Simply The Best 2

Catholicgauze developed a PowerPoint presentation “The United Caliphates of Europe” that is worth examining in further detail. The debate in the comments section has gotten quite pointed as well.

Mountainrunner tackles the overlooked field of “science diplomacy”.

Opposed System Design discusses the forcing function for Chinese SysAdmin in Africa after the attack on a Chinese oil facility in Ethiopia.

The exceptionally interesting “How To Save The World” rightfully blasts the mainstream media as “pimps and panderers” in the larger context of a “Crooked Broker Society”.

Don’t miss AE’s impressions from the Milken Institute Global Conference here, here, here, and here.

Finally, Michael Tanji at the Haft of the Spear needs some suggestions for a new all-encompassing “defense and intelligence’ blog he’s setting up for a major newspaper.

Children At War IV: Stolen Childhoods, Endangered Futures

The human cost of the child soldier doctrine extends its nefarious reach far beyond the violent tragedy of systematic rapes, ghastly rampages through villages and the lost lives of victims and child soldiers alike. Within conflict zones where the doctrine was utilized, all children will have come under suspicion of being fighters and aiding the enemy, exposing them to the risks of the deadly consequences of “shoot first, ask questions later” habits developed by state security forces and other rebel groups.

After conflicts have died down, failed demobilization efforts and vocational rehabilitation programs leave former child soldiers with little hope for the future and few, if any, useful job skills and trades, let alone formal education. Robbed of the tools they need to succeed within society, they are further ostracized (often violently) by their home communities and by others who recognize them as former child soldiers (many groups “mark” their child charges with knives, shards of glass and brands to further exclude them from society). Facing exile from communities and societies is a bitter postscript for children and young adults whose childhoods were stolen. Child soldiers tend to be excessively more prone to STD’s and other ailments, as well as being addled with guilt over their crimes and post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

ED. NOTE: In the past seven weeks I have spent time on my off days with a few former child soldiers from Sudan and Burma/Myanmar who now live in the Seattle area in a variety of states of legal immigration and assimilation into America. The myriad of troubles and disorders they have are eye-opening, but 3 of the 4 seem to have found a bedrock of strength from their neighbors, sponsors, classmates and friends, as well as their faiths. The latter is and will remain indefinitely a suicide risk, the guilt of his dead family and neighbors in Burma while he was a child soldier an incredibly heavy load on his spirit.

When facing an uncertain future with few prospects, child soldiers tend to return to what they know best: violence. Mozambique remains cursed by its failure to rehabilitate and re-integrate into its society the child soldiers from its civil war, a sad state of affairs that directly contributed to extremely high levels of banditry that plagued the nation for years. Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Angola and Afghanistan experienced similar problems with failed programs in recent history.

Obvious causes for the failure of these programs include lack of funding and cultural misunderstandings that breed mistrust and miscommunication between foreign counselors and communities. In addition to these, Singer pinpoints another key error; the lumping together of child fighters with adults in demobilization programs, which fails to offer the specialized help children need.

Singer takes note of several important solutions to the dilemma of what to do with child soldiers after conflicts have concluded.

Disarm and demobilize the children while separating them from adult leaders and other adult fighters, placing them in centers as far away from the conflict zone as possible (provides for security and prevents re-recruitment).

During demobilization efforts, as many local staff as possible should be utilized, as they are familiar with the local cultures’ rites, values and practices.

Conduct an arduous process of rehabilitation with a long-term perspective that is part of a post-conflict assistance plan that helps to restore broken local health networks to help provide for the long-term medical and psychological treatment former child soldiers will require.

“Special attention to the psychological adjustment of children must be at the core of any rehabilitation program.” A few of the most effective strategies include:

the encouragement of self-expression (as articulation often provides an important for psychosocial recovery)

normalization activities that involve children in the positive responsibilities and routines of camp living, such as gathering wood, getting water and washing clothes.

basic schooling, which besides building standards of literacy and mathematics, can emphasize communication skills, civics, and cultural or peace studies.

recreational programs that release energy and encourage normal interaction, including games, story-making, individual and collective art therapy, interactive plays, and other creative educational workshops designed for children in need.

One of the more effective strategies for counseling ex-child soldiers suffering from PTSD is cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), but counseling activities like CBT are difficult to implement because of the critical shortage of specialists skilled in children’s psychology issues available to meet the growing needs of international relief and aid agencies, a problem that could be addressed by a united effort taken up by advocates to build the pool of willing and ready mental health specialists and social workers.

