"Disarmament is not an end in itself. The end is peace, and security is one of its essential elements.”
- John Paul II to the General Assembly of UNO Disarmament Efforts from the Vatican, 31 May 1988
It has become undeniable that illicit weaponry, specifically small arms and light weapons pose an unprecedented global security threat. In fact it may almost be acceptable to say that with the turn of the 21st century, we witness a world which is more further armed (whether legally or illegally) than at any other time in human history. That being said, weapons are readily available to a world overwhelmed with intra state conflict and terrorism, both of which have established themselves as the new post cold-war era widespread types of conflict.
Arms transfers have the capacity to directly and indirectly undermine
development by inducing insecurity, contributing to abuses of power, and diverting arms into illegitimate hands.
An increase in conflicting geopolitical interest and tendency for violence has seen the demand for weapons (especially small arms) increase on a continuous basis. All the meanwhile, these conflicts have called on the United Nations (and other multilateral institutions) operations to restore the peace. While operational success of these efforts has hindered upon the fact that states face a difficulty in agreeing on what the common challenges are, let alone the collective strategies to address them (Prins, 2006:110), one thing remains evident, and that is the fact that small arms and light weapons pose a security challenge to UN Peacekeeping Personnel as well.
This article analyzes the challenges facing the international community when it comes to arriving at collective strategies to address arms control, the feasibility of disarmament under the context of UN Peacekeeping operations, and the threat it poses from a military perspective as opposed to a humanitarian one. Furthermore, this article will consider that the ATT policy on engagement as a product of an unstable decision-making process at the international and domestic levels in which perceived humanitarian and political benefits are weighed against the perceived costs and risks of involvement (Hubert et al. 2000:X - See Figure A Appendix).
The aim is to tackle an overall perspective on arms control from a preventive security approach focusing on UN Peacekeeping Operations.
The Preventive Security Impact
“A weapon is a device for making your enemy change his mind.”
- Lois McMaster Bujold, The Vor Game (1900)
Indeed modernization has yielded an impact on numerous societies and resulted in technological advancements that help shape the nature of the global interconnectedness we experience today, but on another hand the “old politics” mindset continues to exist despite the overwhelming driving force of globalization. Politicians worldwide with extensive Cold War experience find themselves facing a world structured along different lines. None the less they still champion the notion of security under the context of national defense as opposed to collective global preventive human security. Perhaps it would be accurate to say that while the Cold War ended, its ripple waves can still be felt today in the remnants it has left behind. The first of which is the sudden spike in illegal arm transfers worldwide ( as a result of massive stockpiles being abandoned and corruption that saw the other half fall into the wrong hands); secondly, the remnant global political psyche of exaggerated national interest.
It goes without saying that as our world becomes ever more interconnected, so does our security. From a Human Security perspective, this new concept of “protection and empowerment” goes beyond the fact that it is only our physical security that is jeopardized. While arms transfers can contribute to peace and development by deterring rebellion and aggression, strengthening legitimate security functions, and helping governments combat crime and violence, arms transfers also have the capacity to directly and indirectly undermine development, by inducing insecurity, contributing to abuses of power, and diverting arms into illegitimate hands (Small Arms Survey 2004:10) Eventually of course one can draw out that arms are not only expensive in terms of their monetary value, but they proliferate on the account of other vital human security pillars. To invest into arms is an equation that yields the same results always (more so amongst developing nations):
- Monetary Security and Poverty; increased levels of poverty as money that could be used in poverty reduction programs, sustaining the local economy and creating new jobs is diverted to military spending.
- Health and Food Security is threatened; decreased health indicators; aid becomes harder to deliver, and often times these aid packages are the sole source of medical supplies. Also, food aid supplies are disturbed. Hence, arms and conflict yield both direct and indirect mortality.
- Delayed Development; again funds that could have been directed at development projects are instead diverted towards arms (often both legal and illegal).
- Finally, in the absence of Preventive Security (which requires arms) it is almost impossible to pursue all other sub categories of the concept of human security.
Now if we take into consideration the fact that In 2002 alone, arms deliveries to Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa (continents/ regions in most need of development assistance programs) constituted 66.7 per cent of the value of all arms deliveries worldwide, with a monetary value of nearly US$17bn and the fact that the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council accounted for 90 per cent of those deliveries (Amnesty International 2004:4) it becomes remarkable to see that there are two faces to the same coin we toss. On the one hand billions are spent on development and on another billions on arms (which in many instances hampers development eventually).
The Variables of Disarmament & Control
“To the extent that money can solve conflicts and potential conflicts, not a huge amount is required compared to what the world is prepared to spend on everything else, including defense."
