the un’s role in nation building

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THE UN S R OLE INN ATION -B UILDING

FROM THE CONGO

TO IRAQ

James Dobbins, Seth G. Jones, Keith Crane, Andrew Rathmell,Brett Steele, Richard Teltschik, Anga Timilsina


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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

The UNs role in nation-building : from the Congo to Iraq / James Dobbins ... [et al.].p. cm.

MG-304.Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 0-8330-3589-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)1. DemocratizationCase studies. 2. United NationsPeacekeeping forcesCase

studies. 3. United NationsMilitary policyCase studies. 4. United NationsEconomic assistanceCase studies. 5. United NationsTechnical assistanceCase

studies. 6. Peace-buildingCase studies. I. Dobbins, James, 1942JZ4984.5.U534 2005341.5'84dc22

2004027669

Cover design by Stephen Bloodsworth

This research in the public interest was supported by the RANDCorporation, using discretionary funds made possible by the generosity of RANDs donors and the fees earned on client-funded research.


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xv

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

e rst volume of this series dealt with the American experience withnation-building, dened therein as the use of armed force in the aftermath

of a crisis to promote a transition to democracy. It examined eight instancesin which the United States took the lead in such endeavors. is volumedeals with the United Nations experience with comparable operations,examining eight instances in which the United Nations led multinationalforces toward generally similar ends.

For the United States, postCold War nation-building had distant precur-sors in the American occupations of Germany and Japan in the aftermath of World War II and its role in fostering the emergence of democratic regimes

there. For the United Nations, the comparable precursor was in the early 1960s in the newly independent Belgian Congo.

e Republic of the Congo failed almost from the moment of its birth. Within days of the Congos independence its army mutinied, the remaining white administrators ed, the administration and the economy collapsed,Belgian paratroops invaded, and the mineral-rich province of Katangaseceded. ese developments cast a serious shadow over the prospects forthe successful and peaceful completion of Africas decolonization, at that

point just gathering momentum. On July 14, 1960, acting with unusualspeed, the Security Council passed the rst of a series of resolutions autho-rizing the deployment of UN-led military forces to assist the Republic of theCongo in restoring order and, eventually, in suppressing the rebellion inKatanga.

Given the unprecedented nature of its mission and the consequent lack of prior experience, existing doctrine, designated staff, or administrativestructure to underpin the operation, the United Nations performed remark-

ably well in the Congo. Signicant forces began to arrive within days of theSecurity Councils authorizationperformance matched in few subsequentUN peacekeeping missions. e United Nations was quickly able to secure


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xvi e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

the removal of Belgian forces. Over the next three years, UN troops forcedthe removal of foreign mercenaries and suppressed the Katangan secession while civil elements of the mission provided a wide range of humanitar-ian, economic, and civil assistance to the new Congolese regime. Mea-sured against the bottom-line requirements of the international commu-nitythat decolonization proceed, colonial and mercenary troops depart,and the Congo remain intactthe United Nations was largely successful.Democracy did not gure heavily in the various Congo resolutions passedby the UN Security Council; there was, in any case, no agreement during theCold War on the denition of that term. e Congo never became a func-tioning democracy, but large-scale civil conict was averted for more thana decade following the United Nations departure, and the country more orless held together for two more decades, albeit under a corrupt and incom-petent dictatorship.

UN achievements in the Congo came at considerable cost in men lost,money spent, and controversy raised. For many people, the United Nationsapparent complicity in the apprehension and later execution of Prime Min-ister Patrice Lumumba overshadowed its considerable accomplishments. As a result of these costs and controversies, neither the United Nationsleadership nor its member nations were eager to repeat the experience. Forthe next 25 years the United Nations restricted its military interventionsto interpositional peacekeeping, policing ceaseres, and patrolling disen-gagement zones in circumstances where all parties invited its presence andarmed force was to be used by UN troops only in self-defense.

