Pros And Cons Of Child Soldiers

Children are one of the many victims of conflicts especially in places like Syria and Sudan where there is a constant exchange of combat. Many children lose their families or are abducted by one side and are left with nothing. These children have no choice but to join with which ever side will accept them, “Bosco was six years old when he was handed a machete by Ugandan rebels led by Joseph Kony. They demanded he kill his little sister (Juli)... Juli was five. She had to die because she couldn 't keep up with the rebels ' pace as they moved to the next location.” (Christina Ruta, 2013). The children that are pushed into military forces often are intimidated into following orders through means like

The recruitment and use of child soldiers is still a lingering issue in the world. Primarily in third world countries, hundreds of thousands of children are forced to fight and kill others. They are utterly helpless to do anything about their situation. They live

My name is Abida and I am a student at Wayzata West Middle School. Imagine you, an innocent five year old, playing on the soccer field. Then, in an instant, you are blindfolded, and you feel hands on your back. You have been taken, no abducted. There is something heavy placed in your hand. It's a gun. A booming voice commands you, “Shoot,”. So, fearfully you do. You had killed your best friend that day. Fromm them on out, you are a spy, endure the worst physical torture, and are even sent out on the first lines of war. There are currently thirteen countries that use over 33 thousand child soldiers. Children as young as four can be apart of the military. Many of the children have been forced to join or join as a last resort. After these children

These young soldiers seem to not be committed into committing war crimes, but one of their commitments is without a doubt, survival. However, in order for them to accomplish this, they unfortunately have to commit these terrible atrocities to not get killed. As a matter of fact, the vast majority of these children have little to no option whether or not they want to be serving, they are forcibly recruited. Jeffrey Gettle, author of article entitled Armed and Underage argues this idea well with his quote, “purchased, kidnapped, or terrorized” are some of the ways these girls and boys become child soldiers (2009). This quote demonstrates the types of way they are involuntarily placed in the army and when they are in the field, many types abusement become present like when they oppose given orders.

Child soldiers are very common in the Country of Sierra Leone and that is not the only place that these children are being used to fight wars. Other places that are using the children as soldiers are places such as Columbia, South Sudan, Syria, Mexico, and Myanmar.All of these places are using child soldiers and it is a very hard thing to know that kids mine and your age are having to fight in wars and that is really hard to take in. The wars to solve conflict and help one of the groups gain power. The way that all of these children are being treated is horrific and it is something that needs to be stopped right now.

A. Over 250,000 children are being used as soldiers for warfare. Many of them are under the age of 18, the minimum age for recruitment of soldiers. Over 20,000 children were abducted from their families and communities. There are still many groups yet to be known. As a child soldier, you are forced to torture others, be tortured, and be sexually assaulted. Even as normal children, they are too immature to realize the rights and wrongs of their actions; therefore they are easier to manipulate. In these armies and conflicts, over 2 million children have died, 4-5 million are left disabled, and 12 million are left homeless and separated from their families. Millions of these children have been abducted or have joined for the promise of food and shelter/protection.

There are hundreds of thousands of children who are currently accommodating in combat for a rebel group or government (“Facts About Child Soldiers”). For example, during the civil war of Sierra Leone from 1991 to 2001, the use of children as soldiers became more rampant ("Child soldiers in Sierra Leone"). The rebel group Revolutionary United Front of Sierra Leone coerced children to join them in combat by intimidating and abducting them. They would also rape

When I was younger my parents used to make me do work and chores around the house. I used to think that it was child labor or something like using me as some sort of soldier, and therefore I thought that should be illegal. But now I know better. That wasn’t anything that I thought it was. But there does exist child soldiers, and the practice of using child soldiers is wrong, unjust and immoral. Using child soldiers is immoral. This is true because it poisons the hearts of young children and it is unfair towards the children. Some may say that using child soldiers is good because it is a good military strategy. But this is wrong because it is immoral.

Thousands of children are serving as soldiers in armed conflicts around the world. These boys and girls under the age of 18 serve in things such as government forces and armed opposition groups. While serving, they can do a number of things such as fight on the front lines, participate in suicide missions, and act as spies, messengers, or lookouts, take direct part in hostilities or they can be used for political advantage [either] as human shields and/or in propaganda and the girls are forced into sexual slavery. Many tend to believe that child soldiers are mostly boys. In fact, 30% of armed organizations that use children have girls.

In the world there are many issues poverty, war ,hunger but there's one issue that seems to keep coming back and that is child soldiers they are either kidnapped and brainwashed or there fighting for their lives high on cocaine. They don't get a choice it's life or death but the issue right now is should they be given amnesty for their crimes or prosecuted. In my opinion i feel they should be given amesty in the article armed and uderaged it says many off the child soldiers were exposed to sexual abuse including rape. They are also given cocaine, marijuana and sometimes they mix cocaine and gunpowder for them to ingest.

Around 120,000 adolescent children are now engaged in conflicts throughout Africa (“Child Soldiers: An Overview” 4). In Sudan, for instance, thousands of children, some as young as 12, were recruited against their will into separatist and government groups (“Child Soldiers: An Overview” 5). Thousands more children have been enlisted into the armed forces throughout Asia and the Pacific. The most significant numbers are in Afghanistan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and recently, Cambodia. Myanmar, a country in Asia, has some of the most child soldiers throughout the world, with children being recruited into both non-government and government armed forces (“Child Soldiers: An Overview” 6). The number of child soldiers has been decreasing annually, but these children are still being taken against their will.

Child warfare is a big problem today in the world. This is a big problem because children are getting taken away from their families and just getting pulled into the war and have to kill or they get beaten or killed if they put the kids in the front line to get killed before the high ranks. In the world there are approximately 300,000 child soldiers around the world. About 40% of the child soldiers are in their countries rank in the military. 40% of them are girls. This mainly happens in Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan. This happens because the military does not want their high ranked soldiers to die, so they put the child soldiers in the front line to die before the high ranked soldiers die. Also if the children don’t kill in the battle they get beaten with batons and even get killed with guns, knives, or sticks. Then they get hung on a pole to show the people it’s a sign of glory to the people that kill them. The African officials are making the kids go through

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.

According to the Paris Principles on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, a child soldier is a person under 18 that has been recruited by an armed group for purposes that can relate to combat. Among the countries that have child soldiers is the Democratic Republic of Congo, which has a population of 67.5 million. The DRC has had a history of violence and oppression, and an unstable political system has led to more unrest in the present. In the Congo, children are not only used as soldiers, but many are subject to rape and being forced to mine for mineral resources in horrendous conditions, and in order to stop this, either the UN needs to send even more humanitarian aid or big companies need to stop accepting materials from known

If you had a choice, kill or be killed. What would you choose? If you had a choice to starve or to be fed, what would you choose? These scenarios are not common in our everyday life, but to child soldiers this is what they are suffering through everyday. Although many children had the choice to become a child soldiers, most of them were forced to become child soldiers. By their families, and their commanders. Child soldiers were brainwashed to torture, and kill. They did not know any other way to live. They thought what they were doing was the right thing. Many child soldiers were abducted from their own homes, after commanders forced terror on their families and village. Child soldiers needed to stay alive with resources such as food, clothing, and water. The only way that they could receive this, was by agreeing to become a child soldier. It is