How could this have happened? There are many components to the answer. The populace had a long tradition of unquestioning obedience to authority, a helpful trait to develop in a brutally dictatorial nation. Hutu militants had for months before been distributing machetes to the Hutu populace. The government-controlled radio station (the main form of mass media in this marginally literate country) proclaimed that the intent of the invading Tutsi rebels was to kill every Hutu, and that one’s Tutsi neighbors were a fifth column preparing to join in. And there was another meaningful factor. The
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