- Gareth Evans, President of The International Crisis Group, Former Foreign Minister of Australia- Preventing and responding to deadly conflict in UN2000 The United Nations Millennium Summit
Why should disarmament even concern us? Excellent question; now when we take into account the fact that small arms result in at least a third of a million people killed each year, directly with conventional weapons and many more die, are injured, abused, forcibly displaced and bereaved as a result of armed violence, that indicates that on average, up to one thousand people die every day as a direct result of armed violence (Arms Without Borders 2006:4), it becomes apparent then that we not only should be concerned, rather alarmed.
The impact of small arms goes beyond the fact that they simply pose a physical security threat. As mentioned earlier, in an age of globalization, even the threats we face are interconnected, the proliferation of these arms has been shown to hinder development; the cost of lost productivity from non-conflict or criminal violence alone is about USD 95 billion and may reach as high as USD 163 billion per year. (Geneva Declaration 2006:10) Although some steps have been taken in the right direction, for example since early 2001, US-supported programs in 23 countries have resulted in approximately 800,000 SALWs and 80 million rounds of ammunition destroyed (Garcia 2006:10), the world continues to be littered with illegal SALWs which pose a serious risk to global human security. Approximately 8 million small arms and light weapons are produced each year which result in over 1000 deaths per day (Amnesty International 2008) …While this appears to be outragous, to date only about 40 states (including the US and UK) have enacted laws and regulations for controlling the business of arms brokering (Amnesty International 2008).Continued on Next Page »
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Endnotes
1.) NATO, African Union, etc.
2.) Available from UN Information Centre and UNA
3.) Max Boot. Paving the Road to Hell: The Failure of UN Peacekeeping. Foreign Affairs. March/April 2000. http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/55875/max-boot/paving-the-road-to-hell-the-failure-of-u-n-peacekeeping
4.)Committee on Conscience. Burundi Current Situation. United States Memorial Museum. Spring 2008. http://www.ushmm.org/conscience/alert/burundi/contents/02-current/
5.) Nile Gardiner, Ph.D.The U.N. Peacekeeping Scandal in the Congo: How Congress Should Respond. The Heritage Foundation. March 22, 2005. http://www.heritage.org/Research/InternationalOrganizations/hl868.cfm
6.) BBC News. UN probes 'abuse' in Ivory Coast. 23 July 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6909664.stm
7.) United States Department of State Travel Warning. December 15, 2008. http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/tw/tw_915.html
8.)The Haiti Support Group. Haiti News. March 3 2009. http://haitisupport.gn.apc.org/fea_news_index.html
9.) BBC News. UN probes 'abuse' in Ivory Coast. 23 July 2007, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6909664.stm
10.) IBID
11.) Max Boot. Paving the Road to Hell: The Failure of UN Peacekeeping. Foreign Affairs. March/April 2000. http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/55875/max-boot/paving-the-road-to-hell-the-failure-of-u-n-peacekeeping
12.) David Smock. On the Issues: Somalia. United Sates Institute of Peace. January 9, 2007. http://www.usip.org/on_the_issues/somalia.html
13.) CNN.com. U.N.: 100,000 more dead in Darfur than reported. April 22, 2008. http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/04/22/darfur.holmes/index.html.
14.) The Heritage Foundation - http://www.heritage.org/Research/InternationalOrganizations/images/Chart2-lg.gif
15.) United Nations Peacekeeping Operations. “Background note: 31 May 2009”. http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/dpko/bnote.htm
16.) United Nations Peacekeeping Operations. “Background note: 31 May 2009”. http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/dpko/bnote.htm
17.) Mercycorps. “Millennium Campaign”. October 4, 2005 - http://www.globalenvision.org/library/8/809/
18.) Council on Foreign Relations, Jean-Marie Guéhenno. “Key Challenges in Today’s UN Peacekeeping Operations” [ Rush Transcript; Federal News Service, Inc.] 2006. http://www.cfr.org/publication/10766/key_challenges_in_todays_un_peacekeeping_operations
Appendix
Fig A – Some of the issues that outstanding issues that stand as obstacles to the ATT (Parker 2007:3):
- Lack of political will to negotiate an instrument that meets states’ different interests and concerns;
- Lack of capacity on the part of some states to implement such an instrument; and
- Concern that some of the major exporting states will not constructively participate in negotiations on an ATT.
Fig B - Some examples of recent Peacekeeping missions and outstanding Issues:
|
Country
|
Initiation/Termination date
|
Organization(s)
|
Issues
|
|
Bosnia
|
1995–2002
|
United Nations Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (UNMIBH)
|
- the U.N. declared safe areas for Muslims but did nothing to secure them, letting the Serbs slaughter thousands in Srebrenica
- Post conflict relative stability
|
|
Burundi
|
2004–2007
|
United Nations Operation in Burundi (ONUB)
|
- Insecurity continues to be a problem in Burundi and has intensified with the violation of the ceasefire accord that was signed in 2006 after years of civil war.
