FRONTLINE/WORLD . About . Episode Guide . Episode 402 . Transcript

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ANNOUNCER: Tonight on FRONTLINE/World, two Stories From a Small Planet.

In Lebanon, the last three months have seen an assassination, massive protests, and the departure of Syrian troops after 30 years of occupation.

DEMONSTRATOR: United we stand! United we stand!

ANNOUNCER: Reporter Kate Seelye looks at the chance for democratic change in Lebanon and at the political fallout in Syria.

And in Liberia, a country in ruins after 14 years of civil war. Disarming 100,000 rebel soldiers is a hazardous mission even for a veteran U.N. peacekeeper.

DANIEL OPANDE, Force Commander, UNMIL: Are you going to hand in your weapons?

FORMER SOLDIERS: No!

Lebanon: The Earthquake

Reported by: Kate Seelye

KATE SEELYE, Reporter: [voice-over] Beirut has come back to life after a long civil war. It's reclaiming its former reputation as the Riviera of the Middle East. I've lived here for the past five years. I grew up in the Arab world, where my father served as an American diplomat. Now I work here as a journalist.

Last February, I was writing in my office when I heard an explosion.

[on camera] I ran out on my balcony here to see what had happened, and I saw this enormous plume of black smoke.

[voice-over] The explosion was a political assassination. A bomb had killed 20 people, including Lebanon's best known politician.

There was an incredible outpouring of grief. Tens of thousands of people attended the funeral of the former prime minister, Rafik Hariri. He was a billionaire businessman, a Sunni Muslim, much loved for rebuilding a war-torn Beirut. His supporters immediately blamed the killing on Lebanon's neighbor, Syria.

Lebanese of all faiths came to mourn at his gravesite in Martyrs' Square. It was a rare moment of unity in a country still divided along religious lines.

1st WOMAN MOURNER: He was a national hero. This is a turning point in history. And I think that he was the catalyst for this change.

2nd WOMAN MOURNER: They wanted to kill Hariri because he represented strong Lebanon, international Lebanon, but I think the unity you see now, which is always here every day, is in mosque prayers and the church bells.

KATE SEELYE: I had never seen such a powerful expression of Lebanese solidarity.

DEMONSTRATOR: United we stand! United we stand!

MARWAN HAMADE, Member of Parliament: This is one hour before Prime Minister Hariri was killed. We were in parliament debating the electoral law. This is his sister, Bahiya. This is the last time we saw him. And see how joyful he was?

KATE SEELYE: Marwan Hamade is a member of parliament and was a close political ally of Rafik Hariri's. Last fall, Hamade criticized Syrian interference in Lebanese politics. Shortly after, he, too, was the target of a car bombing and badly injured.

[on camera] They meant to kill you.

MARWAN HAMADE: Of course they meant to kill me.

KATE SEELYE: It's a miracle you're alive.

MARWAN HAMADE: They killed somebody who was 10 centimeters from me. And the message was clear. It was addressed to the opposition in Lebanon by -- and I can say it, I say it freely -- by the group which controlled and still controls the power system here and which is made of Lebanese and Syrian intelligence officers who have taken over all the power here.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] For decades, Syria's ruling Assad family pulled the political strings in Lebanon. Last summer, President Bashar al Assad demanded that his man in Beirut, President Emile Lahoud, remain in office beyond his term limit. Assad ordered Prime Minister Hariri to make it happen.

[on camera] Hariri was summoned to Damascus by Bashar Al Assad in late August.

MARWAN HAMADE: Yes.

KATE SEELYE: It seems that was a very critical meeting. Tell me what Hariri told you about it.

MARWAN HAMADE: We were sitting at the house when Prime Minister Hariri arrived directly from Damascus, and he told us, "The Syrian president told me ŒI will break the country over your head if you oppose me.' "

KATE SEELYE: A direct threat to Mr. Hariri?

MARWAN HAMADE: A direct threat.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] At first, Hariri felt he had no option. He did what he was told. But was disgusted by Syria's heavy-handed manipulation. A month later, he resigned and began to form an opposition.

And then he was assassinated in broad daylight on Beirut's Waterfront Boulevard. The bombing became known as "the earthquake," an event that would fundamentally change Lebanon. The U.N. sent a team to investigate. They issued a blistering report, concluding that Syria had created the political climate for the killing and that Lebanese officials had tampered with evidence at the crime scene.

Syria's allies in the Lebanese government were on the defensive. I went to a press conference where the justice minister tried to rebut the U.N. charges.

[on camera] The report accuses you of hiding evidence. The report accuses you of tampering with the scene of the crime. It says you brought parts of a truck, put them in a crater and then photographed the truck. How do you respond to these charges? Are they true? If they are, will you consider resigning?

