The Causes And Consequences Of The Angolan Civil War

In both the Rwandan and Bosnian genocide, the UN was “involved.” Their main job was to be peacekeepers and try to keep the remaining peace that was left, intact. They were equipped with guns and weapons to defend themselves, but they were not to be used to protect the victims during the genocides. The UN decided they would only

Considering the UN’s recent failures to facilitate peace in Africa, more care should have gone into assigning leadership roles. While Dallaire came across as a passionate and enthusiastic leader, he admitted he lacked experience and had no prior knowledge on the history of Rwandan cultural or its ethnic conflicts. Even as Dallaire set up his campaign in a rundown hotel in Kigal the peace agreement was being undermined. His arrival was marked by a slew of riots and assassinations, all of which were tests of his ability to maintain the peace. It soon became apparent to Dallaire and Hutu extremist than the UN was ill prepared to handle the peace keeping mission at hand.

The United Nations failed Rwanda, in a time of need they abandoned the Rwandan people giving them no physical protection. Sadly, things go wrong with the slaughter of almost 800,000 Rwanda people, left defenseless in a country where no one outside cared. U.N. troops were present as only “peace-keepers.” The dispute was between the Hutus and Tutsis people could of been controlled if the U.N. changed their position, but the result could bring more consequences. This conflict between the two social groups in Rwanda,was left to be resolved on its own with many lives lost.

Ikechi Mgbeoji’s book, Collective Insecurity examines the hidden causes of West Africa’s civil wars and addresses an important question: “Why has the U.N. system not worked to protect people and to enhance their welfare, as intended, in Africa and elsewhere?” In his book, Mgbeoji proposes, “the solution to African political instability lies in a structural rearrangement of the African polity for the purpose of legitimate governance of African peoples.”

The UN and the US government are accredited for deploring conflict situations as well as contributing humanitarian aid, and this is what these two organizations did in Rwanda and Darfur. However, the UN did not do anything to punish or prevent the genocides that took place in these two countries. The US government promised to support the peace talk’s agreement in Darfur and hold the perpetrators accountable for their acts. It never kept that promise since nothing has been done. So far, the UN’s Security Council has also failed in its peace keeping mission effeorts, and is instead pressuring Sudan with words only. No solid steps have been made to bring the wrong doers into justice (Shapiro).

Later the peacekeeping forces brought about cease-fires in Central America and the Iran-Iraq War. As a safeguard they kept forces there to make sure that peace continued. After a few failures in Africa, the United Nations learned that by sending a force that is too small and not very intimidating, peace will crumble. The largest peacekeeping mission ever undertaken by the United Nations was the civil war between Bosnia and Herzegovina, after Yugoslavia broke up. On numerous occasions the United Nations underestimated the forces needed and failed the campaign. Since that failure in Bosnia, the United Nations has refused help to any other nations requesting assistance. (United Nations 2)

Most of the time, when you think of kids, you think of miniature people with no cares in the world. You think of innocent children who haven’t experienced the adversity of life. However, in Angola, that is almost never true.

For eleven years, civil war desecrated the infrastructure throughout the small African nation of Sierra Leone. Tens of thousands were killed, and human suffering was widespread. More than a decade of constant fighting between the government and relentless rebels left the country in ruins. Roads were destroyed, bridges burned, buildings left in shambles, and the power supply nearly eliminated. The United Nations intervened, and assisted the government of Sierra Leone in establishing peace and setting up fair and honest, multi-party elections. The new government has since struggled in rebuilding the war-torn nation. More than half of Sierra Leoneans live in poverty, and nearly half are food insecure. Years of food shortages left nearly a third

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

The war in Darfur materialized at the wrong time for the United States, Norway, and Britain, two of which are permanent members of the U.N. Security Council. At the time, they were focused on ensuring the success of the Naivasha negotiations in Sudan. The Naivasha agreement, also known as the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was an permanent ceasefire agreement between the Government of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/ Sudan People’s Liberation Army to end the Second Sudanese Civil War. This was long time coming because the conflict had started all the way back in 1983. The Security Council used the ‘Brahimi principal,’ which states “regional organizations take primary responsibility for the problems in their backyard” to push responsibility on to the A.U. The Brahimi principle The Security Council was glad to give someone else the responsibility of Darfur so they could focus on others tasks at hand.

The UN had resources in Rwanda with the UNAMIR (United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda). When the UNAMIR sent, a report saying they needed more because something big was going to happen in Rwanda, the UN didn’t believe them so they did nothing. The UN Security Council took a slightly non-intervention type of thought. They didn’t completely stay out of it, they had peace keepers on the ground in Rwanda. But they didn’t send enough and once they were there left them to their own

I agree with this statement, as it states in the book, “If the United States and other governments- working directly and through the United Nations- have sufficient political will, they can work with concerned African governments to make a difference in conflict- plagued countries (pg. 205).” So let go back a little, when the genocide took place in Rwanda 800,000 people last their lives. It seemed as if it wasn’t a major concern to other countries, because everything took place at a slow process to stop the violence at the time. But the world agreed upon,

“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

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

What role did competition between the superpowers have in the early stages of the Angolan Civil War (1974-76)?