War 2.0 and How To End It

South Ossetia, one of many little known conflicts

A look at the new ways of resolving conflict and Europe's role in 2012

The European Union was founded after the Second World War, where large armed forces fought each other and devastated a continent. Such wars are becoming a thing of the past and most current and future conflicts are very different. Today, most conflicts are within societies and not between states, argues Jochen Hippler from the Institute for Development and Peace in ISIS Europe's 2009 Peace Report. Politically speaking, there are two important and frequent types of conflict, sometimes combined:

1. Insurgencies involving struggles for power within a state, often involving competing insurgency groups against a government, often with the involvement of outside states conducting 'war by proxy'.

2. Conflicts in the context of failed states, where the state has stopped functioning and insurgents or warlords fight over power and natural resources.

In both cases a military victory is almost impossible to achieve and conflict grinds on, often over decades. In all cases, although winners are hard to see, it is the poor, the dispossessed who are always the losers. The battlegrounds in these cases are often not territory but the hearts and minds of the populations in order to achieve political power in a society rather than the acquisition of territory. Insurgent campaigns are also difficult to fight by military means as it is hard to discern the difference between combatants and civilians. All too often this leads to ethnic cleansing and similar atrocities by organised forces as there is no identifiable enemy or battleground. The old cry from the Crusades of "Kill them all, the Lord will recognise his own" is often a policy objective.

How to end these wars? This is the question being considered by the EU and NATO. It has always been easier to start a war than end it, and in a globalised world the many longstanding conflicts affect us all, from the Israel/Palestine situation, African conflicts, especially in the Congo and Sudan to Western interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan. Most analysts agree that the Iraq war was a grievous strategic error and the poor preparation, combined with hasty decisions, like disbanding the Iraqi army, has proven the old maxim that conflict begets conflict.

Retired British General Rupert Smith wrote in 'The Utility of Force' that "Capturing the will of the people is a very clear and basic concept, yet one that is either misunderstood or ignored by political and military establishments around the world. The politician keeps applying force to attain a condition, assuming the military will both create and maintain it. and whilst for many years the military has understood the need to win hearts and minds of the local population, this is still seen as a supporting activity to the defeat of the insurgents rather than the overall objective."

The US military has learned some hard lessons in Iraq and the arrival of General Petraeus led to a new strategy, elucidated in their counterinsurgency manual, "Counter insurgents achieve the most meaningful success by gaining popular support and legitimacy for the host government, not by killing insurgents. Security plays an important role in setting the stage for other progress, but lasting victory comes from a vibrant economy, political participation, and restored hope."

Hippler agrees with this strategy saying insurgencies seldom succeed against a functioning state and their aims are to weaken a state and provide a 'virtual' state in its place. Groups like Hezbollah and Hamas have been very active in setting up such institutions, providing education, health and other social services where the nominal state cannot provide them. This has given them public support which enhances their capabilities and supports their goals. There is an anecdote set in Afghanistan that illustrates the point. A widow had ten acres of her land taken off her by her husband's brother. She tried for a decade to get restitution in the Afghan courts without success, but when the Taliban gained control of her village she went to their sharia courts. Two days later they had ruled that she must be given her land back and the offender had also to give her an additional ten acres for ten years to compensate her for the loss of crops. This was seen as fair and efficient, so who are the villagers going to turn to in case of difficulties but the Taliban?

The EU is well placed to assist in capacity building. For example European money has kept the Palestinian Authority functioning and has fed the 90% of Palestinians dependant on food aid. The use of soft power is where the EU can try to influence. One council official said that "If there were ten commandments for the EU, the first one would be 'Thou shalt negotiate", echoing Winston Churchill's remark that "Jaw-jaw is better than war, war". However, the parties in conflict do need to have the desire to talk or, as in the case of Israel and Palestine, they will condemn their peoples to seemingly endless violence.

The problem for Europe is that the EU is seen as an economic actor and for all its diplomacy, the monies spent don't always translate into political influence. This often leaves EU policy trailing behind the US State Department and the vagaries of the occupant of the White House. Will Lisbon improve this? Many expect it will, but the vagueness in the treaty mean that there will be turf wars between the institutions and Henry Kissinger's famed request for "what number do I call for Europe?" is still unanswered.