HEALING COLD WAR WOUNDS

e conclusion of the Cold War ended this hiatus in nation-building andpresented the United Nations with new opportunities and new challenges.By the end of the 1980s, the United States and the Soviet Union had begunto disengage from proxy wars in Latin America, Africa, and Asia and werenally prepared to work together in pressing former clients to resolve theiroutstanding differences.

e early postCold War UN-led operations in Namibia, Cambodia, El Sal- vador, and Mozambique followed a similar pattern. e international com-

munity, with U.S. and Soviet backing, rst brokered a peace accord. eSecurity Council then dispatched a UN peacekeeping force to oversee itsimplementation. In each case, the UN missions responsibilities includedinitiating an expeditious process of disarmament, demobilization, and


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Executive Summary xix

process which would put the United Nations at cross purposes with every warlord in the country. e result was a resurgence of violence to levels thatresidual U.S. and UN troops proved unable to handle.

Insuperable difficulties also arose in the former Yugoslavia, where UNpeacekeepers were again deployed to an ongoing civil war without themandate, inuence, or repower needed to end the ghting. UN decien-cies contributed to the failure of its efforts in Bosnia, as they had in Soma-lia, but at least equal responsibility lies with its principal member govern-ments: with Russia, for its stubborn partisanship on behalf of Serbia; withthe United States, for its refusal to commit American forces or to supportthe peacemaking initiatives of those governments that had; and with Brit-ain and France, the principal troop contributors, for failing to enforce themandate they had accepted to protect the innocent civilians entrusted totheir care.

e failure of UN missions in both Somalia and Bosnia, when contrasted with the more robust American-led multinational efforts that succeededthem, led to a general conclusion that, although the United Nations mightbe up to peacekeeping, peace enforcement was beyond its capacity. isconclusion, not uncongenial to the United Nations own leadership, is be-lied by that organizations performance 30 years earlier in the former Bel-gian Congo. Its subsequent conduct of small, but highly successful peaceenforcement missions in Eastern Slavonia from 1996 to 1998 and in EastTimor beginning in 1999, suggested that the United Nations was capable of executing a robust peace enforcement mandate in circumstances where thescale was modest, the force included a core of capable First World troops,and the venture had strong international backing.

Eastern Slavonia was the last Serb-held area of Croatia at the end of the con-ict between these two former Yugoslav republics. e United Nations onceagain became responsible for governing a territory in transition, in this casefrom Serb to Croat control. e UN operation in Eastern Slavonia was gener-ously manned, well led, abundantly resourced, and strongly supported by the major powers, whose inuence ensured the cooperation of neighboringstates. Not surprisingly, given these advantages, the UN peace enforcementmission in Eastern Slavonia was highly successful.

American-led multinational missions in Somalia and Bosnia contrastedpositively with the UN missions that had preceded them, primarily be-cause they were better resourced and more determined in the employmentof those larger capabilities. Had the United States been willing to pro-


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xx e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

vide a military commander and 20,000 American troops to the UN-ledoperations in Somalia or Bosnia, those earlier efforts would likely havefared better, perhaps obviating the need for the subsequent multinationalinterventions.

NATION BUILDING IN THE NEW DECADE

In the closing months of 1999, the United Nations found itself charged withgoverning both Kosovo and East Timor. e latter operation proved an idealshowcase for UN capabilities. Like Eastern Slavonia, East Timor was small

in both territory and population. International resources, in terms of mili-tary manpower and economic assistance, were unusually abundant. Major-power inuence secured the cooperation of neighboring states. A multina-tional coalition, in this case led by Australia, secured initial control of theterritory and then quickly turned the operation over to UN management.Remaining combatants were disarmed, new security forces established, alocal administration created, elections held, and a democratically electedgovernment inaugurated in less than three years.

Even this showcase operation exhibited certain chronic UN deciencies.International police and civil administrators were slow to arrive and of variable quality. Once ensconced, UN administrators were a trie slow toturn power back to local authorities. ese were minor blemishes, however,on a generally successful operation.

In less benign circumstances, such weaknesses continued to threaten thesuccess of UN operations. In Sierra Leone, inadequate UN forces were in-serted in 1999 as part of the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UN-

AMSIL) under unduly optimistic assumptions. ey encountered early re- verses and eventually suffered the ultimate humiliation of being capturedand held hostage in large numbers. Poised on the verge of collapse, the SierraLeone operation was rescued by the United Kingdom and turned aroundthanks in large measure to extraordinary personal efforts by the UN Sec-retary-General. British forces arrived, extricated UN hostages, intimidatedinsurgent forces, and began to train a more competent local military. eUnited States threw its logistic and diplomatic weight behind the operation.e regime in neighboring Liberia, highly complicit in Sierra Leones civil

war, was displaced. Additional manpower and economic resources were se-cured. us bolstered, the United Nations was able to oversee a process of disarmament and demobilization and hold reasonably free elections.


