Peace Support Operations: Lessons Learned? - School of Political ...

Peace Support Operations: Lessons Learned? 

Shannon Tow 

Conflict in weak states has emerged as 

one of the most pressing international 

security concerns. In addressing such 

issues, peacekeeping operations are 

likely to continue to play an intrinsic 

role. Yet considerable debate has 

arisen over how these operations are 

best conducted. ‘Peace support 

operations’ (PSO) represent the most 

recent innovation in peacekeeping 

doctrine. The extent to which these 

operations have successfully learned 

from the failure of the peacekeeping 

operations during the 1990s, however, 

is an important question that merits 

investigation. 

This paper argues that PSO doctrine 

addresses peacekeeping failures to the 

extent that it recognises ‘consent’ 1 of 

warring parties in civil conflict must be 

managed. The operational advantages 

of peace support, however, are not 

easily translated into practice. 

Declining political will among 

peacekeeping actors 2 as operations 

progress has perpetuated many of 

those difficulties that characterised 

past peacekeeping missions. This will 

be explored in relation to specific 

operational components of (1) 

mandate, (2) capabilities, (3) 

organisational infrastructure and (4) 

civil-military relations. With insufficient 

political will at the root of inefficient 

peacekeeping, the remedy to 

strengthening PSOs lies not in 

changing the conceptual underpinnings 

of that concept, but in ensuring PSOs 

work more effectively. 

Theoretical Framework 

The PSO doctrine represents a 

response to the changing nature of 

conflict in the post-Cold War era. 

Increasingly, peacekeeping has been 

used to address ‘complex 

emergencies’- that is, ‘a humanitarian 

disaster that occurs in a conflict zone 

and is complicated by, or results from 

conflicting interests by warring parties’ 

(Mackinlay (1996) cited in Wilkinson 

2000: 63). Initially, peacekeeping 

forces adopted a doctrine known as 

‘wider peacekeeping’. This allowed 

peacekeepers to engage in broader 

tasks such as the delivery of 

humanitarian aid (Woodhouse 1999: 

29). Drawing on the experiences of 

Somalia and Bosnia, however, tasks of 

the peacekeeping forces were 

predicated on the strategic ‘consent’ of 

warring parties (Dobbie 1994: 124). 

Peacekeeping and peace enforcement 

therefore remained two separate 

concepts, not to be mixed (Dobbie 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) pp 1-11

PEACE SUPPORT OPERATIONS: LESSONS LEARNED? 

Shannon Tow 

1994: 121). Yet ‘wider peacekeeping’ 

fundamentally misinterprets the 

lessons of the 1990s. The difficulties 

inherent in these earlier missions lay 

not in breaching the consent line but 

rather that in many of these conflicts 

tactical and strategic consent dividing 

lines were meaningless. The ousting of 

Siad Barre from Somalia, for example, 

led to the collapse of any central 

authority controlling the warring 

factions (Berdal 1993: 10). 

In addressing this issue of consent, 

the PSO doctrine goes some way 

towards applying lessons emanating 

from past missions. The PSO doctrine 

still regards consent as an important 

component of any peacekeeping 

mission. Rather than posited as a 

precondition to intervention, however, 

consent is viewed as variable and as 

an element that must be managed 

(Wilkinson 1996: 33). On one level, 

this may be done through limited 

enforcement mechanisms. While 

maintaining impartiality, the PSO 

doctrine envisions a 'spectrum of 

conflict’ to deter belligerents 

(Wilkinson 1996: 31). This entails both 

peacekeeping where consent is less 

problematic and peace enforcement 

where consent is more problematic 

(Wilkinson 1996: 31). Simultaneously, 

however, the doctrine provides that 

peacekeeping forces maintain consent 

and reduce military escalation by 

engaging in ‘capacity building’. This 

entails such measures as conducting 

public affairs campaigns, rebuilding 

infrastructure and engaging in 

mediation (Woodhouse 1999: 33). 

These measures are regarded as 

necessary to creating a peaceful endstate 

(Woodhouse 1999: 33). 

The PSO doctrine therefore addresses 

important criticisms of earlier 

peacekeeping missions rendered by 

the authoritative Brahimi Report, 

submitted to the UN in August 2000. 

Yet issues of declining political will 

among peacekeeping actors, implicit in 

the report, are likely to undercut many 

of the PSO doctrine’s operational 

advantages. What follows is an 

expanded assessment of how well 

PSOs have operationalised this link 

between political will and force 

effectiveness. 

