Differences Between First And Second Generation Peacekeeping

The Suez Crisis, about 60 years ago, was the world’s first designated UN peacekeeping mission. It was a significant advance within the United Nations and

Although in the past, Canada vastly supported the United Nations, a peacekeeping group, Canada’s rank in the UN Peacekeeping contributions chart has decreased from the 20th to the 21st century. Canada used to be ranked 8th in 1990 sending an average of 1000 forces, whether they be police, military experts, or troops. However in comparison to the other countries that provided thousands of Peacekeepers, in the year 2015, Canada was only ranked 68th sending a total average of 116 forces. From the major decrease of Canadian peacekeepers, it is observed that Canada has scaled back their role as a peacekeeping nation, allowing Canada to uncover its peacemaker within. Secondly, United Nations added an online mediation support tool called Peacemakers. Designed for use by peacemaking professionals, the tool consists of peace agreements, knowledge for guidance as well as material involving the United Nations mediation support services. Peacemaker is used to provide information on various topics revolving around peace mission. The UN’s efforts to try to resolve the worldwide conflict are presented through UN Peacemaker. The UN added peacemaker to inform others of peacemaking, showing that it is not just peacekeeping. Thirdly, the United Nations collects money from its members, Canada may be 9th in the top ten providers, however Canada used to

This peacekeeping force often takes months to gather troops to a location in need and when gathered, little to no force is used to protect the civilians in their time of need. With a standing army the reaction time could be quick and force could be stronger to save millions of lives and provide support in distress countries. Most of the time spent gathering the peacekeeping forces is used to think of logical strikes to the current situation. That time spent creating battle plans have lead to several successful missions. There is a chance with the fast reaction time of the standing army; the careful planning would be thrown out, worsening the situation. Many of these countries need political help from stable countries who are willing to provide support. The United Nations’ 193 countries would be able to provide this support through the standing army. Political allies will form created a peaceful environment in the future.

Thesis: The role of the United Nations has changed from being primarily an international peacekeeping force to primarily a humanitarian organization.

Thesis: The role of the United Nations has changed from being primarily an international peacekeeping force to primarily a humanitarian organization.

As the name suggests, peacekeepers are unbiased special forces whose job is to go in locations where there is a state of conflict and use their negotiation skills to prevent the two sides from engaging in war. This is what the Canadian army has been doing since the Cold War to prevent small conflicts to turn into World War III. This is also what they should keep doing to prevent some major wars. Yet, there are also people who prefer to engage in war rather than peaceful means. Today, not everyone knows who they are, what they do, who created the Canadian peacekeeping forces and how today’s peacekeeping forces remember their predecessors.

Prior to the outbreak of the genocide in April 1994, the United Nations had established the United Nations Assistance Mission in Rwanda. UNAMIR forces consistent of just over 2,000 personnel, and was responsible for the supervision the transition from war to peace. Their responsibilities included ‘monitoring the ceasefire, assisting with demobilisation and mine clearance, and encouraging the facilitation of political and social conditions that would allow a transitional government to take control.1

The United Nations efforts in peace-keeping operations in Rwanda had many setbacks and was considered to be a failure for many reasons. One of the reasons being the International community’s failure to make a distinction between a civil war and genocide in Rwanda. (Khan, 196) This meant that the little effort presented by the UN department of peacekeeping operations was often too late. In previous years the world has witnessed countless civil wars which have taken place in Somalia, Liberia, Haiti, Georgia and Angola. However, genocide was not present in these wars and was uncommon. (Khan, 196) According to Alain Destexhe, Rwanda was only the third experience of genocide in this century. Thus, with the ongoing tensions and unrest, dating back to 1990, between the Hutu-led government and the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) it was evident that Rwanda was on course for a civil war but what was failed to realise was that a genocide was also taking place. (Khan, 197)