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Executive Summary xxi

QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE COMPARISONS

Nation-building can be viewed in terms of its inputswhich, broadly speaking, are manpower, money, and time, and its desired outputswhichare peace, economic growth and democratization. Needless to say, outputsdepend on much more than the inputs. Success in nation-building dependson the wisdom with which such resources are employed and on the suscep-tibility of the society in question to the changes being fostered. Neverthe-less, success is also in some measure dependent on the quantity of inter-national military and police manpower and external economic assistance,and of the time over which these are applied.

e rst volume of this study compared inputs and outputs for seven U.S.-lednation-building missions: Germany, Japan, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo,and Afghanistan. Drawing on that earlier work, this volume compares datafrom the eight UN missions described herein, the eight U.S. missions fromthe previous volume, and data from the current operation in Iraq.

Military Presence

Military force levels for UN missions ranged from nearly 20,000 UN troopsdeployed in the Congo and 16,000 in Cambodia to 5,000 in Namibia andEl Salvador. UN missions have normally elded much smaller contingentsthan American-led operations, both in absolute numbers and in relation tothe local population. e largest UN mission we studied is smaller than thesmallest U.S. mission studied.

DurationUN forces have tended to remain in post-conict countries for shorter pe-riods of time than have U.S. forces. In the early 1990s, both U.S. and UN-led operations tended to be terminated rather quickly, often immediately following the completion of an initial democratic election and the inau-guration of a new government. In this period, the United States and theUnited Nations tended to dene their objectives rather narrowly, focusingon exit strategies and departure deadlines. As experience with nation-building grew, however, both the United Nations and the United Statescame to recognize that reconciliation and democratization could requiremore than a single election. By the end of the decade, both UN- and U.S.-ledoperations became more extended and peacekeeping forces were drawndown more slowly, rather than exiting en masse following the rst nationalelection.


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xxii e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

Figure S.2Duration of Operations

U.S.-led cases

UN-led cases

N u m

b e r o

f y e a r s

G e r m

a n y

J a p a n

C o n g

o

N a m i b

i a

E l S a

l v a d o

r

C a m b

o d i a

S o m a

l i a

M o z a

m b i q u

e H a

i t i

aB o s n i a

E a s t e

r n S l a

v o n i a

aS i e r r a

L e o n

e

aE a s t T i m

o r

aK o s o

v o

aA f g h a

n i s t a n aI r a

q

RAND MG304-S.2 NOTE: See Figure 12.3 for source information.

1

0

23

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

8 8

4

1

4

2

3

2

3

2

5+

9+

5+ 5+

3+

1+

aOngoing operation

101

5

13

2

54

19

34

3

10

20

1

7

0.380.070

5

10

15

20

25

U.S.-led casesUN-led cases

S o

l d i e r s p e r

t h o u s a n

d i n h a

b i t a

n t s

G e r m

a n y (

1 9 4 5

)

J a p a n

( 1 9 4

5 )

C o n g

o ( 1 9

6 1 )

N a m i b

i a ( 1 9

8 9 )

E l S a

l v a d o

r ( 1 9 9

1 )

C a m b

o d i a (

1 9 9 3

)

S o m a

l i a ( 1 9

9 2 )

M o z a m

b i q u e

( 1 9 9

3 )

H a i t i (

1 9 9 4

)

B o s n i

a ( 1 9

9 5 )

E a s t e

r n S l a

v o n i a (

1 9 9 6

)

S i e r r a

L e o n

e ( 2 0

0 0 )

E a s t T

i m o r ( 1

9 9 9 )

K o s o v

o ( 2 0

0 0 )

A f g h a

n i s t a n

( 2 0 0

4 )

I r a q (

2 0 0 3

)

RAND MG304-S.1

NOTE: See Figure 12.2 for source information.

