Rating: 
Summary: Engrossing, Disturbing, Instructive
Review: "Shake Hands with the Devil" is a disturbing book, written by a man who candidly admits to chronic mental problems in the wake of his horrific experiences in Rwanda. After reading his account, I now realize that my knowledge of the Rwandan genocide was very limited. For example, I always viewed the Hutus as the clear antagonists (they comprise 85% of the Rwandan population and carried out the vast majority of the killing), yet I'm now convinced that if the population distribution percentages were reversed, the Tutsis might have been equally disposed to slaughter their Hutu neighbors with little provocation. Moreover, the Tutsi-Hutu conflict is not limited to Rwanda, but involves other parts of Sub-Saharan Africa (especially northern Burundi).
This book is a story of conflict on many levels - especially the interpersonal conflict within General Dallaire. On one hand he seems proud to have followed his UN orders to the letter, while at the same time he seems to regret not militarily intervening in defiance of those same orders. Throughout the book, he seems to alternately praise and scorn Kofi Annan and the UN in general. He is proud to be Canadian, yet he blasts Canada for not being more supportive of the Rwandan peacekeeping effort.
I must say that I was disturbed by the constant use of acronyms - a condition that requires the reader to constantly page to the glossary until he becomes familiar with the alphabet soup that makes up "UN speak." In one single paragraph, (bottom of page 132) the following acronyms appear: BBTG, MDR, MRND, PDC, PSD, RPF, CDR, RTLM. Over a dozen acronyms begin with "UN..." as in "UNICEF." But then, the acronyms do seem to accurately convey the United Nations bureaucracy that frustrated Dallaire at almost every turn.
In the end, readers will read this book through their own political prisms. Conservatives will see it as a damning indictment of UN ineptitude. Liberals will see it as the natural historical consequence of racism, European colonialism, and exploitation of black Africans. Perhaps both are right. When this book is referenced, the subtitle is rarely mentioned "The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda." Of that failure there is no doubt.
Rating: 
Summary: Understanding the Rwandan Genocide
Review: "Shake Hands with the Devil" is a simply amazing book. I first read it having no previous knowlage of what happened in Rwanda. I must admit I didn't even realize there WAS a genocide. I bought this book specifically to find out what happened and I was not disapointed. It gives a detailed account of the entire war, including events leading up to it so the reader can better understand the motives behind the destruction. At times this book can be extremly hard to read (in my opinion at least). There are very graphic descriptions of people being tortured, raped and killed, but it only manages to further illustrate the point that the world messed up the whole situation beyond belief. I would definitly recommend this book to anyone interested in Rwanda. Your money will not be misplaced I promise you.
Rating:
Summary: Genocide is SYMPTOM--Lack of Public Intelligence is CAUSE
Review:
I read this book with the eye and mind of a professional intelligence officer long frustrated with the myopia of national policy constituencies, and the stupidity of the United Nations Headquarters culture. General Dallaire has written a superb book on the reality of massive genocide in the Burundi and Rwanda region in 1994, and his sub-title, "The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda" is where most people end up in reading this book.
