Five Lesser Known Genocides

Published February 26, 2013
Updated September 12, 2019

Operation Searchlight Leads To 1.5 Million Dead In Bangladesh

When West Pakistan attempted to stomp out nationalistic sentiment in its Eastern counterpart, things did not go nearly as well as they’d hoped. Planning to be done in a month, West Pakistan launched Operation Searchlight in 1971 as a nation-wide occupation and silencing of political and military opponents in East Pakistan—now Bangladesh.

By the time the occupation was rolling into its third month, the Western Pakistani military had decided to take more extreme measures. The plan, according to a top general speaking to his soldiers, was to “Kill 3 million of them and the rest will eat out of our hands.” Instead, what they got was impassioned, continued resistance, as the occupation only served to embolden the independence movement.

Men and teenage boys were disproportionately targeted for slaughter, ironically because the Western Pakistani soldiers considered themselves too decent to kill women. Instead, they raped upwards of 200,000 female Bengali, with girls as young as thirteen reported forced into sex slavery.

In Dacca, male conscientious objectors were roped together in half-dozen groups and made to wade out into a river as riflemen picked them off from the pier. Hindus were particularly targeted as though their specific eradication would dilute what was seen as heavy Indian influence in the country.

Though Pakistan still to this day plays down the death toll to a paltry 26 thousand, most historians agree it was closer to 1.5 million. Bangladesh won its fight for independence later that year when India and the USSR came to their aid (guess who was funding West Pakistan). Like the Armenians and Circassians, they are still fighting for acknowledgement and reconciliation for a genocide unrecognized by the perpetrator.


Then, learn about the brutality of Belgium’s Leopold II and his genocide in Africa.

author
All That's Interesting
author
A New York-based publisher established in 2010, All That's Interesting brings together subject-level experts in history, true crime, and science to share stories that illuminate our world.
editor
John Kuroski
editor
John Kuroski is the editorial director of All That's Interesting. He graduated from New York University with a degree in history, earning a place in the Phi Alpha Theta honor society for history students. An editor at All That's Interesting since 2015, his areas of interest include modern history and true crime.