Figure S.1Peak Military Presence Per Capita


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Executive Summary xxi ii

Civilian PoliceInternational civilian police are an increasingly important component of most UN nation-building operations, in some cases representing 10 percentor more of the overall force. UN civilian police forces usually left with thetroops. However, in El Salvador, Haiti, and Eastern Slavonia they stayeda year or more after the military component withdrew. e United Statespioneered the use of armed international police in Haiti but looked to the

United Nations to supply police for the NATO-led operations in Bosniaand Kosovo. e United States did not include civilian police in its last twonation-building operations, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Combat-Related DeathsCasualties suffered are a good measure of the difficulties encountered inan operation. Missions with high casualty levels have been among the leastsuccessful. Among UN cases, the Congo had the highest number of casu-alties, reecting the peace enforcement nature of the operation. After theCongo, the Cambodian operation, lightly manned as a proportion of thepopulation, had the highest casualty level, followed by Sierra Leone.

U.S.-led cases

UN-led cases

P o

l i c e p e r

t h o u s a n

d i n h a

b i t a n

t s

G e r m

a n y

J a p a n

C o n g

o ( 1 9

6 5 )

N a m i b

i a ( 1 9

9 0 )

E l S a

l v a d o

r ( 1 9 9

2 )

C a m b

o d i a (

1 9 9 4

)

S o m a

l i a ( 1 9

9 6 )

M o z a m

b i q u e

( 1 9 9

5 )

H a i t i (

1 9 9 5

)

B o s n i

a ( 2 0

0 0 )

E a s t e

r n S l a

v o n i a (

1 9 9 8

)

S i e r r a

L e o n

e ( 2 0

0 4 )

E a s t T

i m o r ( 2

0 0 2 )

K o s o v

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A f g h a

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RAND MG304-S.3


0 0 0.02

1.12

0.11

0.32

0.010.07 0.13

1.16

3.14

0.02

1.65

2.02

0 00.2

0

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure S.3Peak Civilian Police Presence Per Capita


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xxiv e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

Following the loss of 18 U.S. soldiers in Somalia in 1993, the United Statestook great precautions through the rest of the decade to avoid casual-ties. e United Nations was slightly less risk averse. rough the end of the 1990s, casualty rates in UN-led operations were consequently a littlehigher than American. In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terroristattacks, American sensitivity to casualties diminished. At the same time,the United States abandoned its strategy of deploying overwhelming forceat the outset of nation-building operations. Signicantly lower force-to-population ratios in Afghanistan and Iraq than in Bosnia or Kosovo havebeen accompanied by much higher casualty levels.

U.S.-led cases

UN-led cases

P o s t - c o n

i c t c o m

b a

t c a s u a

l t i e s

G e r m

a n y

J a p a n

C o n g

o

N a m i b i a

E l S a l

v a d o r

C a m b

o d i a

S o m a

l i a

M o z a m

b i q u e H a

i t i

aB o s n i

a

E a s t e

r n S l a

v o n i a

aS i e r r a

L e o n

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aE a s t T

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aK o s o v

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aA f g h

a n i s t a

n aI r a

q

RAND MG304-S.4

0

10

20

30

40

50


aOngoing operation

0 0

135

1 0

25

43

14 3

0+4+

8+

0+

143+ 1,106+

Figure S.4Post-Conict Combat Deaths


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Executive Summary xxv

Sustained PeacePeace is the most essential product of nation-building. Without peace, nei-ther economic growth nor democratization are possible. With peace, somelevel of economic growth becomes almost inevitable and democratizationat least possible. As Table S.1 illustrates, among the 16 countries studied inthis and the preceding volume, eleven remain at peace today, ve do not. Of the eight UN-led cases, seven are at peace. Of the eight U.S.-led cases, fourare at peace; four are notor not yetat peace. ese categorizations arenecessarily provisional, particularly for the ongoing operations in Afghani-stan and Iraq. Peace in Bosnia, Kosovo, East Timor, and Sierra Leone hasbeen sustained but so far only with the ongoing presence of internationalpeacekeepers.

