I’ve promised to write more on this, and Shun asked me about Hotel Rwanda sometime ago where I had only given him a very sketchy, garbled reply (the movie itself I haven’t yet seen). In a world where the word “genocide” has penetrated popular propagandastic vocabulary the way the word “fascism” does (let’s not even go there), and where genocides and sexual scandals are plastered next to each other in screaming headlines, I didn’t want to further add the confusion and misinformations. My intention here is merely to add bits and pieces from a number of books and essays that I’m familiar with in an easily-read fashion and to (hopefully) avoid oversimplified generalisations.

This is by no means meant to provide an all-encompassing comprehension, and for the sake of convenience (and to save me typing whole loads of general facts), this will be structured as a kind of footnotes to the Wikipedia entry on Rwandan Genocide. I will not go into details of the massacres nor recent developments on which I only am unauthorized and unrealiable commentator: there’re recommended readings at the end of this post, all of them I would attest for the meticulous research and writings.

Background
The population of Rwanda—in spite of the linguistic and cultural homogeneity—was divided into three groups: The Hutu (vast majority, standard Bantu physical aspect, principally farmers), the Tutsi (extremely tall and thin, often displaying sharp, angular facial features, usually pastoralists) and the Twa (1%, pygmoids). Contrary to the popular perpetually-segregated-”tribe” beliefs, they shared the same language, lived side by side and often intermarried. In other words, they’re not as hard unchanging identities as often portrayed.

But racially-obsessed nineteenth century Europeans (notably John Hanning Speke) were smitten by the Tutsis, whom they viewed as ’superior race’, and too fine to be ‘negroes’. Struck by the degree of political and religious sophistication deemed unthinkable to be achieved by ‘totally savage negroes’, the explorers (Sir Harry Johnston, building from said Speke’s before) put forward a theory of kingship as having originated from Ethiopia and having been brought by ‘pastoral invaders’, i.e. the Tutsis who, in the so-called ’scientific canon’, had skillfully subjugated the ‘inferior’ Hutu peasant masses. (This is just the prototype theory, others were definitely more bizarre.)

Note that originally a number of the chiefs, working under the king (mwami), although most were Tutsi, were Hutu. They were in charge of controlling (tighter at the core of the kingdom, but looser at the periphery) and extracting collective responsibility, none of which was purely exploitative or rested on each person separately. This was, however, excessively tightened in the late 19th century by the Belgians on the European taxation model. Ubuhake, a form of social cohesion (but vilified by Hutu ideologues as a symbol of exploitation that had only existed at some parts of traditional Rwanda) was universally developed, while a new form of forced labour (ubuletwa) was introduced. The newly integrated elites were co-opted by the monarchy (‘tutsified’ or ‘de-hutuised’) in order to turn them into faithful servants of the new order. Racial terminology was specifically employed to both explain and justify colonial divide and rule.

The 1959 muyaga
In 1957, a tract known as the Hutu Manifesto was published by nine Hutu intellectuals, arguing for democracy, but instead of rejecting the Hamitic myth, it was embracing it, arguing that if the Tutsis were foreign invaders, then Rwanda was by rights a nation for the Hutu majority. The Belgians attempted ‘a quick switching of horses’ to the majority (newly-developed counter-élite) Hutu as a battle-axe against the the long-coddled Tutsi élite who, just like many colonialised protégés, were increasingly viewed as a mixture of backward traditionalists, revolutionary communist, ‘ungrateful traitors’, &c. But most conveniently, as feudalists, which thus gave revolutionary credentials (whatever that might mean) to the eviction of the Tutsi-led feudal monarchy by what appeared to be the down-trodden movement (even if the average financial situation of the Tutsi and Hutu groups in 1959 was similar and did not offer the ‘aristocratic’ picture). Masqueraded as ‘popular democracy’, Rwanda’s power struggles became an internal affair of the Hutu elite, very much as the feuds among royal Tutsi clans had been in the past. Organised persecution of the Tusis took place, starting a mass exodus of refugees abroad, notably to Uganda, Belgian Congo, and Burundi. Those that remained were politically emasculated, and quota policy was introduced.

