidnapped they are then drugged with cocaine mixed with gunpowder and if they refuse to take the drugs they are beaten or killed and sometimes both. Then after they are drugged they are forced to watch people be killed right in front of them this makes them even more dependant on the drugs and now they are dependant on alcohol in addition to be able to escape the grief so they become dependant on their commanders. The second reason why they are victimised has to do with the fate that they were forced into when they were kidnapped and the statistics about this was stated very well in the article summative essay child soldiers “...in the last 10 years over 2 million children have been killed, over 1 million orphaned, over 6 million have been left seriously injured or permanently disabled and over 10 million have been diagnosed with psychological trauma.” This proves that child soldiers are victims because according to google the definition of viacom is “A person harmed injured or killed as result of a crime accident or other event or action.” and over 10 million child soldiers have been diagnosed with psychological trauma. …show more content…
not to mention the physical injuries and deaths. The third and final reason applies to girls. I believe this reason was stated perfectly in the article Armed and underage on page 6 when it states “And it isn’t just boys, girls are often pressed into duty as cooks or messengers many are subjected to sexual abuse including rape.” so now child soldiers are not only victims of kidnap and injuries but they are victims of rape. But some people still might say that they could of just run away but they are unable to escape because they would starve to death and even if they did not starve to death they would not know what direction to go and they would not know how to handle the wave of grief they would go through after the drugs and alcohol wear off not to mention that they would simply be shot when they get caught trying to escape. My second reason why child soldiers should be given amnesty is that they have their sense of right and wrong striped from them and they do these things against their own will like stated in the article Summative essay child soldiers on page 2 “The drugs, often cocaine mixed with gunpowder, brainwash the children to the point where they would rather not escape from the horror unraveling around them.” This shows that they lose their sense of right and wrong because of the drugs they are forced to take and once they lose their sense of right and wrong they lose control of their own fait.
They never wanted to be drugged and turned into a child soldier and once they are brainwashed with drugs and watching people be killed in front of them they are taught how to fight because they have lost everything else they ever knew so the only thing they know is how to follow orders and how to fight like stated in the article TIME magazine Hope for uganda's child soldiers? Philip Ludara states “You’re trained how to torture. You’re trained how to kill. It’s all you
know,” My third reason is that giving them amnisty would be better for the future of the usa like stated in the artical debatewise.org child soldier prosicution. “The aim should not be punishment of child soldiers but rehabilitation” If we can rehabilitate them then they can join the usa and we would have more people in the usa to help the economy. The second thing they could do is help convince people to take action against the people who kidnap them and turn them into child soldiers so that no more kids will be turned into child soldiers. Also the USA contributed accidentaly to kidnappers that turn kids into child soldiers as stated in the article Armed and underage page 7 “Because the U.S is helping to pay Somali soldiers, it is possible that the money for some child soldiers may have come from american taxpayers.” so if its possible that we could of caused this so some children its only fair to them that we try to make up for our mistake by giving them amnesty and helping them to recover. This is not something that children should be forced to go through and if they do go through it the last thing that they need held against them is there prosecution so like stated in this article child soldiers should be given amnesty because they are a victim and not a perpetrator, There sense of right and wrong has been striped from them and it would be best for the future of the usa.
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.
There is no exact known number of children currently being utilised in warfare worldwide. The issue of the military use of children is so widespread that no figure can be calculated, although it is estimated that there are currently over 250,000 child soldiers across the world. Many are drugged and brainwashed into murder, many are forced to sever all ties with their family or watch them die. Most are faced with a simple choice: kill or be killed. Although the notion of child soldiers is vastly alien to contemporary Australian society, it is a reality in many parts of the world.
The U.S. and other Western nations support the fragile Somali regime, which is battling an Islamic insurgency, as part of the counterterrorism strategy for the region.” As apparent, the United States has put a counterterrorism strategy into place, to help bring down the power that Somalia has over child soldiers. As seen from “Armed & Underage” by Jeffrey Gettleman, “.200,000 children worldwide are still being used as combatants, usually against their will. And it isn't just boys: Girls are often pressed into duty as cooks or messengers.
As defined by Timothy Webster, author of Babes with Arms: International Law and Child Soldiers, a child soldier is “any person under the age of eighteen who is or has been associated with any kind of regular or irregular armed group, including those who serve as porters, spies, cooks, messengers and including girls recruited for sexual purposes (Webster, 2007, pp.230). As this definition reveals, a child soldier is more than simply a child with a gun. It is estimated that there are approximately 300,000 children under the age of 18, being used as soldiers in 33 conflicts currently, and this figure continues to rise (Webster, 2007, pp.227). Similarly, in 1999 it was estimated that more than 120,000 children, under the age of 18, were used as soldiers to fight ...
