Dear FRONTLINE,

It is with grim compunction that I write in response to your program of January 26 on the shocking genocide in Rwanda.

That the United Nations gutlessly abandoned its responsibility is bad enough; that the United States did not hesitate to lavish its formidable resources on the rescue of some two hundred of its own from the melee while looking the other way in the face of the wanton slaughter of thousands is beyond reprehensible.

It has been my contention that fellatio and a fib fail to qualify as impeachable offenses on the part of our president, while launching missiles in an act of overt war against a sovereign nation just to create a smokescreen against publicity of the indiscretion, at least in my humble opinion, definitely is. The flagrant moral bankruptcy that president Clinton displayed in characterizing U.S. condonation of the violence in Rwanda, akin to Israelís implicit sanction of the massacres at Sabra and Shetila (sp?), as mere negligence, is inexcusable.

Slick Willie, smiling wife-object in tow, is indeed as slick as an Arkansas cesspool, and I am ashamed. I can only hope that Chelsea Clinton and her peers have intelligence and reason enough to determine which kinds of indiscretion are truly worthy of shame.

Doug McCarter
chico, ca

Dear FRONTLINE,

Thanks again for ruining my evening. After having a wonderful dinner and evening with my husband and two small children, I put them to bed and turned on FRONTLINE. My dinner turned to lead in my stomach and the frivolity with my family seemed absolutely undignified. Where was I during that period? Horrible to say, I was in the Air Force. Did I hear anything about this? No. My only hope now is to try to raise my children to be more aware than I, and have a great enough sense of compassion to speak out loudly. Unfortunately, it seems those are exactly the kind of people who stay OUT of politics....

Rebecca Gross
dixon, ca

Dear FRONTLINE,

I have just watched your Rwanda show and I'm angry!!

I understand that a Canadian General tried to arrange escape for a large portion of these poor refuges.All that was required was several hundred US flights,but the whole effort was dashed because your administration didn't want to get involved!!

I remember those days and it only took me 2 days to realise it was Genocide.

How can your country claim to be the world leader when you won't lead?

Paul Lakowski
vancouver, canada

Dear FRONTLINE,

Strange that none of the comments so far state the obvious: that THIS holocaust happened to blacks, while whites stood by and watched. Similar events are unfolding even now in Africa. 50,000 Eritreans have been deported from Ethiopia, and 2 million more are in fear of ethnic cleansing. Thousands are in concentration camps. Bet you didn't know about that. Now you know why...because everyone, except the Eritreans who are suffering, is in denial.

John Rude
salem, oregon

Dear FRONTLINE,

I can't remember watching a show that has made me as disgusted with American politics as I am now !! But, I feel that all the countries involved with that U.N. Council are responsible for the escalation to genocide. And while some may feel that President Clinton's apology was shallow I wonder how many other countries did the same.

Stephen Rutkowski
washington township, nj

Dear FRONTLINE,

I am an US Special Forces Soldier. I've served as a peace keeper several times. My specific unit stationed in Germany was slated to deploy to Rwanda in 94 during the disaster. I agree that it was a travisty that we were not employed due to politicl fear of failure. I have experienced simillar problems in Bosnia, Liberia, Ziare, Congo, and several other African countries. Your documentory was excellent. I strongly feel for the Belgian Forces. There are those of us that do believe a world power has a responsibility to prevent such humanitarian disasters and are willing to put our lives at risk to do so. In April of 96 Approx. 20 Navy Seals and 90 Green Berets stationed in Germany deployed to Liberia. During the fighting in Monrovia we secured the US embassy and evacuated over 2000 civillians. Of the 2000, 400 were Americans

Mark Grdovic
fayetteville, nc

Dear FRONTLINE,

Where did the Hutu extremists get the idea that they could get away with genocide? The answer is clear: in Bosnia. By 1993, when Rwandan genocide was being organized, Serbian extremists had demonstrated to the entire world that the promise of "never again" is hollow even in Europe, at NATO's doorstep. Clearly, Hutu extremists had no reason to worry that more would be done to stop a genocide in Rwanda, far from Western concerns.

Slaughter of innocents in Bosnia stopped only once the victims became strong enough to defend themselves. The same was true in Rwanda, where Tutsi rebels saved the surviving Tutsis. The UN did nothing for Rwanda's Tutsis, just like they did nothing for Bosnians of Srebrenica. Those whose fate is in the hands of reluctant bloated bureaucracies thousands of miles away are at grave risk. The lesson of this for small nations everywhere is that the only chance for survival is one's own army.

yorktown, va

Dear FRONTLINE,

As I watched the program on Rwanda and read some of the comments from fellow viewers I wonder what it takes to prevent something like this to happen in the first place let alone for it to take place again? My first thought is what did I do about this tragedy? My second thought is that we ALL must look in the mirror and ask that very question. There is alot of blame to go around with the UN and the US government front and center. Our President(and his shallow apology), the indifference of a insensitive bureaucracy, and a lack of leadership by the UN deserves all of our contempt. But what about me and you --- how do we absolve ourselves, where was I and where were you? Thank you to PBS for a truly moving and thought provoking piece of journalism -- I sleep not well tonight.

