UN Peacekeeping

["Ken Hanly" <khanly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

The Globe and Mail Thursday, September 14, 2000

There's no risk-free way to keep peace

Many would argue that the Security Council's inclination not to
intervene in Yugoslavia's sovereign affairs was the best solution.

By Lewis MacKenzie

Now that the New York traffic jams are back to normal and more than
150 world leaders have returned home from the UN's Millennium
Summit, the time is ripe to analyze the platitudes and promises that
accumulated during their three-day speechathon.
Don't get me wrong. Any time the world's movers and shakers get
together and talk about international peace and security and how to
enhance the UN's effectiveness, it's a good thing. Unfortunately,
promises are cheap -- the devil is in the execution. Canada is attempting
to take the lead in encouraging a more interventionist UN, and to
develop criteria for intervention. I fear for this initiative. Governments
rarely follow predetermined criteria when deciding to participate in
international military operations. And if we do develop reasonable criteria
for humanitarian intervention it would demand immediate UN action in at
least 30 conflicts -- at a time when the UN can't protect its staff in West
Timor thanks to the lack of support from member nations.
Meanwhile, the Security Council is constituted so that its permanent
five members must agree unanimously before action can be taken. In his
presentation at the Summit, Prime Minister Jean Chrétien unfortunately
cited the UN's failure to act in Kosovo as an example of how the Security
Council was incapable of dealing with major humanitarian disasters. But
many would argue that the Security Council's inclination not to intervene
in Yugoslavia's sovereign affairs was the best solution. The fact that a
humanitarian disaster unfolded in Kosovo after NATO hijacked the
decision-making process from the UN makes many UN member states
uneasy: Is this an example of how Canadian-inspired intervention might
work?
In the absence of any original ideas for enhancing the effectiveness
of UN peacekeeping operations, delegates and much of the media
embraced the recommendations of the UN's recently released Brahimi
Panel Report on UN Peace Operations. It contained practical
recommendations that any ex-UN commander would endorse -- in
theory. The problem is that many recommendations defy practical
implementation due to characteristics of the UN and the Security Council
in particular. For example, the Report urges the UN to identify
"aggressor" and "victim" early on and, if appropriate, side with the victim.
But who decides which faction or government force is in which category?
The UN commander in the mission area would be in a good position
to make such a judgment, but my personal experience suggests that his
views will be eclipsed by the Security Council's natural alignments.
During the war in Bosnia, if one condemned the Serbs, the Russians
stonewalled; if one called the Croatians "aggressors," the United States
got the item off the Council's agenda.
The Report says that the Security Council has to be told what it
needs to know and not what it wants to hear. Sounds good. But in reality
the permanent five members, with their superior intelligence-gathering
capabilities, know long before the UN Secretariat what they "need to
know" (mind you, they frequently deny this to avoid responsibility during
crises such as the Rwandan genocide).
The Report calls for the creation of a number of cohesive multi-
national rapid reaction brigades (approximately 6,000 troops each) which
could deploy in as little as 30 days. Unfortunately, the term "cohesive"
will rarely apply at the critical time of deployment; some nations would
decide that they had no national self-interests in the new crisis area and
would withdraw their contingent at the 11th hour.
Since the report came out, some observers have suggested that
Canada restrict its participation in peacekeeping to offering training and
expertise.
I disagree. A nation's credibility as an effective peacekeeper is
proportional to the risks it is prepared to accept. We can't ask Third
World countries to do the dirty, dangerous work while we stick to more
cerebral tasks. If blessings at home dictate responsibilities abroad -- and
I believe they do -- Canada has a big bill to pay. It cannot be amortized
merely by offering the benefit of our self-declared superior knowledge.
Like it or not, spilled blood counts more than anything else when it
comes time to grade a nation's contribution to international peace and
security.
The Brahimi Report and the recent UN summit's focus on
peacekeeping is encouraging, as is Canada's persistent obsession with
enhancing one of the UN's key roles. But, in the same breath, let me add
that this is no time to sit back and feed off our hard-won reputation. It's
essential that we repair the damage done over the past decade to the
Canadian Forces while reducing the national deficit. Then we will be
ready again to loan combat-ready forces and other resources to that
elusive search for peace.

Retired Canadian major-general Lewis MacKenzie served in the
Canadian Armed Forces for 40 years. He was the first commander
of UN peacekeeping forces in Sarajevo in 1992.