On April 6, 1994, the jet carrying the president of Rwanda, Juvenal Habyarimana (a Hutu) and the newly elected president of Burundi (also a Hutu) was shot down over the captial city of Kigali. The evidence suggests that he was actually killed by fellow extremist Hutus in his own party as justification to launch a Tutsi genocide - the plot for which began as many as four years prior.

France has been implicated as supporting the radical Interahamwe Hutu death squads by supplying them with both the weapons and training for mass Tutsi killings. Death lists were already ready. Practice slaughters had been conducted to test the world's response as well their newly aqcuired execution strategies. High government officials had openly discussed their desire for an apocolyptic "final solution" for the Tutsis. Propoganda media peaked, justifying and sanctioning the need to elimiate this ethnic group en mass. A code phrase to begin the killing was widely distributed beforehand, and those words were uttered over the radio immediately following the presidential plane crash. That was all that was needed, and the killing began.

Within 100 days, 1,000,000+ men, women, and children were brutally killed. With the majority of the killings done in the early phase, the efficiency of the Rwandan death squads surpassed that of the highly organized Nazi death camps. And those who plotted the genocide predicted accurately that the international community would not respond.

To put this into context: Imagine every Cubs' home game between the months of June and July, with Wrigley Field filled to capacity. Imagine everyone attending each of those 25 games killed in the most sickening ways imaginable. Imagine, in response, the UN removing resources. Imagine world leaders debating whether or not this technically met the definition of genocide, therefore obligating a response. Imagine world leaders turning their back and allowing it to continue. This is what happened in Rwanda.

The picture above is a short and highly incomplete list of names of genocide victims in the region of the memorial site I visited. At that site alone, over 250,000 people are buried in common toombs, with caskets stacked on top of each other that contain the incomplete and mixed remains of multiple victims.

The memorial site offers lovely gardens, peaceful meditation space, candid information, and chilling artifacts to help those who visit remember, grieve, and learn. It's part of a large scale mandate from the government and the church for reconcilliation and peace across the country.

In 1994, Rwanda died. Could a country that experienced this tsunami of evil ever recover? Before I share my observations about the current state and possible future of this tiny little country that the world once forsaked, I encourage you to reflect and share your thoughts about this very dark time in our world's history....