Inspiring: Healing the War Machine News Stories
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For more than two decades, Theresa S. Betancourt has followed the lives of children (now adults) who returned home after being forced to fight in the civil war that ravaged Sierra Leone from 1991 to 2002. Thousands of children unwillingly participated in the violent conflict as soldiers, spies and laborers. Many took part in attacks on their own neighbors and relatives, many faced sexual violence, many witnessed unspeakable atrocities. Sahr ... was kidnapped as a toddler and spent four years with rebel fighters, returned to rejection and isolation. Then there is Isatu, age 12 when rebels attacked her village, capturing her and her sister. Isatu’s experience upon her return was much different. Initial support from her family and community, combined with her own motivation, led to more help from an extended network. “Isatu’s perseverance generated additional ripples of support, soon to become a self-fulfilling virtuous cycle,” Betancourt writes. Isatu is now a doctor. In her new book, Betancourt ... shares what she has learned about the factors that have helped some of these people recover and even thrive. Shadows into Light is both heart-wrenching and heartening. It tells the stories of the trauma these children faced, their reunion with family, their reintegration into their communities, and their ongoing struggles and healing. One research finding is the importance of family, community, and societal and cultural influences on a person’s trajectory - what psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner described as “social ecology.”
Note: About 160,000 former child soldiers and their families have been “reintegrated” into Nigerian society, according to estimates by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Explore more positive stories like this on healing the war machine.
Since their liberation from a dictatorship Dec. 8, Syrians have been in a cheering mood. People in the capital gave a hero’s welcome to a grassroots rescue organization widely seen as the country’s most selfless, trusted, and impartial group: the Syrian Civil Defense, otherwise known as The White Helmets. This band of some 3,000 unarmed and local volunteers, who wear white headgear, has saved more than 129,000 people during 13 years of civil war. They have rushed to bombed-out buildings to search for survivors – whether they be children, terrorists, or soldiers of the regime. After they served as first responders, they would then clear rubble, rebuild homes, and restore communities. Even though some 10% of them have been killed, the volunteers hold fast to their motto (a verse in the Quran): “Whoever saves one life, it is as if they have saved all of humanity.” Its leader, Raed Al Saleh, says the group’s neutrality and independence have been an important shield. “We existed before all these armed groups and we continue to exist based on the power of the people,” he told Berkeley News in October. Now The White Helmets wants to help Syrians “shake off the dust of war,” he said in a video on the social platform X. That effort includes their help in freeing political prisoners, clearing land mines, and preserving documents of the regime’s abuses. “The Syria of peace and civilization will return to you,” said Mr. Saleh.
Note: Check out our video on transforming the war machine, highlighting the stories of courageous individuals and groups who channel their skills into service and solidarity. Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive healing the war machine.
While praying for world peace and an end to national, ethnic, and religious conflicts is a good start, as Emmanuel Acho and Noa Tishby remind us in their recent book, Uncomfortable Conversations with a Jew, actions are more important than words. Getting involved with and supporting organizations that fight discrimination and promote peaceful dialogue can do more to change the world. The Carter Center in Atlanta is guided by the principles and its founders, Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter, and it has a commitment to human rights as well as preventing and resolving conflicts, enhancing freedom and democracy, and improving health. One of the ways, the Carter Center advances its mission is by observing elections (125 elections in 40 countries so far), and working in countries such as Ethiopia, South Sudan, Uganda, Haiti, and the Middle East. While The Carter Center is primarily focused outside the United States, during the recent polarized presidential election, it created a series of pro-democracy, sports-themed ads that were centered on the idea that we may not like the same teams, but we love the game and believe that everyone should adhere to its rules. The campaign sought to push the message of American unity into unexpected places where audiences might be more open to it, such as in Sports Illustrated, and professional baseball and football programs.
Note: Check out our video on transforming the war machine, highlighting the stories of courageous individuals and groups who channel their skills into service and solidarity. Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive healing the war machine.
