op 18 front pages-converted - The Watson Institute for International ...

ity and seriousness of the U.N.’s humanitarian agenda. A
more decisive response to obstructions might even have reduced
the level of relief required, they said, by making convoys
less vulnerable to extortion. However valid this view in
theory, governments in practice were unwilling to back up
Security Council rhetoric with more military clout.
UNPROFOR troops were often least available where and
when they were most needed. In accepting the refusal of the
Serbs to allow the stationing of UNPROFOR troops in the
areas they controlled, the U.N. essentially agreed to play the
game by Serb rules. As a result, when ethnic cleansing raged
in Banja Luka and the lives of humanitarian personnel were
also on the line, UNPROFOR troops were absent. Those who
viewed UNPROFOR’s restrictive rules of engagement as tying
one of its hands behind its back argued that acquiescing in Serb
objections to UNPROFOR presence rendered the other hand
useless as well.
Even in areas where United Nations troops were present
on the ground, the military tended to be cautious—generally
far more so than civilian humanitarians. The military, with a
clearer chain of command and elaborately codified procedures,
was less apt to take risks than their civilian counterparts,
who placed a premium on being present precisely
where the danger was greatest and local populations the most
exposed. In addition to the military’s own instincts against
sending troops into harm’s way, troop-providing governments
back home were reluctant to have their nationals exposed.
As a result, U.N. soldiers were often least available in
the most critical circumstances.
UNPROFOR troops also encountered difficulties that were
not appropriate for the use of armed force. Many of the
obstructions to humanitarian activities were not high-powered
weapons but agitated (and sometimes well choreographed)
women and children. They blocked passage of relief
to areas controlled by enemies who, they protested, had killed
or imprisoned their menfolk. In such circumstances, the military
was no better off than civilian humanitarians: that is,
“reduced” to negotiations or to waiting out the situation. More
forceful action would have raised the levels of local resistance
to U.N. presence and, at the international level, provoked
87