Rwanda inquiry into French role (French Complicity?!!...I'm shocked)

Rwanda is to investigate France's alleged role in the mass killing of Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 1994. The Rwandan government said it was setting up an "independent commission charged with assembling the evidence of France's involvement in the genocide".

Rwanda has regularly accused the French of aiding and abetting the Hutu extremists who killed 800,000 people.

Paris denies responsibility - although it has admitted supporting Rwanda's former Hutu-led government.

The current Rwandan government, which took over after the genocide, argues that Paris knowingly armed the killers and provided an escape route after their defeat.

=== more interested in making money than creating a stable world.

Is that what we've been doing since Korea? Creating a stable world?

If I'm not mistaken, Saddam (and his initial superior) were just two of scores of our interventions/connections for "stability" purposes which have blown up in our faces ... around the world ... though none quite as spectacularly as "Tim Osman" / Osama bin Ladin.

And naturally, when I think of our cleaning up at a French Connection, I think of Viet Nam.

How is it possible that appeasing? the Chicoms by stopping overflights of Burmese poppy fields and having the CIA crank the Golden Triangle OUT of China proper was intended to create a more "stable" world in the longterm?

Wouldn't we have stemmed the tide of some serious blowback in the whole of Latin America if we'd gone to Cuba instead of Viet Nam?

If Stabilization is the name of the game, outside the occasional retribution as part of the War on Terror, I think we ought to finish just ONE job that we start before taking on others.

We've yet to stabilize Haiti, really ... not that it keeps us from taking on the trafficking nexus in Kosovo, opting to build a landbridge to the 'Stans instead liberating Kabul for Christmas and -- currently in the process of bribing recalcitrant regions in Iraq with the BILLIONS we are spending on improvements (so that our Private Contractors already busy-busy-busy risking kidnapping the getting's so good can cash in with running water and real roads at their disposal) and other curious Extra Credit Items on our tick-list of Democratizing the world.

ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: […] a very good question, but one has to take realities into account. Europeans have stood with us on this issue, and they are with us in the air. But they, just like us, are democracies. They don't like to have people fight on the ground and suffer casualties.
[…crosstalk…]CHARLIE ROSE: Their national interest is more at stake than our national interest.
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: No, I think our national interest is almost as much at stake or perhaps even more.
CHARLIE ROSE: But you just said ``the future of Europe is at stake.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: Well, but the future of Europe--
CHARLIE ROSE: The future of the United States is not at stake.
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: --is enormously important to us because our global leadership very much depends on having a supportive coalition in Europe. Without Europe, our global leadership would be very much at stake and global stability would be much at stake, therefore. So, we have a very big stake in this, but I really don't want to parse who has more and who has less. What is important is that the Europeans with the means that they have are with us on this.
CHARLIE ROSE: What are the implications for the future in terms of those who say, ``If you go to Kosovo with your bombs, then you have to be prepared for every other moral issue to take a position and be willing to use and employ your treasure and your men and women in the armed forces''?
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's a very troublesome question. And it's a very good question, and one to which there is no easy answer. But there is, nonetheless, an answer. Just because we cannot stop a crime everywhere we should not fail to stop a crime where we can stop it. The fact is we are in Europe. We have an alliance in Europe, therefore we can do something about what is happening in Kosovo.
We can't go into Tibet without starting a massive, huge war with China. We are not present in other parts of the world with our forces and with allies and so forth.
And then, last but not least, even a self-serving argument. What happens in Europe impacts on us much more. so, in that sense, yes, we cannot do it across the board. We cannot have a moral imperative on a universal scale. But it doesn't excuse us from the obligation of doing it where we can do it.
CHARLIE ROSE: So, we say to the Tibetans, ``You know, we can't do it because we don't want to get into a big deal with China, a fight with China.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's right.
CHARLIE ROSE: ``They're too big and strong.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's right.
CHARLIE ROSE: We said with Chechnya, ``We can't do it because morality plays no issue here because, you know, we don't want to get into a big conflict with the Russians.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's right. That is unfortunately--
CHARLIE ROSE: And we say to the Africans, ``We don't have a big stake here. It's Africa. It's not Europe, and so -- therefore -- we can't get involved.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: And we can support the African states doing-- You're absolutely right, Charlie. That's exactly the reality.
CHARLIE ROSE: It's not very tidy, is it?
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: It isn't tidy. And reality isn't tidy. And look at our own society. Look at the presence of crime in certain parts of our cities. In certain parts of a city there's much less. In other parts of the city there is much more. In certain parts of the cities certain forms of conduct would not be tolerated in daylight. In certain parts of cities they are. Unfortunately you cannot deal with all of the problems of the world at the same time. But that's not an argument for doing nothing where you can.
CHARLIE ROSE: So, the Brezhnev principle becomes--I mean, the Brzezinski principle--
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: You're not the only one who has done this, Charlie.
CHARLIE ROSE: There is no Brezhnev-- The Brzezinski principle becomes, ``Do something where you can have an impact and where it most closely fits your national interest in terms of like people.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: Well, where morality, practicality and interest coincide, obviously it's more possible. And I think it's even obligatory.
CHARLIE ROSE: It's situational ethics, isn't it?
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: Well, isn't all of life situational ethic, to some extent, unless we're saints? But societies cannot be saints. And also you can't do everything. You can't be in Kosovo and in Kashmir and in Tibet and in Rwanda and in Somalia all at the same time.

Events in Kosovo ... Brzrzenski, Lavrov and Scowcroft ChitChat with Charlie Rose

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