Rwandese Patriotic Front
Among the refugees in Uganda, small commandos began ineffective attacks (labeled inyenzi (cockroach)). Plenty joined Museveni’s NRA, two prominent ones being Fred Rwigyema and Paul Kagame. But with the 1982 Ugandan guerilla crisis ‘these foreigners’ were feeling increasingly unwelcomed. In December 1987 RANU changed its name into the Rwandese Patriotic Front (RPF), focusing into the systematic penetration of key sections of the NRA to build a small but well-equipped Banyarwanda-manned segment of the army into Rwanda.

They attacked in 1990, unsuccessfully, and Fred Rwigyema—the charismatic, extremely popular leader of RPF—was killed on the second day of the attack. Facing them were the Forces Armeés Rwandaises (FAR) of Habyarimana (who would later be heavily involved in the genocide), backed by foreign military interventions, notably from France who believed that the invasion was an obvious ‘Anglo-Saxonisation’ plot to encroach Francophone ‘chez nous‘. (Laugh, but you’d see how deadly this blind commitment to the absurdity was.) France channeled huge shipment of armaments and directed everything from air traffic control and the interrogation of RPF prisoners to frontline combat. Belgium and Zaire (with Sese Seko eager to rub shoulders with France and Belgium), also sent troops, but Belgians quickly withdrew on their own accord while Zairean troops were so given to drinking, looting and raping Rwanda soon begged them to return home.

RPF—under the leadership of Paul Kagame—retreated and lie low in Virunga volcanoes in Uganda to bid their time, as well as attracting more recruits from the diaspora. This émigré component of the early RPF recruitment gave it a very high average standard of education and, having the long military experience gained on Ugandan battlefields by the ex-NRA officers in its top leadership, contributed to its efficiency as a fighting force. This standard, however, was later to decline in the war.

The assasination of President Habyarimana
The exact responsibility of the assasination is still not known, although most of the sources I read have their suspicions on some of the akazu, the inner core of Habyarimana’s regime: members of MRND (Habyarimana’s single political party) and the Clan de Madame, members of Habyarimana’s wife’s family and their close associates (including Colonel Théonoste Bagosora) which had always been one of the regime’s main political clans, if not the main clan. The plane was shot down at around 8.30 pm, and by 9.15 roadblocks were already set up and houses were searched everywhere by Interahamwe, the first civil militias with its genesis in soccer fan clubs sponsored by leaders of the MRND and the akazu.

There are numerous facts that point the connection between the President’s assasination and the massacres that followed. Notion of a genocide had become a common talk in Kigali during 1993-4, with headlines to fire Tutsi extermination conspicuously published in magazines and radio (notably RTLMC, a main orchestrator of the genocide, a ‘free’ radio station set up by Hutu extremists after the state relinquished its monopoly on broadcasting) barely inducing any shock or surprise.

RPF renewed
The RPF restarted their military operations almost forty-eight hours after the assasination, concentrating to fight for Kigali, while also moving in a slow but regular advance to infiltrate other prefectures. This war tended to be confused with the genocide, and as RPF entered Butare and Kigali in early July, more than a million Hutus fled following their leaders, taking with them whatever they could grab and loot. This ‘victory’ by the RPF was cleverly made use by the génocidaires‘ propaganda’s engines, in a sort of ‘tit for tat’ fashion that quickly became a public accolade for the so-called ‘theory of the double genocide’: Hutus killed Tutsis, then Tutsis killed Hutus.

This is not to deny that there were killings of civilians by the RPF, largely attributed to the decline of discipline I mentioned before. Faced with humongous tasks ahead as the RPF spread to cover more and more areas, the front had to recruit massively and less selectively. As many young survivors, understandably bitter with desire for a revenge, offered their services, the level of discipline and control in the front declined. In addition, they were faced with chaotic situation: sporadic Interahamwe attacks, no payment (the front couldn’t afford it—a stapler couldn’t even be found at their office, that is, if they had an office), and familial pressures among many others. But to then use this to push the ‘double genocide gambit’ is a fallacy meant to fool the simple minds.

