Thus, even if Dallaire's telegram had been acted on half of the genocide would have been already completed. Dallaire himself was unaware of what was going on outside the capital and in all probability the arriving troops would have stayed in Kigali.
If, indeed, Dallaire had known what was going on all over the country 5,000 troops would not have been enough; it would have required a good 15,000. Transporting such a force to a landlocked country with limited airfields would not have been a quick business. It would have taken two weeks to get enough troops and equipment sufficient to attempt a halt to the fighting.
If there was a time to have intervened on a large scale it was, in fact, way back in January. That is when the moderate Hutu government was still in power desperately trying to keep Hutu militants in check. (These moderates were some of the first to be murdered when the killing began.)
This is when both that government and its old colonial power, Belgium, were arguing for a major UN intervention. (There was a small force on the ground under Dallaire's command.) But the US and Britain quashed the idea, arguing that the cost was prohibitive and that peacekeepers would be endangered, as they had been in Somalia the previous October.
What does one deduce from this? Yes, the obvious. We have to use our imaginations to better anticipate situations. But it is not as simple as that. Each of the recent interventions teaches a different lesson.
Somalia taught us not to allow peacekeeping troops to start to fight like an invading army. Haiti taught us even a successful military occupation by outsiders may not change the fundamental antagonisms that undermine society. Bosnia teaches us that after there has been an awful war military intervention can buy a little time for reconstruction, but it can't stabilize a precariously unbalanced political situation. Kosovo taught us that military intervention can, first, precipitate the situation it is supposed to forestall and, second, substitute one problem (Albanian terror) for what preceded it (Serb terror).
The intervention debate has become impaled on the horn of multiple dilemmas. No wonder the Security Council becomes so often deadlocked on these issues. No wonder even when it votes to do something it finds no member countries want to risk their troops to implement the decision.
If the UN needs to beef up anything it needs to beef up its preventive diplomacy. That means developing a large cadre of people -- not just a lone troubleshooter who flies in to meet the president -- which can go into a situation of conflict, stay a year or two or more and work at every level of society, not just the very top.
Jonathan Power is a freelance columnist based in London.
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