UN Peacekeeping - cheap at twice the price?

United Nations peacekeeping has been heavily criticized in books, articles, speeches and in our own Congress.  Criticisms have focused on the UN bureaucracy, the long lead time for establishing a peacekeeping mission, the failure of peacekeeping missions to completely fulfill their mandate, and, particularly, the handful of missions that went very badly wrong.  UN peacekeeping has become defined by Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda, and Sudan and not the other 58 peacekeeping missions that have been established by the Security Council since 1948.   

One of the harshest critics was John Bolton who served as the United States Permanent Representative to the United Nations in 2005 and 2006.  Interestingly, the Security Council approved over 100 resolutions in this period,  according to the record, Bolton voted for all of them. Since 1991, the United States has voted for over 1100 Security Council Resolutions.  And, in fact, the United States voted for all resolutions that were passed relating to Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda and Sudan.  One would assume that it the United Nations peacekeeping operations are so flawed, the United States, which helps negotiate the enabling resolutions, would balk from time to time and issue a veto. 

There is no doubt that peacekeeping, as the UN practices it could be more efficient and more effective, but there easier or cheaper alternatives if we want international authorization and approval.  Without that approval, it becomes extremely difficult, and in some cases impossible to attract troop contributors. Some countries are precluded by domestic legislation from participating in a peacekeeping mission that is not sanctioned by the UN.

There are other optiions.  Regional organizations like NATO and the African Union have engaged in peacekeeping with mixed results.  The United States has composed ad hoc coalitions of the willing, with limited UN cover.  And the United States created a special purpose peacekeeping operation outside of the UN system in the Sinai with the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) mission to monitor the Israeli Egyptian peace.  It incorporates troop contributions from 11 different countries and is composed of about 3000 military and civilian personnel.   In 1993, the MFO operating budget was $56.1 million and while this cost was divided into thirds by Egypt, Israel and the US, the actual US cost was much higher since the Department of Defense absorbed the cost of the US troops, which amounted to $46.6 million.  While the MFO total cost is not out of line with UN mission costs for equivalent missions, the US contribution is significantly greater than the 25% we pay for UN missions.  In short, the UN is a bargain when it comes to peacekeeping and yet still Congress complains.  

The fact that the former Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld was anxious to cancel our participation in the MFO, suggests that the drain on US resources in terms of lift, logistics and retraining would exceed by a considerable margin the impact of a UN peacekeeping mission on our readiness.  So the question is not whether we should advocate unilateral or regional peacekeeping over UN missions, but which missions to mount through the UN. Or, more appropriately, when to pull the plug on a UN mission that has gone sour or is not fulfilling its mandate. 

In the case of Bosnia, which started with a peacekeeping mission in Croatia to provide security for three UN protected zones, all the proper steps in terms of getting agreement of the combatants were in place and the mission was operational, until the mission was expanded and the original mandate changed.  At that point the Security Council, advised by the military commander in the field, should have taken steps to provide adequate resources to do the job and to renegotiate agreement for the mission by the combatants or it should have pulled the troops home and terminated the mission.  Similarly, there were points in Somalia, Rwanda and Sudan where the game changed from the original concept sold to the Security Council and on which the peacekeeping missions were based.  In each case there should have been a reevaluation and conclusion that unless conditions were again favorable, the missions would have to be aborted. This is easier said than done. 

Public opinion and pride seem to stand in the way of considered military judgment.  The Secretary General does not want to encourage unilateralism or admit that the UN cannot handle the job and the members of the Security Council are reluctant to back away from doing something to relieve an humanitarian crisis, which has captured the attention of CNN.  Everyone seems to have his eye on his own reputation or standing in the public eye more than on the humanitarian tragedy that is unfolding.  The result is that the United Nations is discredited and its future ability to help devalued and people suffer. 

   

Comments

[James Giroday]

The most interesting aspect of this article is the notion that privately held media corporations influence the decisions of United Nations officials (i.e. “reluctant…CNN”). Although at times the UN is surely a bureaucratic labyrinth, it is more importantly an organization that functions according to a charter. These rules are set and upheld in a democratic way.

Ideologically, I see little reason for the UN to submit themselves to the whimsical positions of mass media. The fact that some missions have been unsuccessful is inevitable. The resultant sensationalizing of the event is unfortunate. But as an organization, it should have the fortitude to resist the popular decision in favour of the correct one.

Practically, this is a difficult position to hold. It requires leadership and confidence within the organization to enable it to endure pressure from the public eye. Clearly however, they should not sever their decision making from public opinion.

