Past humanitarian atrocities have gone unhindered

Once the horrors of the Nazi persecution of the Jews, homosexuals, gypsies, political enemies, and other minorities became clear, much of the world vowed to prevent such acts from happening again. Sadly, they have not lived up to that promise. Since then, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Iraq, Rwanda, Bosnia, and many other nations have suffered under genocidal regimes. No genocide has the same political causes or motivations, but that does not give the world a pass to watch on as they occur. In many of the cases of genocide since the Holocaust, Western powers knew they were occurring and either did nothing or did too little. Since the Rwandan genocide, many academics and critics of the response have suggested that a more aggressive intervention may have prevented, or at least lessened, the murder of hundreds of thousands of Rwandans.^[1] In the case of the Sbreninica massacre in Bosnia, UN officials were told that Serbian commander Ratko Mladić had surrounded the town. Considering the town was primarily Bosniaks, which had already suffered years of persecution by the Serbians, it was easy to guess what inaction would cost.^[2] Humanitarian interventions can be messy, but it guarantees that someone is standing up for the persecuted, at any cost. We cannot let the failures in the short history of intervention deter action against future atrocities.

[P1] Nations generally posture a desire to uphold human rights. [P2] Many atrocities have occurred without intervention. [C] Despite indicating a dedication to protecting human rights, the US and its allies have failed time and again to do so in practice.