DDR: Rebuilding the Lives of Child Soldiers

In a previous post entitled "Child Soldiers: A Global Crisis" I briefly discussed the intricacies associated with bringing youth armed forces back into their societies. This topic is something that needs to be examined in much greater depth in order to begin grasping the gravity of the situation of hundreds of thousands of juveniles around the globe. The most immediate problem to be addressed is recovering children from places where they are forced to fight, but what is the next step? How does one bring such a young person who has witnessed and performed so many atrocities back into a functioning, peaceful civilization? The solution is not simple, cheap, or fast. Rather, these adolescents need to go through a rigorous progression of psychological, emotional and physical healing. With the rise of the child soldering phenomenon in the last few decades, the international community has been pressed to find a means to amply tackle these new layers of modern warfare. Their response that aims to stop the cycle of violence from continuing to spiral from one war-torn generation to the next has become known as the Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration Process (DDR). While the development of this course of action has led to the beginning of many happy endings for individuals, it cannot account for several societal factors out of its control that ultimately are the make-or-break factors in success stories.

The DDR program was created to deal with the post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSD) experienced by soldiers returning from war; when young boys and girls began to be used to fight, an entirely new element needed to be taken into account: pre-adolescent vulnerability. As one humanitarian writes, "Child soldiers, having grown up within an armed group and having been exposed to atrocities since a very young age, are often the most difficult ex-combatants to reintegrate into society." Because all they have known and can remember is conflict, they lack the norms of behavioral interaction with other people. As the United Nation's DDR Center explains, these young people are entirely unaware of how to interact without resorting to violence. Therefore when it comes to rehabilitation, after they are taken out of the conflict zone and demobilized, the process becomes convoluted and varies with every case. Through the first hand research that has been done in correlation to the wars in Sierra Leone, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a few key over-arching actions emerged for creating the most effective agenda for reintegrating juveniles. These entail separating the young combatants from any other soldiers, finding their families and reuniting them as quickly as possible, providing a strong education and basic skills for entering the work force, and long term out-patient therapy sessions to help unite the two worlds the child has lived in. The most crucial piece is to provide the child with a consistent, stable daily life and environment, so they are less inclined to revert to aggressive and hostile behavior when faced with a challenging situation. If each of these steps can be taken for every individual, then their chances of remaining out of warfare dramatically increase.

While the process has proven to be extremely successful, DDR cannot address all of the complications entangled with the horrific experience of child soldiers. One of the major barriers is persuading societies to allow these former combatants back into their homes. Many families do not accept their kids out of fear of violence and of being shunned by the public for housing vicious murderers. This story becomes even more complex when the former militants are female because they are often victims of brutal rapes, genital mutilation, and forced prostitution. The UN's site for the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children says, "Wartime rape often has a tragic ripple effect that extends far beyond the pain and degradation of the rape itself. Rape victims who become pregnant are often ostracized by their families and communities and abandon their babies. Some may even commit suicide." When organizations focused on reintegrating soldiers are faced with such monumental roadblocks, the struggle to achieve the goal of the programs can be instantaneously rendered ineffective. With this in consideration, suddenly breaking cultural taboos then becomes yet another issue to be dismantled and reversed.

Addictions and diseases are yet another impediment the DDR process struggles to address. Militia leaders are notorious for giving youth highly addictive drugs as a way to relieve anxiety and to make those under the influence more brutal on the battlefield. Brown-brown, the most pervasive substance utilized, is made from a mixture of cocaine and gun powder that is administered by being packed into open wounds or by injection into the bloodstream. Through both the reuse of dirty needles and unprotected sex, many of the juveniles who participate in conflicts are exposed to lethal diseases like HIV/AIDS. Even the most well equipped cities in Africa lack the proper funding and tools necessary to treat such an overwhelming number of infected and addicted people, so when soldiers are released from their rehabilitation programs they are left with little access to adequate medical attention. Of course it is absurd to infer that one single DDR program should be able to account for all of these obstacles. This just shows that while so much has already been improved in removing the children from conflict and helping them to rebuild a new life for themselves, broader pushes need to be made in the political, economic and socio-cultural spheres in order for reintegration to be entirely successful.

When all of this is taken together, it is hard to conceive of a way to fully save future generations from repeating our mistakes, but massive undertakings need to be pursued because the stakes are exceedingly high. Currently there are over six million child casualties world-wide along with another one million orphaned. If we cannot help them now, then their kids too will turn to violence when facing economic suffering and political turmoil. The costs of war and of stopping war in future years are not just monetary but are also a matter of security, a sum that far exceeds the price of implementing an all-encompassing effort to rehabilitate those presently affected. International efforts and funds need to be more directly allocated towards both ending clashes today and minimizing the effects of imminent disputes. While we tend to largely disregard the cliché adage "the youth are our future," the statement is full of immeasurable truth, especially in regards to adolescents engaging in combat. The only way to ensure peace for tomorrow is stop the fighting today, to save those who are fighting today.