The article asserts that UN officials are holding their personal interests above those of the organization. If this is the case, I would find a discussion of the problematic nature of the UN’s public relations relevant to our course and interesting.

[Cameron Tudhope]

The UN is easy to criticize. Critics have targeted the balance of power, inefficiency, fiscal imprudence, and untimely decision-making. As Ambassador Waker points out, the UN has come to be defined by its failures – Bosnia, Rwanda, Somalia, and Sudan – when it has, in fact, established many successful peacekeeping operations. We can argue then, that the UN peacekeeping works, more or less. But the UN is charged with one of the most important global initiatives, and therefore must be judged on a correspondingly rigorous level.
I would argue the inefficiencies of the UN are a result of a distinct lack of culture around which UN participants can unite. A culture distinct from those represented by the UN’s members. Yes, there is a common goal of global betterment to which delegates subscribe, but this goal is clouded by divergent national agendas. As any successful business, there must be an alignment of values between every facet of the organization in order for it to deliver on any kind of meaningful level.
But as mentioned, it is easy to criticize the UN. It is an organization that presents an undeniable exigency for improvement. Attempts at improvement, however, have been thwarted and slowed to a halt by the bureaucratic sludge that clogs the valves of a machine that might otherwise run quite efficiently.
Perhaps it is time to subject the UN to intense reform. Is the UN an effective tool for promoting peace, enforcing it when necessary? Or is it a tool that has grown too complex and inappropriate for the task at hand? A broken tool, which we continue to use at the expense lives.

[Andrew Sigler]

The UN was founded in an era of conventional warfare after World War II, one without terrorist organizations and guerrilla warfare, but instead it was designed to prevent another major world war. Therefore, while it is well equipped to deal with conflicts between nations, the UN is unable to deal effectively and efficiently with modern threats to peace. One example is genocide like in Rwanda where the UN needed to quickly respond in order to prevent the Hutus from murdering thousands of Tutsi families. It would be impossible for the UN to react so quickly. Another argument against the UN is that it gives too much power to the victors of World War II, while powerful countries like Japan and Germany wish to be a part of P5 and earning the power of veto. However, giving more countries the power of veto would be a mistake for it further slow down the UN's ability to act.

The UN was established to be a neutral force in the world, able to work in peacekeeping missions without standing on one specific side. While the U.S. is the major financial backer to the UN, if the US were to take on one of these missions on their own, it would not only be financially irresponsible, but it would also jeopardize the US's soft power. By taking a stance as a country rather than a collective, the US would be seen as taking sides, perhaps alienating other countries from helping or even pushing some toward opposing the US's efforts. Also, even though the US does give the most to the UN, by taking on a mission on their own, the financial burden would be solely on its back rather than being able to spread the cost to other countries, even if only marginally. An example of this is the MFO mission to supervise Israeli Egyptian peace, for even though the US was able to divide the costs with Israel and Egypt, they still spend $46.6 million, paying for all of the US military personnel.

[RD Eisenhart]