JUSTICE MINISTER: [subtitles] If you want to hear falsehoods like that -- there were no car parts in the crater. Quite the contrary. The evidence is there.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] The justice minister gave his explanation, but the Lebanese had stopped listening. They no longer believed their Syrian-backed government. Anti-Syrian graffiti began to appear on the streets of Beirut. President Assad was a particular target. ["Kill the lion"] His name in Arabic means "lion." Every night, young people began to gather in Martyrs' Square in memory of Hariri, demanding that Syria withdraw its 14,000 troops from Lebanon.

YOUNG MAN: What about the people they killed before Hariri? Let's forget about them.

YOUNG WOMAN: Syria killed Lebanese.

YOUNG MAN: Before Hariri, there's a lot of presidents, they killed them. Come on, give us some freedom, you know, because we don't care if they will kill us, all of us, here. We don't care about that. Sooner or later, we're going to have our independence.

KATE SEELYE: Young people camped out every night, declaring they wouldn't leave until the Syrians were gone.

YOUNG WOMAN: Sorry for my voice, but I've been shouting for 21 days, so -- I think that I should do something for Lebanon, for my country that I love, for my future, for my sons and daughters.

KATE SEELYE: Syrian troops came to Lebanon as peacekeepers during the civil war, but they overstayed their welcome. [graffiti: "Syria out. We hate you!"] During their 30-year occupation, Syria siphoned off billions from the Lebanese economy. Analyst Joe Faddoul wrote a report for the French government about Syrian racketeering.

[www.pbs.org: Read the reporter's dispatches]

JOE FADDOUL: The Syrian intelligence agencies used to occupy part of the port. There was a zone where the Lebanese wouldn't have the right to go. So there was at least part of the incoming goods in the port not paying the custom duties, and instead paying part of it to the Syrian intelligence installed at the port.

KATE SEELYE: Faddoul told me how Syria ripped off Lebanon's phone company, the gas business, even the casino.

JOE FADDOUL: At the end of each night, at 2:00 or 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning, the slot machines are emptied by members of the -- both local and Syrian intelligence agencies.

KATE SEELYE: [on camera] So the idea that comes to mind as you tell these stories is of a house that keeps being robbed every night.

JOE FADDOUL:: Every night and every day, not only every night. The only name I can have is a cash cow. Lebanon was a cash cow for -- not for Syria, for the Syrian establishment, the Syrian ruling class.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] The pressure was building on Syria to withdraw from Lebanon. The U.N. Security Council was demanding it. Even the Americans and the French had joined forces. Everyone wanted Syria out.

I'd heard that Syria's president was about to make a major announcement. Protesters gathered in Martyrs' Square, wondering what would happen. To their astonishment, Assad pledged that Syrian troops would begin leaving in compliance with U.N. resolution 1559.

But then Syria's allies took to the streets. The armed Islamist group Hezbollah called out its followers. It was an intimidating show of support for Syria, raising fears that the streets might turn violent. A half million people came, mostly Shi'ite Muslims.

But despite the anti-American rhetoric, the protest was peaceful. Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah was more moderate than usual. And as I filmed the march, I noticed that even Hezbollah was now flying the Lebanese flag.

No one could have predicted what happened next. The opposition responded with an even larger demonstration, the largest Lebanon had ever seen. A million people massed in Martyrs' Square, one quarter of the entire country. And they wanted the Syrians out now.

Syrian troops did begin to pullback toward Lebanon's Bekaa valley, closer to the Syrian border. But there was still apprehension, a fear that Syria might try to wreck Lebanon on its way out. Sure enough, a series of car bombs hit the Beirut area.

[on camera] [subtitles] Is there any danger?

YOUNG MAN: There's an explosion. There's been an explosion. There are lots of -- there's a huge depot where they have all the fuel, liquid fuel.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] I was shaken by the damage. A car bomb had set a factory district ablaze, wounding several workers. The bombs that went off over the next two weeks -- all in Christian neighborhoods -- provoked fear that Lebanon might descend back into sectarian violence. In this neighborhood, everyone blamed the bombings on the Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services.

Could the Syrians really be trusted to leave? I headed east over the mountains into the Bekaa valley to see if the Syrians were indeed withdrawing. And there they were, packing up their military outposts, loading tanks on trucks and heading home.

[on camera, to farmers] [subtitles] Are you happy?

FARMER: [subtitles] How can I not be happy.

KATE SEELYE: [subtitles] How long were the Syrians here?

FARMER: [subtitles] For 30 years. And 30 years of imposing on our freedoms. Now we're coming outside and seeing the fresh air.

KATE SEELYE: [subtitles] You're tasting freedom?

FARMER: [subtitles] Yes, freedom.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] As I pressed on toward the Syrian border, I passed a steady stream of retreating trucks and soldiers.