- Sporadic fighting in late 2007 and early 2008 between Government forces and the Palipehutu-FNL rebel group (Forces Nationales de Libération) has increased during April in and around the capital of Bujumbura displacing thousands throughout the country.
- Food security remains a problem with 600,000 people needing food aid according to a recent UN report.
|
|
Congo
|
1999
|
UN; (MONUC)
|
- Widespread abuses carried out by United Nations personnel against refugees in the Democratic Republic of Congo; Personnel from the U.N. Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo stand accused of at least 150 major human rights violations.
- The crimes involve rape and forced prostitution of women and young girls across the country, including inside a refugee camp in the town of Bunia in northeastern Congo.
|
|
Côte d'Ivoire Ivory Coast
|
2004
|
United Nations Operation in Côte d'Ivoire (UNOCI)
|
- Moroccan soldiers taking part in the mission are accused of rape.
- Cote d’Ivoire continues to experience periodic episodes of political unrest and violence since a 2002 failed coup attempt evolved into an armed rebellion that split the country in two.
|
|
Haiti
|
2004
|
United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH)
|
- Deepening poverty and ineffective governance have left Haiti at risk for renewed violence and political instability.
- 2006 - UN personnel accused of rape and exploitation
|
|
Liberia
|
2003
|
United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL)
|
- 2006 - UN personnel accused of rape and exploitation
|
|
Rwanda
|
1993–1994
|
United Nations Observer Mission Uganda-Rwanda (UNOMUR)
|
- U.N. peacekeepers in Rwanda stood by as Hutu slaughtered some 800,000 Tutsi
- Post conflict dire humanitarian situation
|
|
Somalia
|
1993–1995
|
United Nations Operation in Somalia II (UNOSOM II)
|
- There is still no central government in place
- Airports closed, militias compete for space and economic advantage
- December 24 2007 Ethiopia’s army invaded Somalia, killing hundreds of rebels and encountering virtually no opposition; engaging in clean up operations.
|
|
Sudan
|
2007
|
United Nations/African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID)
|
- 200,000; 2.5 million people displaced…Darfur today is still characterized by insecurity, lawlessness and impunity
- Inability to provide promising results.
|
Note: Not only do peacekeeping operations come at a high material cost, but they too come at a high humanitarian cost. The examples above demonstrate how even when deployed under an international set of standards, unprofessional soldiers, usually from developing countries, engage in inhumane behavior, which in turn lays the grounds for further instability. On a further note, even collaboration between numerous organization is a difficult issue (such as the case of former Yugoslavia) - NATO, the EU and the UN carried out operations without a clear system of the chain of command or structural order.
Fig. C – The Costs of Peacekeeping: 
Fig D- Some examples on UN Peacekeeping Fatalities and operational costs>[15]:
|
UN Mission
|
Country
|
Annual Budget (07/08 - 06/09)
|
Date
|
Fatalities
|
|
MONUC - United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
|
DRC
|
$1,242,729,000
|
Since November 1999
|
144
|
|
UNMOGIP - United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan
|
Pakistan & India
|
$57,392,000 (gross) including voluntary contributions of one third from Cyprus and $6.5 million from Greece
|
Since January 1949
|
179
|
|
UNIFIL
|
Lebanon
|
$680,932,600
|
Since March 1978
|
279
|
|
UNAMID - African Union/United Nations Hybrid operation in Darfur
|
Sudan
|
$1,569,255,200
|
Since July 2007
|
37
|
|
UNMIL- United Nations Mission in Liberia
|
|
$631,689,100
|
Since September 2003
|
128
|
Note: 18 current peace operations directed and supported by the Department of Peacekeeping Operations yield a 2008-2009 total cost of 7,057,751,600 USD. Now when taking into consideration the fact that: “to ensure improvements in fundamental human needs by 2015 approximately $75 billion (7. 5 Billion USD per year) will be required over the next decade to achieve these eight Millennium Development Goals”. It becomes apparent that while the world is overwhelmed with raising money to meet annual MDG goals, the United Nations already spends what is required per year to meet the MDGs on UN Peacekeeping Missions. Let aside the philosophical debate in this regard, one must admit that SALW and eventually conflict itself poses a serious threat to overall human security. Although total costs may appear to be alarming, it is important to remember that the annual operating budget for the 18 peacekeeping-related missions is roughly equivalent to one month of operations, U.S. operations, in Iraq—about $5 billion