Military use of children

Introduction For most of human history, war has generally been conceptualized as a domain of adults in uniform. However, in the past decades, a disturbing trend has surfaced – children, both boys and girls, are increasingly taking up arms. While this is not an entirely new attribute of warfare, the use of child soldiers in history has been an exception and not a regular feature as it appears to be today. According to international law, a child soldier is defined as any individual who is aged below

Otunnu explains that children are forced into becoming weapons of war. Children under 18 years old are being recruited into the army because of poverty issues, multiple economic problems, and the qualities of children, however, many organizations are trying to implement ways to stop the human rights violation. Throughout the world children younger than 18 are being enlisted into the armed forces to fight while suffering through multiple abuses from their commanders. Children living in areas and

Countries torn by civil war often recruit child soldiers. In ‘A Long Way Home’, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) was attempting to overthrow Joseph Momoh’s government. Boys end up being recruited because they were starving, orphaned, alone, had nowhere else to go, and wanted revenge on those that had killed their families. Ishmael, his brother, and friends were on the run after the RUF attacked their home village. They spent days running, searching for food to stay alive, and finding safe

Children go to war because there aren’t enough soldiers in foreign countries, like Afghanistan and Yemen. They are usually kidnapped from their home and forced to do many things.“Novela was kidnapped as a toddler. Reared in a remote Renamo bush camp, he was assigned to carry water, then ammunition and, finally, a tripod-mounted machine gun.... But in an infantry unit with more boys than men and more casualties than survivors, Novela was lucky: He lived….He witnessed summary executions, survived on

Before becoming a child soldier, children go through a process that seems to desensitize and break down their moral fiber. When faced with the situation of being a child soldier many are not given a better option then to choose to conform to the aforementioned lifestyle or die. This situation presented itself to Agu, the protagonist of the film Beast of No Nation. After losing his father and brother through murder by the government soldiers, he was left with being an orphan alone in the jungle to

civil wars.” “African children are being targeted across the continent as tools of war.” In today’s day and age, children from all over the world are real soldiers in conflicts instead of playing toy soldiers. These children are being denied their childhood and instead are given a violent and gruesome role to play in brutal conflicts. These children are fighting wars that they had no responsibility in creating. Children are fighting in wars created by their elders. Children are replacing their toys

family. Now imagine these men taking your children, forcing them to serve in their military force. In only an instant, your children are gone and you are left with no knowledge of the fate of your kids. As terrifying and seemingly impossible as this imagined scenario may be, it is a stark reality for many families in third world countries. Where families fear not if their children will be taken but when those doors will be broken down, and their screaming children will be dragged out through the front

always have disastrous effects on civilians, in particular on children who are growing up in a world of violence and are surrounded by atrocities and deaths. It can be even more traumatic when children find themselves taking an active part in conflicts. Indeed in numerous conflicts, combatants aged under eighteen, and therefore considered as ‘child soldiers’, are involved. Although international law expressly prohibit the recruitment and use of youths aged under fifteen, about 300,000 child soldiers

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

thousands of people are tormented, and living a difficult life. Of these thousands, are child soldiers. Child soldiers experience awful wars with bloodshed, which no child should ever experience. The Middle East, where most children are recruited, is filled with cities of rubble. Children living in this environment can’t go to school, starve and may even be abandoned or separated from their parents. Being in war, child soldiers commit crimes each and every time they land a foot on the battlefield. Is this