I wanted to see what all this would mean for Syria. It's just over a two-hour drive between Beirut and Damascus. Lebanon was once part of Syria, and many Syrian nationalists still regard Lebanon as theirs.

For me, arriving in Damascus always feels like a kind of homecoming. I spent several years here as a teenager while my father was posted at the American embassy. Damascus is a city of two million people. Walking around, I couldn't escape the images of the ruling family. For the past 35 years, the Assads have governed Syria with an iron fist -- first the father, Hafez, who died in 2000, then his Western-educated son, Bashar. When he came to power, Bashar promised reforms but never really delivered. There's talk in Washington that Syria should be a target for regime change.

But as I walked through the old city and its ancient marketplace, the souk, I was surprised to find how calm it was. You'd never know there was turmoil next door in Lebanon.

Damascus is one of the world's oldest cities. Whenever I'm here, I feel suspended in time. At the heart of the city is the Umayyad mosque. Once a Roman temple, then a church, the mosque is home to the tomb of St. John the Baptist.

I noticed all over the souk new posters saying "Bashar, we're all with you."

[on camera] [subtitles] What are the reasons for the posters?

SHOPKEEPER [subtitles] We love president Bashar al Assad. We're a people who love Syria. We love our president. Here in Syria, there is no opposition. There is nobody against the president or the party.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] I heard that kind of praise for Bashar from a lot of shopkeepers, but Syria is a police state and many people are afraid to speak openly. The Syrian government is defensive about the lack of freedoms here, not to mention the charges that they killed Rafik Hariri.

BUTHEINA SHABAAN, Syrian Government Minister: Those who arranged the killing of Hariri were planning things against Syria and against Lebanon. It would be a political suicide for anybody in Syria to think of doing that. Syria is as interested as everybody in the world to find the truth of who killed Hariri because it is in our interest to find the real perpetrator of that terrorist crime.

KATE SEELYE: Shabaan also says the Bush administration misunderstands the Syrian president.

BUTHEINA SHABAAN: How could they talk about Bashar al Assad without talking to him? I think they should talk to him and know who he is before talking about him.

KATE SEELYE: [on camera] Why is he being compared to Saddam Hussein, then?

BUTHEINA SHABAAN: Absolutely stupid comparison. Excuse me. Very stupid. None in Syria would compare, none in the world would compare Bashar al Assad to Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein was a criminal against his own people and against Syrian people. So the comparison shows absolute lack of knowledge, and that's one of the big problems of the U.S. policy in the Middle East.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] Unlike Saddam Hussein, Bashar al Assad is not guilty of mass murders or developing nuclear weapons. But Syria's Ba'ath Party rules under a state of emergency. There are many political prisoners, and the state-controlled economy is in trouble.

I went to see one of the country's few outspoken dissidents. Ammar Abdel Hamid is a blogger and runs an organization that defends minority rights.

AMMAR ABDEL HAMID, Human Rights Activist: Frankly, after five years, we just have to see the obvious and admit the obvious. This regime is not -- has not been good for this country anymore. You know, it's time for them to go. What I want is an orchestrated collapse, not necessarily the kind of sort of catastrophic collapse as a result of, you know, some kind of an invasion.

KATE SEELYE: Abdel Hamid says he welcomes U.S. pressure on Syria to reform and democratize but opposes U.S. military intervention.

AMMAR ABDEL HAMID: I don't want to see insurgents and I don't want to see the destruction of the infrastructure. And I don't want to see Abu Ghraibs happening here in Syria. What I want to see is a peaceful change in this country, a long overdue change. And despite my vehement criticism of this regime, I still hope that they will be able to understand that the reason for this criticism is my desire to really see -- to avoid having to see an Iraqi-style scenario unfolding in Syria.

KATE SEELYE: The war in Iraq is on Syria's doorstep. It's the source of tension between the U.S. and Syria. I set off for the Iraq border to see what was happening there. It's a six-and-a-half-hour drive through the Syrian desert. The only break in the journey is the oasis of Palmyra. Wandering through these Roman ruins, I thought of all the armies that for centuries have marched across this desert.

That afternoon, I finally reached the Syrian border. It's tense here. The Abu Kamal crossing has been closed for several months. At first, the Syrian border guards wouldn't let us film, but we kept our camera rolling. After a while, they led us behind their offices, and there in front of us was a U.S. Marine base. Camp Gannon, where several hundred Marines are stationed, is an outpost in one of the most troubled provinces in Iraq.

The U.S. government accuses the Syrians of not doing enough to stop Arab fighters from crossing this border. Recently, under pressure from the U.S., the Syrians have reinforced a sand wall along the 600-mile border. And beyond that, I could see that the Americans had built an even larger barrier.

