Keeping watch: Monitoring, technology and innovation in UN peace ...

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4 KEEPING WATCHmarketplace at a fraction of the previous price or even free on some cellphones. However, the United Nations continues to distribute only cartographyproducts and paper maps and has yet to make the jump to sharedGIS databases, which would allow direct input anytime from users suchas UN police and military observers in the field. Fortunately, this capabilityis likely to come soon, given the considerable progress that has beenmade in the DPKO’s cartography units in the missions.Modern militaries around the world have a keen awareness of technologicalevolution, especially the enormous impact on operations fromincreased intelligence, speed and precision. The terms “revolution in militaryaffairs” and “network-enabled operations” or “network-centric warfare”,based on GIS, are now common in military circles, especially in theWestern world. Such systems convey the reality that new technologiescombined with new strategies have substantially changed military operations,especially through advanced electronic networks. Many militarieshave been quick to take advantage of the sensor revolution, deployingruggedized night-vision equipment (now in the fourth generation)and ground-based radars for air/ground surveillance and making use ofaerospace reconnaissance. The military concept of C4ISR (Command,Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance),8 with its strong emphasis on information collection andsharing, has long been viewed as an essential field of military study andoperations.Notwithstanding this rapid evolution of sensor technologies in modernmilitaries and across modern societies, the United Nations has been slowto apply sensors to the military and civilian domains of its peacekeepingoperations. The world organization is subjecting its personnel to unnecessaryrisks by not utilizing modern technologies that can monitor the mostdangerous areas from a safe distance and help gain a broader awarenessof safety and security threats.Technological deficiencies in monitoring and a lack of “situationalawareness” have already led to tragedy. In Rwanda in 1994, Force CommanderRoméo Dallaire complained of being “deaf and blind in thefield”. Not being able to corroborate reports of a planned genocide or tomonitor radio conversations of genocidal militiamen or to track armsflows, he lacked the detailed intelligence to secure UN headquarters supportfor preventive action (Dorn and Matloff 2000). Moreover, after thegenocide began, he also lacked the fighting forces needed for an effectiveresponse. This led to a loss of UN credibility in Rwanda and a UN failurein the eyes of the world, though the fault lay more with the nations in theSecurity Council that delayed and obfuscated instead of providing desperatelyneeded support.In the neighbouring DRC, an estimated 3–4 million people have perishedsince 1996 in widespread strife, including two civil wars, the second
INTRODUCTION: TECHNOLOGY FOR PEACE 5of which could be termed a “continental war” given the presence ofopposing fighting forces from many African nations. At the beginning ofthe Congo/Zaire crisis, the United Nations proved unable even to provideaccurate and consistent counts of moving refugees (Dorn 2005).Large shipments of illegal armaments are routinely imported into theDRC as vast quantities of minerals are illegally shipped out, withoutUnited Nations detection or interdiction (UN Security Council 2004).Rogue militias routinely carry out illegal “tax” collecting, looting, smuggling,kidnapping and killing in areas of the country with no real-timewatch from the United Nations. Furthermore, on average one peacekeeperdies each month while serving in the Congo. 9 Although militaryleaders in MONUC clearly expressed the operational requirements forsurveillance technologies (see the case study in Chapter 7), the UN planningand procurement process has proven too slow in response.The harrowing consequences of the technological deficiencies in UNmissions are illustrated by the November 2008 headline on the front pageof the New York Times: “A Massacre in Congo, Despite Nearby Support.”As hundreds were killed in Kiwanja and the village burned, over100 UN peacekeepers were merely a kilometre away, “struggling tounder stand what was happening outside the gates of [their] base”. Thecommanding officer had to “grope his way through a fog of rumour, speculationand misinformation”. The officer complained: “During this wholetime, there was an informational vacuum” (Polgreen 2008). The rebelmilitias of Laurent Nkunda held Kiwanja and Rutshuru and advancedtowards Goma. Fortunately, the United Nations deployed some advancedtechnologies to counteract this advance, showing what a tremendous differencetechnology can make. As the rebel forces approached Goma, theUnited Nations deployed its Mi-35 attack helicopters equipped withstate-of-the-art day- and night-viewing cameras. The high-zoom featuresenabled the helicopters to identify advancing targets, to confirm groundreports that there were no civilians or UN or government forces nearby,and to aim precise fire. With this help, UN forces prevented an attack onGoma, something the United Nations had failed to do in Bukavu fouryears earlier. The lack of intelligence in 2004 was similar to the famousinadequacies of previous missions, such as in Rwanda.A few UN missions have used a few technologies to great advantage, asdescribed in detail later in this book. The United Nations Interim Forcein Lebanon has deployed several sophisticated radars for both air andground surveillance. The United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprushas become the first UN force to install CCTV cameras to monitor areasin a conflict zone. They are located in sensitive hotspots along the “GreenLine” that winds its way through Nicosia separating two armies. TheUnited Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti has used heliborne camerasthat transmit imagery in real time to mission headquarters. Moreover, the
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