Sierra Leone had been considered a fragile state even before its civil war from 1991-2002, this is because it had “weak capacity and will to provide security and deliver services to its population” (Pickering, 2009, p20). The decade during the civil war was overwhelmed by huge human rights abuses, lack of coherent governments, weak social security structures and masses of violence (Evoe, 2008, p2).. A number of peace efforts were generated by international institutions, none of which were extensively effective throughout all of Sierra Leone. Despite these difficulties, the intervention in Sierra Leone is considered a noteworthy success for the United Nations peacebuilding mission. The main objective of peacebuilding missions is to ‘rebuild’ failing and weak states (Cubitt, 2013, p91) and to “prevent violence from recurring in countries that are just emerging from civil conflict” (Paris, 2002, p637). The UN mission in Sierra Leone is widely regarded as an example of successful peacebuilding in a war torn country. The mission facilitated a transition from, a failing state to a moderately peaceful state. This mission is held as an example of successful intervention, and is often used as a means to justify the benefits of UN peacebuilding and peacekeeping missions.

Upon its withdrawal in 1995, the UN left Somalia in mostly the same state it was in in 1992. The mission created the idea in future involvements not to cross the “Mogadishu line” from peacekeeping to war-fighting (Clarke). UNOSOM 2 also suffered 154 fatalities as well as major problems stemming from the complexity of its mandate and command and control issues, confusion over the appropriate rules of engagement (RoE), lack of effective intelligence gathering capabilities, and the huge challenges involved in a predominantly military mission being tasked with inherently political goals

“Give War a Chance” is an article written by the American economist, historian and military strategist Edward Nicolae Luttwak in 1999, in the American magazine Foreign Affairs. It make an easily understandable “buzz”, since its main assumption is that most kind of peacekeeping or humanitarian operations are, in an objective point of view, a bad thing for the peace, and that it tends, paradoxically, to slower its establishment. We will analyze here the main hypothesis that Luttwak is developing among the article, the first one being the destruction of the legitimacy usually accorded to peacekeeping operations, led by the UN or by other military organizations, and the second one being the obstacle to a durable peace establishment, created

In order to understand the concept behind peacekeeping we have to first look at the history of this UN term and how it got established. The initial kick-off year was 1948 (un.org) when the Security Council deployed troops to the Middle East in order to observe the region. It was the outcome of the creation of the state Israel and the rest of the land piece was given and left over to the Palestinian Arabs. The Arab society and the Arab Nation leaders did not accept this division which caused the conflict. At first the UN sent only observers and peaceful troops to the region

Much recent discourse surrounding humanitarian intervention has focused on the responsibility to protect (R2P). Prevention is a key component for good international relations and few would say it is not important, but as evidence to date would show prevention is very ineffective, the legality of military intervention still needs to be debated, as to date there is no consensus. For any intervention to be legitimate, whether unilateral or multilateral, it must comply with international law. So as not to cause any confusion, any situation in which an “intervention” is done with the permission or by request of the state being intervened, should be considered humanitarian assistance as state sovereignty is not breached. This paper will

The United Nations, with its rigid moral and political limitations against force, has become a benchmark of peace and a social achievement of modern times. From war torn Europe, the United Nations developed from five major powers with an initial goal to prevent the spread of warfare through peaceful means and to establish and maintain fundamental human rights. Through the past fifty years, this organization has broadened its horizons with auxiliary organizations from peace keeping missions to humanitarian aid, to economic development. However, in a modern example of ethnic cleansing, the UN faces new a new role as a bystander as its power is bypassed by NATO forces. The UN, however, promises to be an

The purpose of this paper is to examine the six chapters assigned for this week. First, in Weiss et al.’s first chapter entitled The Theory of UN Collective Security, the authors elaborate on the foundation and purpose of the United Nations serves on a global scale by means of collectivity. Second, chapter four entitled Evolving Security Operations: Kosovo, East Timor, Sierra Leone, Lebanon, Sudan, Cote d’Ivoire, Libya, and Syria, provides specific examples of relations between the United Nations and individual nation-states, the progress the UN has made in developing countries, and how the resistance the UN faces affect the organization as well as the population they serve. Third, chapter ten of Weiss et al.’s book, Sustainable Development as Process: UN Organizations and Norms focuses on the humanitarian efforts of the UN, especially in the focus of establishing self-sufficiency in developing countries. Then the three chapters in Pease’s book, Security, The Environment, and Human Rights and Humanitarian Issues, focus on three key issues facing the international organizations today.