Since the U.N. began peacekeeping operations in 1948, there have been a total of 63 operations, costing about 7.1 billion dollars. There are currently 16 active operations, more than half of which started before 2000. Some operations, such as UNMOGIP (the peace keeping operation monitoring India and Pakistan) were started 50 years ago in 1949 while two other operations are at least 31 years old . Reflecting upon this data, it is not hard to understand the frustrations expressed by John Bolton, the U.S. government, and others over what appear to be seemingly endless expenditures. Reflecting upon the 50 year mission, one has to wonder why nothing has changed over the course of that time and whether a peace keeping operation of that length is justified when their are other conflicts that could also use those resources. These operations, however, have clearly proven themselves necessary time and again as demonstrated by the recent increase in India-Pakistani relations, but so have others that are equally important and worthy of attention. With the state of the world economy as it is and in light of how the UN is viewed by the public, I think it’s fair to say that we wont see an increase in donations to the UN anytime soon. Reluctance to financially support the UN and fulfill all their needs has been a common sentiment in government’s for some time now and will only serve to further undermine their power as an organization.
As Ambassador Walker previously mentioned, one can trace the drop of interest in the UN to the string of crises in the early 1990s that lead to what Conor Foley refers to as the “Somalia Syndrome.” The result of this “syndrome” has lead to a reluctance by member states to get involved in the domestic issues of nations, not border disputes, such as the above mentioned independent US MFO peacekeeping operation that monitors relations in the border between Egypt and Israel. Although this operation is costly as Ambassador Walker stated, it is a far easier conflict to maintain then internal ones, which present a host of issues, the most loaded of which is that issue of state sovereignty, that must be addressed if the operation is to be effective . In 1998 former Secretary General, Kofi Annan, tried to circumvent the idea of national sovereignty with that of “conditional sovereignty” which enhanced the rights of individual citizens and called for international state intervention in response to human rights violations . This of course was not popular and many nations, particularly those in developing countries, reacted negatively to Annan’s ideas. This doctrine largely fell on deaf years that resulted in the emergence of another Balkans crisis, this time in Kosovo, in addition to the genocide in Sudan. In 2004, former president G. W. Bush formerly referred to the crisis in Sudan as a genocide in a speech he made before the UN General Assembly; all of which fell on deaf ears. This represented, in my opinion, the real failure of the UN in two respects. The first and most apparent was that nothing came from the president’s speech. This has served to undermine the provisions of the 1948 Genocide Convention, demonstrating the worlds’ unwillingness to intervene in order to prevent the reoccurrence of genocide. Secondly, and less apparent, is that President Bush’s appeal represented an opportunity for a possible UN upheaval. If the world had wanted to act, the General Assembly could have pushed for a peace-keeping operation under the Resolution 377, commonly referred to as the “Uniting for Peace Resolution” which gives the GA the ability to circumvent the Security Council in the event deadlock through their own authorization of a peacekeeping mission. Many believe that the current structure of the UN is obsolete yet all attempts to revise the system have proved useless. One can only imagine the upheaval that the GA could have created if they had taken this path. This of course never happened and the UN continues to function as it did when it was established 64 years ago. After examining all of this it is not at all difficult then, to understand the source of John Bolton’s criticism. I believe that his voting record during the period from 2005-2006 was done simply out of politeness and respect for bilateralism, but this only serves to demonstrate how nations, particularly the US, currently value the UN as an organization. Clearly, if the US thought the UN was still an effective body, they would veto a resolution semi-frequently, but they have shown through their own unilateralism in the Iraq War and a handful of disastrous missions that the UN, lacking any enforcement power, currently stands as a monument to hoped for peace in the Post WWII world.

[Connor Hines]

One of the greatest challenges the UN faces is its scrutiny from both the public and politicians. As Professor Walker pointed out, the United Nations has orchestrated over sixty successful peacekeeping operations throughout the world. However, like anything else, the UN is remembered for where it failed to establish order, and the public remains skeptical of the organization for its failures in Rwanda, Bosnia, and Somalia. States should supply an equally proportional amount of resources to the United Nations, and without excuses regardless of the state’s power. Therefore the power of the UN must be enhanced so as states feel obligated to answer to its needs and requests.
One of the primary reasons the United Nations is crucial to providing and maintaining order in countries of conflict is because of its neutrality. Many issues would emerge if states were to act independently of each other. In most cases, the state would have a bias against one of the parties involved in the particular conflict. Furthermore, the motives of the state would most likely involve obtaining special interests as oppose to humanitarian relief. If the conflict is one of religion, or cultural, it is essential for a neutral and agreeable party to intervene so as to achieve the utmost cooperation from the various parties involved.

[Caroline Maran]

Over the years, US support for UN Peace Keeping Operations has been inconsistent to say the least, supporting the UN's efforts when the mission is successful and blaming the organization and renouncing its support when an attempt fails miserably, tarnishing the countries image. The primary example of a failed mission is Somalia. The mission started out as a humanitarian aid action and quickly escalated in to a failed PKO, resulting in the deployment of US troops into the region. Ultimately the US became a party to the civil war occurring in Somalia and thus a part of the problem, not the solution in the region. The US position in the war became evident when Somali rebel forces shot down a US helicopter. After the helicopter went down the public reaction was that the situation was the UN’s fault and not the US’s (who in actuality placed the troops in Somalia against the wishes of many high UN officials, including US secretary of state Madeline Albright (class notes).
The Somali mission dramatically shifted the nature of PKO’s and the US’s willingness to engage in them. The mission incited fear in the US and the UN in future involvement with humanitarian crisis, such as the genocide of the Tutsi in Rwanda by the majority Hutu population. Because of the aftermath of Somalia, I agree that the UN peacekeeping missions have been defined and further operations discouraged by failed operations in Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda, and Sudan.
Staunch critics of Peace keeping operations, such as US Ambassador to the UN under the Bush administration John Bolton, believe that peace operations in places stricken by civil conflict go against the UN charter, convinced that internal conflicts do not pose a threat to international peace and security. Because of the financial and moral costs of a failed mission, there has been a budgetary battle between the UN and Congress regarding the monetary expense of PKO’s. As Ambassador Walker states, the UN faces a “daunting” problem because Congress is constantly trying to lower the UN’s budget for missions. Ambassador Walkers believes that Congress needs to understand that the UN operations are a bargain.
This is a powerful statement and its validity is seen in a case study conducted by the GAO, in which a comparison of costs was projected for a humanitarian crisis. The study concluded that a peacekeeping operation (similar to the one in Haiti) would cost the US twice as much as it would the UN due to differences in wages, benefits and supplies of the UN troops verses the US soldiers.
I agree with Ambassador Walker's comments that Congress needs to understand that peacekeeping missions enforced through the UN are a bargain in comparison to the costs of a mission done unilaterally by the US. However, I think that the most important question raised by Ambassador Walker's bog is “ when to pull the plug on a mission that has gone sour or is not fulfilling its mandate”. As we learned in class, often times it is easier to reinstate a resolution regarding buffer zones, UN officers, and Borders than it is to solve the problem at hand. Thus the status quo of the operations can prevent peace agreements from taking place. The Un needs to be aware of missions that are not fulfilling their stated mandates and severe funding. There needs to be a compromise between both congress and the Un for PKO to work successfully. Congress needs to understand that sometimes PKO’s are money well spent.

