Preventing Genocide: A National Security Priority
This is a guest post by Mike Abramowitz, Director, US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Committee on Conscience, and Sam Bell, Executive Director, Genocide Intervention Network.
It’s been said that the bookshelves of Washington think tanks are littered with commission reports gathering dust. That must not be the case with the recommendations of the Genocide Prevention Task Force, issued a year ago on the eve of the anniversary of U.N. approval of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
The Task Force, convened by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and the American Academy of Diplomacy and co-chaired by former Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright and former Defense Secretary William S. Cohen, sought to remedy one of the most vexing problems of modern statecraft: six decades after the approval of the convention, the world’s governments have failed to institute reliable mechanisms for preventing the recurrence of genocide and other forms of mass atrocities, as anyone familiar with the sad stories of Cambodia, Rwanda and Darfur, Sudan is well aware.
The Albright-Cohen report powerfully made the case that genocide is preventable; it does not stem from irrational, ancient hatreds. Preventing it is not simply a humanitarian imperative; it is in the national security interest of the United States. The failure to halt genocide in places like Rwanda has badly hurt American credibility in the world and invited the kind of extremism that has stoked widespread violence and other transnational threats.
It would be satisfying to report that the White House and Congress immediately adopted the common-sense recommendations of the Task Force. But with so much attention focused on a succession of other pressing matters, policy makers have been slow to fully embrace the Albright-Cohen report.
Progress is, nonetheless, tangible. Senior officials like Vice President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. and U.N. Ambassador Susan E. Rice have praised the recommendations and indicated they are being taken seriously by the administration as it organizes the foreign policy and defense apparatus and prepares a national security strategy. In commemoration of the Holocaust Days of Remembrance on April 23, President Obama spoke of his “commitment as President” to “[do] everything we can to prevent and end atrocities like those that took place in Rwanda, those taking place in Darfur.”
On Capitol Hill this year, the House-approved Foreign Relations Authorization Act required the administration to submit a report “outlining specific plans for the development of a government-wide strategy and the strengthening of United States civilian capacities for preventing genocide and mass atrocities against civilians.” When it takes up similar legislation, probably sometime next year, the Senate is likely to consider similar language.
Interestingly, the intelligence community has been the arm of the government perhaps most interested in the report’s recommendations. Admiral Dennis C. Blair, the director of National Intelligence, committed to Congress this year to prepare a coordinated national intelligence product addressing countries at risk of genocide in the next three-to-five years. He also agreed to highlight countries at risk of genocide in his annual threat assessment testimony to Congress, along lines recommended by the Albright-Cohen report.
More can be done, especially a clear presidential statement that preventing genocide is a national security priority, and the development of a White House plan to coordinate the federal response to possible genocide and mass atrocities. But what is heartening is the way the Task Force principles have taken root in the worlds of ideas and advocacy. Groups interested in civilian protection are using the recommendations as an organizing and advocacy tool, and at Genocide Intervention Network, the report is the basis for its genocide prevention initiative for this coming year. The Task Force’s work is being cited by scholars urging reforms in the way the government organizes itself to prevent conflict.
It’s all enough to give us hope that the Genocide Prevention Task Force work may one day take its place as the rare Washington report that actually made a difference. For the people of Sudan, Congo and other genocide-threatened regions, it won’t be a moment too soon.
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