Abstract
This book evaluates past and current contributions by Asia-Pacific nations to international peace support and stability missions, with a view to identifying trends and future prospects for such contributions. It fills a glaring gap in the existing literature examined below, which tends to focus predominantly on Western nations’ conduct of these said operations. In spite of widespread proclamations of the coming Asian century, there has been a dearth of sustained and systematic comparative analysis of what Asia-Pacific nations can or cannot contribute to international peace support and stability missions. While there are more than 40 newcomers in United Nations (UN) peacekeeping since the end of the Cold War, many of these newcomers, from a rising China to small states such as Singapore, hail from the Asia-Pacific region. On the other hand, more seasoned contributors such as Indonesia are increasingly viewed as an emerging power with potentially larger contributions to managing global security. Taken together, the increasing participation of Asia-Pacific nations in peace and stability missions also reflects a greater desire for countries in the region to play a larger international role commensurate with the eastward shift of economic and political power.
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Notes
Asian institutions have been extensively analyzed. Ralf Emmers, ASEAN and the Institutionalization of East Asia (London: Routledge, 2011);
Juergen Haacke and Noel M. Morada, eds., Cooperative Security in the Asia-Pacific: The ASEAN Regional Forum (London: Routledge, 2011);
Amitav Acharya, Constructing a Security Community in Southeast Asia: ASEAN and the Problem of Regional Order (London: Routledge, 2009).
The literature on this transformation is vast. For a most notable “textbook” interpretation of such transformation, see Alex Bellamy, Paul Williams, and Stuart Griffin, Understanding Peacekeeping (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2004) (and the second edition, 2009, by Bellamy and Williams, published by Polity).
See also Kobi Michael, David Kellen, and Eyal Ben-Ari, eds., The Transformation of the World of War and Peace Support Operations (Westport, CT: Praeger Security International, 2009);
Henning A. Frantzen, NATO and Peace Support Operations: Policies and Doctrines (London: Routledge, 2006);
Erwin A. Schmidl, Peace Operations between War And Peace (London: Routledge, 2000);
Thierry Tardy, Peace Operations after 11 September 2011 (London: Routledge, 2005).
Earlier considerations of peace operations environment can be seen in Michael Pugh, ed., UN, Peace and Force (London: Routledge, 1997).
United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations and Department of Field Support, “United Nations Peacekeeping Operations Principles and Guidelines” (Capstone Doctrine), 2008. For a critique of the idea of “robust” peacekeeping in the UN context, see Thierry Tardy, “A Critique of Robust Peacekeeping in Contemporary Peace Operations,” International Peacekeeping, Vol. 18, No. 2 (April 2011): 152–67.
UNDPKO, “Principles and Guidelines.” On integrated approach, see United Nations, “Report of the Panel on the United Nations Peace Operations” (Brahimi Report), October 2000; Cedric de Coning, “The United Nations and the Comprehensive Approach” (Copenhagen: Danish Institute for International Studies, DIIS Report 2008);
Cedric de Coning and Karsten Friis, “Coherence and Coordination: The Limits of the Comprehensive Approach,” Journal of International Peacekeeping 15 (2011): 243–72.
United Nations, United Nations Peace Operations Year in Review 2011 (New York: United Nations, March 2012), p. 81
Traditional troop contributors and model-setters for UNPKO were middle powers during the Cold War. These countries no longer provide for the bulk of UN peacekeepers today. Nor does the “Nordic Model,” once standard during the Cold War, provide for a viable template for peace operations today. See Peter Viggo Jakobsen, Nordic Approaches to Peace Operations: A New Model in the Making? (London: Routledge, 2006).
On RtoP, the literature is vast. See the original report, International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS), The Responsibility to Protect: Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (Ottawa: the International Development Research Centre, December 2001).
As for secondary literature, see, for example, Alex Bellamy, Global Politics and the Responsibility to Protect: From Words to Deeds (London: Routledge, 2010);
Rama Mani and Thomas Weiss, Responsibility to Protect: Cultural Perspectives in the Global South (London: Routledge, 2011);
Philip Cunliff, Critical Perspectives on the Responsibility to Protect: Interrogating Theory and Practice (London: Routledge, 2011).
UN Security Council Resolutions 1265 (1999), 1296 (2000), 1674 (2006), 1738 (2006); Victoria Holt and Glyn Taylor, Protecting Civilians in the Context of UN Peacekeeping Operations: Successes, Setbacks and Remaining Challenges (New York: UN DPKO/DPET/PBPS and OCHA/PDSB, November 2009).
