Military strategy and peacekeeping: An unholy alliance?

ABSTRACT

Despite the increased use of military force in peacekeeping operations in the twenty-first century, these operations are not included in traditional strategic theory. In this article, I outline the logic of four strategies for peacekeeping operations – defence, deterrence, compellence and offence – and trace the use of these strategies in two consecutive UN operations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: MONUC and MONUSCO. The article concludes that all four strategies are indeed used in the two operations, but they are neither comprehensive nor proactive, leaving the true potential of military strategy unrealised.

KEYWORDS:

• Military strategy
• use of force
• coercion
• peacekeeping
• MONUC
• MONUSCO

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ There are some exceptions, for example, the UN operation in DR Congo in the 1960s.

² Charles T. Hunt, ‘All Necessary Means to What Ends? The Unintended Consequences of the “Robust Turn” in UN Peace Operations’, International Peacekeeping 24/1 (2017), 108–31; John Karlsrud, ‘The UN at War: Examining the Consequences of Peace-Enforcement Mandates for the UN Peacekeeping Operations in the CAR, the DRC and Mali’, Third World Quarterly 36/1 (2015), 40–54; Thierry Tardy, ‘A Critique of Robust Peacekeeping in Contemporary Peace Operations’, International Peacekeeping 18/2 (2011), 152–67.

³ Here, I follow Barry R. Posen. In his article on military responses to refugee disasters, Posen argues: ‘The threat or use of force for humanitarian purposes is as much an act of strategy as is the threat or use of force to achieve geostrategic goals.’ Barry R. Posen, ‘Military Responses to Refugee Disasters’, International Security 21/1 (1996), 72–111, 79.

⁴ On limited war and counterinsurgencies, see, for example, Lawrence Freedman, ‘Ukraine and the Art of Limited War’, Survival 56/6 (2014), 7–38; Stephen Peter Rosen, ‘Vietnam and the American Theory of Limited War’, International Security 7/2 (1982), 83–113; Hew Strachan, ‘Strategy and the Limitations of War’, Survival 50/1 (2008), 31–54; Hew Strachan, ‘Strategy or Alibi? Obama, McChrystal and the Operational Level of War’, Survival 52/5 (2010), 157–82. On humanitarian interventions, see Taylor B. Seybolt, Humanitarian Military Intervention: The Conditions for Success and Failure (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2007). See also, Genocide Prevention Task Force, Preventing Genocide: A Blueprint for U.S. Policymakers (Washington, DC: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum 2008), on genocide, and Posen, ‘Military Responses to Refugee Disasters’, on refugee disasters.

⁵ Ken Ohnishi, ‘Coercive Diplomacy and Peace Operations: Intervention in East Timor’, NIDS Journal of Defense and Security 13 (2012), 53–77, 77. See also Alexander J. Bellamy, ‘Lessons Unlearned: Why Coercive Diplomacy Failed at Rambouillet’, International Peacekeeping 7/2 (2000), 95–114.

⁶ See, for example, Arthur J. Boutellis, ‘From Crisis to Reform: Peacekeeping Strategies for the Protection of Civilians in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’, Stability: International Journal of Security and Development 2/3 (2013), 1–11; Stian Kjeksrud, ‘The Utility of Force for Protecting Civilians’, in Haidi Willmot, Ralph Mamiya, Scott Scheeran and Marc Weller (eds.), Protection of Civilians (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2016), 329–49; Paul D. Williams, Enhancing Civilian Protection in Peace Operations: Insights from Africa (Washington, DC: Africa Center for Strategic Studies 2010).

⁷ There are some notable exceptions, for example, Hakan Edstrom & Dennis Gyllensporre, Political Aspirations and Perils of Security: Unpacking the Military Strategy of the United Nations (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan 2013); Trevor Findlay, The Use of Force in UN Peace Operations (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2002); John Hillen, Blue Helmets: The Strategy of UN Military Operations (London: Brassey’s 1998).

⁸ Jeffrey W. Meiser, ‘Ends + Ways + Means = (Bad) Strategy’, Parameters 46/4 (2016/2017), 81–91, 86. This understanding also follows Barry Posen’s understanding of grand strategy. Barry R. Posen, The Sources of Military Doctrine: France, Britain, and Germany between the World Wars (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 1986), 13.

⁹ For an overview of all four approaches, see, for example, Robert J. Art, ‘To What Ends Military Power?’ International Security 4/4 (1980), 3–35; Peter Viggo Jacobsen, Western Use of Coercive Diplomacy: A Challenge for Theory and Practice (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan 1998); David J. Lonsdale, ‘Strategy: The Challenge of Complexity’, Defence Studies 7/1 (2007), 42–64.