Table S.1Sustained Peace

Country At Peace in 2004

Germany Yes

Japan Yes

Congo No

Namibia Yes

El Salvador YesCambodia Yes

Somalia No

Mozambique Yes

Haiti No

Bosnia Yes

Eastern Slavonia Yes

Sierra Leone Yes

East Timor YesKosovo Yes

Afghanistan No

Iraq No


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xxvi e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

Refugee ReturnSuccess in stemming the ow and facilitating the return of unwanted refu-gees is one of the chief benets provided to the international community by nation-building and often a major incentive to launch such operations.Most nation-building missions have been highly successful in this regard.Low rates of refugee return are often a sign of continued conict in the so-ciety in question (e.g., Somalia, Iraq, and Afghanistan) but are sometimesindicative of the signicantly better living conditions in the places of refuge(e.g., the United States for Salvadoran and Haitian refugees).

DemocratizationBelow, we characterize each of the sixteen societies studied as democraticor not based on codings from Freedom House and the Polity IV Project atthe University of Maryland. Among the U.S.-led cases, Germany and Japanare clearly democratic; Bosnia and Kosovo are democratic but still under varying degrees of international administration; Somalia and Haiti are

not democratic; and Afghanistan and Iraq are seeking to build democraticstructures in exceptionally difficult circumstances. Among the UN-ledcases all but the Congo and Cambodia remain democratic, some of coursemore than others.

U.S.-led cases

UN-led cases

P e r c e n

t o

f r e

f u g e e s r e

t u r n e

d a

f t e r

5

y e a r s

( o r m o s t r e c e n

t y e a r )

N a m i

b i a

E l S a

l v a d o

r

C a m b

o d i a

S o m a

l i a

M o z a

m b i q u

e H a

i t i

B o s n

i a

E a s t e

r n S l a

v o n i a

S i e r r a

L e o n

e

E a s t

T i m o r

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RAND MG304-S.5

100

20

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50

60

70

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100100

53

83

22

98

13

39

73 72

8590

50

12


Figure S.5Refugee Returns After Five Years


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Executive Summary xxvii

Country Democracy in 2004Polity IV

(0 low, 10 high)Freedom House(0 low, 10 high)

Germany Yes 10.0 10.0

Japan Yes 10.0 10.0

Congo No 0.0 2.9

Namibia Yes 6.0 8.6

El Salvador Yes 7.0 8.6

Cambodia No 3.0 2.9

Somalia No 2.9

Mozambique Yes 6.0 7.1

Haiti No 1.0 2.9

Bosnia Yes 5.7

Eastern Slavonia a Yes 7.0 8.6

Sierra Leone Yes 5.0 5.7

East Timor Yes 6.0 7.1

Kosovo Yes

Afghanistan No 2.9Iraq No 0.0 1.4

Table S.2Democractic Development

a Since neither Polity IV nor Freedom House had data for Eastern Slavonia, we used Croatiaas a proxy.

External AssistanceUN-led operations have tended to be less well supported with internationaleconomic assistance than U.S. operations, in both absolute and propor-tional terms. is reects the greater access of the United States to donorassistance funds, including its own, and those of the international nan-cial institutions to which it belongs. In effect, the United States can alwaysensure the level of funding it deems necessary. e United Nations seldomcan. Many UN operations are consequently poorly supported with eco-nomic assistance.

Economic Growthe presence of international peacekeepers and their success in suppress-ing renewed conict, rather than the level of economic assistance, seem tobe the key determinants of economic growth. As the present situation of Iraq illustrates, security is a prerequisite for growth, and money is no sub-


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xxviii e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

U.S.-led cases

UN-led cases

A n n u a

l p e r c a p

i t a a s s

i s t a n c e

( 2 0 0 0 U S $ )

G e r m

a n y

J a p a n

C o n g

o

N a m i b

i a

E l S a

l v a d o

r

C a m b

o d i a

M o z a m

b i q u e H a

i t i

B o s n i

a

E a s t e

r n S l a

v o n i a

S i e r r a

L e o n

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E a s t T

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K o s o v

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RAND MG304-S.6

100

0

200

300

400

500

600

129

29 24

13285

28

90 73

290

25

233

526

57

206

679


Figure S.6Annual Per-Capita Assistance After First Two Years

U.S.-led cases

UN-led cases

E c o n o m

i c g r o w

t h ( % )

G e r m

a n y

J a p a n

C o n g

o

N a m i b

i a

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Figure S.7Average Annual Growth in Per Capita GDP During First Five Years After Conict


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Executive Summary xxix

stitute for adequate manpower in providing it. Indeed, security withouteconomic assistance is much more likely to spur economic growth than iseconomic assistance without security.