[on camera] The Syrians say that the Americans have been coming under almost nightly mortar attack from the Iraqi resistance, and they've told us that it's not safe for us to be here beyond dark.

[voice-over] In fact, just after we left, insurgents tried to overrun the base. In response, the U.S. launched a major offensive, killing a hundred fighters.

I wanted to learn more about the Arab fighters who Washington says are slipping across the Syrian border. In the seedy frontier town of al Hiri, down the dusty back streets, I found a tribal leader who'd fought in Iraq, Sheikh Rutha Baruth Dulaimi.

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] You are my guest. You are welcome, even if you are American.

KATE SEELYE: [on camera] [subtitles] What's the cloth with the red and blue colors?

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] Give me five. You got me straight away! Look here. It's American.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] The sheikh explained to me that he put it there to signal to American planes that he's not an enemy.

[on camera] [subtitles] Do planes fly above your house?

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] Yeah, they circled around and left.

KATE SEELYE: [subtitles] Do they bomb you?

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] No, no. They don't bomb us. It's only for show, as if to say, "Watch out, we're coming for you."

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] He was evasive about his time in Iraq but not about his sympathies.

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] I wish I was there during the bombing with the people who were bombed so that people would say Sheikh Dulaimi was a martyr.

KATE SEELYE: I asked Dulaimi and his sons if fighters were still crossing over to Iraq.

SON: [subtitles] The borders are closed. No one is allowed to cross over. Let the Iraqis fight by themselves.

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] Assad, of course, is the boss, and whatever he says, we agree.

KATE SEELYE: It seems like a new line has come down from Damascus, and people like Dulaimi have gotten the message.

SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] That's a political question. I can't speak about politics. He prevented us citizens from crossing, so we don't cross.

KATE SEELYE: [on camera] [subtitles] People support the president?

SON OF SHEIKH RUTHA BARUTH DULAIMI: [subtitles] Everyone supports the president.

DULAIMI AND SONS: [chanting] [subtitles] With our blood, with our soul, we'll give our all for Bashar.

CHILDREN: [subtitles] With our blood, with our soul, we'll give our all for Bashar!

KATE SEELYE: Back in Damascus, I wondered how secure Bashar al Assad's hold on power really is. I went to see an old family friend, Mohammed Aziz Shukri, who's been an adviser to the government.

MOHAMMED AZIZ SHUKRI, Professor, International Relations: We are fighting against time, and we cannot sleep while others are putting the squeeze on us, including the very United States of America. They want everything to happen overnight.

KATE SEELYE: [on camera] And are you worried about the squeeze? I mean --

MOHAMMED AZIZ SHUKRI: I am. I am worried. If I tell you I'm not worried, I'd be laughing at myself.

KATE SEELYE: What are you worried about?

MOHAMMED AZIZ SHUKRI: I'm worried that the Syrian economy is going down the drain if we maintain the status quo. The government is under severe pressure -- once through Lebanon, once through Iraq, once through Turkey -- to the extent that I wonder at times whether the American administration, the American present administration, wants to bring the regime down.

KATE SEELYE: How nervous is this regime that the U.S. might attack?

MOHAMMED AZIZ SHUKRI: On the surface, it doesn't act nervously, but I know that everybody almost is nervous. Everybody almost is asking, "What's next?" Could we wake up tomorrow and find the Marines trying to land in Syria?

KATE SEELYE: So do you think this American pressure on Syria is threatening the Assad regime?

MOHAMMED AZIZ SHUKRI: Yes. Yes. Yes.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] The regime has been shaken by its humiliating retreat from Lebanon. Its territory, the Golan Heights, is still occupied by Israel. I wonder what happens now. Under pressure, will Bashar al Assad reform his government or is some sort of confrontation with the U.S. inevitable?

Back in Beirut, the Syrians are gone, posters of Hariri are still all over town, and a U.N. team is on its way to carry out a full investigation into his killing. But the main focus is the upcoming election to choose a new government, the first election in decades free of Syrian domination. Opposition newspaper editor Gebran Tueni believes that Lebanon could become a model democracy in the Arab world, but it could also unravel without international support.

GEBRAN TUENI, Editor, An Nahar Newspaper: If you want to create a new Middle East with democracies in the Middle East, with a new kind of society, if you want the Middle East to evolve, you should first of all be able to defend the only democratic society that you have in the Middle East, which is Lebanon. If you want the Middle East with free speech, you should preserve Lebanon. And if you want a real answer to the dialogue of culture after 9/11, you should preserve Lebanon.

KATE SEELYE: With so much at stake for Lebanon, I went to see a man who's been at the heart of the struggle for independence from Syria. He lives high in the Chouf mountains, where he has been holed up since the Hariri killing, fearful he, too, may be the target of an assassination.