They are both bereaved fathers, of young daughters. Somehow, against the odds, both have resisted the urge for vengeance. Rami Elhanan, an Israeli, and Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian, were once united by their anger and grief. Elhanan lost his 14-year-old daughter Smadar when she was killed in a Palestinian suicide bombing in Jerusalem in 1997. Aramin's daughter Abir was 10 when she was shot in the head and killed in 2007 by a bullet fired by an Israeli soldier as she stood outside her school with some classmates. Now they are close friends, refer to one another as "my brother" and share the belief that no amount of fighting between Israelis and Palestinians will lead to peace, just more killing in a "circle of blood." With Israel embroiled in a war with Hamas ... "We have the moral authority to tell people this is not the way," said Elhanan, 74, a former solider in the Israeli army whose father was an Auschwitz survivor. Elhanan has said he still struggles to explain his conversion to a "peace warrior." It coincided with a meeting of bereaved Israeli and Palestinian families he was invited to by Yitzhak Frankenthal, one of the co-founders of the Parents Circle. "I saw an amazing spectacle. Something completely new to me," Elhanan said. "I saw Arabs getting off the buses, bereaved Palestinian families: men, women and children, coming towards me, greeting me for peace, hugging me and crying with me. ... From that day on ... I got a reason to get out of bed in the morning." For Aramin, the journey to nonviolence began as he was being beaten by Israeli prison guards. One day ... he was stripped naked and beaten until he could hardly stand. "As I was being beaten, I remembered a movie I’d seen the year before about the Holocaust. At the time I’d been happy that Hitler had killed 6 million Jews," Aramin has previously recalled. "But some minutes into the movie, I found myself crying and feeling angry that the Jews were being herded into gas chambers without fighting back," he said. "It was the first time I felt empathy."
Note: War destroys, yet these powerful real-life stories show that we can heal, reimagine better alternatives, and plant the seeds of a global shift in consciousness to transform our world.
In a remote part of Maine shrouded by trees, 14- and 15-year-olds from the Middle East, Asia, Europe and the U.S, many of whom have long considered one another "the enemy," spend three weeks side-by-side united by one goal: to open their minds and their ears. At the Seeds of Peace camp, the teens eat, interact and engage in dialogue with people from countries some of them are banned from visiting. Seeds of Peace campers are identified by only their first names because, for some, the release of their full identity could put them in danger. Broken up into groups of about 15, campers aren't only asked to share their own narrative. It's also time spent listening and engaging in conversations with people whose opinions are often contrasting and even offensive. They're also placed together for a physical group challenge. Habeeba [a 22-year-old Egyptian] found herself paired with the Israeli, who in dialogue group was so vocal and resolute, she couldn't establish one piece of common ground. Blindfolded, she had a single choice: to depend on someone she couldn't trust or risk falling. As he guided her through each step of the course, she felt a shift in herself, finding an ability to care about a person she never imagined was possible. "He is just as human as me. He's also 14 or 15. I am him and he is me," she realized. "Up on the high ropes, I didn't care that he was Israeli; I cared that we wouldn't fall." What Seeds of Peace does have are the tools needed for these teenagers to break out of a world that wants to force people into one ideological box. "I connected it to the culture that seems to be growing in the United States in universities today of needing a safe space and being triggered very easily," Adaya [22-year-old Israeli] said. "If you're not able to engage someone that you disagree with, how are you going to grow? You have to challenge yourself from different directions in order to know that your opinion stands."
Note: War destroys, yet these powerful real-life stories show that we can heal, reimagine better alternatives, and plant the seeds of a global shift in consciousness to transform our world.