I see things a little differently. I see this book as a massive indictment of the United Nations culture of "go along gently", as a compelling documentary of how ignorant the United Nations is about impending disasters because of its persistent refusal to establish a UN intelligence secretariat as recommended by the Brahimi Report, and as a case study in how the Western nations have failed to establish coherent global strategies--and the intelligence-policy dialogues necessary to keep such strategies updated and relevant. According to the author, 15 UN peacekeepers died--over 800,000 Rwandans died. The number 15 is not larger because Belgium, Canada, and the US explicitly stated that Rwanda was "irrelevant" in any sense of the word, and not worth the death of a single additional Western (mostly white) soldier. Although there has been slight improvement in the UN since LtGen Patrick Cammaert, NL RM became the Military Advisor to the Secretary General (see General Cammaert and other views in "Peacekeeping Intelligence: Emerging Concepts for the Future"), the reality is that the UN is still unintelligent and unable to muster the strategic intelligence necessary to get the mandate right; the operational intelligence necessary to get the force structure right; and the tactical intelligence necessary to achieve the mission on the ground. Just about everything General Dallaire writes about in this book with respect to UN culture and UN lack of intelligence remains valid today: they still cannot get decent maps with which to plan a campaign or execute the mission; UN administrators are still anal-retentive bureaucrats that will not issue paper and pencils, much less soft drinks for diplomatic encounters; UN "seniors" still like the first class lifestyle on the road (they pretend to be austere only in NY); UN civilian mission leaders still misrepresent military reporting, as Booh-Booh did to Dallaire; and the UN is still ineffective in creating public intelligence with which to communicate directly to national publics the reasons why humanitarian operations must take place early and in force. General Dallaire concludes his excruciatingly detailed book, a book with enormous credibility stemming from the meticulous manner in which he documents what happened, when it happened, and what everyone knew when (including advance warning of the genocide from the "third force" that the UN leadership refused to take seriously), with two thoughts, one running throughout the book, the second in the conclusion only: First, and perhaps because of the mental toll he himself paid for this mission, there are frequent references throughout the book to the urgency of understanding the psychology of groups, tribes, and cultures. This is not something any Western intelligence agency is capable of today. The closest I have seen to this is Dr. Marc Sageman's book on "Understanding Terror Networks." We urgently need a global "survey", with specific reference to the countries plagued by ethnic conflict and other sources of instability, and we need to start taking "psychological intelligence" very seriously. We need to UNDERSTAND. Second, he concludes the book by emphasizing the urgency of understanding and then correcting the sources of the utter RAGE that characterizes hundreds of thousands if not millions of young men around the world, all of whom he says have access to guns and many of whom he says will ultimately and unavoidably have access to weapons of mass destruction. As I contemplate the six-front hundred-year war that America has started by attacking Iraq instead of addressing the social networks and sources of terrorism, I cannot help but think that this great solider and statesman has hit the nail on the head: Rwanda is coming to your neighborhood, and nothing your policy makers and military leaders are doing today is relevant to avoiding that visitation. Remember the kindergarten class in Scotland? The Columbine shootings and Oklahoma disasters? Now magnify that by 1000X, aggravated by a mix of angry domestic militants, alienated immigrant gangs, hysterical working poor fathers pushed into insanity--and the free availability of small arms, toxins, and simple means for collapsing the public infrastructure.... The complexity of society, which has lost its humanity, is leading to unpredictable and difficult to diagnose and correct collapses of all the basic mechanisms of survival. General Dallaire's book is not about Rwanda--it is about us and what will happen to us if we persist in being unintelligent about our world and the forces that could--if we were wise--permit billions to survive in peace. In addition to this book I recommend the PKI book mentioned above, Jonathan Schell's book on "Unconquerable World," Bill Moyer's on "Doing Democracy", and Tom Atlee on "The Tao of Democracy." If we do not take back the power and restore common sense to how our nations behave and how our nations spend our money around the globe, the plague of Rwanda will visit our neighborhoods within the decade.
Rating:
Summary: One Genocide Among Many
Review: As I read this book I wonder why. There's a phrase in the product description that goes, "the most barbarous and chaotic display of civil war and genocide in the past decade." Note that this is restricted to just the past decade. Tragic as it is, this is just one incident. There was ethnic clensing in what was Yugoslovia, Saddam Hussein using nerve gas on the Kurds, who can forget the mounds of skulls in Cambodia. Of course to really get big time, you need to be organized and professional like the Germans in World War II.
Looking to the future, what do those people who would have us pull out of Iraq think would happen between the Shiite and Sunni and Kurds that remain. What will happen as weapons of mass destruction become available -- yes, I know Iraq didn't have any. I could build some, and my chemistry is out of date. The organization that pulled off 9/11 has the resources and obviously the will to fund the development of them.
Then there's AIDS. 3.1 million people died of AIDS in 2001, that's the same rate of death as in Rwanda but over the whole year and continuing year after year. Are Robert Mugabe (Zimbabwe), Thabo Mbeki (South Africa) and other African leaders any worse than the devil in Rwanda. They know what they are doing, they just don't seem to care.
