Keep Children Off the Battlefield

This video, which in the satirical tradition of Swift's 'A Modest Proposal', calls on people to help child soldiers fight, is rather shocking.  But rather than seeing it as bad taste, it forced me to think about how my complacency actually allows the phenomenon of child soldiers to continue unchallenged -- almost as if I was sending them weapons myself.

As P.W. Singer described in his book Children at War (to read an extract click here), the changing nature of armed conflict in the modern world has made children particularly vulnerable to recruitment by warring factions.  The breakdown of societies in impoverished countries, separation of families due to displacement, lack of employment and the growing informalization and privatization of the use of violence has led to some 300,000 children and adolescents bearing arms.

Living in Uganda, where the Lord's Resistance Army has forcibly recruited thousands of children to fight or be 'wives' for commanders, I have been shocked by just how many people are living with terrible memories and enormous trauma. Being forced to commit atrocities against your family and having your whole moral universe turned upside down is about the worst possible thing that can happen to you as a child.  The process of reintegrating with society, dealing with guilt and facing post-traumatic stress is fraught with incredible difficulty.  For a particularly eloquent description, read the autobiography of Ishmael Beah, a former child soldier from Sierra Leone.

Thankfully there are things that you and I can do to join the struggle against the abuse of children in war. The Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers has several useful suggestions of ways to get involved. The NGO War Child (which produced the above video) also has an impressive website dedicated to the issue.

As you spend time with your families this Christmas season, think about those children who are not so lucky.  For those of you who are Christians, consider the horrific situation faced by Jesus and his family when he entered the world.  Many kids in today's war zones face similarly terrible situations as they are forced from their homes and become trapped in abusive and corrosive political circumstances.

- Matthew Bolton