European military (in)capabilities - why is Europe so "weak"?

[Leifmk]

UN is completely useless in peacekeeping, sorry to say that, maybe you're a believer in all that international stuff as I used to be, but this isn't what UN should do.

I think, rather, that the UN peacekeeping forces have over the years shown themselves quite effective at actual peacekeeping, i.e. keeping the lid on situations where a certain measure of stability has already been established, and preventing further instability. Not so good at peacemaking, i.e. stabilizing an already unstable situation.

 

[Winner]

I think, rather, that the UN peacekeeping forces have over the years shown themselves quite effective at actual peacekeeping, i.e. keeping the lid on situations where a certain measure of stability has already been established, and preventing further instability. Not so good at peacemaking, i.e. stabilizing an already unstable situation.

Their presence may stabilize the situation, but I don't think they can actually do something in case the people they should keep an eye on want to start fighting again.

I think that the bureaucracy and inability to make quick and controversial decisions prohibits the UN from being a real peacekeeping force.

Rwanda is a nice example of a complete and total UN failure. I think I heard somewhere that when the Belgian soldiers were ordered to leave the country, people they protected tied themselves to their jeeps to prevent them from leaving. When they left, they were massacred, of course, and the blood is on the UN hands. The story is the soldiers had teared off their UN insignia and spate on them before they boarded the plane which took them out of the country.

 

[Riffraff]

I think its unfair that the UN organisation or its 'army' get the blame for situations in which they are sent into a crisis zone with a lousy mandate. If the UN troops can't resolve a situation, or have to leave a location leading to a slaughter, its because they follow their mandate very strictly - which they should to remain impartial.

I tend to think of failures of the UN as failures of the world community itself.

 

[Winner]

I think its unfair that the UN organisation or its 'army' get the blame for situations in which they are sent into a crisis zone with a lousy mandate. If the UN troops can't resolve a situation, or have to leave a location leading to a slaughter, its because they follow their mandate very strictly - which they should to remain impartial.

Yes, and that's the problem! It is an institutionalized moral relativism - you see group of people with guns massacring other people, but you have to remain "impartial" and avoid condemning anybody. That is perverse. Exactly because of this, UN is unable to stop any conflict. Missions like UNPROFOR are useless (just look at the name: UN PROtection FORce - who, pray tell, was protected, except the asses of the UN officials?) because they never get a proper mandate.

I know that UN isn't the only one to blame for that - UN can do only what its members allow it to do, but sometimes, UN is even more incompetent that it is forced to be.

I tend to think of failures of the UN as failures of the world community itself.

Touché. The problem is that nothing like world community exists.

There is European community, Latin American community, even African community. Each is or should be represented by a strong regional organization (EU, AU..), that would be able to enforce peace and stability in its own backyard.

It is clear that if such missions are led by more competent regional organizations, they tend to be more successful. UN should do only what it can do - distribute humanitarian aid and provide mediation in negotiations. This is something all nations can agree on.

 

[Riffraff]

Touché. The problem is that nothing like world community exists.

There is European community, Latin American community, even African community. Each is or should be represented by a strong regional organization (EU, AU..), that would be able to enforce peace and stability in its own backyard.

yeah you've got a point there, I was gonna write 'humanity' instead of 'world community' first, but I felt that would have sounded to dramatic.

 

[schmiddi]

EDIT: Huge point; part of the reason Europe has been able to spend less is that up until recently most of the countries had some form of conscription. Even now, something like 30,000 German soldiers are conscripts. These people don't need to be paid salaries, and salaries are a huge chunk of military budgets.

Atleast for Germany ,thats plain wrong. Conscripts do get payed, though admittedly not much (personal experience). But the costs of conscription is much higher than the direct salaries imply, cause these conscripts have to be "trained", equiped etc.

 

[CurtSibling]

I can't see a situation where Sweden would need 80 000 soldiers. Armies are expensive and never get used. I have never understood why the US needs 4 000 000 soldiers.

The current US army is around 1.4 million men, not 4 million.

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