Walid Jumblatt lives in his family's castle. He's a member of parliament and was a close ally of Rafik Hariri's. It's widely believed that in 1977, the Syrians killed his father.

[on camera] Did you ever think you'd see the day when Syria would withdraw from Lebanon?

WALID JUMBLATT, Member of Parliament: Before the killing of Hariri, of course, we did not even think about it, no. No. But I mean, this earthquake, the assassination of Hariri, caused their departure. At the same time, I mean, I don't feel like other Lebanese, like that, the joyful, because, OK, Syria is out, but Syria -- how should I say it? We've got a long history with Syria, and I don't want the Syrians to feel humiliated, defeated.

KATE SEELYE: You've toned down a little bit. I mean, the last time I saw you, you were very angry about Syria turning Lebanon into a police state. Now I'm hearing --

WALID JUMBLATT: Now it's over. Now it's over. Now it's over. OK, now we have to think about the future. It's just the start of a new era.

KATE SEELYE: [voice-over] Jumblatt is the leader of an important minority group in Lebanon, the Druze. On most weekends, his courtyard becomes a public square. This Sunday, his supporters debate what they'll do if the Lebanese opposition takes power in the election. The most sensitive issue they face is how to handle the radical Islamist group Hezbollah, which the U.S. regards as a terrorist organization.

MAN IN COURTYARD: [subtitles] Is it possible to have an economic program that includes Hezbollah?

WALID JUMBLATT: [subtitles] We hope for an agreement with Hezbollah. And we even want them to take part in the next government.

KATE SEELYE: I asked Jumblatt about the U.N. demand that Hezbollah's militia disarm.

WALID JUMBLATT: Hezbollah is not a terrorist organization. And we have to manage as Lebanese to see what will be the future of Hezbollah. It's already a political party. And we might -- I might say, Well, OK the weapons of Hezbollah, maybe they could be included, the weapons, into the Lebanese army.

[www.pbs.org: More on Hezbollah]

KATE SEELYE: In his dream of a new Lebanon, Jumblatt wants to abolish the country's traditional political system, in which power is divided along religious lines.

WALID JUMBLATT: If we after the elections go back to the old classical game, it will be a terrible frustration for the Lebanese. It's going to be a frustration for the new generation of Lebanese that were united in the Martyrs' Square. And well, they've -- we have to give them some hope. A new Lebanon, a modern Lebanon. Is it possible? I don't know.

KATE SEELYE: Returning to Beirut, I find an electric atmosphere in Martyrs' Square. People are celebrating their newfound national identity at a concert by Lebanese superstar Majida al Rumi.

MAJIDA AL RUMI: [singing] [subtitles]

Get up and fight oppression,

break the silence within you.

O people chased from your land,

you've had enough hate and sorrow.

KATE SEELYE: I never thought I'd see anything like this in Lebanon. Despite the threats they still face, people seem to share a deep sense of hope. And after the "earthquake," it's truly starting to feel like a Beirut spring.

MAJIDA AL RUMI: [singing] [subtitles]

Where are you?

Your land is calling you.

Get up and fight oppression,

break the silence within you.

ANNOUNCER: Coming up next: In Liberia, life after war.

Liberia: No More War

Reported by: Jessie Deeter

JESSIE DEETER, Reporter: [voice-over] I'm with a United Nations mission flying into the jungle of northern Liberia. The United Nations has just been put in charge of securing this country, and they don't know what they're going to find here. This is how the biggest peacekeeping operation in the world begins.

In these days, when the United Nations' effectiveness is being questioned, I've come to Liberia to watch the U.N. try to disarm an entire nation of fighters and turn around one of the most failed states in the world.

This ragtag group used to be soldiers in Liberia's national army. U.N. Force Commander Daniel Opande, a three-star general from Kenya, is here to disarm fighters like these around the country.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE, Force Commander, UNMIL: How long have you been fighting for?

FORMER SOLDIER: Fighting for?

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Two years? One year?

FORMER SOLDIER: A long time. I started in 1990.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: In 1990? That's a long time. Now, gentlemen, I see that you have very good AK-47s. These weapons are no longer to be shot to kill another Liberian because the war is over. OK? Promise me, are you going to maintain peace?

FORMER SOLDIERS: Yes!

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Are you going to maintain peace?

FORMER SOLDIERS: Yes!

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: When we come to disarm you, are you going to hand in your weapons?

FORMER SOLDIERS: No!

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Are you, to me?

FORMER SOLDIERS: No.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Are you going to give it to me?

FORMER SOLDIERS: Yes.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Are you going to give it to me?

FORMER SOLDIERS: Yes!

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: All right. Thank you very much. No more war.

FORMER SOLDIERS: No more war.

JESSIE DEETER: This is a new direction for these soldiers, a complete turnaround from the life that most of them had known just a few months earlier. For the better part of 14 years, Liberia's civil war spiraled out of control. Rebels battled government forces in a bloody scramble for power that left over 200,000 Liberians dead.