THE U.S. AND UN WAYS OF NATION BUILDING

Over the years, the United States and the United Nations have developeddistinctive styles of nation-building derived from their very different na-tures and capabilities. e United Nations is an international organizationentirely dependent on its members for the wherewithal to conduct nation-

building. e United States is the worlds only superpower, commandingabundant resources of its own and having access to those of many othernations and institutions.

UN operations have almost always been undermanned and under-resourced. is is not because UN managers believe smaller is better,although some do. It is because member states are rarely willing to com-mit the manpower or the money any prudent military commander woulddesire. As a result, small and weak UN forces are routinely deployed into

what they hope, on the basis of best-case assumptions, will prove to be post-conict situations. Where such assumptions prove ill founded, UN forceshave had to be reinforced, withdrawn, or, in extreme cases, rescued.

roughout the 1990s, the United States adopted the opposite approachto sizing its nation-building deployments, basing its plans on worst-caseassumptions and relying on overwhelming force to quickly establish a stableenvironment and deter resistance from forming. In Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia,and Kosovo, U.S.-led coalitions intervened in numbers and with capabili-

ties that discouraged signicant resistance. In Somalia, this American force was drawn down too quickly. e resultant casualties reinforced the Ameri-can determination to establish and retain a substantial overmatch in any future nation-building operation. In the aftermath of the September 2001terrorist attacks, American tolerance of military casualties signicantly in-creased. In sizing its stabilization operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, thenew American leadership abandoned the strategy of overwhelming pre-ponderance (sometimes labeled the Powell doctrine after former Chairmanof the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Colin Powell) in favor of the small foot-

print or low prole force posture that had previously characterized UNoperations.


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xxx e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

In both cases, these smaller American-led forces proved unable to establisha secure environment. In both cases, the original U.S. force levels have hadto be signicantly increased, but in neither instance has this sufficed to es-tablish adequate levels of public security.

It would appear that the low-prole, small-footprint approach to nation-building is much better suited to UN-style peacekeeping than to U.S.-stylepeace enforcement. e United Nations has an ability to compensate, tosome degree at least, for its hard power decit with soft power attributesof international legitimacy and local impartiality. e United States doesnot have such advantages in situations where America itself is a party tothe conict being terminated, or where the United States has acted with-out an international mandate. Military reversals also have greater conse-quences for the United States than for the United Nations. To the extentthat the United Nations inuence depends more on moral than physicalpower, more on its legitimacy than its combat prowess, military rebuffs donot fatally undermine its credibility. To the extent that America leans moreon hard than on soft power to achieve its objectives, military reversesstrike at the very heart of its potential inuence. ese considerations,along with recent experience, suggest that the United States would be welladvised to resume supersizing its nation-building missions and to leave thesmall-footprint approach to the United Nations.

e United Nations and the United States tend to enunciate their nation-building objectives very differently. UN mandates are highly negotiated,densely bureaucratic documents. UN spokespersons tend toward under-statement in expressing their goals. Restraint of this sort is more difficult forU.S. officials, who must build congressional and public support for costly and sometimes dangerous missions in distant and unfamiliar places. As aresult, American nation-building rhetoric tends toward the grandiloquent.e United States often becomes the victim of its own rhetoric when itshigher standards are not met.

UN-led nation-building missions tend to be smaller than American opera-tions, to take place in less demanding circumstances, to be more frequentand therefore more numerous, to have more circumspectly dened objec-tives, andat least among the missions studiedto enjoy a higher successrate than U.S.-led efforts. By contrast, U.S.-led nation-building has takenplace in more demanding circumstances, has required larger forces andmore robust mandates, has received more economic support, has espousedmore ambitious objectives, andat least among the missions studiedhasfallen short of those objectives more often than has the United Nations.Table S.3 summarizes nation-building operations since 1945.


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Country Years Peak Troops Lead Actors Assessment

Somalia 19921994 28,000 UN-ledpeacekeepingmission, followedby US-led coalition,followed by UNled peacekeepingmission

Not successful. Littleaccomplished other than somehumanitarian aid delivered toMogadishu and other cities.