Operational Components 

Mandates 

Among the Brahimi Report’s concerns, 

was the failure of earlier peacekeeping 

missions to devise clear and specific 

mandates that reflect operational 

realities (United Nations General 

Assembly). This was particularly 

evidenced by the United Nations 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 2


Shannon Tow 

Protection Force (UNPROFOR) 3 . The 

UN authorised individual member 

states to “take all measures 

necessary” to restore peace and 

security but did not explicitly direct 

parties as to how to achieve these 

objectives (Hillen 2000: 169). The PSO 

doctrine’s acknowledgement that 

consent is variable partially overcomes 

this difficulty. By allowing for the use 

of measured force, PSOs facilitate 

greater responsiveness to actual 

ground conditions- a mandate that 

neither overstretches the force ‘nor 

inhibits the commanders from getting 

on with the job’ (Wilkinson 1996: 33). 

This capacity is further enhanced by 

the tendency to outsource PSOs to 

more capable and homogenous 

regional organizations that are often 

able to form more specific mandates 

with less political compromise 

(Williams 1998: 30). Successful efforts 

by the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) 

to counter Albanian attacks against the 

Serb quarter of Mitrovica are 

indicative. 

The deterioration of political will as the 

mission progresses, however, could 

undercut such operational advantages. 

This is especially manifest in two ways. 

Firstly, member states of 

peacekeeping operations want to 

ensure sufficient maneouverability and 

control over their forces. This can 

inhibit them from including more 

specific strategic guidance in the 

mandate. As Alex Bellamy observes, 

insufficient direction as to how force is 

to be employed could lead to ‘[the] 

danger that Rules of Engagement and 

Chapter VII authorisation become so 

predominant that force becomes an 

end in itself, rather than being a 

means to a wider political end’ 

(Bellamy 2002: 26). 

Alternatively, a PSO mandate might be 

too limited in scope to effectively 

sustain peace in the longer term. This 

is most recently exemplified by the 

ISAF force in Afghanistan. Sufficient 

consensus initially existed that this 

peacekeeping mission might later be 

expanded to support Afghanistan’s 

interim government. In spite of the 

difficulties of demobilisation and direct 

attacks on aid workers, however, 

member states have refused to 

increase troop levels and expand the 

mission outside Kabul (Deen 2002: 5; 

Holt 2002: 3). This, in turn, raises 

questions as to what extent ISAF can 

provide for a stable end-state. While 

PSOs may resolve many of those 

problems previously associated with 

peacekeeping mandates by recognising 

consent as variable, absence of 

political dedication to peace operations 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 3


Shannon Tow 

in the longer term might preclude 

these lessons being translated into 

practice. 

Capabilities 

Admittedly, attempts to limit the 

mandate reflect past peacekeeping 

operations and the difficulties that 

resulted from the gap between 

mandate and means. In Rwanda, for 

instance, Force Commander Lieutenant 

General Romeo Dallaire requested 

4500 troops to meet warnings of 

escalating violence between Hutus and 

Tustsis, yet was granted only 2500. 

This number proved insufficient to 

protect civilian populations in the 

ensuing genocide (Lessons Learned 

Unit 1996). By addressing the issue of 

variable consent, PSOs necessarily 

provide the framework and 

justification for the more ‘robust force’ 

that the Brahimi Report advocates 

(United Nations General Assembly 

2000). 

INTERFET 4 represents a successful 

case in point. Continuing attacks by 

pro-Indonesian militias against the 

East Timorese population following the 

August 1999 referendum, impelled the 

UN to authorise Australia to forge a 

coalition-of-the-willing to intervene. 

Australia’s ties in the region enabled it 

to form a coalition force of ASEAN 

states (Cotton 2001: 131). Australia 

also provided advanced air and sea 

units for force protection and heavy 

armour and artillery enabling rapid 

deployment. These capabilities proved 

instrumental in countering TNI militias 

in East Timor (Breen 2000: 135). 

Although boasting higher overall 

capability levels than past 

peacekeeping missions, recent PSOs 

have simultaneously highlighted how 

this operational advantage might be 

threatened by deteriorating political 

will of peacekeeping forces over time. 

This is not only the case in fulfilling 

capability requirements promised but 

in sustaining these commitments for 

the duration of the mission. As ‘public 

interest’ in a particular conflict wanes, 

so too do member states’ willingness 

to provide capabilities, particularly as 

other national interests come to the 

fore (Mackinlay and Kent 1997: 34). 

