Rape as a Continuing Weapon of Psychological Warfare, Suppression & Subjugation

“Beyond the daily gun battles, women have been a powerful voice in the opposition in villages and towns across Syria. In response, the Syrian government is punishing women for delivering humanitarian assistance, participating in protests, and supporting the opposition by subjecting them to detention, torture, and sexual assault.” – Liesl Gerntholtz, women’s rights director Rape and sexual abuse is not just a by-product of war but has been used as a deliberate warfare strategy from time to time. The opportunistic rape and pillage of previous centuries has been replaced by rape used as a strategic combat tool. Women and girls are particularly targeted by the use of sexual violence, including as a tactic of war to humiliate, dominate, instill fear in, disperse and/or forcibly relocate civilian members of a community or ethnic group. This paper examines historical and contemporary instances wherein sexual violence, specifically rape, was used as a strategic weapon of psychological warfare in various types of conflicts. It further analyzes the cogency of sexual violence as a weapon by considering its physical and psychological effects on victims and the morale of targeted populations. Additionally, it scrutinizes the motivations and intentions that support the use of sexual violence. The intent of this paper is to identify the use of rape from psychological perspective in socio-political spectrums of different types of conflicts. This paper thus offers multidimensional psycho-socio-political analysis of sexual violence in general and rape in particular as a major weapon of war.