Peacekeeping Effects in South America: Common Experiences and Divergent Effects on Civil–Military Relations

Abstract

Participation in UN peace operations has increased differences in civil–military relations in South America. Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay have internalized and implemented divergent defence policies, even as they have increased their troop contributions and been involved in similar or identical peacekeeping missions. This is caused not only by the fact that these countries have very different motivations for participating in peace operations; they have also drawn very different lessons from their exposure to peacekeeping.

Notes

See Lisa L. Martin and Beth Simmons, ‘Theories and Empirical Studies of International Institutions’, International Organization, Vol.52, No.4, 1998, p.753.

Charles C. Moskos, John Allen Williams and David R. Segal, ‘Armed Forces after the Cold War’, in Charles C. Moskos, John Allen Williams and David R. Segal (eds), The Postmodern Military: Armed Forces after the Cold War, New York: Oxford University Press, 2000, p.9.

See Charles C. Moskos, Peace Soldiers: The Sociology of a United Nations Military Force, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976, p.10.

See Charles C. Moskos, ‘Toward a Postmodern Military: The United States as a Paradigm’, in Moskos et al. (n.2 above), pp.14–27.

Moskos et al. (see n.2 above), p.2.

For a detailed analysis of South America's engagement in UN peace operations, see Arturo C. Sotomayor, ‘Why Some States Participate in UN Peace Missions while Others do not’, Security Studies, Vol.19, No.1, 2010, pp.160–95.

See, e.g., Charles C. Moskos, Jr, ‘UN Peacekeepers: The Constabulary Ethic and Military Professionalism’, Armed Forces & Society, Vol.1,1975, pp.388–401.

See Patrick M. Regan, ‘Choosing to Intervene: Outside Interventions in Internal Conflicts’, Journal of Politics Vol.60, No.3, 1998, pp.754–79.

See Wendy Hunter, ‘State and Soldier in Latin America, State and Soldier in Latin America’, Peaceworks, No.10, 1999, at: www.usip.org/resources/state-and-soldier-latin-america

The literature available on Argentina's peace operations is vast. See, e.g., Deborah L. Norden, ‘Keeping the Peace, Outside and in: Argentina's UN Missions’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.2, No.2, 1995, pp.330–49; Antonio L Palá, ‘Peacekeeping and its Effects on Civil–Military Relations’, in Jorge I. Domínguez (ed.), International Security and Democracy: Latin America and the Caribbean in the Post-Cold War Era, Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1998, pp.130–50; Antonio L. Palá, ‘The Increased Role of Latin American Armed Forces in UN Peacekeeping: Opportunities and Challenges’, Airpower Journal, Vol. VIV, Special Edition 1995, pp.1–10, at: www.airpower.maxwell.af.miL/airchronicles/apj/apj95/spe-ed95_files/pala.htm; Andrés Fontana, ‘Seguridad Internacional y Transición Democrática: La Experiencia Argentina, 1983–1999’ [International security and democratic transition: Argentina's experience], working paper, Facultad de Estudios para Graduados de la Universidad de Belgrano, Buenos Aires, 2001; Marcelo Fabián Saín, ‘Seguridad regional, defensa nacional y relaciones cívico-militares en Argentina’ [Regional Security, National Defence and Civil–Military Relations in Argentina], in Francisco Rojas Aravena (ed.), Argentina, Brasil y Chile: Integración y seguridad [Argentina, Brazil and Chile: Security Integration], Santiago de Chile: FLACSO, 1999, pp.125–62; Ricardo E Lagorio, ‘Institutionalization, Cooperative Security, and Peace Operations: The Argentine Experience’, in Jorge I. Domínguez (ed.), International Security and Democracy: Latin America and the Caribbean in the Post-Cold War Era, Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1998, pp.121–9.

See José Etchegaray, ‘Operaciones Militares de Paz’ [Peace operations], policy paper, Permanent Mission of Argentina to the United Nations, New York, Jan. 2001.