This has devastating ramifications for 

PSOs. The key benefit of the PSO 

model is the ‘spectrum of conflict’ it 

uses to sustain peace and the implicit 

‘robust force’ necessary to realise this 

objective. Former KFOR Commander 

Klaus Reinhardt reflected the most 

difficult part of his mission was 

actually acquiring the money promised 

by member states for the operation 

(Reinhardt (2000) cited in Dorscher 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 4


Shannon Tow 

2000: 32). Constraints on the 

Australian defence budget were also 

responsible for a number of 

shortcomings in key INTERFET 

weapons systems (Bostock 2000: 26). 

Trends towards outsourcing peace 

operations also raise questions as to 

whether a two-tiered peacekeeping 

system might emerge between those 

PSOs supported by a relatively wellequipped 

coalition and those managed 

by the UN and largely symbolic in 

nature (Bellamy 2002: 27). Thus while 

the PSO doctrine facilitates closure of 

the mandate-capabilities gap by 

addressing consent as a managed 

element, whether this is actually 

realised remains contingent on the 

sustainability of member states’ 

political commitments to the 

operation. 

Organisational Infrastructure 

Such dilemmas might also emerge in 

relation to the organisational 

infrastructure that supports these 

capabilities. During the early 1990s, 

planning for peacekeeping missions 

was generally carried out on an ad hoc 

basis. In Somalia, for instance, 

humanitarian agencies were not 

adequately consulted when preparing 

plans to deploy UNISOM (Lessons 

Learned Unit 1995) 5 . PSOs, by 

contrast, require sound logistics and 

supply lines, integrated infrastructure 

and planning, and a unified command 

structure in order to manage consentboth 

through enforcement and 

capacity-building measures (Wilkinson 

1998: 66). This is again best 

exemplified by INTERFET. To mitigate 

operational difficulties arising from 

member states’ concerns over forces’ 

access to national command 

authorities, a command structure was 

established that provided direct access 

from these national commands to 

Australian command (Ryan 2002: 31). 

Yet while INTERFET highlights the 

benefits of the PSO doctrine relative to 

coordinating organisational 

infrastructure, it simultaneously 

illustrates how some member states’ 

lack of dedication to a mission, over 

time, might jeopardise these gains. 

This is particularly the case with 

regard to command structure with 

many countries, most notably the 

United States, wary of submitting their 

troops to foreign command (Berdal 

1993: 42). Even after nominally 

submitting to a supranational 

command structure peacekeeping 

forces often resort back to national 

chains of command when directives 

are unclear (Hillen 2000: 148). 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 5


Shannon Tow 

Logistics arrangements also present 

particular difficulties. Logistics chains 

are not only contingent on whether the 

needs of peacekeeping forces can be 

met, but also whether suppliers and 

transporters can meet the needs of 

logistics headquarters (Cohen and 

Shelton 1999: 4; Breen 2000: 139). In 

the case of INTERFET, logistics chains 

were stretched to maximum (Cotton 

2001: 137). These difficulties were 

only compounded by expectations of 

many international contingents’ that 

Australia, as the lead state, would also 

supply the bulk of INTERFET troops 

(Breen 2000: 140). The PSO doctrine’s 

recognition that consent must be 

managed, points to the model’s utility 

in encouraging a more integrated 

organisational structure. However, the 

erosion of political will over time is 

likely to prove a significant obstacle in 

actually realising these operational 

advantages. 

Civil-Military Cooperation 

Efforts to generate integrated 

peacekeeping missions are further 

complicated by the need to coordinate 

with humanitarian agencies. Such 

efforts have, in past, proven relatively 

unsuccessful. In Bosnia, for example, 

over 150 NGOs operated in the UN 

theater of operations. Only forty-one 

of these agencies, however, regularly 

coordinated their operations with 

UNPROFOR (Hillen 2000: 172). In 

recognising the role of these agencies 

in managing consent, the PSO doctrine 

encourages and codifies greater civilmilitary 

coordination. This has been 

evidenced by the plethora of civilmilitary 

coordinating mechanisms that 

have emerged in recent years. Among 

these include NATO’s strengthened 

Civil Military Cooperation (CIMIC) 

component and Humanitarian 

Coordination Information Centre 

(Bellamy 2001: 11). 

