Child Soldiers Are Victims

There is a huge issue of child soldiers worldwide. Child soldiers are being used everywhere. The only place they haven’t been used is Antarctica. The majority of child soldiers are used in Asia. There are many different ways that children become child soldiers. Based on how they become child soldiers people have a question if child soldiers are either victims or perpetrators. Child soldiers are perpetrators because they were forced to join the army and manipulated to stay; they had a hard time integrating back into society, and the view of the people who think that child soldiers are perpetrators are wrong when they say that child soldiers did everything voluntarily when they actually didn’t.

The children were forced to join the army and manipulated to stay. In the article, “Armed & Underage” the writer talks about former child soldier Ishmael Beah which said, “When Beah was 13, Sierra Leone was embroiled in a civil war. Rebels attacked his village, and Beah was separated from his parents. After spending months wandering through his war-torn country, he was forcibly recruited in Sierra Leone’s Army. Beah was armed with an AK-47, drugged, and taught to kill.” Beah was one of the children forced to join the army. They drugged the children so that they would stay. Another example of how they were forced to join the army was in “Military History” where the writer talks about another boy who said, “‘I was attending primary school.’ The young boy speaks in a monotone, masking his emotions as he recounts events that irrevocably changed his life. ‘The rebels came and attacked us. They killed my mother and father in front of my eyes. I was 10 years old. They took me with them.’” That’s how children were forced to join the army and manipulated to stay.

            After being a child soldier, victims have a hard time integrating back into society. In the article “Military History” the author elaborates on the aftermath by saying, “For the child soldiers, the impact of being plunged into war creates problems long after the end of the actual combat. Many suffer long-term trauma that can disrupt their development.” Former child soldiers have memories of their experiences of killing people in the war and had to learn to face these memories and move on with their life. Many girls had to face memories of being abused. In the article “Military History” the author describes the hardships of being a girl child soldier, in which he said, “Girl soldiers are often singled out for sexual abuse, even by their own commanders, and have a hard time integrating back into society at war’s end.” They had to get used to being around men in society while facing the memories of being abused by other men in the war. They would be scared to interact with men prior to previous experiences and had the thought of potentially being abused again. After being forcibly recruited to war, child soldiers had to face the unwanted memories of combat and try to integrate back into society.

            Some believe that child soldiers are perpetrators but if they think critically, they’ll see that they’re actually victims. In the article “Armed & Underage” the author describes an army of child soldiers who aren’t willingly prone to violence in which he says, “It is less an army than a drugged-out street gang with military-grade weapons and 13-year-old brides. Its ranks are filled with boys brainwashed to burn down huts and pound newborn babies to death.” People who say child soldiers are perpetrators would say that the quote shows that the child soldiers committed horrifying crimes. It actually shows that when the child soldiers were brainwashed they did whatever the commander told them to do. Later in the article the author includes a quote from a commander explaining the reason behind targeting children to be soldiers. The quote said, “‘Child soldiers are ideal,’ a military commander from Chad told Human Rights Watch. ‘They don’t complain, they don’t expect to be paid – and if you tell them to kill, they kill.’” This shows how the commanders took advantage of the children’s’ obedience. People who think that child soldiers are perpetrators think that child soldiers willingly stayed in the war without escaping to get away from killing. In the Interview if Ishmael Beah video, Ishmael Beah said, “You’ve lost yourself. It completely becomes your life. You have to do it to survive.” The people who think that child soldiers are perpetrators should know that they are wrong because the child soldiers couldn’t escape. If they did escape the army would hunt them down and kill them. So, child soldiers are victims because everything they did was involuntary.

            Overall, child soldiers are victims. Child soldiers were forced to join the army when they were captured or in other ways. They had a hard time integrating back into society with all the trauma prior to the war. Lastly, the people who think that child soldiers are perpetrators are completely wrong when they say that the child soldiers did everything voluntarily, when they had to do it to survive. What side do you take, perpetrators or victims?