A former U.S. Special Forces officer and ordained Christian minister, [Dave Eubank] ... is a diehard humanitarian who has risked his life time and again to help the most vulnerable in a forsaken place that most Americans can’t find on a map. [He] started the Free Burma Rangers (FBR) in the late 1990s to provide medical care and aid to people resisting the Southeast Asian nation’s military junta, a brutal dictatorship that has crushed dissent and oppressed ethnic minorities for seven decades in what is the world’s longest-running civil war. Eubank [leads] an all-volunteer staff of ethnic minorities and foreigners — many of them ex-military, teachers, students, engineers, poets, and shopkeepers — working on the front line. On missions, the Rangers bring gifts and entertainment to brighten the lives of the children living in harm’s way. With his own wife and kids in tow, Eubank set FBR apart with a relentless commitment to go places other humanitarian groups would not. And that’s built FBR into a movement that fields teams and tracks human-rights abuses across Burma’s front lines and beyond, from northern Syria to Sudan. “You could be a murderer. You only have to say ‘I don’t think that’s the best behavior, and I’m trying not to do those things,’ and then you can join us,” [Eubank] says, adding that FBR includes atheists, agnostics, and spirit worshipers. Eubank insists that love is the force that drives him to take extreme risks, and also what makes FBR so effective. “[You will] run forward through the bullets, even if you don’t know the person you’re trying to save,” he says. “If I’m shot and I’m bleeding out on the trail and dying and I can’t see my wife and kids again — if I’m not doing that for love, what a disaster.”
Note: Check out their powerful work in action on their Youtube channel. The Free Burma Rangers are featured in our latest video on healing the war machine.
As war rages between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, it is hard to envision an end to the conflict. For decades, though, a growing movement of Palestinian and Israeli women has not only envisioned a peaceful coexistence, but also demanded it. Just three days before Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack, thousands of women from two peacebuilding groups gathered at Jerusalem’s Tolerance Monument. Israelis from Women Wage Peace carried blue flags, and Palestinians from Women of the Sun flew yellow ones. Members of the two groups traveled to the Dead Sea—believed since ancient times to have healing qualities—and set a table. Women from both sides pulled up chairs as a symbol of a good-faith resumption of negotiations to reach a political solution.“We, Palestinian and Israeli mothers, are determined to stop the vicious cycle of bloodshed,” reads the preamble to their campaign, the Mother’s Call. This campaign ... involved aligning around a single agenda that demands a political solution within a limited time frame. They set the table to show the importance of dialogue and women’s involvement in decision-making. Ensuring women’s participation isn’t about equity or fairness. It’s about winning the peace. A quantitative analysis of 156 peace agreements over time ... found that when women are decision-makers—serving as negotiators and mediators—the probability of an agreement lasting at least two years increased by 20 percent.
Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing the war machine.
Since the coup in Burma three years ago, over 3 million people have been displaced and thousands have been killed. Not only was there heavy fighting between resistance forces and the Burma Army, but the Burma military regularly attacked civilian populations. Local pro-democracy resistance groups, the Karenni National Defense Force (KNDF) and Karenni Army, asked us to provide medical support as they tried to push the Burma Army out of the town of Shadaw in Karenni State. We went to help treat any wounded from the battle. 33 Burma Army soldiers were brought out of the camp. We told them, “Don’t be afraid, we’re not going to hurt you. See, this is what the people of Burma have been facing these last three years. For the ethnic people it’s been over 70 years! The cause of the dictators is lost. Please give up on that idea, rooted in force, control, greed, and hate. We are not better than you. God has made us to love each other and help each other. We’ll take care of you, but we first have to survive this attack together.“ As the jetfighters came in, screaming over us and releasing their bombs just over our heads, I gathered the couple to me with both of my arms and shielded them with my body the best I could. Our team followed my example, shielding their former enemies with their own bodies. One of the wounded had lost a lot of blood so one of Rangers, named Barnya, volunteered to give his blood to the Burma Army soldier. He lay down and looked straight at his former enemy as he gave the blood. The medics ... administered the transfusion, saving the soldier’s life. This was blood given for the enemy out of love, not spilled by the enemy in hate.
Note: Don't miss the powerful pictures of those providing medical care in the jungle to victims of this conflict at the link above. This article was written by the director of Free Ranger Burma and former US Army Special Forces officer David Eubank. Free Burma Rangers is a humanitarian service movement for oppressed ethnic minorities of all races and religions in the Burma, Iraq, Kurdistan, Syria and Sudan war zones. Explore more positive stories like this on healing the war machine.