¹⁰ I am using coercion in the same way as for example, Daniel Byman and Matthew Waxman, i.e. I include both deterrence and compellence. Daniel Byman and Matthew Waxman, The Dynamics of Coercion: American Foreign Policy and the Limits of Military Might (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2002). Robert A. Pape, for example, uses coercion instead of compellence. Robert A. Pape, ‘Coercion and Military Strategy: Why Denial Works and Punishment doesn’t’, Journal of Strategic Studies 15/4 (1992), 423–75.

¹¹ Byman and Waxman, The Dynamics of Coercion, 3; Jakobsen, Western Use of Coercive Diplomacy, 11; Pape, ‘Coercion and Military Strategy’, 425.

¹² Jakobsen, Western Use of Coercive Diplomacy, 12.

¹³ Colin S. Gray, Maintaining Effective Deterrence (Carlisle, PA: SSI, US Army War College 2003), 25; Jakobsen, Western Use of Coercive Diplomacy, 12; Pape, ‘Coercion and Military Strategy’.

¹⁴ However, some scholars include pre-emptive strikes in their understanding of defence. For example, Art includes both ‘offensive (first) strikes’ and ‘repellent (second) strikes’ in his understanding of defence. Art, ‘To What Ends Military Power?’ 5.

¹⁵ Thomas C. Schelling, Arms and Influence (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press 1966).

¹⁶ Byman and Waxman, The Dynamics of Coercion, 3.

¹⁷ For a discussion on coercion vs brute force, and different forms of coercion, see Byman and Waxman, The Dynamics of Coercion.

¹⁸ Art, ‘To What Ends Military Power?’ 5; Glenn H. Snyder, Deterrence and Defense: Toward a Theory of National Security (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 1961), 4.

¹⁹ Snyder, Deterrence and Defense, 4.

²⁰ Cf. Edstrom and Gyllensporre, Political Aspirations and Perils of Security; Hillen, Blue Helmets.

²¹ See, for example, UN, S/RES/1756 (2007): Resolution 1756 (2007) (15 May 2007). In later mandates, several of these objectives have been included as part of the protection of civilians. See, for example, UN, S/RES/2277 (2016): Resolution 2277 (2016) (30 March 2016), 9–10.

²² Virginia Page Fortna, Does Peacekeeping Work? Shaping Belligerents’ Choices after Civil War (Princeton: Princeton University Press 2008); Kersti Larsdotter, Military Interventions in Internal Wars: The Study of Peace or the Study of War? (Gothenburg: School of Global Studies, University of Gothenburg 2011), 58–9.

²³ This is similar to Taylor B. Seybolt’s categorisation in his research on humanitarian interventions as well as Paul D. Williams categorisation in his research on civilian protection in peacekeeping operations, but including all aims of peacekeeping operations. Seybolt, Humanitarian Military Intervention; Williams, Enhancing Civilian Protection in Peace Operations.

²⁴ Art, ‘To What Ends Military Power?’ 5; Lonsdale, ‘Strategy’, 53; Snyder, Deterrence and Defense, 3–4.

²⁵ Sometimes, other organisations, such as NGOs and humanitarian assistance convoys are included in this kind of defensive strategies. The aim is, however, the same.

²⁶ UN, S/1999/790: Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Preliminary Deployment in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (15 July 1999); UN, S/2000/30: Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (17 January 2000), 12–13; UN, S/2001/572: Eighth Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (8 June 2001), 13; UN, S/RES/1291 (2000): Resolution 1291 (2000) (24 February 2000).

²⁷ UN, S/2000/30, 12. In February 2000, this was authorised by the Security Council, under a Chapter VII mandate. UN, S/RES/1291 (2000), 4. The forces were indeed also authorised with this resolution to ‘protect civilians under imminent threat of physical violence’, but in subsequent concepts of operations, the Secretary-General firmly stated that the troops deployed did not have the capacity to do so. See page xx for further discussion.

²⁸ UN, S/2000/30, 12–13; UN, S/RES/1291 (2000).

²⁹ UN, S/2001/128: Sixth Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (12 February 2001), 11.

³⁰ In this way, contemporary peacekeeping operations sometimes resembles humanitarian interventions, with the exception that they cannot be deployed without the consent of the belligerent parties.

³¹ UN, S/RES/1291 (2000).

³² UN, S/2002/621: Eleventh Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (5 June 2002), 11.

³³ UN, S/2004/1034: Sixteenth Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (31 December 2004), 9.

³⁴ UN, S/2008/728: Fourth Special Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (21 November 2008), 11.

³⁵ UN, S/2009/160: Twenty-Seventh Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (27 March 2009), 13.

³⁶ MONUSCO, ‘MONUSCO Deploys to Support Security Zone in Goma – Sake Area’, Press Release, PR/OSMR/300713 (30 July 2013).