[Colin Flaherty]

While the United Nations continues to be the preeminent body of international law, its inefficient organization and methods limit the effectiveness of actually accomplishing its objectives. Currently peacekeeping missions are the most significant undertaking of the UN. Without a means to force stubborn dictators and regimes to cooperate with them, the United Nations will remain simply excellent in theory but poor in practice. The main problem with the functionality of the UN is that many of the nations harbor tendencies of realism within an organization that is supposed to embody the spirit of liberalism and international cooperation. Additionally the United Nations was originally designed to maintain international peace between nations in the post WWII era, and does not possess the hard and soft power required to handle third world civil wars between tribes and religious groups. These inabilities of the UN to cope with these strives has caused these missions to become costly and prolonged, and this has caused reactions by Congress over funding.
As Ambassador Walker pointed out this reaction from Congress does not seem logical given the amounts they pay for peacekeeping with other organizations, such as MFO. Since the Iraq War, the United States has lost a considerable amount of soft power, which is vital to power in the UN. With their standing in the UN reduced, the United States has less control over the direction taken in the peacekeeping missions. Therefore the U.S. is willing to pay more for missions with the MFO that they control. As displayed in the months before the invasion of Iraq, the U.S. is happy to work with the UN when they are aiding U.S. ambitions, but will readily ignore them when they attempt to prevent us. Congress complains not because of the amount they are paying, but the amount of control they’re getting for the price. Until the permanent members of the UN approach the organization without realism, the UN will not be able to truly achieve its ultimate goals of maintaining international peace and order.

[Maria Leonardi]

Many criticisms have arisen from the intense bureaucracy and failures in peacekeeping missions of the United Nations, but no alternatives have been suggested or created to address the terrible humanitarian issues and violence in areas that are incapable of internal solutions. Many point to the troubles faced in Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda, and Sudan. One of the harshest critics has been the United States. Despite criticism, the United States has voted for “over 1100 Security Council Resolutions,” and only 25% for the implementation of U.N. missions. The United States may believe that they can achieve better results, but it is impossible to sustain the costs of an effective mission.
Although there appear to be no other effective avenues for peacekeeping missions, there are many aspects of the failed missions that should be taken into account and change the process of decision making, especially in the strategies for entering countries in violent turmoil. First, the problems faced in Bosnia may have been avoided if adequate resources had been provided. The mission was going well until the original plan was expanded. Although the military commander advised the Security Council that more resources were needed, none were provided. If there was a military advisor to the Security Council, unnecessary problems with military forces may be avoided. When people are making decisions that do not necessarily have a military background, the decisions may not be the most effective approach. The case in Bosnia is similar to Somalia where the Secretary General would not keep the United States as the head of the military efforts. Another problem is the difficulty in backing out of a mission. The U.N. wants to appear capable and competent while the Security Council is “reluctant to back away from doing something to relieve a humanitarian crisis.”
Lastly, military intervention has failed in areas where the Security Council has not taken into account the differences in culture and political turmoil from one mission to another. In a conflict between states, as in Sinai, military conflicts are more easily remedied. In a country that has tribes, clans, and unfamiliar cultures, assumptions made in the planning of a mission may not be true or may cause the mission to be ineffective. These assumption must be changed to ensure that the mission is effective.

