Joseph Koniy

He began to tell his followers they were meant to build an “army of God”, so this led them to start stock piling weapons. The Branch Davidians supported themselves by trading at gun shows and always took precaution to have paperwork, and made sure all their transactions were legans. “Branch Davidian Paul Fatta was a federal firearms licensed dealer and the group operated a retail gun business called the Mag Bag. When shipments for the Mag Bag arrived, they were signed for by Fatta, Steve Schneider, and Koresh” (Bates). This raised cause for the ATF (Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms) to request a warrant to raid the compound. The ATF planned to arrest Koresh when he was outside Mount Carmel, but received faulty information that Koresh rarely left, when in fact he was a known member of the local community. The ATF attempted to make the raid a surprise, but it was spoiled when a KWTX_TV reporter asked a mailman for directions to the compound, when coincidentally the mailman was Koresh’s brother in law. Koresh then knew the raid was

During the imperialism in Africa, a lot of different events happened in Uganda. The imperialism had effects on the country, some of the effects benefited the country, and some did not. Mostly, it did not benefit the country. The British did most things to only benefit themselves, and did not care about what happened to the citizens of Uganda. The British only wanted power over the country, and to make a profit.

The country known as Uganda was once a British colony just like the majority of its neighbors in East Africa. It was initially intruded into by the Arab traders led by Speke and the British explorers led by Stanley in 1862 and 1875 respectively. They both paid homage to Mutesa who was the King (kabaka) of the Buganda. Uganda remained predominantly under the colony of the British until 1962 when they were granted internal self government by Britain (History World, 2011).

In over twenty-five countries, many children are abducted and beaten into submission to be used in real life wars. A very famous viral video called “Kony 2012” was trying to get people to help catch the Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony, who has kidnapped thousands of children over the past twenty years. Child soldiers are defined as: children under the age of 18 who are recruited by state or non-state armed groups and used as fighters, cooks, suicide bombers, human shields, messengers, spies, or even for sexual purposes.

Imagine having to fight in a war you don’t want to fight in, seeing friends and family die all around you, but no matter how far you run you can never escape. Child soldiers in Sierra Leone do not have to imagine this - for them, it is reality. Ishmael Beah, who became a soldier at just age 12, as well as researchers such as Christophe Bayer, Fionna Klasen, Hubertus Adam know too well that the events in the war can never be forgotten. The story Beah told in his memoir A Long Way Gone captures the inhumane events that take place in Sierra Leone and tells of a story that many children have to endure. Sources like Harvard claim “among the 87 war-torn countries...300,000 - 500,000 children are involved with fighting forces as child soldiers.” Many of those children are being forced into the war without any choice at all and having to kill others as well. With this information we’re forced to ask the question: how are these children being affected by the war?

No one wants their childhood to be utterly destroyed or have their family taken away from them in the blink of an eye, without the chance to even say one last goodbye. The odd chance of that happening to us, here in America, is slim to none. In Sierra Leone on the other hand, along with many other parts of Africa, child soldiers are being put to use in armies. In A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, the recruitment of child soldiers, African living situations, and the psychological trauma endured by the children deals with the issue of child soldiers.

In addition, from 1988 to 2004, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in northern Uganda abducted youth as recruits to their guerilla force. More than 60,000 child soldiers are estimated to have been abducted by the LRA, taken from one day to ten years. Many children were taken from their homes, forced to become child soldiers against their will. If 60,000 child soldiers were abducted by the LRA, there are 60,000 people suffering because of the battle in Uganda.

The article “ The Perfect Weapon for the Meanest Wars,” by Jeffrey Gettleman discusses the issue of child soldiers, children who are used during the war. He explains that the idea of the child soldier is spreading. In these places rebels are taking control without caring and using population as prey. The authors message in the article is that adults are manipulating children and using them as weapons for their own needs. Jeffrey Gettleman uses cause and effects, the principle of causation, throughout article.

This article focuses on Sierra Leone's severe common war is the persuasive induction of children, some as youthful as 7 years of age. Captured by revolt constrains or drawn into the Government's armed force, they are compelled to wind up warriors, human shields, spies, watchmen and sex slaves. A ton of these children saw the butcher of their folks and were traumatized to the point that they were living like animals in the jungle. Of numerous stories on the site the one that emerged was M.G., he was given the name M.G. by rebels. M.G was 10 years old when he was first forced to point his gun at a villager and pull the trigger. He was a fourth grader walking to school when he was abducted by the RUF.

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,

Continuously throughout the civil war, the Revolutionary United Front forced their child soldiers to terrorize communities of people. There are many known operations that caused devastation to Sierra Leone, all of which were headed by children. A few examples are “operation fine girl” where child soldiers were to ordered to find and abduct pretty virgins, “operation burn house” was an arson attack, and “operation pay yourself” was looting (Children: The New Face of War). The Revolutionary United Front would also coerce child soldiers to amputate and disfigure members of the villages they invaded in order to create a generation of victims. As time went on and these child soldiers committed more and more wartime atrocities the communities become increasingly weary and skeptical of the child. Stories are told of children being forced to kill members of the community, including their own family members. This fear caused by the actions of the abducted child soldiers has led to a changed image of the children in the minds of the community members.

The issue of child soldiery is a social issue that plagues society on a global scale. For instance, The Global Report 2008 which was edited by UNICEF and Child Soldiers Global Institution reported that 19 countries and territories employed children in government forces as well as non-state armed groups. Some countries include Iraq, Sudan, Uganda, and Somalia (Deak, 2013, p. 1). It is impossible to state the exact number of child soldiers around the world; however, the United Nations and non-governmental organizations estimate that that there are about 250,000 to 300,000 child soldiers (Szijj, 2010, p.4) It is evident that that child soldiery is an epidemic thus, I will investigate what social and political factors are responsible

Imagine being snatched from your bed in the middle of the night and forced to commit horrific war crimes at only 7 years old. In Uganda, this sadly isn’t an unusual occurrence. Children and their families live in fear of being captured and made into child soldiers against their will. Led by Joseph Kony, the Lord’s Resistance Army has abducted over 30,000 children in Uganda and forced them to fight in war. These children are forced to become brutal killing machines, and lose touch with their livelihood, morals and ultimately their childhood. A student at MHS should care about the child soldiers in Uganda because children are the future of a country. If children grow up in inhumane conditions and trained to be violent from a young age, they will grow up into antagonistic adults that our generation will have to deal with later on in life.

Some of the basic human rights we see as children of the United States are not guaranteed everywhere. One example of this would be the oppressing of children in Uganda. As more and more children were enslaved by the Lord’s Resistance Army, led by Joseph Kony, the Invisible Children was founded to raise awareness through their campaign of “Kony 2012.” After eight years of campaigning against the Lord’s Resistance Army, the Invisible Children posted a video titled “Kony 2012.” It began as an experiment, but with over 100 million views in only six days, the infamous Joseph Kony went from an obscure villain to world known criminal. The campaign reached its goal in April of 2012, when President Barack Obama announced that he would reignite the United State’s mission to help the African Union in stopping LRA violence.

Uganda is a country located in Africa that is surrounded by Kenya and the Republic of Congo. Uganda’s capital is Kampala and some other major cities would be Gulu, Lira, Mbarara, Jinja, Bwizibwera, Mbale, Mukono, Kasese and Masaka. The coordinates are 1 00 N, 32 00 E and the total area of Uganda is two hundred forty one thirty eight thousand. The land is one hundred ninety seven hundred thousand square kilometers and the water being forty three nine hundred thirty eight thousand square kilometers. When you are comparatively speaking about Uganda it is just slightly smaller than the state of Oregon.