On the relationship between RtoP and protection of civilians in armed conflict, see Hugh Breakey, Angus Francis, Vesselin Popovski, Charles Sampford, Michael G. Smith, Ramesh Thakur, eds., Enhancing Protection Capacity: Policy Guide to the Responsibility to Protect and the Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict (Queensland, Australia: Institute for Ethics, Governance and Law, Griffiths University, 2012).
On military implications, see Dwight Raymond, Bill Flavin, and Jurgen Prandtner, eds., Protection of Civilians Military Reference Guide (Carlisle: US Army Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute, 2012).
Alex Bellamy, Responsibility to Protect (New York: Polity, 2009).
UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations and Department of Field Support, “United Nations Peacekeeping Operations Principles and Guidelines” (Capstone Doctrine), p. 16. UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations and Department of Filed Support, “The New Horizon Initiative: Progress Report No.1” (New York, DPKO/DFS, October 2010); Holt and Taylor, Protecting Civilians.
The most standard version is UK Ministry of Defense, Joint Warfare Publication (JWP 3–50): The Military Contribution to Peace Support Operations (1st ed., 1998) and its 2nd edition published in 2003. This was later the basis of standardized NATO PSO. See also Philip Wilkinson, “Sharpening the Weapons of Peace: The Development of a Common Military Doctrine for Peace Support Operations,” International Security Information Service Briefing Paper No. 18, 1998.
Peace Enforcement is defined by UK/NATO doctrines as: “A peace support operation conducted to maintain a ceasefire or a peace agreement where the level of consent and compliance is uncertain and the threat of disruption is high. A Peace Support Force (PSF) must be capable of applying credible coercive force and must apply the provisions of the peace agreement impartially,” whereas Peacekeeping is defined by “peace support operation following an agreement or ceasefire that has established a permissive environment where the level of consent and compliance is high, and the threat of disruption is low. The use of force by peacekeepers is normally limited to self-defence.” JWP 3–50 (2nd ed.), para. 103, citing AAP-6. Hence it is the level of consent that separates the two. Such concepts of peacekeeping/peace enforcement are different from the UN’s definitions, where peacekeeping indicates existence of consent, however fragile, whereas peace enforcement does not presuppose consent. On comparisons of the terms, see UK Ministry of Defence, Joint Doctrine Note 5/11, Peacekeeping: An Evolving Role for Military Forces (Shrivenham: JCDC, July 2011).
JWP 3–50 (2nd ed.), para. 240. Note that Gen. Sir Rupert Smith argued that wars today were about establishing conditions. See Rupert Smith, Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World (New York: Penguin, 2006).
Robert Egnell, Complex Peace Operations and Civil-Military Relations (London: Routledge, Cass Military Studies, 2009).
On US Peace Operations doctrine, for example, see William Flavin, “US Doctrine for Peace Operationsn,” International Peacekeeping, Vol. 15, No. 1 (February 2008): 35–50.
Christopher Dandeker and James Gow, “Military Culture and Strategic Peacekeepingn,” in Earwin A. Schmidle, Peace Operations between War and Peace (London: Routledge 2000).
The most notable was the UK Ministry of Defence’s new doctrine on security and stabilization. UK Ministry of Defence, Joint Doctrine Publication (JDP) 3–40, Security and Stabilisation: Military Contribution (Shrivenham: The Development, Concepts, and Doctrine Centre, Ministry of Defence, 2009). The US also updated its counterinsurgency doctrine.
The US Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual (U.S. Army Field Manual No. 3–24; Marine Corps Warfighting Publication No. 3–33.5), (Published also from Univ. of Chicago Press, 2006).
For a recent academic consideration of stability operations, see Chiyuki Aoi, Legitimacy and the Use of Armed Force: Stability Missions in the Post-Cold War Era (London: Routledge, 2011).
Some exception to this trend can be identified, such as UN Interim Force in Lebanon, where Italy and France, for example, contribute large numbers of troops. In 2011, International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) under NATO command employed more personnel than the rest of peace operations combined. Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, SIPRI Yearbook 2011: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2012), Appendix 3A.
Egnel, Civil Military Relations; Richard Teuten and Daniel Korski, Preparing for Peace: Britain’s Contribution and Capabilities (RUSI Whitehall Papers 74, 2010).
Cedric de Coning and Karsten Friis, “Coherence and Coordination: The Limits of the Comprehensive Approach,” Journal of International Peacekeeping, Vol. 15 (2011): 243–72.