[Lachlan Markay]

American objections to the United Nations stem from its inability to address changes in the global order. The United Nations is no longer suited to work towards or to maintain a global peace as it operates on assumptions of the international relations paradigm that are no longer relevant. The changing role of nuclear weapons in global relations since the Second World War demonstrates this shift.

The five permanent members of the Security Council--the US, Russia, France, the UK, and China--are, not coincidentally, the first five nations to develop functional nuclear weapons. Those five nations therefore held unquestionably superior military positions at the time of the UN's founding. Today, on the other hand, four more nations (India, Pakistan, Israel, and by most accounts North Korea) boast the possession of a nuke. This military development alone shifts the balance of global military power away from the large and traditionally stable (if occasionally hostile) permanent SC members to states that have demonstrated, in practice or in rhetoric, their willingness to use military force.

Though the UN could potentially deal with, for instance, the threat of a nuclear conflict between India and Pakistan, the organization is in no way suited to address the growing threat posed to world peace by non-state actors, especially transnational terrorist organizations, and their continued quest to attain nuclear weapons. The prevention of violence between states can no longer be the central role of the UN, as the groups that initiate violence on the largest scale, and the groups that do the most to threaten the peace the UN was created to protect, are not states. They may be supported, harbored, funded, and protected by states, but multilateral peacekeeping missions cannot rout these organizations, as peacekeeping is a tool designed for traditional multi-state conflicts.

[Jamon R.]

As the Obama administration outlines their Foreign Policy intentions, a “realist” strain is beginning to emerge. Secretary Clinton stated recently “When we talk about the three pillars of American foreign policy- defense, diplomacy, development- they’re not just words to the president and me.” In this realist paradigm, U.N. cooperation will take precedence unforeseen in the Bush Administration.

While in the immediate future the U.S. will continue its wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, U.N. cooperation on peacekeeping missions will not only become a desire for Obama’s realist F.P but an absolute necessity. Due to these two separate but similar wars in the Middle East, U.S. resources are stretched thin. Quite frankly, the U.S. can no longer afford to go at it alone anymore. Furthermore the U.S. needs to focus on rebuilding relationships that were damaged in Bush’s administration outright display of unilaterism and disregard for international institutions.

The economic incentive of U.N. peacekeeping missions presents large opportunity for the Obama administration. As the cost for the Iraq war nears $600 million, a simple cost-benefit analysis suggests that U.N. cooperation is a much cheaper alternative.

As people continue to suffer, and the U.N. further discredited, at what cost must we continue unilateral interventionism. Clearly, the Obama Administration “HOPES” to pursue a realist F.P., and in doing so the bargain of U.N. peacekeeping must become a top priority.

[Marcello Maceira]

The United Nations since it’s founding in 1945, has provided a critical platform for International political issues to be discussed and addressed by the world community. While the UN has been very successful in a number of peacekeeping missions it has received harsh criticism for failures in Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda, and Sudan. As noted by Ambassador Walker the UN is primarily criticized for three reasons: failure of missions to fulfill their original mandates, UN Bureaucracy, and the long lead time for establishing missions. These failures are partially caused by the structure of the UN as well as the changing global environment. When the UN was founded conflicts were often between waring countries. Now many of the conflicts brought to the Security Council are civil conflicts spurred on by ethnic and religious differences. Even with these changes the UN missions have proved to be more cost effective than regional organizations (NATO & AU) and multinational forces (MFO) alike. The United States contributes 25% of the cost for UN peacekeeping missions. Similarly when the US created the MFO to monitor Israeli Egyptian peace the US alone paid 65.3 million to fund the mission. This number is significantly higher than the 25% the US pays for UN missions.
Congress frequently complains at the cost of UN missions and for good reason. While UN missions are a bargain they are generally not as effective as planned and continue for longer than expected. The UN can improve its position by improving its structure in a manner that assures success. Members of the Security Council are influenced by media coverage given to humanitarian crisis and this affects their decisions when voting. The issue is that continuing to support a doomed mission because of public pressure is not going to turn things around. Members of the Security Council should not turn their backs on humanitarian crisis; instead they should reevaluate the mission’s original mandate and whether it’s being fulfilled. If not terminate the mission until it can be completed successfully. Action of this sort would cause further public criticism of the UN who would seemingly be sitting out on this humanitarian crisis and that is against the principles of the UN. The UN needs to slightly modify its existing structure to make it the well-oiled machine it should be. For this to happen the UN must decide as Ambassador Walker put it “When to pull the plug on a UN mission that has gone sour or is not fulfilling its mandate.” In the end UN missions are a good alternative for the US for two reasons: they are cheaper than unilateral or multinational options, and with the UN involved it protects the US’s dwindling image abroad.