By the summer of 2003, pressure built on the United States to help this country founded by former American slaves finally end the chaos. But the U.S. was stretched by military commitments in Iraq and leery of another Somalia. They sent a token force of Marines and pushed to indict Liberian president Charles Taylor for war crimes. With the rebels also closing in, Taylor fled the country.

[www.pbs.org: Learn more about U.S.-Liberia ties]

Responsibility for cleaning up the mess in Liberia fell to a few thousand African troops, who would later operate under the authority of the United Nations.

Two months later, I land in Monrovia for the first time. The scale of the United Nations' work here is enormous. The capital, Monrovia, has been without electricity for over a decade. Eighty-five percent of the population is unemployed and one out of every five Liberians is homeless.

I find 8,000 people squatting in this abandoned Masonic lodge. Any place will do until the U.N. has collected the guns that make the rest of the country deadly for civilians.

The U.N. Security Council has promised money and 15,000 troops to disarm Liberia. To complete the job, they've given just one year to Force Commander General Opande.

Opande served as a military observer during an earlier attempt to disarm Liberia, which failed. This time, he's prepared to do whatever's necessary to get the former factions from the civil war to go along with the disarmament.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: It is hard to know what people you have to work with did during the war. I may not be the one who will reconcile them with their sins or the bad things that they did, but I have a job to ensure that they play ball.

JESSIE DEETER: On my first trip with Opande, he brings along Daniel Chea, Liberia's defense minister. Chea is controversial because he held the same job in Charles Taylor's old regime, but Opande needs him now. Chea trained these troops. Now he's here to get them to disarm.

DANIEL CHEA, Defense Minister: We have fought wars in this country for the last 25 years. Where has this led us to? Nothing. Zero. No infrastructure, our education system is zero, everybody's poor. Is this now what we want? And we have never had any opportunity like what we have today. This is the end game. Do I make myself clear?

FORMER SOLDIERS: Sir!

JESSIE DEETER: Chea and Opande have heard that these former government fighters have been setting up illegal roadblocks to extort money and food, and they've come here to stop it.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: I was with you here two weeks ago, right? And I told you I don't want, you know, misbehavior on this road. And then two, three days ago, you misbehaved again. You know, your people misbehaved again. Today you have lost even your rank. You understand? You've lost your rank. Right?

FORMER SOLDIER: Yes, sir.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: You are no longer general, and you are going to hand in your weapons now. You understand?

FORMER SOLDIER: Yes, sir.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Because I came here and I spent one-and-a-half hours with you. I talked to the whole lot of you, OK, and I told you, don't harass people on this road. And you are not -- you didn't listen. OK? I'm not here to fool around with you, you understand? I'm not here to fool around with, you know, rebels. The way you want to be treated is the way you will treat other people, you understand? Let's go.

JESSIE DEETER: Liberia's new peace is fragile. The U.N. wants to disarm the country quickly before fighting breaks out again, but only a third of the 15,000 troops promised to Liberia are in place.

U.N. officials are pressuring General Opande to begin disarmament right away. They need to raise hundreds of millions of dollars for Liberia in New York, and they want to point to some success on the ground here.

Opande's worried he still doesn't have sufficient troops, but the first disarmament site is opened anyway in December 2003. As word of the U.N.'s money-for-guns buyout spreads, some 9,000 rebels descend on the site designed to process only a couple hundred a day.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: We were not prepared for it. We didn't have the manpower, you know, to do it. We didn't have the facilities, and we were overwhelmed.

JESSIE DEETER: Frustrated mobs of young soldiers go on a rampage, ransacking Monrovia and leaving 12 people dead. The U.N. is forced to stop the disarmament and regroup.

Much of Liberia still remains in the hands of the rebels Opande is trying to disarm. I go on my own to one of the their strongholds, just 37 miles outside the capital. These rebels consider themselves the saviors of Liberia because they led the charge to oust the president, Charles Taylor. Colonel Amos Tomba gives me a tour.

Col. AMOS TOMBA, Rebel Leader: We are rebels. We live here. She have her arms here. The arm is here. Here is the weapon. Here is the weapon. Yes. We are not fight for money. We are not fight for money. We fight to free our country.

JESSIE DEETER: These former soldiers are barely getting by on what they can gather from the bush as they wait to disarm. They tell me that any opportunities the U.N. can provide will be better than what they've got now.

"WOLFCATCHER": We fought because of a cause, to liberate our people.

JESSIE DEETER: This man calls himself "Wolfcatcher" and tells me that he wants to forget his rebel life.

"WOLFCATCHER": My intention now is to matriculate at any university.