The first reason these kids shouldn’t be prosecuted or punished in any way is because it wasn’t their choice to be a soldier to begin with. According to Child Soldiers, Prosecution, most kids were forced to fight and had no choice of weather to enlist or not. There are about 200,000 child soldiers worldwide state's Armed and Underage, (Gettleman) and these kids are doing things their adolescent brains
Children at such a young age don't have the mental ability to think long term about their actions, especially when they are being forced or drugged. Some may argue that if child criminals get punished for their actions, then child soldiers should too, but that is just not the case. The difference being, child criminals choose to commit their crimes, child soldiers are forced to commit crimes. As an example, in the article Child Soldiers it states, “More often than not, children have no say in whether they enlist or not and once recruited the children have become brainwashed through the use of drugs and alcohol” (Child Soldiers).
Children have been used as soldiers in many events, however two that stand out are the use of child soldiers in the Sierra Leone civil war and the drug cartels in Mexico. Most people agree that forcing children to be soldiers is wrong and not humane. The people that make them soldiers transform them into belligerent beings by force. Child soldiers of drug cartels and the armies of Sierra Leone were threatened with their lives if they didn’t become soldiers. The lives of these child soldiers are lives that nobody should live. Situations in both countries are horrible because of the high number of youngsters that are forced to take part in drug use and are transformed into extremely belligerent and inhumane people; in addition they are deprived
Military children are in a league of their own, and at very young ages are thrown into situations of great stress. Approximately 1.2 million children live in the U.S. Military families (Kelly. 2003) and at least 700,000 of them have had at least one parent deployed (Johnson et al. 2007). Every child handles a deployment differently, some may regress in potty training, and others may become extremely aggressive. Many different things can happen, in most cases when a parent deploys and the child becomes difficult to handle, it can cause a massive amount of stress on the parent that is not deployed as well as added stress on the parent who is deployed. There are three stages of a deployment, pre-deployment, deployment, and reintegration, being educated on these three things can make a deployment “run” smoothly for the entire family.
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.
Many child soldiers willingly join the armed forces. In their eyes, it is to follow in their families footsteps. In “ Child Soldier.Some words don't belong together.” It states that, “Children join for ideological reasons or to avenge the death of a family member,” Also, “Contrary to popular belief, a large portion of child soldiers volunteer,” And finally, “ did not turn them away when they came eager to fight,” However, children join willingly to avenge the death of a family member. Children would do anything to get revenge or save their family. Thus, makes them dangerous because they won't stop until they succeed in what they set out to do.
Though the use of child soldiers is a global concern, the highest numbers have been reported mainly in Africa and Asi...
These are the words of a 15-year-old girl in Uganda. Like her, there are an estimated 300,000 children under the age of eighteen who are serving as child soldiers in about thirty-six conflict zones (Shaikh). Life on the front lines often brings children face to face with the horrors of war. Too many children have personally experienced or witnessed physical violence, including executions, death squad killings, disappearances, torture, arrest, sexual abuse, bombings, forced displacement, destruction of home, and massacres. Over the past ten years, more than two million children have been killed, five million disabled, twelve million left homeless, one million orphaned or separated from their parents, and ten million psychologically traumatized (Unicef, “Children in War”). They have been robbed of their childhood and forced to become part of unwanted conflicts. In African countries, such as Chad, this problem is increasingly becoming a global issue that needs to be solved immediately. However, there are other countries, such as Sierra Leone, where the problem has been effectively resolved. Although the use of child soldiers will never completely diminish, it has been proven in Sierra Leone that Unicef's disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration program will lessen the amount of child soldiers in Chad and prevent their use in the future.
One reason why child soldiers are victims is they are taken advantage of in armed forces. Children tend to act without thinking through so then on command they commit terrible acts of violence. In a breeze, they can be taken control of because they are more easy to manipulate than adults. As a result, commanders use this as a tool when recruiting
In Africa there is a civil war between groups of terrorists and the government. But Children are also fighting in this war and they become child soldiers that are drugged with cocaine and have weapons. Are statement for today is that should child soldiers be victims or perpetrators?
Children all around the world are being forced to join militias that they don’t want to. Their leaders, bribe them with drugs and alcohol so they keep fighting for them. “They are easily manipulated, intensely loyal, fearless, and most important, an endless supply.” The commanders say that they are the perfect weapon, and that’s why. Many people argue that these child soldiers should be given amnesty [Legal Forgiveness], sadly many think they shouldn’t.