Mozambique 19921994 6,576 UN-led Mostly successful. Transitionto independence was peacefuland democratic. But negativeeconomic growth.

Haiti 19941996 21,000 U.S.-led entry,followed by UN-led peacekeepingmission with largeU.S. component

Initially successful but ultimatelnot. U.S. forces restoreddemocratically elected presidentbut U.S. and UN left beforedemocratic institutions took hold.

Bosnia 1995present

20,000 U.S./NATOledmilitary component, adhoc coalition civil

component, largely U.S. and EU

Mixed success. Democraticelections within two years, butgovernment is constitutionally weak.

Table S.3Continued


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EasternSlavonia

19951998 8,248 UN-led Successful. Well-resourcedoperation and clear end state

contributed to peaceful anddemocratic transition.

Sierra Leone 1998present

15,255 UN-led, parallel UKforce in support

Initially unsuccessful, thenmuch improved. Parallel Britishengagement helped stabilizemission.

East Timor 1999present

8,084 Australian-led entry followed by UN-led peacekeeping

mission

Successful. UN oversaw transition to democracy, peace,and economic growth.

Kosovo 1999present

15,000 U.S./NATOledentry, followedby NATO-ledpeacekeeping,UN-led civilgovernance,OSCE-leddemocratization,and EU-led

reconstruction

Mostly successful. Elections within 3 years and strongeconomic growth. But no nalresolution of Kosovos status.

Table S.3Continued


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Afghanistan 2001present

20,000 U.S.-led entry andcounterinsurgency,UN-leddemocratization,and NATO-ledpeacekeeping

Too soon to tell. Democraticelections and decline as abase for terrorism. But littlegovernment control beyondKabul, and rising drug andinsurgency challenges.

Iraq 2003present

175,000 U.S.-led entry,occupation, and

counterinsurgency

Too soon to tell. Overthrow of Saddam Husseins brutal regime

But insurgency has slowedreconstruction efforts.

Table S.3Continued


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Executive Summary xxxv

ere are three explanations for the better UN success rate. e rst is thata different selection of cases would produce a different result. e secondis that the U.S. cases are intrinsically more difficult. e third is that theUnited Nations has done a better job of learning from its mistakes than hasthe United States. roughout the 1990s, the United States became steadily better at nation-building. e Haitian operation was better managed thanSomalia, Bosnia better than Haiti, and Kosovo better than Bosnia. e U.S.learning curve was not sustained into the current decade. e administra-tion that took office in 2001 initially disdained nation-building as an un-suitable activity for U.S. forces. When compelled to engage in such mis-sions, rst in Afghanistan and then in Iraq, the administration sought tobreak with the strategies and institutional responses that had been honedthroughout the 1990s to deal with these challenges.

e United Nations has largely avoided the institutional discontinuitiesthat have marred U.S. performance. e current UN Secretary-General,Ko Annan, was Undersecretary-General for Peacekeeping and head of the UN peacekeeping operation in Bosnia throughout the rst half of the1990s, when UN nation-building began to burgeon. He was chosen for hiscurrent post by the United States and other member governments largely onthe basis of his demonstrated skills in managing the United Nations peace-keeping portfolio. Some of his closest associates from that period movedup with him to the UN front office while others remain in the Departmentof Peacekeeping Operations. As a result, UN nation-building missions havebeen run over the past 15 years by an increasingly experienced cadre of international civil servants. Similarly in the eld, many UN peacekeepingoperations are headed and staffed by veterans of earlier operations.

e United States, in contrast, tends to staff each new operation as if it wereits rst and destined to be its last. Service in such missions has never beenregarded as career enhancing for American military or Foreign Serviceofficers. Recruitment is often a problem, terms tend to be short, and few in-dividuals volunteer for more than one mission.

IS NATION BUILDING COST EFFECTIVE?