For rehabilitation efforts, “in the end, time and stability appear to be what is most required for healing.”

From a security standpoint, if left to their own devices and left behind by flagging efforts to offer them training and skills necessary to compete in the economy, “an entire generation may be left adrift and seek refuge in other warring groups or criminal activity”.

From a moral and societal standpoint, the worst legacy of the child soldier experience is that it never ends, shaping the child’s development and later adulthood. For now, “the recovery of lost childhood is as much a developing art as (it is) a known process.”

How To Help:
World Vision does incredible things for child soldiers.

The Coalition To Stop The Use Of Child Soldiers has done some bone-headed things in the past by failing to get their priorities straight regarding who the most dangerous offenders abusing children are, but have improved in recent years.

Human Rights Watch applies the right kind of pressure to governments, corporations and individuals and offers consistent and through reporting on the issue.

Lastly, bringing the issue up in your local center of worship among other faithful would do a world of good by raising the voices of more and more religious groups on the issue, because faith offers a world of redemption that few other organs of society can.

Children At War III: Beyond The Paralysis Of Pity And The Trauma Of Fighting Children

“Every time I look at them, I think of my son. They are so small. Sometimes, when I am here, I put myself in God’s hands.” UN peacekeeper deployed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Conventional wisdom would hold that militaries, especially Western ones, face a terrible crux when dealing with child soldiers. On one hand, in recent years, the commander of a band of soldiers from the Royal Irish Regiment was unwilling to fire upon what he called “children armed with AK’s” and was subsequently taken hostage along with his men by an infamous child solider group known as the “West Side Boys” in Sierra Leone. Elsewhere, an occasional traumatic experience of American soldiers in Iraq that they disclose to stateside counselors is their horror at having to fire upon lethally armed children fighting in militias and with insurgents.

In “Children At War”, P.W. Singer identifies the paralysis caused by poor or nonexistent training that soldiers receive and the danger it puts them in when they are on the ground as well as the demoralizing effects inflicted upon professional soldiers when forced to fight and kill children. Pity for the enemy has the polar opposite effect of hatred, causing soldiers to question their roles. Are soldiers doomed between paralysis and anguish?

Singer emphatically provides a blend of observations and proposals that prove there is a third option that is more promising for both the success of the mission and the health of both professional and child soldiers.

First and foremost, conflicts with child soldiers are among the most dangerous forces will face. As in experiences with terrorist proxies and insurgents, respect for the traditional rules of war is not likely. Troops must be prepared for false surrenders, hiding among civilians and POW executions by their child opponents. Young soldiers often come to the battlefield with a great deal of combat experience and individual combat skills under their belt from prior flashes of conflict or even other wars within the region.

Forces should focus on the center of gravity for most child soldier forces by recognizing the hold adult (or older teenager) leaders have on their troops. Prioritizing the targeting and elimination of the adult leaders whenever possible is an excellent way to get inside the opponents decision loop and dispel the often coerced cohesion of the child fighters as a unit.

Tactically, traditional targeting and set-piece movements will be less effectual than the imposition of shock and the deliberate creation of avenues and openings to shape the child opponents’ response. Chaos and confusion are more valued than pure destruction; a low-intensity warfare equivalent of “shock & awe” like the use of helicopter gunships (as in Sierra Leone, where one gunship was credited with contributing as much to the routing of child troops as peace keepers and government troops combined). Child soldiers described the Sierra Leone gunship as “a big pyscho thing, spitting death out flying low to the ground”.

Along with such tactics, the continued development and improvement of non-lethal weapons will offer an invaluable tool for soldiers to disarm and apprehend child soldiers rather than exchange armed pleasantries.

In the field, even a successful first encounter with child soldiers, which dissolves an adversary force, is a battle half won if it does not prevent the adult leaders from regrouping. “Follow through” is the key to taking them off the battlefield for good, as well as taking the further step of denying the adults the use of prime recruiting pipelines (which often will direct the course of child soldier group operations) like refugee camps and overcrowded slums.

Lastly, psychological operations must be utilized as a supplement to traditional military operations whether they be peacekeeping or counterinsurgency. Highlighting the breaking of cultural norms, the undue casualties children tend to suffer, and the hypocrisy of adult leaders sending other peoples’ children off to fight for their gain is sure to win some ground in the eyes of the people and the young children themselves.

An epilogue this weekend will be a short look at programs and methods to help rehabilitate child soldiers, which is a massive security and development dilemma across the developing world, as well as the organizations that help make progress in the arduous, lifetime process.