Laura Neack, ‘UN Peace-Keeping: In the Interest of Community or Self?’, Journal of Peace Research, Vol.32, No.2, 1995, p.189.

See Thomaz da Costa Guedes, Brazil in the New Decade: Searching for a Future, Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2000, pp.2–3.

Sotomayor (see n.6 above).

See Instituto de Ciencia Política de la Universidad de la República, ‘Informe Semanal Uruguay’, Observatorio Cono Sur de Defensa y Fuerzas Armadas [Weekly Review Uruguay, The Southern Cone Observatory of Defence and Armed Forces], 19–25 July 2003, at: www.cee-chile.org/resumen/urug/uru054-099/semuru96.htm

Ibid.

Interviews with Gen. Héctor R. Islas, Director-General, School of the Arms and Services and Lt. Col. Pablo Pintos, Director, School of Peace Operations, at the School of the Arms and Services, Uruguayan Army, Montevideo, 8 Aug. 2003.

See Graciela Römer and Asociados, Militares y sociedad en Argentina: Siglo XXI, El Ejército actual y su proyección [The Argentine Military and Society: 21st Century, the Current Army and its Projection], Buenos Aires: Graciela Römer y Asociados, 2001.

See Kimberly Marten Zisk, Engaging the Enemy: Organization Theory and Soviet Military Innovation, 1955–1991, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993, pp.21–3.

See David Pion-Berlin, ‘From Confrontation to Cooperation: Democratic Governance and Argentine Foreign Relations’, in David Mares (ed.), Civil–Military Relations: Building Democracy and Regional Security in Latin America, Southern Asia, and Central Europe, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1998, p.86.

See Rut Diamint, ‘Un producto de la posguerra fría: la cooperación en seguridad. El caso argentino’ [A Post-Cold War Production: Cooperation for Security. The Case of Argentina], in Francisco Rojas and Claudio Fuentes (eds), El MERCOSUR de la Defensa, Santiago de Chile: FLACSO, 1997, p.38.

See Norden (n.10 above), p.333.

See David Pion-Berlin, Through Corridors of Power: Institutions and Civil–Military Relations in Argentina, Pittsburgh, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997.

Cynthia A. Watson, ‘Argentina’, in David S. Sorenson and Pia Christina Wood (eds), The Politics of Peacekeeping in the Post-Cold War Era, London: Frank Cass, 2005, p.64.

See Elsa E. Llenderrozas, ‘Argentina, Brasil y Chile en la reconstrucción de Haití: intereses y motivaciones de la participación conjunta’ [Argentina, Brazil and Chile in the Reconstruction of Haiti: Interests and Motivations for Combined Participation], paper presented at Meeting of the Latin American Studies Association, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 15–16 Mar. 2006; Luciana Micha, ‘Una visión integrada de la participación aragentina en MINUSTAH’ [An Integrated Vision of Argentina's Participation in MINUSTAH], Security and Defence Studies Review, Vol.5, No.1, 2005, pp.109–29.

Interview with Luciana Micha, Department of Peace Operations, Argentine Defence Ministry, Buenos Aires, 22 July 2009.

Jeffrey W. Cason and Timothy Power, ‘Presidentialization, Pluralization, and the Rollback of Itamaraty: Explaining Change in Brazilian Foreign Policy Making in the Cardoso-Lula Era’, International Political Science Review, Vol.30, No.2, 2009, pp.117–40.

Interview with Prof. Shiguenoli Miyamoto, Department of International Relations and Centre for Strategic Studies, University of Campinas, Brazil, 15 April 2002.

Monica Hertz, ‘Brazilian Perspectives on the Redefinition of the Concept of Security’, paper presented at workshop on ‘The Traditional and the New Security Agenda: Inferences for the Third World’, Universidad Torcuato DiTella, Buenos Aires, 11–12 Sept. 2000, pp.22–3.

Cason and Power (see above n.27).

