The Rise of the Lord's Resistance Army | Teen Ink

The Rise of the Lord's Resistance Army

February 20, 2012
By bryan waters BRONZE, Coppell, Texas
bryan waters BRONZE, Coppell, Texas
1 article 0 photos 0 comments

The Lord’s Resistance Army came into existence about ten years ago. They came to be after a group of military personnel refused to sign a treaty, one of these people was Joseph Kony. Joseph Kony got the other members who didn’t sign this treaty to follow him to form the Lord’s Resistance Army, and attempt to overthrow the Ugandan Government.
Stopping the Lord’s Resistance Army has to be done. They have been committing treacherous acts and been attempting to overthrow the Ugandan government for a little over a decade.

The Lord’s Resistance Army or the “LRA” uses an interesting tactic by using some children that they abduct for fighting in war. Their thinking is that most people would have a difficult time shooting an eight year old child. That is most likely true for most people, making their tactic unfortunately somewhat successful. For example, Globalsecurity.com states, The LRA abducted large numbers of civilians for training as guerrillas. Most victims were children and young adults. By saying this, the reader can get a general idea of what children are being abducted for. By reading this the reader can conclude that the crimes being committed by the LRA are not minor acts that can just be forgotten about.

The ultimate goal of the LRA is to overthrow the Ugandan government and it may seem as if the LRA is the only one of the two with any military type of threat, but that is definitely not true. This was proven not true in December of 2008, On December 14, 2008, the Ugandan government again decided to deal with the LRA militarily, with armies of Southern Sudan and Congo and with the support of the United States. Operation Lighting Thunder destroyed the LRA bases around Garamba national park in Eastern Congo; however, all of the LRA commanders escaped unharmed. The joint offensive weakened the LRA by cutting off food and other supplies. This was stated by csmoniter.com. In other words, the efforts weren’t successful for killing the senior leadership of the LRA, but it did cut off supplies and food. By reading this, the reader may conclude that LRA is not a joke. The things they are doing and crimes they are committing are not something to look past.

The word of the LRA and their acts have spread worldwide. For over a decade now Joseph Kony and the LRA have been abducting, murdering, and raping civilians and children. America has been a part of efforts to stop this and has come up with its own way as well. As nytimes.com states, “The decision by Mr. Obama to deploy armed military advisers into the region was welcomed by human rights advocates who have chronicled the atrocities committed by Mr. Kony and his subordinates.” After reading this, the reader can see that America is stepping in and putting in effort to stopping Joseph Kony and his subordinates. In other words, the United States realize the atrocities of what is happening and they are trying to do what they can to stop these acts.

Joseph Kony and the LRA need to be stopped. They are abducting, raping, and murdering innocent children. If they are not abducting, raping, or murdering the children then they are using them to fight for them in an army of abducted children. I agree with President Obama on sending Military forces to Ugandan to try and seize this.


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