By the early 1990s, extremist Hutu propaganda had started to spread in newspapers and on the radio, radicalizing Rwandans. Over the course of just 100 days [in 1994], about 800,000 Rwandans, primarily Tutsi, were killed. On April 22, 1994, [Hussein] Longolongo recounted, he and an armed group of men entered a chapel where dozens of Tutsi were hiding. “We killed about 70 people,” he said. “I was brainwashed.” Eventually, more than 120,000 Hutu were arrested on charges of participating in the genocide. In prison, [Longolongo] was forced to take part in a government-sanctioned reeducation program. He initially dismissed much of what he heard. “But as time went on, I became convinced that what I did was not right,” he told me. Longolongo also participated in more than 100 of what were known as gacaca trials. Gacaca—which roughly translates to “justice on the grass”—had historically been used in Rwandan villages and communities to settle interpersonal and intercommunal conflicts. Now the government transformed the role of the gacaca court to handle allegations of genocide. Many survivors were initially reluctant. “They would say, ‘How can you forgive those people?’” [Albert] Rutikanga told them that these conversations weren’t something they should do for the perpetrators. “Forgiveness is a choice of healing yourself,” he would say. “You cannot keep the anger and bitterness inside, because it will destroy you.”
Note: Read how a Rwandan woman forgave the man who killed her husband during the 1994 genocide and allowed his daughter to marry her son. Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division.
Each link of that paper trail carries a handwritten message of love and kindness. These 360,000 chain links were created with used paper — homework assignments, old tests, artwork, paper bags, cereal boxes — by students from schools in all 50 U.S. states and on all continents. You get the gist of this colossal undertaking by Kids for Peace, a global nonprofit based in Carlsbad. Instead of stretching the paper chain from Carlsbad’s Pacific Rim Elementary School to Westfield UTC, however, they arranged the strands into a giant heart on the football field. This paper chain project, more than 18 months in the making, came to fruition on Nov. 13, World Kindness Day. “It was started because of the pandemic,” explains Jill McManigal ... who co-founded and heads Kids for Peace. Students, isolated for months at home, needed to find ways to connect and to remain optimistic during this uncertain time, she says. “By doing this paper chain, they were symbolically connected.” The recycled paper “love links” were written in several languages, including Chinese, Farsi, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, Swahili and Tagalog. One message read “love” in Braille. Messages sent from other states and from abroad were stapled and assembled into chains by local student volunteers. Among thoughts shared were: “You’re loved,” “Kindness matters,” “Have faith,” Care for each other,” “Have a good day,” “All we need is hope,” “Stay Strong!,” “Be the source of someone’s joy” and “Learn to dance in the rain.”
Note: Don't miss the pictures of this incredible event at the link above. Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division.
Duberney López Martinéz was only 13 when he joined the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in 2003. Today, Duberney, 33, lives with his wife and young son after spending more than a decade fighting in the FARC 32nd Front and two years in jail. As part of his reintegration into society ... Duberney got involved in the ecological restoration of the Colombian Amazon. He and another 23 ex-FARC members are promoting the ecological restoration of the Colombian Amazon. The Communitarian Multiactive Cooperative of the Common (Comuccom) ... aims to plant and care for 1 million native trees in order to counteract deforestation from illegal gold mining, cattle ranching, coca-growing and illegal logging. Despite the peace agreement, the conflict is still present in daily lives and memories, according to Kristina Lyons, professor of anthropology ... who has been working in the region. “In Putumayo, armed conflict and antidrug policies heavily impacted bonds among people, communities and their relations with the region’s ecosystems,” Lyons [said]. “The ecological restoration of the Amazon has deep significance for healing relations between humans ruptured by the conflict and among people and their territories. It can be understood as a form of reparation for war crimes and other kinds of violence in the wake of the peace agreements.” “To me, restoring the Amazon is the same process needed for healing the heart of a person,” [said Aroca Sanchez with Comuccom].
Note: Read how tourists in Colombia can now take jungle hikes with ex-FARC guerilla guides. Explore more positive stories like this about healing the war machine.