Despite this the EU has built up significant experience in peace building and is a major player. The Obama administration is seen as being much closer to EU ideals and the American President has shown a keen interest in conflict resolution, despite a domestic agenda of almost overwhelming problems, but the EU does need to get its act together and find mechanisms to expedite their contributions towards conflict resolution or they will continue to trail behind Uncle Sam, losing prestige and more importantly, influence.

Give peacekeepers a chance

Alain Le Roy at work

A 2011 interview with the head of the UN peacekeeping operations shows how little has been achieved in the intervening years.

The UN’s peacekeeping chief, Alain Le Roy, is asking the EU to play a greater role on the world stage and thinks the early signs from the External Action Service are showing that the EU wishes to live up to its international responsibilities. After meeting officials, he spoke with New Europe.

Do you have the resources that you need to carry out your missions?

We have enough soldiers but we lack some capabilities, which is why we are keen to develop our cooperation with the EU, who have a lot of capabilities. We don’t have enough helicopters, we lack intelligence capacity, military hospitals and the technology that the EU has. I’ve just come from a meeting and they were very interested to work more with our operations, or in support of UN operations.

Has the European External Action Service changed anything?

I feel a change. The meeting today was a change. It was clear that the member states wanted to define a more collective answer to how they can support peacekeeping. That is exactly why they invited me to come and they have shown that they want to take the initiative and support peacekeeping worldwide. The EEAS is still at the beginning, but this is a very encouraging sign.

Is the EU playing the role it could?

The answer is no. It could play a much bigger role. Less than 7% of our soldiers are European. That is fewer than 7,000. We have 1,400 from Italy, 1,100 from Spain, 500 from France and Austria with 400. In Africa, where our operations are very important, less than 2% of soldiers are from Europe.

The numbers could be increase, along with capabilities. I would like to see more involvement in Africa, which is next door to the EU. Any trouble in Africa could have important ramifications for the EU so I would like to see more political involvement.

How do you persuade the EU to take a larger role?

It’s clear that the EU has a collective ambition to be a very important actor in the global sphere. Participation in the peace and security field, is one where the EU has contributed a lot. What they did in the Balkans was tremendous. When the EU is united it’s a huge force. Now they have the EEAS so it’s time to play a larger role.

You’ve been involved in some places, such as Cyprus, for a very long time

Since 1948 we have had 64 peacekeeping operations and 49 have closed, and we remain with 15 today and Cyprus is one of the oldest, along with Kashmir and the Golan heights. The Cyprus operation began in 1964.

It is clear that the mission is there to provide a space for a political sphere and there is tremendous pressure for a political settlement. It is important to make sure that there are no incidents and thanks to our efforts, there are none.

Has the role of your agency changed? Peacekeeping today seems to be less about separating two sides and more with conflicts that have no front line.

It has changed drastically. The old, traditional peacekeeping is still there in the conflicts I mentioned, but now the bulk of our work is completely different, it’s larger multi-dimensional missions with stabilisation mandates. The DRC and Sudan missions are much more complicated and expectations are much higher and much more challenging than simply standing between two armies. We also have millions of civilians to protect.

This means that the soldiers you want have to be of a much higher standard, are you getting the quality that you need?

We have very professional soldiers. For example in the DRC we have Indian and Pakistani soldiers, they are extremely professional. They have to be very agile as there is a vast territory to cover, with no infrastructure. We have to be much more agile, more mobile and be able to react to any attacks on the civilian population. We don’t always have the right troops or the right equipment, but we’re working on that.

China is beginning to get involved in peacekeeping, how do you see that progressing?

It’s very clear that China has made a strategic decision, at the highest level,  to be more involved in UN peacekeeping. They consider that as a way to show their contribution to peace and security in the world. I was invited to China last year and I was very well received. China now has more peacekeepers in the UN than any EU country.

They are steadily increasing their commitment. They are sending engineers, medical facilities and they are extremely professional and we welcome that.

The UN has just released reports on women’s roles in peace building, how would you like to see involvement increase?

Recently, we issued a report on women, peace and security. It shows that we have made significant progress, for example the number of women in the police has increased from 3% to 9% and we have an ambition to reach 20% by 2014. Out of 15 peacekeeping missions, three are led by women, Cyprus, Liberia and Timor.

It’s important also, to increase women’s participation in political institutions. Thanks to our presence, in Afghanistan 25% of MPs are women, the same in Burundi. In Rwanda, and it was not our decision, but a Rwandan one, they decided to have 56% of women in parliament.

There is much more to be done. When we work with civil society we try to ensure that women are represented, this is a key aim of ours.