Rating:
Summary: Honest & Vulnerable Portrayal of Preventable Atrocity
Review: Dallaire describes the detail and horror of his experience in Rawanda during the genocides of 1993-94 as a UN peacekeeping commander who is ill prepared and lacked even the rudiments needed to support his effort. This work is an attempt at carthesis on his part, in hopes that in telling his story, from the role of the First World Nations and the UN to the horrific fate of millions, he would find some peace from his nightmares and guilt. He is right on in his delivery and evaluation, to the distaste I'm sure of France, the U.S., the U.N. and Belgium particularly and the First World more generally. These are the people (countries), it seems, who are far more deserving of both nightmares and guilt. His genuine concern for humanity and for Rwanda, along with his repeated disappointments, work to destroy his trust in his fellow man and in the millitary machine that he is a part of. Excellent book. My only criticism lies in the difficulty I had in following some of the military jargon and thread of his sentence structure. It's well worth the read, regardless.
Rating:
Summary: Fires that can be put out
Review: Dallaire's book, Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (2004), tells the tragic and profoundly important story of this legendary general who "watched as the devil took control of paradise on earth and fed on the blood of the people we were supposed to protect." Dallaire argues that Rwanda-like situations are fires that can be put out with a small force if caught early enough will certainly draw debate, however, the book documents in horrifying detail what happens when no serious effort is made.
One should read about Rwanda's genocide to learn how to limit genocide in Darfur.
Recently in the New York Times (Dallaire, Romeo. 2004. "Looking at Darfur, Seeing Rwanda." The New York Times, October 4), Romeo Dallaire portrayed Sudan, as an underdeveloped, orphan nation, with no links to colonial masters of its past, essentially being left to its own devices. He believes the Janjaweed militias of Darfur, with the complicit approval of the government, are bent on ridding the region of its residents, primarily black Africans -- killing, raping and driving refugees into camps along the border with Chad.
Sudan is a huge country with a harsh terrain and a population unlikely to welcome outside intervention. Still, Dallaire believes that a mixture of mobile African Union troops supported by NATO soldiers equipped with helicopters, remotely piloted vehicles, night vision devices and long-range special-forces could protect Darfur's displaced people in their camps and remaining villages, and eliminate or incarcerate the Janjaweed.
In April 2004, on the 10th anniversary of the start of his country's genocide, President Paul Kagame told his people and the world that if any country ever suffered genocide, Rwanda would willingly come to its aid. He chastised the international community for its callous response to the killing spree of 1994, during which 800,000 people were slaughtered and three million lost their homes and villages. And sure enough, Rwanda sent a small contingent to Darfur. President Kagame kept his word. Having called what is happening in Darfur genocide and having vowed to stop it, Dallaire says was time for the West to keep its word as well (Dallaire 2004).
Rating:
Summary: Let's Start Spending Our Money on Something That Matters
Review: Every once in a while you read something that not only leaves an impression on you, but also give you a whole new understanding of the "way the world works". In "Shake Hands With The Devil", Romeo Dallaire gives us a surprisingly objective, yet very personal account of the events the took place in Rwanda. It is not giving away the plot to acknowledge that 800,000 people were massacred in 100 days, all of this while "peacekeepers" were on the job. The "How and Why?" is what this book is about. Dallaire leaves out a lot of the drama that fiction readers love but gets on with the story. Shake Hands is documentary in nature and while the real drama was being there, the book remains very readable.
This one volume provides world insights that a 1000 five-minute news clips and time magazines will never come close to offering. The reader will walk away from the experience with a totally different view of: the Canadian Military, The UN, and the concept of "World Peace". Truly Dallaire puts these issues into clear perspective and gives us a timely foundation of knowledge for viewing and judging todays events.
Dallaire opens with a commentary and a brief family Bio, affording us an appreciation for his reference point. The real story is about the tragedy of Rwanda and the needlessness of it all. Politics, UN bureaucracy, racism and powerful international forces, are dealt with in an incredibly unbiased manner. Dallaire's argument is clear and direct yet he doesn't resort to finger pointing or slander to make the point. His experience is the explanation and the proof is irrefutable. The reader only needs to reflect on the whole situation to see the truth!