JESSIE DEETER: [on camera] Do you know what you want to be after --

"WOLFCATCHER": Yes, certainly. I want to be a journalist. I want to take up mass communications.

JESSIE DEETER: [voice-over] Wolfcatcher has big dreams, but he faces a country with few jobs and little infrastructure. And he worries that the general population might not accept him back.

"WOLFCATCHER": They shouldn't think about the wrongs that some of us did to them. They should waive everything, let bygones be bygones. Whatever happened should be put aside, and we should think forward and not backward.

JESSIE DEETER: [on camera] What do you think of Opande?

Col. AMOS TOMBA: Opande? Yeah, the job that he came to do in Liberia, actually, he's trying. He's trying. He's not finished yet, but he's trying. He's doing his best. Taking guns from a group of boys not easy thing.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Are we ready?

PILOT: We are ready.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Oh, good. I have been ready, you know, for a long time.

JESSIE DEETER: [voice-over] Before Opande's next attempt to disarm, he needs to make certain that the combatants and their leaders are on board.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Let's go. Let's go. Ma'am, let's go.

JESSIE DEETER: Today he's going up country with Aisha Conneh, the wife of an important rebel leader, who wields a lot of political power here herself. Aisha has close ties to the president of nearby Guinea, who helped back the rebels' struggle against Charles Taylor. Her followers affectionately call her "the Iron Lady."

[www.pbs.org: More on the civil war's factions]

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Aisha played a very, very pivotal role in what they call their struggle against Charles Taylor. She ended up as a mother figure of, you know, most of those fighting kids. They respect her and they listen to her. She's one of those we have to deal with.

You see how your children love you!

AISHA CONNEH: They make me cry.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Yeah, I know.

JESSIE DEETER: Aisha has come back to reconnect with her people and to help Opande persuade her former fighters to disarm.

AISHA CONNEH: This is my brother.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Aisha has handed you over to me, and it is me who is going to disarm you. And my troops here are going to renovate this school so that this school --

[cheers]

AISHA CONNEH: I want to ask you, when I send General Opande for you to disarm, you will disarm or you will not disarm?

FORMER FIGHTERS: We will disarm!

JESSIE DEETER: After giving her troops Opande's message, the Iron Lady does some campaigning of her own -- with bricks of Liberian dollars. The sudden arrival of wealth creates chaos in this impoverished place. Fearing a riot, Opande is forced to cut short his mission here.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: I tried to explain to Aisha that you don't do that. You can find a way by which you can share your money, you know, to the people who need it but not throwing it away like that. I did tell her that.

JESSIE DEETER: It's April, 2004, when I come back to Liberia. The U.N. is still struggling to control territory outside of the capital as Opande's next attempt at disarmament gets under way.

[April 15, 2004, Disarmament Day]

RADIO: Today we wish all the Liberians a happy D-Day because whatever you do, wherever you are and wherever you play, today is your day, a day for you to think seriously about where you want this country to go.

JESSIE DEETER: The U.N.'s full force of 15,000 troops are now in place, and a handful of disarmament sites are being set up around the country. Opande hopes that things won't get out of hand this time. The Iron Lady's former fighters are the first to test the system.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Now there is no more war for you, you understand, OK? No more war. You go to school, eh?

My job is to destroy that fabric of being under control of the gun by taking away their weapon and telling them, "Look, from now on, you are a civilian, and we want to turn your life around."

What battalion were you in?

FORMER FIGHTER: Jungle Warrior.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Jungle Warrior? Good. I'm glad to see that. Now the war is over. Completely. From today, you don't have that Jungle Warrior-era battalion anymore which you belonged to. You don't have your commander who is going to tell you, "Do that, do that, do this."

U.N. OFFICER: How old are you? What's your age?

CHILD: Fourteen.

U.N. OFFICER: Fourteen? OK, Mike, it's for you. OK?

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Now we're on our own. Should I go back where I originally came from? Should I begin looking for my mom, my brothers and sisters? Should I go back to my county, or should I head to Monrovia? It's still a long way for them.

JESSIE DEETER: In exchange for a weapon or 150 rounds of ammunition, each former combatant gets an I.D. card that entitles him to $300, food and medical care.

AID WORKER: If you want to do carpentry, you go do carpentry. If you want go do -- be tailor, learn how to sew. You want to be a shoemaker --

JESSIE DEETER: Money has also been promised for fighters to return to school or get job training.

FORMER FIGHTER: We were small, small when war start. Our ma, our pa, some of them died. That is why we took up arms. Today we are happy the U.N. come and take arms from us. We're happy today. We want -- we must go and learn job. We must know something for ourselves. U.N., thank you for that. Thank you, U.N.