An absence of enduring political will on 

the part of both military contingents 

and NGOs at the operational level, 

however, often undermines such 

initiatives and the efficacy of the PSO 

model. Indeed, both actors continue to 

perceive themselves as autonomous 

rather than as equal partners of a 

broader peacekeeping/peacebuilding 

force. Several military forces, for 

instance, do not attempt or are not 

equipped for the capacity-building 

activities that the PSO doctrine 

envisions. The US army represents a 

case in point, preferring to focus on 

issues of force protection (Bellamy 

2001: 10). Michael Pugh has also 

suggested that civil-military initiatives 

such as NATO’s CIMIC, are designed 

by military forces primarily to support 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 6


Shannon Tow 

their own mission and do not 

adequately take into account civilian 

agencies’ perspectives (Pugh 2001: 

138). Similarly, humanitarian 

organisations often compete with one 

another, hire private security forces 

and pursue a myriad of objectives 

(Fitzgerald and Whitehall 2001: 5-7) 

that make a single civil-military link 

difficult to forge. Until greater political 

will on the part of 

peacekeeping/peacebuilding forces 

emerges, the operational advantages 

of the PSO doctrine will remain difficult 

to realise. 

Even if greater civil-military 

cooperation were possible, however, it 

is debatable to what extent this would 

necessarily lead to a stable end-state. 

The PSO doctrine envisions this 

outcome by highlighting the 

importance of a robust and integrated 

mission to manage consent. 

Ultimately, however, any efforts 

directed towards managing consent 

must take into account the nature of 

the actors engaged in conflict and their 

underlying motives (Bellamy 2002: 

29; Wilkinson 1998: 77). Such actors 

might include professional warlords 

who promote violence to further their 

own material interests. Addressing 

these issues, in turn, requires 

cooperation with agencies beyond the 

humanitarian community including the 

corporate sector and intergovernmental 

economic bodies. 

Furthermore, while the PSO doctrine 

correctly assumes that consent will 

flow on from peacekeeping forces’ 

impartiality, concerted efforts must be 

undertaken to ascertain whether this 

impartiality is perceived by the 

belligerents themselves. Efforts to 

promote consent by enforcement 

might be viewed by the offending 

party as discriminating (Betts 1994: 

22). The PSO doctrine’s operational 

advantages are therefore likely to be 

limited if insufficient political will is 

directed towards these broader 

aspects of managing consent. 

Conclusion 

In light of this fundamental difficulty, 

efforts of operation planners should be 

focused not on continually altering 

peacekeeping doctrines in the hope of 

improving results, but on ensuring that 

the current one works more 

effectively. By highlighting the 

importance of managing consent, 

PSOs represent a meaningful 

adaptation to the changing nature of 

conflict in the post-Cold War era. If the 

doctrine is to actually operate more 

successfully, however, fundamental 

issues of political will must be 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 7


Shannon Tow 

addressed. In order to provide the 

degree of integration that a more 

successful PSO entails, a supranational 

response is required from an 

intergovernmental coalition. 

For these reasons, some analysts have 

suggested creating a UN standing 

army (United Nations General 

Assembly 1996). Yet issues of political 

will coupled with some member states’ 

continued refusal to pay their UN debt, 

decrease the likelihood that any such 

force could be formed. One alternative 

might be conducting a number of joint 

peacekeeping training exercises under 

UN and regional auspices. Such 

measures would facilitate greater 

interoperability and common views on 

what tasks peacekeeping should 

actually entail. Initiatives that promote 

practical collaboration between the 

military and national NGOs might also 

provide for a more integrated future 

peacekeeping force. PSOs can make a 

difference only if such measures that 

seriously address these issues of 

political will are pursued. 

1 

The term ‘consent’, in the peacekeeping context, implies the approval of the relevant local 

political authorities to peacekeeping activities. 

2 The term ‘peacekeeping actors’ is used in reference to both the military peacekeeping force 

itself, humanitarian agencies and troop contributing countries in a multinational force. The 

importance of the conflicting parties political will in realising a sustainable peace is also an 

important factor that affects the operational efficacy of PSOs. Due to reasons of space, 

however, this paper assumes this variable to be constant. 

3 The United Nations Protection Force was the principle peacekeeping force that operated in 

Bosnia-Herzegovina from 1992 to 1995. 

4 Intervention Force East Timor was conducted from 1999 to 2001, in the aftermath of the 

East Timor referendum for independence and ensuing militia violence. 

Dialogue 1:1 (2003) 8


Shannon Tow 

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