At the Battle of the Little Bighorn, 146 years ago, my ancestors defeated the US army’s Seventh Cavalry led by George Armstrong Custer, who had previously massacred Cheyenne people. I want to share with you the story of how my people and my family survived through generations – despite many attempts to exterminate us. We are peace chiefs – we never provoke war, our main role is to steward our people and way of life. My father’s grandmother, Quill Dress Woman ... witnessed Cheyenne matriarchs push sewing awls into Custer’s ears so that next lifetime he would listen. They did this because after the Washita massacre in 1868, where Custer had attacked a peaceful Cheyenne camp resulting in the killing of many women and children, our Cheyenne chiefs still made peace with him in a sacred pipe ceremony. The Creator wants us to love each other. Looking at the wars, mass shootings and genocides happening around the world right now, and reading about what has been done to my people above, you might ask: how can people do this to each other? In 1946, Albert Einstein made a call to “let the people know that a new type of thinking is essential if mankind is to survive and move to higher levels”. We will never end war and genocide unless we change the mindset that created it. War cannot defeat war, only love can stop war. My love and my forgiveness do not depend on you. I want to forgive you for what you have done to my people, the genocide and the eradication process. This might be our last chance to put an end to this genocidal and suicidal mindset. I love you, and there is nothing you can do about it.
Note: This article was written by Heove ve 'keso (Yellowbird), Chief Phillip Whiteman Jr, traditional Northern Cheyenne Chief. He is part of an organization, Yellowbird Lifeways, that organizes a run in which Cheyenne children follow the footsteps of their ancestors. During this event, they run 400 miles across four states, enduring the harsh conditions of winter. Explore more positive stories like this about healing the war machine.
Latin America is the world’s most dangerous region due to cartel and gang violence. It has 9% of the global population but one-third of the world’s homicides. Kidnapping and extortion are on the rise. The trend is driving a turn toward increasingly militarized solutions. El Salvador, for example, has incarcerated some 75,000 people – nearly 2% of its population – in recent years on suspicion of being involved in gangs. In Colombia, by contrast, exchanging the threat of arrest for dialogue is a key part of the government’s painstaking strategy of negotiating peace simultaneously with some 20 armed factions to end 60 years of conflict. That process, known as Paz Total (“total peace”) and launched less than two years ago by President Gustavo Petro, has been marked by reversals and unintended effects. But a key distinction lies in its emphasis on both empathy and the rule of law. The strategy’s first example of “restorative incarceration,” launched earlier this month, shows how. In exchange for admitting guilt for violent acts and seeking forgiveness from victims and the families, 48 military and former guerrilla leaders are now serving “sentences” by planting trees and helping heal the communities they once dominated through fear. “We’re going to sow life to try to make amends and build peace,” [said] Henry Torres, a former army general. As Colombia’s new attorney general put it, “our mission will be ... a mission for the dignity and well-being of our people.” Peace requires patience, said Juan Manuel Santos, a former president who negotiated a 2016 peace accord with Colombia’s main guerrilla faction that still serves as a template for Mr. Petro’s broader peace plan. “You need to convince, to persuade, to change people’s sentiments, to teach them how to forgive, how to reconcile,” he told The Harvard Gazette.
Note: A prison in Brazil with low recidivism rates uses a humane approach, where there are no armed guards and inmates have the keys to their own cells. Explore more positive stories like this about repairing criminal justice.
This year’s winner of the Templeton Prize, which highlights discoveries that yield "new insights about religion" ... was given to Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, a South African scholar who has explored ways to nurture deep empathy between victims and perpetrators of conflict. Her particular focus is on the power of forgiveness to expunge hatred and historical harms. Such an approach is now widely acknowledged as essential because of wars – from Ukraine and Gaza to Myanmar and Sudan – that have resulted in extensive harm to innocent civilians. Serving on South Africa’s post-apartheid Truth and Reconciliation Commission in the 1990s, Dr. Gobodo-Madikizela gained insights into both the needs of those who suffered under decades of apartheid and the motivations of those who upheld racial separation through violence. Her life work, she said following the award announcement Tuesday, involves understanding “the conditions necessary to restore the values of what it means to be human.” “There’s no better time to shove away prejudices, pull up a chair with a supporter of that party you can’t stand, and talk with them about how we can work together for a brighter future,” wrote Ian Siebörger, a senior lecturer of linguistics at Rhodes University. Dr. Gobodo-Madikizela offers ways to avoid “the passing on of grievance and a sense of victimhood from one generation to the next.” The “reparative quest,” she told Time magazine this week, is “a constant journey to repair and to heal” through atonement and forgiveness. It is not a singular moment. Victims and perpetrators move each other beyond the boundaries of their own experiences.