Refugees-slash-fugitives
In the meantime, a cholera epidemic broke among the million fleeing refugees due to the monstrous condition. The largest and most expensive international humanitarian-aid industry in 20th century was rapidly deployed, resulting in—almost overnight—a setup of a new, semi-autonomous replica of previous regime where the same genocidal logic, propaganda, violence and hierarchy were militarily organised by the same largely intact Hutu Power army, FAR and interahamwe in an archipelago of refugee camps. UNHCR and other organisations had no real political control over these camps, with ‘Hauts Criminels Rassasiés‘ (Well-fed Top Criminals) controlling and monopolising the distribution of humanitarian aid, meanwhile conspicously announcing that the refugees would never return except as they had come, en masse, and that when they went back they would finish the job they had started with the Tutsis. Large shipment of arms and recruitments of young men for the next extermination were observed. Those that disagreed (or suspected to) were murdered to prevent mass desertion of the civilians that would leave the génocidaires isolated and exposed.

Over $1,400 millions for ‘humanitarian’ aid went to the supporters of the former regime and the génocidaires while nobody could find the ‘mere’ $4.5 millions to unblock the desperately-needed World Bank credits for Rwanda to build the wrecked state (France played a major role in this). You bet they didn’t want to go back: the refugee camps provided free (and ample) food, good medical care, with malnutrition rates far lower than anywhere else in the region. Camp residents were also free to engage in commerce, with some camps quickly becaming the biggest, best-stocked and cheapest markets in the region. Among the main thoroughfares you found what you wouldn’t be able to in most Rwandan villages: library, video bars, libraries, well-stocked pharmacies, brothels, photo studios, &c. Large slices of these profits went into the purchase of, unsurprisingly, more arms and munitions.

In other words, the single largest society of fugitive criminals against humanity ever assembled was kept catered, helped, fattened, and armed, while the new, teetering regime making modest attempts at improvement for a land thoroughly looted by the mentioned criminals was systematically starved by the international community, if not oh-so-often taunted to forget and hold hands with remorseless criminals clearly still planning further extermination in its face.

A decade later these camps are still slowly being flushed out. Unfortunately all of the non-periodical English publications I’ve read are dated before 2000, so there’s nothing worthwhile I’d venture to say from this point onwards that couldn’t be found elsewhere on the net.

Extra notes (to the Wikipedia entry)
1) Rwandese Patriotic Army (RPA) is the ‘official’ name adopted for the armed branch of the RPF, but in practice RPF is used to refer to both the political and military wings.

2) For the old rumour that ‘the RPF has been trained by the Americans’: Paul Kagame was trained in the US for a total of three and a half months and he was already an experienced soldier when he went to Fort Leavenworth.

3) Jared Diamond, although argued extensively on the role of overpopulation to the genocide, certainly wasn’t the first to suggest this cause. Prunier has made numerous references to overpopulation and land exhaustion, as Diamond himself had noted in the book itself.

Recommended readings
We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families
by Philip Gourevitch (1998)

This is probably the most popular book written on Rwandan genocide, a ’smaller canvas’ book that would be a good introduction. It’s not as detached as Prunier’s (below), but never falling into the trap of so-called ‘philantrophic’ writing (where people are often portrayed as some sort of helpless, docile ‘unfortunates’ whom you are deigning yourself to help and should pat yourself on the back for). If you want more personal accounts of some (sometimes key) personnels (including Paul Rusesabagina of Hotel Rwanda, Paul Kagame, and just random people), read this one.

The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide
by Gérard Prunier (1995)

Meticulously researched, elaborating history and politics of pre-colonial Rwanda, written in a “scientifically” detached tone, with the author most of the time addressing himself in third person (except in the occasion of Opération Turquoise where he was involved). Prunier is unapologetically, scathingly sardonic towards France, his home country, who undeniably contributed majorly in the further poisoning of an already disastrous solution.
(Some excerpt and an interview with Prunier can be found from FRONTLINE).

Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda
available online from Human Rights Watch.

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive
by Jared Diamond
dedicated a chapter analysing the Malthusian population pressure factor and the genocide.

As for periodicals, most (and best) general long-term coverage of Rwanda are in French and Belgian newspapers.