See Wendy Hunter, Eroding Military Influence in Brazil: Politicians against Soldiers, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1997; João R. Martins Filho and Daniel Zirker, ‘The Brazilian Military under Cardoso: Overcoming the Identity Crisis’, Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs, Vol.52, No.3, 2000, pp.143–70; Eliézer Rizzo de Oliveira and Samuel Alves Soares, ‘Brasil: Forças armadas, direção política e formato institucional’ [Brazil: The Armed Forces, Political Direction and Institutional Formation], in Maria Celina D'Araujo and Celso Castro (eds), Democracia e Forças Armadas no Cone Sul [Democracy and the Armed Forces of the Southern Cone], Rio de Janeiro: Editora FGV, 2000, pp.112–16; Arturo C. Sotomayor Velazquez, ‘Different Paths and Divergent Policies in the UN Security System: Brazil and Mexico in Comparative Perspective’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.16, No.3, 2009, pp.371–3.

Hunter (see n.9 above), p.4.

Interview with Gen. Benedito Leonel, former head of the Army's Joint Chiefs of Staff and former military adviser to the Brazilian permanent mission to the UN, Brasilia, 1 May 2002.

For a discussion of the training centre in the jungle, see Antonio Eleuterio Sucena do Carmo, ‘CIGS: Centro de Instrução de Guerra na Selva’ [CIGS: Instruction Centre for Jungle Warfare], Revista do Exército Brasileiro [Brazilian Army Journal], Vol.135, No.3, 1998, pp.29–35.

MINUSTAH rotates geographically and few have come from Amazon units. The first Brazilian MINUSTAH contingent was from the Rio Grande do Sul in the far south near Uruguay and Argentina.

See ‘UN Troops Flood into Haiti Slum’, BBC News, 11 Feb. 2007, at: www.bbc.co.uk/caribbean/news/story/2007/02/070211_unhaiti.shtml; ‘Two UN Soldiers Killed in Haiti’, BBC News, 18 Jan. 2006, at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4622772.stm

According to Human Rights Watch, forces in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo routinely resort to lethal force, often committing extrajudicial executions and exacerbating violence there. See Human Rights Watch, ‘Brazil: Curb Police Violence in Rio, Sao Paulo’, 8 Dec. 2009, at: www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/12/08/brazil-curb-police-violence-rio-s-o-paolo

See Moskos et al. (n.2 above).

Interview with Col. Raúl Gloodtdofsky, Military Attaché, Permanent Mission of Uruguay to the UN, New York, 3 July 2003; interview with Ambassador Pablo Sader, General Director for Political Affairs and deputy ambassador to the UN in 1991–93, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Montevideo, 18 Aug. 2003.

See Comando General del Ejército, Ejército Nacional: Desde 1811 al servicio de la patria, desde 1935 al servicio de la paz mundial [National Army: Serving the Nation since 1911, Serving World Peace since 1935], Montevideo, 2003.

‘Military prerogative’ refers to those areas where, whether challenged or not, the military as an institution assumes it has an acquired right or privilege, formal or informal, to exercise effective control over its internal governance. See Alfred Stepan, Rethinking Military Politics: Brazil and the Southern Cone, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988, pp.68–127.

Interview with senior commander at the Peacekeeping Training Centre, Montevideo, 20 Aug. 2003.

Interview with Prof. Julián González, Montevideo, 11 Aug. 2003.

See US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1999–2000, Washington, DC: Bureau of Verification and Compliance, Department of State, 2000.

Interview with senior Uruguayan force commander, Montevideo, 11 Aug. 2003.

For a critical review of Uruguay's peacekeeping participation in Congo, see Arturo C. Sotomayor, ‘Unintended Consequences of Peace Operations for Troop-contributing Countries in South America: The Cases of Argentina and Uruguay’, in Chiyuki Aoi, Cedric de Coning and Ramesh Thakur (eds), Unintended Consequences of Peacekeeping Operations, Tokyo: UN University Press, pp.171–91.