Do political elites use armed groups to foster civilian participation in genocidal violence ? Are armed groups employed strategically ? How do they mobilize civilians? I investigate these questions using data from the Rwandan Genocide. To establish causality, I exploit exogenous variation in armed groups' transport costs induced by weather fluctuations: the shortest distance of each village to the main road interacted with rainfall along the dirt tracks between main road and village. I find (ⅰ) 1 additional armed-group member resulted in 7.3 more civilian perpetrators; (ⅱ) armed-group leaders employed their men strategically; and (ⅲ) armed groups invoked civilians' obedience.
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