A report by Jean Hatzfeld.
The first thing that came to my mind when i picked this book was "A report by Jean Hatzfeld". The usage of the term "A report", interesting. It told me what the author's intentions were.
Last weekend I read the Antelope's strategy, the third book by Jean on Rwanda. I was so curious to read the killer's account that the first that i did yesterday (Saturday) morning was to go to library to get this book. My notes on Antelope strategy can be read here - http://arvindbatra.blogspot.com/2009/11/antelopes-strategy.html
Why i wanted to read?
Machete season, where the killers speak. Why was i so curious to hear from them? Because the idea that a normal farmer can become a killer in 3-6 months, the fact that you can kill your neighbor with whom you grew up, went to same school etc, you can kill that person without blinking an eye - how did the transformation happen? Is there a pattern between Jewish and Rwandan genocide. Stanford prison experiment had a deep impact on me. I wanted to know that can the conclusions of Stanford prison experiment (mentioned on the wiki page ) be applied in this context?
The report review
One of the recommender, Susan Sontag, writes on the cover of this book - "Everyone should read this book". I completely agree but i will not call this a book, it is as jean writes, it is a report. Jean in this book gives first hand experiences of 10 killers who belong to the same gang. They went to the marshes together, killed together, and were very good friends. Jean justifies that this worked better than asking people from different gangs because they often lied and there was little way to check their facts. Jean also has a chapter on his methodology of conducting interviews etc which is a very insightful chapter to read. I think the reason Jean calls this a report because after the interviews, he tries to understand the meaning of it. In the last 2-3 chapters, he tries to understand why they did what they did, he tries to make some sense of it. I agree to most of his points.
The interviews -
The book is organized in a chapters where each chapter has got interviews from killers on a common subject. The subjects are like - how it started, first killing, going into marshes, evening celebrations, looting, killing neighbors, organizers etc. In the last few chapters, the subject become more personal such as "remorse and regrets", "And God in all this", forgiving, "Words to avoid saying it (genocide)" etc. I read some reviewer who didnt like the fact that interviews were broken down by subjects because it was difficult to track the ideology of one killer from another. Using this the subject becomes primary, the killer secondary. I can see why the reviewer was upset, for me i didnt mind much. It would also be interesting to read each killer's conversations by itself so that we can change the psychology.
Why did they do it ?
The question that started it all. Interestingly, it was not just my curiosity, it was also Jean's and also of his first book readers'. The first answer is that even they don't know. They were swept into this thing in such a small time that even they couldn't introspect. But what they do know is that those who didn't comply were killed. Those who resisted were killed, or were imposed heavy fines. To some extent it became greed because there was looting, the more you looted, the more richer they became. But initially, it was just force/fear of organizers. They also say that Hutus and Tutsis although may be living next to each other, there are always suspicion, one was always alert for the other. The radio/television/speeches etc where always hinting toward the division, a Hutu since childhood had heard so many bad stories about Tutsis that he had been already brainwashed. Everything contributed, looking back even they couldnt believe that did something like that. Killing also became a social activity, lack of participation caused rebuke from comrades which was unacceptable.
Some interesting points -
1. One killer points that some of the killers are executed, some like him are in prison, and some are outside free. But most importantly he says that the idea of genocide is still free. You can not imprison the idea or execute it. There is still distrust between Hutus and Tutsis and even more so now. Nothing has been done to kill the idea.
2. One killers says that we were farmers who got tempted by greed, tempted by looting, living luxuriously etc. "Through greed and obedience I found the cause worthwhile and i ran down to the marshes" ..... "Afterward the temptation can not go to prison so they imprison the people. And the temptation can certainly show up just as dreadful further along"
3. One of the killer remembers the organizer speaking - "There is not enough land in this country for two ethnic groups, and neither one will leave. So it is up to the Hutus to solve the problem".
4. Another one says - "What we did was beyond human imagination, so it is too difficult to judge us - too difficult for those who did n0t share our situation, in any case. "
Among the above, point 3 is the one that disturbs me the most. I can see it easily happening in India in future. The question is when or what it takes to avoid it?
Jean has done a fantastic job in explaining the killers, pointing the difference in interviews when he spoke to survivors and when he spoke to killers. There are many small small things in the report which are very deep.
With this, i end my reading on genocide. I do not want to read Jean's first book now, may be some months later. Jean has given some references which i should check out in future - these are Movie Shoah, book Ordinary men by Christopher Browning.
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