MacCaulay
Banned
I heard a story once told by a French Legionary who was in Rwanda that his unit (I think it was a company of airborne infantry acting as advisors) wanted to go out and put a stop to the genocide once the balloon went up, but the UN wouldn't let them and the French government wouldn't override the UN. Afterwards the man walked through one of the killing fields, knee high in body parts and blood.
I can't blame him for following orders, but I really wish the unit had gone out and done the job anyway. It would've prevented one of the biggest tragedies of the 20th century.
The French were there for rather different reasons than the UN. Where Belgian, Ghanaian, Bangladeshi, and (small amounts of) Canadian soldiers were there under UNAMIR auspices as peacekeepers, the French were there as military advisors to one of the regimes in place.
That was one large reason the French weren't ever looked at as the anchor force: had the UN selected as it's main peacekeepers the same group that was arming and training one of the parties to the conflict then the Arusha Accords might as well have not been signed.
Also...Namaste, don't be douchey.