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Skriven 2006-01-17 12:46:28 av Roy Witt (1:1/22)
     Kommentar till en text av Ya'll
Ärende: Why UN Efforts Fail
===========================
Why UN Efforts Fail

January 5, 2006: Peacekeeping has been a lot easier to get involved in
since the Cold War ended in 1991. During the Cold War, the Russians (the
Soviet Union) still maintained that they were the "vanguard of world
revolution," and supported just about any anti-Western rebels out there.
Because Russia had a veto in the UN, it was able to stop any UN
peacekeeping operation it did not approve of. This murderous mischief
eventually contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union, as adventures
in Afghanistan and elsewhere proved very expensive, and often embarrassing
as well.



Freed from the Soviet veto, the UN got into the peacekeeping business in a
big way, and failed spectacularly. You'd never know this from reading UN
press releases. Even before the Cold War ended, the UN had decades of
experience in issuing glowing press releases to cover up yet another
boondoggle. It was never much of a secret that the UN bureaucracy was
corrupt and inept, but the UN was considered such a valuable diplomatic
forum that everyone pretended all the bad news didn't matter. The UN had
perfected the art of waiting around for something good to happen, then
taking credit for it. When bad things happened, you could always find
someone else to blame.



The UN developed a pretty slick routine for peacekeeping. In most cases,
their peacekeepers came in after the fighting was over and peace was
breaking out anyway. This was because a major problem with the UN was that
they were very reluctant to get involved in any fighting ("peacemaking"),
even if such action would save many lives. There were any number of
bureaucratic maneuvers the UN could employ, without even bothering the
members for a vote, to avoid a possibly dangerous peacekeeping situation.
There is a practical, or at least political, reason for this. Many UN
members are tyrannies, who regularly kill their own people in large
numbers. If the UN should suddenly get active about taking care of
situations where thugs are killing innocent civilians, many UN members
would be highly qualified targets. Thus the UN peacekeepers must be very
peaceful, even if atrocities are committed in the vicinity of the
peacekeepers.



Once the UN peacekeepers are in the field, a major concern is minimizing
bad news getting out about misbehavior among the peacekeepers. The UN pays
a rate that is below what professional troops from the West get, but above
what professional and conscript armies in less affluent nations get. As a
result, the UN takes what it can get, usually from less affluent nations.
Many contributing nations are not keen to send their best troops, so the
ones who show up for peacekeeping are a mixed bag. Some of them are poorly
trained, led and disciplined. These guys get into trouble, with women,
with looting and with stealing from the UN. Officials from the UN prefer
to keep all the embezzlement to themselves, as that makes it harder for
the media to get hard evidence.



The UN peacemaking programs emphasize looking good over actually
accomplishing anything. Which is why most UN peacekeeping operations later
turn out to be more smoke and mirrors, than anything of substance. The UN
denies this in general, but gets nervous when you get down to details.



Many people working for the UN mean well, but, let's face it, an
international bureaucracy only functions if the least number of member
nations are offended. Emphasis on the least. Someone is always hacked off
about something. For example, the United States has long been critical
about the corruption and inefficiency. The UN attempts to placate the U.S.
(which is, after all, the largest contributor of funds), but cannot really
crack down on the corruption too hard without offending nations that hold
the majority of the votes in the UN.



So the next time you see mention of "UN peacekeepers," keep in mind that
there's a lot more than peacekeeping going on.


Roy
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