In addition to the horrendous human costs, war inicts extraordi-

nary economic costs on societies. On average, one study suggests, civil wars reduce prospective economic output by 2.2 percent per year for theduration of the conict. However, once peace is restored, economicactivity resumes and, in a number of cases, the economy grows. A study


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xxxvi e UNs Role in Nation-Building: From the Congo to Iraq

by Paul Collier and Anke Hoeffler looked at the cost and effectivenessof various policy options to reduce the incidence and duration of civil wars. It found that post-conict military intervention is highly cost-effectivein fact, the most cost-effective policy examined. 1

Our study supports that conclusion. e UN success rate among mis-sions studiedseven out of eight societies left peaceful, six out of eight leftdemocraticsubstantiates the view that nation-building can be an effec-tive means of terminating conicts, insuring against their reoccurrence,and promoting democracy. e sharp overall decline in deaths from armedconict around the world over the past decade also points to the efficacy of nation-building. During the 1990s, deaths from armed conict wereaveraging over 200,000 per year. Most were in Africa. In 2003, the last yearfor which gures exist, that number had come down to 27,000, a vefolddecrease in deaths from civil and international conict. In fact, despitethe daily dosage of horric violence displayed in Iraq and Afghanistan, the world has not become a more violent place within the past decade. Rather,the reverse is true. International peacekeeping and nation-building havecontributed to this reduced death rate.

e cost of UN nation-building tends to look quite modest compared tothe cost of larger and more demanding U.S.-led operations. At present theUnited States is spending some $4.5 billion per month to support its military operations in Iraq. is is more than the United Nations spends to run all17 of its current peacekeeping missions for a year. is is not to suggest thatthe United Nations could perform the U.S. mission in Iraq more cheaply, orperform it at all. It is to underline that there are 17 other places where theUnited States will probably not have to intervene because UN troops are do-ing so at a tiny fraction of the cost of U.S.-led operations.

CONTINUING DEFICIENCIES

Even when successful, UN nation building only goes so far to x the under-lying problems of the societies it is seeking to rebuild. Francis Fukuyamahas suggested that such missions can be divided into three distinct phases:(1) the initial stabilization of a war-torn society; (2) the creation of localinstitutions for governance; and (3) the strengthening of those institutions

to the point where rapid economic growth and sustained social develop-1 Paul Collier and Anke Hoeffler, e Challenge of Reducing the Global Incidence of Civil War, Centre for the Study of African Economies, Department of Economics, Oxford Univer-sity, Copenhagen Challenge Paper, April 23, 2004, p. 22.


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Executive Summary xxxvii

ment can take place. 2 Experience over the past 15 years suggests that theUnited Nations has achieved a fair mastery of the techniques needed to suc-cessfully complete the rst two of those tasks. Success with the third haslargely eluded the United Nations, as it has the international developmentcommunity as whole.

Despite the United Nations signicant achievements in the eld of nation-building, the organization continues to exhibit weaknesses that decades of experience have yet to overcome. Most UN missions are undermanned andunderfunded. UN-led military forces are often sized and deployed on thebasis of unrealistic best-case assumptions. Troop quality is uneven and haseven gotten worse as many rich Western nations have followed U.S. practiceand become less willing to commit their armed forces to UN operations.Police and civil personnel are always of mixed competence. All componentsof the mission arrive late; police and civil administrators arrive even moreslowly than soldiers.

ese same weaknesses have been exhibited most recently in the U.S.-ledoperation in Iraq. ere, it was an American-led stabilization force that wasdeployed on the basis of unrealistic, best-case assumptions and Americantroops that arrived in inadequate numbers and had to be progressively re-inforced as new, unanticipated challenges emerged. ere, it was the qual-ity of the U.S.-led coalitions military contingents that proved distinctly variable, as has been their willingness to take orders, risks, and casual-ties. ere, it was American civil administrators who were late to arrive, of mixed competence, and not available in adequate numbers. ese weak-nesses thus appear to be endemic to nation-building rather than unique tothe United Nations.

CONCLUSIONS

Assuming adequate consensus among Security Council members on thepurpose for any intervention, the United Nations provides the most suit-able institutional framework for most nation-building missions, one witha comparatively low cost structure, a comparatively high success rate, andthe greatest degree of international legitimacy. Other possible options arelikely to be either more expensive (e.g., coalitions led by the United States,

the European Union, NATO) or less capable organizations (e.g., the AfricanUnion, the Organization of American States, or ASEAN). e more expen-2 Francis Fukuyama, State-Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century (Ithaca,NY: Cornell University Press, 2004), pp. 99104..


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