Such construct was not without criticisms. For an excellent discussion of issues in UK doctrinal developments, see Stuart Griffin, “Iraq, Afghanistan and the Future of British Military Doctrine: From Counterinsurgency to Stabilisation,” International Affairs, Vol. 87, No. 2 (March 2011): 317–33.
Hugo Slim, “With or Against? Humanitarian Agencies and Coalition Counter-Insurgency,” Center for Humanitarian Dialogue, Opinion (July 2004).
Nicholas Leader, “Proliferating Principles, or How to Sup with the Devil without Getting Eaten,” The International Journal of Human Rights, Vol. 2, No. 4 (1998): 1–27.
Alex J. Bellamy and Paul D. Williams, “The New Politics of Protection? Côte d’Ivoire, Libya and the Responsibility to Protect,” International Affairs, Vol. 87, No. 4 (July 2011): 825–50.
Eli Stammes, Peace Support Operations: Nordic Perspectives (London: Routledge, 2008).
For instance, David S. Sorenson and Pia Christina Wood, eds., Politics of Peacekeeping in the Post-Cold War Era (London: Frank Cass, 2005);
Derek McDougall, “Humanitarian Intervention and Peacekeeping as Issues for Asia-Pacific Security,” in James Hentz and Morten Boas, New and Critical Security and Regionalism: Beyond the Nation State (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), pp. 33–55.
R. E. Utley, Major Powers and Peacekeeping (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), is a good example.
See Norrie McQueen, UN Peacekeeping in Africa (New York: Longman: 2002);
Andrzej Sitkowski, UN Peacekeeping: Myth and Reality (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2006);
and Beatrice Pouligny, Peace Operations Seen from below (London: Hurst and Co, 2006).
As noted above, no cross-regional work on politics of PKO participation exist in the literature. Nonetheless, peace operations policies of great powers in the region have been examined in a few journals/books. For China, see Stefan Stahle, “China’s Shifting Attitude towards UN Peacekeeping Operations,” The China Quarterly, Vol. 195 (2008): 631–55;
Marc Lanteigne, “A Change in Perspective: China’s Engagement in the East Timor UN Peacekeeping Operations,” International Peacekeeping, Vol. 18, No. 3 (2011): 313–27.
On Japan, see Chiyuki Aoi, “Beyond Activism-lite: Issues in Japanese Participation in Peace Operations,” Journal of International Peacekeeping, Vol. 13, Nos. 1–2 (2009): 72–100;
Hugo Dobson, Japan and United Nations Peacekeeping (London: Routledge, 2003).
Yee-Kuang Heng, “Confessions of a Small State: Singapore’s Evolving Approach to Peace Operations” Journal of International Peacekeeping, Vol. 16, Nos. 1–2 (2012): 119–51.
For the history of Australia’s involvement in peace operations, see David Horner et al., eds., Australian Peacekeeping: Sixty Years in the Field (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2009);
James Cotton, East Timor, Australia and Regional Order: Intervention and Its Aftermath in Southeast Asia (London: Routledge, 2004);
Jeffrey Grey, A Military History of Australia (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2008).
Japanese Ministry of Defense, Contribution by Advanced Nations on Peace Operations (research commissioned to Research Institute for Peace and Security [RIPS], coordinated by Chiyuki Aoi, Tokyo: RIPS, March 2011).
Sefan Staehe, “China’s Shifting Attitude towards UN Peacekeeping Operations,” The China Quarterly, Vol. 195 (2008): 631–55.
For a recent analysis of Japan’s expeditionary capabilities, see Chiyuki Aoi, “Punching Below Its Weight: Japan’s Post-Cold War Expeditionary Missions,” in Alessio Patalano (ed.), Maritime Strategy and National Security in Britain and Japan: From the First Alliance to the Post-9/11 World (Leiden: Global Oriental, 2012).
See, for example, the following for theory and policy considerations stemming from such structure. John G. Ikenberry and Michael Mastunduno, International Relations Theory and the Asia-Pacific (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 2003);
William H. Overholt, Asia, America, and the Transformation of Geopolitics (Rand Corporation, Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2009).
US Department of Defense, “Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense,” January 2012.
Literature on power transition is of relevance here. See A. S. K. Organski, World Politics (New York: Knopf, 1968);
Zhiqun Zhu, U.S.-China Relations in the 21st Century: Power Transition and Peace (London: Routledge, 2009).
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Aoi, C., Heng, YK. (2014). The Asia-Pacific in International Peace Support and Stability Operations. In: Aoi, C., Heng, YK. (eds) Asia-Pacific Nations in International Peace Support and Stability Operations. Asia Today. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137366955_1
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