³⁷ UN, S/2008/728, 14.

³⁸ UN, S/2004/650: Third Special Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (16 August 2004), 21.

³⁹ UN, S/RES/1565 (2004): Resolution 1565 (2004) (1 October 2004), 2.

⁴⁰ UN, S/2006/390: Twenty-First Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (13 June 2006), 6; UN, S/RES/1671 (2006): Resolution 1671 (2006) (25 April 2006).

⁴¹ UN, S/RES/1756 (2007), 4.

⁴² UN, S/RES/2098 (2013): Resolution 2098 (2013) (28 March 2013), 4.

⁴³ UN, S/RES/2147 (2014): Resolution 2147 (2014) (28 March 2014).

⁴⁴ UN, S/2014/957: Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Submitted Pursuant to Paragraph 39 of Security Council Resolution 2147 (2014) (30 December 2014), 12.

⁴⁵ For a detailed discussion on compellence, and coercive diplomacy in interventions, see Bellamy, ‘Lessons Unlearned’; Jakobsen, Western Use of Coercive Diplomacy; Ohnishi, ‘Coercive Diplomacy and Peace Operations’.

⁴⁶ This is also true for closely related operations, such as military operations in refugee disasters. According to Posen, ‘rescuers’ in refugee disasters ‘more often find themselves in the active compellence mode than the deterrent mode’. Posen, ‘Military Responses to Refugee Disasters’, 81.

⁴⁷ UN, S/RES/1355 (2001): Resolution 1355 (2001) (15 June 2001).

⁴⁸ MONUSCO, ‘MONUSCO Deploys to Support Security Zone in Goma’.

⁴⁹ MONUSCO, ‘International Envoys for the Great Lakes Region Call for Decisive Actions against the FDLR’, Press Release (2 January 2015).

⁵⁰ MONUSCO, ‘International Envoys for the Great Lakes Region’.

⁵¹ UN, S/2008/728, 11.

⁵² UN, S/2004/650.

⁵³ UN, S/RES/1565 (2004).

⁵⁴ UN, S/2004/650, 21.

⁵⁵ UN, S/RES/1565 (2004). This was specifically asked for in a letter from the Secretary-General to the President of the Security Council. UN, S/2004/715: Letter dated 3 September 2004 from the Secretary-General addressed to the President of the Security Council (7 September 2004).

⁵⁶ UN, S/2005/167: Seventeenth Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (15 March 2005), 9.

⁵⁷ UN, S/2005/506: Eighteenth Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (2 August 2005), 7.

⁵⁸ UN, S/2009/160, 3.

⁵⁹ UN, S/RES/2098 (2013), 6.

⁶⁰ UN, S/RES/2098 (2013), 6–7.

⁶¹ UN, S/RES/1493 (2003): Resolution 1493 (2003) (28 July 2003), 4.

⁶² UN, S/RES/1291 (2000).

⁶³ UN, S/2004/650, 21. UN Security Council resolution 1533 authorize MONUC to seize or collect arms. UN, S/RES/1533 (2004): Resolution 1533 (2004) (12 March 2004).

⁶⁴ UN, S/RES/2147 (2014), 5.

⁶⁵ UN, S/RES/2147 (2014), 6.

⁶⁶ UN, S/RES/2147 (2014), 7.

⁶⁷ UN, S/RES/1856 (2008): Resolution 1856 (2008) (22 December 2008), 4.

⁶⁸ Snyder, Deterrence and Defense, 4.

⁶⁹ UN, S/2002/1005: Special Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (10 September 2002), 7.

⁷⁰ UN, S/2002/1005, 6.

⁷¹ UN, S/2004/650, 21.

⁷² UN, S/RES/1565 (2004).

⁷³ Strachan, ‘Strategy and the Limitations of War’, 48.

⁷⁴ See, for example, Art, ‘To What Ends Military Power?’ 6.

⁷⁵ UN, A/68/787: Evaluation of the Implementation and Results of Protection of Civilian Mandates in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations (7 March 2014), 7–8. This also in line with Trevor Findlay’s findings in 2002 regarding the willingness of using force by UN peacekeepers. Findlay, The Use of Force in UN Peace Operations, 355.

⁷⁶ Safe zones and safe havens are often utilized in humanitarian interventions. See Posen, ‘Military Responses to Refugee Disasters’.

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Kersti Larsdotter

Kersti Larsdotter is Associate Professor of Military Strategy at the Norwegian Defence University College, Norway, as well as Associate Professor of War Studies at the Swedish Defence University, Sweden. Her research interests include the dynamics, nature and conduct of war, specifically civil wars and different forms of military interventions, such as peacekeeping, stability and counterinsurgency operations. She has published in journals such as Journal of Strategic Studies, Small Wars & Insurgencies and Parameters.