George Towle
verona, wi

Dear FRONTLINE,

I find your expose disturbing on two fronts. First, that our President was more worried about politics than about the lives of so many defensless people - especially women and children. Second, it's TOO LITTLE TOO LATE! I also question the timing for releasing this story. What's the point? Why didn't you attack President Clinton while it was happening? Is it because you people are just like him? Full of talk, but no action? Playing politics with right and wrong, and publishing what suits you and your political agendas? What do you hope to gain by revealing what Clinton is truly like now that he will complete his 2nd term in office? Why didn't you go public with this before his re-election? He lied to us about Rwanda in the same way he is lying to us now about his sexual trysts in the Oval Office! You people should be ashamed of yourselves! I will be surprised if you post this message in its entirety!

Ed Carmona
houston, tx

Dear FRONTLINE,

Your report was horrifying. As an officer in the U.S. Army, the most horrifying thing about it was the empathy I felt for the UNAMIR soldiers that were given orders not to intervene and then to abandon the Tutsis. As a military lawyer, I am only too aware that if U.S. soldiers had been in the place of the Belgians, the outcome would almost certainly have been the same under U.S. and international law. When you are in someone elses country, your authority to act is limited. Unless the President has ordered us to intervene, or delegated authority to do so to subordinate leaders, we too would have had to stand witness to genocide. The principle that the U.S. military is subordinate to our civilian political leaders requires this. 99% of the time, this is a good thing, but when the President puts elections above morality, it puts soldiers on the ground into a terrible moral dilemma: obey orders and watch innocents be murdered, or act in disobedience of orders and face punishment, including possible court-martial.

Jeff Arnold
fort leavenworth, ks

Dear FRONTLINE,

It seems to me that it is a plague on all of us, that we wait in indecision, concerned about our own image or political advantage, while evil over takes us. In the early 1940's Franklin Roosevelt may not have done all he could to prevent the slaughter in Nazi Germany. However, to his credit, he was involved in an all out military effort to defeat the forces of Nazi Germany. Our troops were fighting and dying to defeat the German army as quickly as possible. The U.N. and the U.S government, with full knowledge what had happened in Europe fifty years before, sat on their hands as it happened again in Ruwanda. This time we had the power to intervene and act. Unlike the our situation in World War II, we had the power to put troops on the ground effectively in short order. We were not opposed by a powerful modern army. In this instance we were defeated by our own lack of moral resolve. I am not sure that President Clinton's apology is enough. We failed to make real the motto, "Never again." Thank you for a very important show. All of us should be ashamed of our country's failure in this singular oportunity to stand up against evil. I wonder if we will do any better in the Balkans.

William S. Harris
arlington, texas

Dear FRONTLINE,

Your piece was brilliant, heartbreaking and enraging. A question you did not address is why the contemporaneous press reports did not inspire public outrage over our gonverment's failure to act. Was it because white Americans have difficult identifying with black Africans? Or because the government effectively blunted the force of the current press accounts? Or because political commentators were silent? With the avalanche of news we face every day, events even of this importance, power and magnitude can escape our serious attention unless the editorial writers and pundits repeatedly force us to pay attention. So while "Frontline" deserves our praise, our government's failure to act was in part a result of the failure of the press at the time to inspire public opinion to demand action before it was too late.

Jonathan Marks
brooklyn, ny

Dear FRONTLINE,

What good does it do to give my opinion? As I sit here watching this genocide. We could have at least stayed a saved the children. We will be judged by God for turning our backs on these people. Those who made these decisions to walk away will suffer the same fate of judgement as the Tutsis'. What a bunch of cowards they were (UN). We have obligations to lesser countries and nations. We are supposed to be superior and more powerful, to protect those who cannot protect themselves. We are pathetic. I include myself because I did not get up, organize a mercenary unit or something to go over and save those poor people. I am former military and former U.S. State Dept diplomat. I lived in Zimbabwe for 3 years. A few years before this happened. How mentally retarded we are.

WK hoffmann
cincinnati, oh

Dear FRONTLINE,

I wanted to congratulate PBS/Frontline on what was, without a doubt, one of the strongest pieces of TV journalism I've seen in some time. As an educator, I can't tell you how critical a program such as this is to "putting a face" on the nebulous issue of "human rights". I also cannot think of a more obvious case than this for exposing to students the hypocrisy of US Human Rts policy under the Clinton Admin. How does one explain the Administration's failure to act in Rwanda with their near unilateral decision to bomb Iraq? How does the Clinton Admin. explain its policy vis-a-vis China and/or Indonesia (re:East Timor) versus its policies towards Cuba? The answer is quite simple of course, Rwandans, East Timorese, and Cubans cannot afford powerful lobbies in Washington. If they have oil, as is the case of East Timor, it is controlled by the party committing the atrocities, and we have an "understanding" with them. As usual, concerns about human rights take a back seat to "strategic interests", i.e., the interests of multinational capital and realpolitik.

Michael Baum
providence, ri

Dear FRONTLINE,

The lesson for me is to stop the maiming in Sierra Leone, which involves the smae madness -- and low-level political country-- as Rwanda. I wrote the President asking what he'd now do -- given his apology about Rwanda.

Dan Brenner
washington, dc