Dictionary of Genocide - D Ank Unlimited

to contain a conflict. Through mid-2007, the United Nations has used preventive deployment
in only two specific cases: The UN missions in the former Yugoslav Republic of
Macedonia from 1992 through 1999, and in the Central African Republic in 1998.
Preventive Diplomacy. Preventive diplomacy refers to three specific actions: (1) actions
taken to prevent disputes from arising, (2) actions taken to attempt to resolve disputes
before they escalate into conflicts, and (3) actions attempting to limit the spread of conflicts
after they have broken out. Efforts undertaken to implement preventive diplomacy
may include conciliation, mediation, and/or negotiation.
Preventive Disarmament. Preventive disarmament efforts by the United Nations
attempt to reduce the number of small arms/weapons in conflict-prone regions. This
involves demobilizing combat forces (official military personnel and members of militias
and irregular groups) as well as collecting and destroying the latter’s weapons. Preventive
disarmament is often implemented as part and parcel of a comprehensive peace
agreement.
Private Military Companies (PMCs). Private military companies are those privately
owned firms that hire personnel, form forces, and offer services traditionally provided by a
nation’s military. Such companies offer a wide array of services, including but not limited to
combat operations for states and regional organizations, security and protection for humanitarian
NGO operations in areas of conflict, security for private companies/groups in areas
of conflict, and demining efforts. The use of such services increased enormously in the 1990s
as violent conflicts erupted around the globe and various nations’ militaries were inadequate
for the task(s) at hand. Some of the many reasons for the latter include the following:
(1) following the Cold War, states that once were under the protective wing of one of the
two superpowers (the United States or the Soviet Union) crumbled and felt the need to
seek the assistance of outsiders such as private military companies; (2) certain Western
nations down-sized their militaries following the end of the Cold War, and thus when conflicts
broke out in their states or regions, they sought help from private military companies;
and (3) various corporations and states involved in petroleum, minerals, and other related
industries in areas of conflict hired private military companies to provide security and
protection when local military and/or police forces were not up to the task.
Some see the ever-increasing use of private military companies as a positive development,
whereas others see it as a negative development. Those who see it as positive
believe that such companies are capable of ending violent conflicts more quickly and efficiently
(while still adhering to rules of international law) than some ragtag armies that
now exist in third world countries. Those who perceive the trend as negative see such
companies as constituting a new wave of mercenaries (and all that accrue to such) simply
cloaked in a new, and euphemistic, name.
Project Paperclip. The code name given to a joint British-American operation toward
the end of World War II in which groups of special agents were parachuted behind German
lines with the objective of seizing Germany’s top scientists and technologists and transporting
them back to Allied countries. The roundup was intended to fulfill what some had
referred to as “intellectual reparations,” whereby German scientific figures would be
required to work for the Allies as a way of expunging the German academic world’s contribution
to the Third Reich’s criminal activities.
The Allied agents dropped behind enemy lines tracked down specific scientists, and as
an inducement for the scientists’ cooperation the scientists’ families were sometimes
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