If the history of humanity is a book, then the Rwandan genocide is definitely the darkest page in it.
As we all know, the 20th century was an era of war and peaceful development. In the first half of the century, the smoke of war filled the air, and world wars and national civil wars were staged one after another. In the second half of the century, the people of the world have been painfully determined, and peaceful development has been the theme of this period. But in Rwanda, Africa, there was a terrible massacre. In just 100 days, 1 million people were killed since 7 April 1994.
Rwanda is a small country in Africa with a total population of only about 8 million in 1994. The Hutu, who make up 80 percent of the population, have killed 20 percent of the Tutsi and a few moderate Hutu, almost half of whom have been killed, and one-eighth of the country's population has disappeared in just 100 days.
The immediate cause of this massacre was the antagonism between the Hutu and Tutsi. But the two groups have been married and integrated for a long time, and most ethnologists and historians tend to think that they should no longer be seen as different ethnic groups. Why is it that there is no difference between customs and languages, but the people of one country are divided into two peoples? The answer is the need for colonial rule.
After the end of World War I, Rwanda was placed under Belgian administration. Unlike the loose management approach in Germany, Belgium has developed a set of strict management standards. In order to facilitate colonial rule, Belgium naturally did not want the Rwandan people to be monolithic. They used the usual tactics of "less management and more confrontation" in Western colonial rule, intending to raise a number of reliable cronies in the local area, so that the smaller but overall richer Tutsis came into their sights (the Tutsi were mainly herders and richer; the Hutus were mainly peasants and poorer). In order to forcibly distinguish between these two long-merged peoples, Belgium introduced phrenology and the identity card system to further distinguish between Hutu and Tutsi, solidifying the identities of these two ethnic groups.
As a result, the Tutsi, who are the target of the Belgian support, although they are absolutely inferior in the proportion of the Rwandan population, are often able to control more arable land, hold important government positions, and receive good educational opportunities, while the larger Hutu have always been the targets of exploitation and repression, and the significant difference in treatment has buried the grievances between the two communities. In the following decades, under the deliberate guidance of Belgium, the hatred between the two communities deepened step by step, eventually becoming a volcano that could erupt at any time. Therefore, the enmity between the two ethnic groups is not so much a class contradiction as a national contradiction deliberately created by the colonizers.
The worst part is that the bitter consequences will ultimately be borne by the Rwandan people. In April 1994, the tragedy finally broke out.
On 6 April 1994, a plane travelling from the moderate Hutu Rwandan and Burundian Tutsi presidents participating in the mediation meeting crashed in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. Hutu extremists believe that this is the work of the Tutsi Patriotic Front. The Patriotic Front, on the other hand, believes that it is a farce directed and performed by Hutu extremists in order to provoke a civil war. So the plane crash of the presidents of the two countries became the fuse of the massacre.
After the death of the Rwandan president in the plane crash, extreme Hutu forces took control of the Rwandan Interim Government and immediately plotted a massacre. The day after the crash of the two presidents, the Hutu militia took up sticks and machetes, and the massacre began.
Millions of Hutu people with machetes, sickles, and hoes kill Tutsi men and rape Tutsi women when they see them. For a time, the whole of Rwanda was plunged into horrific killings, with rivers of blood, unhandled corpses, and humiliated women and girls. This horrific massacre lasted for 4 months!
During these four blood-soaked months, the Western countries that single-handedly created ethnic contradictions chose to look on the sidelines, and the Belgian government withdrew all its troops in Rwanda and took all its weapons with it on the grounds that 10 Belgian peacekeepers had been killed. In this way, the massacre that could have been prevented was indulged, and eventually turned into a great tragedy that made people sigh.
In the film based on the Rwandan massacre, "The Hotel in Rwanda", Paul, who has always worn a suit and a leather tie, cried and tore off the tie after witnessing the bones, and has never appeared in a suit since; The priest in The Killing Zone gives the Bible to the refugees and burns it as fuel. Western civilization and God, without saving Rwanda, their lifelong faith, are crumbling at this moment. Rwanda has become a sea of blood, and no one will come to save them, they can only save themselves.
Three months after the massacre, the Tutsi Patriotic Front defeated Hutu government forces and seized power. For 17 years, the Tutsi government has sought to restore order in Rwanda, dilute ethnic differences and, in 2001, replaced the red in the original flag with blue, because red was reminiscent of massacres and Rwanda did not want to see blood again.
Nowadays, the identity card of Rwandans no longer distinguishes between Hutu and Tutsi, they have only one common name - Rwandan!
PS: I am a cat and cat fish, ask for attention, ask for forwarding, cherish peace from you and me.