Note: To explore more stories of forgiveness and healing in the face of atrocities, check out our powerful interview with Marina Cantacuzino, journalist and founder of The Forgiveness Project. Explore more positive stories like this about healing the war machine.
Abba Gana was only 10 years old when Boko Haram insurgents attacked his village in northern Nigeria in 2014. Along with the other boys his age, he was kidnapped. By the time he was 15, Mr. Gana had joined the ranks of the group’s fighters, carrying out raids like the one on his own village. “Growing up with them, I thought I was fighting for a greater cause,” he says of his time with the group, whose goal is to create a fundamentalist Islamic state. In 2022, he heard a government radio program urging Boko Haram members to surrender. “They said ... that we are welcome back [to our communities] if we repent,” he recalls. For the first time, Mr. Gana says, he allowed himself to imagine that he might be able to go home. Today, some 160,000 former fighters and their families have been “reintegrated” into Nigerian society, according to estimates by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). The experiences of former child soldiers ... point to how complex those efforts can be. Many have struggled to find a place for themselves. But their supporters say it isn’t impossible. “Kindness always pays,” says Bulama Maina Audu, whose nephew was abducted by Boko Haram in 2014, and who now works with a group helping former child soldiers return home. “The fears and concerns of the communities they are returning to are completely legitimate, but they can only be addressed through dialogue,” says Oliver Stolpe, UNODC country representative for Nigeria.
Note: Explore more positive stories like this about healing the war machine.
In Sudan ... civilians have endured 16 months of a violent civil war. Last week, talks to end the war began in Switzerland, but only one of the two warring factions showed up. By the weekend, however, each side had taken a critical step. The armed group attending the talks agreed to enable the delivery of emergency aid to parts of the East African country where hundreds of thousands of people are at risk of starvation. About the same time, and seemingly independently, the other faction opened a vital border crossing for the same purpose. The mutual acknowledgment of the need to protect innocent life may have opened a door to solving one of the world’s gravest crises. “These constructive decisions by both parties will enable the entry of aid needed to stop the famine, address food insecurity and respond to immense humanitarian needs,” international mediators in Geneva said in a joint statement. Recent trends in conflict resolution, the International Committee of the Red Cross noted, have shown that protecting innocent civilians from harm “can have an impact on the success of peace negotiations and agreements, as well as on the chances for post-conflict reconciliation.” Humanitarian gestures, the ICRC observed, helped the Colombian government build trust with guerrilla factions and strengthen compliance with a 2016 peace accord. More recently, two armed groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo signed a mutual pledge in March to respect and protect civilians caught in the vast African country’s fragmented wars.
Note: Explore more positive stories like this about healing the war machine.
Not long after Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Oksana Sokhan found herself in an evacuation minibus, wedged between two stricken soldiers in the dark, as the vehicle tried to safely get away from the front line. She began singing Ukrainian lullabies to the wounded fighters, and stroking them as a mother would. Their anxiety eased. If she stopped the soothing singing for a moment, she saw their anxiety surge again. “I was surprised myself that it worked – surely it worked on a subconscious level for both of them,” recalls the nurse. Ms. Sokhan still laughs about that moment of serendipitous support with the lullabies in the minibus, and about how – after they had all arrived safely at the hospital – a nurse came out to report that one of the men was convinced his mother had been with him during the evacuation. Ms. Sokhan may be just one senior nurse, but she is emblematic of the legions of Ukrainian military medics devoted to preserving the lives of the country’s outnumbered forces. For years a member of the 128th Separate Transcarpathian Mountain Assault Brigade, she has seen a whirlwind of casualties at different points along the front line since Russia’s all-out invasion. “We want to save everyone,” she says. “Of course, it’s very important to see the results of your work, because when they come here” the soldiers are traumatized, in pain, “and when they leave ... they are already waving sometimes.”
Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing the war machine.
Between 136.5 and 148.5 million people became casualties of war in the 20th century alone. The economics are equally staggering. For instance, U.S. spending on the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan could top $4 trillion. Despite the exorbitant human and financial costs, the vast majority of governments consider defense spending to be a necessity. A few renegade countries have opted to shed their militaries, however. The first country is the most recent one on our list to get rid of its armed forces. After Jean-Bertrand Aristide was elected president [of Haiti] on Dec. 16, 1990, his government was overrun by a military coup. Aristide ... moved quickly to disband Haiti's armed forces before they could pose any further problems. What prompted Costa Rica to eliminate its armed forces? In 1948, after an unusual period of political upheaval ... the new government drafted a constitution that not only guaranteed free and open elections but also abolished the country's armed forces. The island nation of Mauritius is home to more than a million people and one of the strongest economies in Africa. What you won't find, however, are regular military forces. Thanks to the deep distrust Panamanians held for the military, the government adopted a constitutional amendment disbanding the military in 1994. In 1986, Micronesia entered into a Compact of Free Association with the United States.
Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing the war machine.
The Afghanistan Memory Home is a growing online archive of testimonies of endurance by ordinary Afghans during years of conflict and repressive rule under the Taliban. The virtual museum is an example of the kind of community-led initiatives that Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has described as “healing spaces” – local sites of nation-building where the traumas and resentments of war are salved through traditional forms of civic engagement based on cultural values, spirituality, and listening. These projects in reconciliation quietly persist almost everywhere people seek freedom from conflict or repression, from Afghanistan to Yemen. They often supplant the work of national transitional justice initiatives stalled by political disagreements or lack of cooperation. They also underscore that “justice isn’t just punishment or prosecution and presenting evidence against perpetrators,” said Ruben Carranza, an expert on post-conflict community healing. In South Sudan, for instance, a local peace and reconciliation process called Wunlit gave grassroots strength to a 2018 national peace agreement. Led by tribal chiefs and spiritual leaders, the “peace to peace” dialogue defused cattle raids and abductions between the Nuer and Dinka communities. In Iraq, the Ministry of Human Rights has relied on tribal, religious, and civil society leaders to help forge local support for a national dialogue on reconciliation. History has “taught us that relying solely on military force will not bring about lasting peace and stability,” Hodan Ali, a Somali presidential policy adviser, wrote. The more durable work of peace involves empowering individuals and communities to tell their own stories – and listen to each other.
Note: Explore more positive stories about healing the war machine.
Mohamedou Ould Slahi and Steve Wood met in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in 2004. At the time, Slahi had been in captivity for two years, accused of acts of terrorism. Wood, then a member of the National Guard, was assigned to watch the Mauritania native. For nine months, they spent their days together. After more than a decade, the two saw each other once again this spring, when Wood traveled to Slahi's home in Mauritania to see his old friend. The two became fast friends. They bonded over the movie The Big Lebowski. Slahi related to the main character, "The Dude," a victim of mistaken identity. The U.S. government detained Slahi in Guantanamo for 14 years, but never charged him with an offense. In 2010, a federal judge ruled that Mohamedou should be released from Guantanamo. Wood reached out to Slahi's legal team, telling them that he'd like to help in any way he could. He wrote a letter supporting Slahi's release. While Slahi was still in prison, his 2015 memoir, Guantanamo Diary, became a bestseller. The next year, the Department of Defense finally allowed Slahi to return to his home. Wood ... flew there in May to see the man he once guarded. "We never believed in this war," Slahi said. "There is no war between Muslims and Americans. There is no war between Americans and the poor people in the world. There is only a war between people on the top who have their own agenda. People are people no matter what ... When we die it doesn't matter what passport we hold."
Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.
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