There is no question that Dallaire suffered tremendously from his experience in Rwanda. Originally, as scapegoats, he and his his colleagues were publicly discredited for their "weakness". Later as professionals and humanitarians they have been exonerated for the real strength and character they showed in the face of overwhelming nightmares. The media often focusses on this personal suffering as a priority in promoting this story. But what Dallaire professes and reveals, so truthfully, is what little emphasis western society places on mass suffering and how greatly it focusses mass resources on the few.
Dallaire must be commended for his guts and tact in writing such an account. He puts our lives in perspective and humbles himself before the dead and dying. He is not afraid to look shame in the face and admit it for himself and for us. In a time when popular culture glosses over the negative with honey nut coating, Dallaire projects a collective need to stop denying world suffering and start sharing in the cost. This is not "Blackhawk Down", where hundreds of millions of dollars were spent to sensationalize the "bravery and human cost" of a few American lives lost to save a few American lives. This is one mans account of the lack of value placed on millions of families in a forgotten part of the world and the few people that tried to do something about it...but couldn't.
What Dallaire tells us so clearly in his closing, is that the vast resources of our western society need only to be refocussed and put to good use. Perhaps this is the most important point he demonstrates to us. It takes people who care, to make a change for good in the world. A person of rare character and integrity, Romeo Dallaire speaks to a calling much greater than his own self. Spending on just cause is something we need not just to promote but support as well.
CB
Rating:
Summary: The most powerful book I've ever read
Review: I bought this book a few days after it was released and read it within a week. It is an extremely compelling account of a horrific event from one of the few people who tried to stop it. He looked at dead or orphaned children in Rwanda and saw his own young children. He exhorted the UN and the powerful nations of the world to send him a few thousand troops, so that he could save hundreds of thousands of innocent lives. In the end, political calculus was more important to those nations than the lives of almost a million Africans. This book really changed the way I look at the world. Another really good book for exploring the role of politics in refusing to prevent genocide is "A Problem from Hell" by Samantha Powers.
Rating:
Summary: Unbelievable Account By One Who Would Know
Review: I must admit...I only bought this book because it was rated a Bestseller up here in Canada. Before I read it, I had no idea there was a genocide in Rwanda. Goes to show you how little the news media bothered to play up what was REALLY going on. Makes you wonder just HOW MUCH control the governments of the western world really have over the media. After I had finished reading the Introduction, I was captured and read the book within 4 days. Gives an excellent account as to not only what was going on politically within the country leading up to and during the genocide..but also the back and forth banter that this UN Force Commander had to endure from the governments of the world who could have at any time stopped this tragedy from happening. My heart goes out to Mr.Dallaire and everyone who had to witness the genocide of 1994. What courageous and determined human beings they are. Not only is this book an eye opener about the problems humanity faces, it also stands to remind you that there are still people in this world, willing to stand up for what they believe in and try to make a difference, no matter how small. This is a must read!!!
Rating:
Summary: informative and tear-jerking
Review: i ordered this book to know more about what happened in rwanda, expecting a somewhat factual account of events from a military-man's perspective... au contraire, "shake hands with the devil" is a moving, emotional roller coaster that gets the facts across to you but drags you to tears many times along the way...
so much has been said in these reviews already, but this work of non-fiction is the first book that's gotten me to cry in a long time... i can only hope that it does the same to everyone else who reads it and that this spurs them to go out and find MORE information on rwanda and other places of horror in the world... it is most likely that the history of rwanda has already repeated itself in the interim, is currently repeating itself and will repeat itself again in the future... maybe if kids around the world were given books like "Shake Hands with the Devil" while impressionable schoolchildren some of the suffering would be avoided...
what is happening right now in the sudan? or iraq and afghanistan? or other african countries i know nothing about? for me the magic of the book was that it whetted my appetite for more knowledge about the injustice both in rwanda and elsewhere..it made me realize how much of the picture we are not given in the media and by our governments... the knowledge is out there in books like this, but you have to go find it on your own...as dallaire demonstrates, there is a world full of bureaucrats sitting on their laurels that don't really want you to know or just don't care
if one lesson is to be learned from dallaire (who i truly admire after reading this book), it is that action is all that counts... in an age when we all have the right to speak our minds, we should realize that speaking is useless if it isn't backed up with money, strength, action and people like dallaire who put things into practice
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