Child Soldiers

            Sara Morales, who is in her early 20s, said she has been to hell and back.  She stated she was forcibly recruited by the main guerilla group in her county of Columbia.  "When I was only 11 years-old I was raped by FARC guerrillas and for 11 years I was abused and exploited by them," Morale said.  FARC stands for Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (a Spanish acronym).  FARC has been at war with the Columbian government for over fifty years.

                Some people are just insane.  I don’t understand why they would think it is smart to recruit children as soldiers.  The children will not be true followers, but followers out of fear.  Children are not meant to go to war.  By forcing children to go to war, you are ruining their generation and the future leaders.  You are not only hurting them, but you are also hurting your future when they are the leaders.  Children have no idea about anything when it comes to war.  They just don’t understand.

                Research has found about 18,000 children have been forced to join guerilla groups in the past four years.  Some were kidnapped, but most were lured in with promise of food and shelter.  According to Natalia Springer, about sixty-nine percent of the kids kidnapped were fourteen years old or younger.  The children are not doing normal jobs either.  They are being forced  to do the most dangerous jobs that the adult soldiers don’t want to do.  They were forced to plant land mines, transport explosives, and kidnap other children.

                In my opinion, and probably many, many others, it is definitely not okay to force children to be soldiers.  They don’t know what they are doing, and don’t know why they are doing it.  You are ruining  the future, and going through innocent lives like Americans go through gas.