JESSIE DEETER: Six months later, I've come back to Liberia one last time. The U.N. says it's disarmed 100,000 fighters, and it seems to be having an impact. In the capital, I find the main market is more crowded. There's new construction. And thousands who had sought refuge across the border in neighboring countries are returning home. I go back to the Masonic lodge that was packed with 8,000 refugees when I first visited. Now the families are gone, and the building is being revamped.

Everywhere I go, I find former fighters trying to resume their education, which leads to the moving sight of 20-year-olds in 4th-grade classrooms. Over half of the former combatants have applied for vocational training, in programs like these sponsored by NGOs and the U.N..

TEACHER: [subtitles] We've got these students here to help them reintegrate into society and keep them off the street. These ones decided to do sewing. This is why they are here.

FORMER FIGHTER: I would like to do a dress, dress for a lady and a coat for a gent. You know, a French coat, a real coat. That's what I like.

JESSIE DEETER: Instead of French coats and wedding dresses, these former fighters have been sewing dolls' clothes for three months because they can't afford enough material. The international community still hasn't delivered all of the aid they promised to Liberia.

Before leaving the country, I go looking for the rebel fighters I met in their makeshift camp six months ago.

Col. AMOS TOMBA: Long time, long time, long time!

JESSIE DEETER: [on camera] You cut your hair!

Col. AMOS TOMBA: Yeah, I cut my hair!

JESSIE DEETER: [voice-over] I find the former rebel, Colonel Amos Tomba. He still survives on food that he gathers from the bush, and he lives in a house that's only a slight upgrade from the place I saw before.

Col. AMOS TOMBA: This is my room.

JESSIE DEETER: Tomba tells me that not much has changed for him, even though he's gone through the first steps of the U.N. disarmament program.

Col. AMOS TOMBA: All my boys, they gave their guns to UNMIL All my boys, they got this. I got my first $150 from the DDRR program. This is my last benefit, but I don't get it yet. But I get my first money and my second money, but I haven't got my benefit. Now they say they want to give us jobs. When they take the gun from you, they will send you to school. They will find a place for you to be.

If they give me a job, I got no problem with them. If they do not give me a job, I got a big problem with them because I'm not working. How I will eat? How my family will survive?

JESSIE DEETER: I ask Amos about his old comrade, "Wolfcatcher," who dreamed of being a journalist. He's in the capital, Amos tells me. I'm amazed to hear Wolfcatcher on the radio.

"WOLFCATCHER": [radio broadcast] I am Dennis Weah, reporting for Common Ground.

JESSIE DEETER: He now goes by his given name, Dennis Weah, and is like a rock star in this country where people get nearly all of their news from the radio. At this station set up by an NGO to promote peace, Dennis is now working with a woman who used to be a government soldier.

DENNIS WEAH: Technically and physically, we used to be enemies. When we introduce ourselves to people that we are former combatants, they feel happy, they feel glad, seeing that a Liberian boy or a Liberian girl who fought the war can come out of war and say, "I want to be a journalist."

JESSIE DEETER: I ask Dennis what he thinks about his old life.

DENNIS WEAH: I did not know at the time the aftermath of rebellion. I felt that rebellion was the only way out. This is my mother's land. This is my land. I have to fight, of course, for freedom, but not with guns.

JESSIE DEETER: [on camera] You don't believe in it anymore.

DENNIS WEAH: I don't believe in it anymore.

JESSIE DEETER: As a method.

DENNIS WEAH: I have graduated from that stage.

JESSIE DEETER: [on camera] Disarmament is over. In this country once ruled by the AK-47, there are now virtually no guns on the streets. The U.N. is working toward elections in the fall, but real solutions to Liberia's staggering problems could take decades more aid, and war in this volatile region remains a constant threat.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: A situation like this one, where they have been, you know, at war for 14 years, you can't, you know, resolve all the issues. But we've only been here for a year, and I think for a year, we've done well.

JESSIE DEETER: His mission over, General Opande is proud of what he's done in Liberia, but the real challenge lies ahead. Over half of all U.N. missions ultimately fail, and Liberia doesn't stand a chance if the United States and other world powers back away before the job is truly done.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: This is not a hopeless country, as far as peace and stability. I hope my sons or my grandchildren will not come back here to -- you know, to stabilize Liberia again. No, I don't think so.

Are you combatants?

FORMER SOLDIER: I'm an AFL personnel

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Yes? AFL?

FORMER SOLDIER: Yes.

FORMER SOLDIER: We are all from the armed forces of Liberia.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Do you know me?

FORMER SOLDIERS: No. No.

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: Opande.

FORMER SOLDIERS: Opande? Yes, sir! Yes, sir! [laughing] General Opande, sir! We are sorry, sir!

Gen. DANIEL OPANDE: [laughs] I tell you -- oh, I tell you, Jessie -- [laughs]

THE EARTHQUAKE

Produced by

KATE SEELYE

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