By: David Pugliese, Defence Watch
The Mali mission that the Canadian government announced Monday had a familiar ring to it. Canada will contribute two Chinook helicopters, four armed Griffons and an air support contingent.
Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland pointed out that the contribution meets the government’s pledge to return Canada to peacekeeping and peace operations.
During the 2015 federal election campaign, then Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau promised that his government would “renew Canada’s commitment to peacekeeping operations.”
Monday’s announcement has a familiar ring to it. That’s because the UN had thought it convinced the Liberal government in 2016 to contribute the Chinooks and Griffons to the Mali mission. Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan had said that year the government was focused on Africa for a UN contribution. Mali was “one place we need to be mindful of,” Sajjan added.
In September 2016 Canada sent a team to Mali to conduct a reconnaissance mission in that country as a prelude to a potential deployment. Members of the Canadian Forces, the RCMP and Global Affairs Canada, took part in the reconnaissance.
Both the Dutch military and UN were lobbying Canada to provide Chinooks and Griffons.
In November 2016 Atul Khare, the undersecretary general of the UN’s department of field support, tried subtly put pressure on the government but outlining the need for the helicopters. “I think the most important contributions currently would be devoted to Mali,” he told journalists at a security conference meeting in Halifax after meeting with Sajjan. Both armed helicopters and military utility choppers were needed, he added.
It appeared that the appeals worked – a short time later information was leaked to journalists that the provision of Chinooks for the Mali mission was a go.
And then nothing.
In February 2017 it was revealed that Canada missed an opportunity to provide the commanding officer for the Mali mission because the Liberal government first wanted to confer with the Trump administration on its peace support plans.
A little more than a year after that the Canadian government is back to where it started.
Friday, March 23, 2018
Thursday, March 22, 2018
Send Canadian forces into Mali with our Eyes Open
Opinion Column - The Hamilton Spectator
After months of wavering, Justin Trudeau's Liberals have finally committed Canadian peacekeepers to a dirty, dangerous mission in Mali.
The wisdom of the government's decision this week has already been challenged by critics who say this is not peacekeeping as Canadians have ever known it because much of this impoverished, West African nation is still torn apart by fighting.
There is no peace to be kept, they point out, fully aware Mali is the United Nation's most dangerous, ongoing mission and that 162 peacekeepers have died there since 2013.
Despite there being some truth in these words of warning, on balance Ottawa made the right call.
The Liberals campaigned in the last election with a pledge to renew Canada's peacekeeping commitments, but did little in their first two years in office, for which they were roundly criticized.
At the start of 2018, there were just 43 Canadian peacekeepers deployed on UN missions — the lowest number since Canada helped initiate those missions 62 years ago.
While defending Canada must be the priority for our military, there is a long and honourable tradition in this country of deploying our Armed Forces in tandem with our allies, not only to promote peace but also to end conflicts that claim innocent, civilian lives.
But is Mali the place for Canada to breathe new life into this tradition?
In theory, the Mali government and two coalitions of armed groups have agreed to a peace process. In reality, peace remains elusive.
Parts of the country are lawless and chaotic due to ongoing fighting that involves not only Islamist jihadists but rival ethnic groups. That instability could spread to neighbouring countries, igniting a regional crisis.
And just as al-Qaida insurgents in Afghanistan played a role in the infamous 911 attacks on the United States, so al-Qaida fighters in Mali could decide to export their violence to Europe or North America.
No wonder the UN sent 12,000 peacekeepers and 1,900 police officers into Mali to lay the groundwork for a lasting peace there. Most of this support comes from poor, African nations.
They should not have to shoulder the burden alone. As one of the world's wealthiest countries, Canada has a role to play.
Canada should not help Mali just so the Liberals can say they kept a promise — though it's welcome to see them doing this.
Instead, Canada should send troops to Mali to help that tormented nation, stabilize a shaky region and, quite possibly, protect our own continent from terrorists.
The plan is to deploy two Chinook transport helicopters and four Griffon attack helicopters to provide armed escort and protection in the fight against the Islamist militants in Mali. An infantry unit and military trainers will also go along.
This is a relatively modest yet significant, 12-month commitment that can be reviewed next year.
Our forces will be in danger, but less so because most of their work will be done in the air, not on the ground.
Of course Canadians should not blindly underestimate the risks. But we should not shirk a job that should be done, eyes-open.
After months of wavering, Justin Trudeau's Liberals have finally committed Canadian peacekeepers to a dirty, dangerous mission in Mali.
The wisdom of the government's decision this week has already been challenged by critics who say this is not peacekeeping as Canadians have ever known it because much of this impoverished, West African nation is still torn apart by fighting.
There is no peace to be kept, they point out, fully aware Mali is the United Nation's most dangerous, ongoing mission and that 162 peacekeepers have died there since 2013.
Despite there being some truth in these words of warning, on balance Ottawa made the right call.
The Liberals campaigned in the last election with a pledge to renew Canada's peacekeeping commitments, but did little in their first two years in office, for which they were roundly criticized.
At the start of 2018, there were just 43 Canadian peacekeepers deployed on UN missions — the lowest number since Canada helped initiate those missions 62 years ago.
While defending Canada must be the priority for our military, there is a long and honourable tradition in this country of deploying our Armed Forces in tandem with our allies, not only to promote peace but also to end conflicts that claim innocent, civilian lives.
But is Mali the place for Canada to breathe new life into this tradition?
In theory, the Mali government and two coalitions of armed groups have agreed to a peace process. In reality, peace remains elusive.
Parts of the country are lawless and chaotic due to ongoing fighting that involves not only Islamist jihadists but rival ethnic groups. That instability could spread to neighbouring countries, igniting a regional crisis.
And just as al-Qaida insurgents in Afghanistan played a role in the infamous 911 attacks on the United States, so al-Qaida fighters in Mali could decide to export their violence to Europe or North America.
No wonder the UN sent 12,000 peacekeepers and 1,900 police officers into Mali to lay the groundwork for a lasting peace there. Most of this support comes from poor, African nations.
They should not have to shoulder the burden alone. As one of the world's wealthiest countries, Canada has a role to play.
Canada should not help Mali just so the Liberals can say they kept a promise — though it's welcome to see them doing this.
Instead, Canada should send troops to Mali to help that tormented nation, stabilize a shaky region and, quite possibly, protect our own continent from terrorists.
The plan is to deploy two Chinook transport helicopters and four Griffon attack helicopters to provide armed escort and protection in the fight against the Islamist militants in Mali. An infantry unit and military trainers will also go along.
This is a relatively modest yet significant, 12-month commitment that can be reviewed next year.
Our forces will be in danger, but less so because most of their work will be done in the air, not on the ground.
Of course Canadians should not blindly underestimate the risks. But we should not shirk a job that should be done, eyes-open.
CAF Role 2 Medical Hospital in Ebril, Iraq Saying Put until Early 2019
By: David Pugliese, Defence Watch
The Canadian government is still figuring out how to further contribute to the Iraq mission. But in the meantime it has extended the Canadian military commitment to lead the Role 2 Medical Treatment Facility in Erbil, Iraq, until March 31, 2019. This extension is in response to a request from the United States, the Department of National Defence stated Monday.
The Canadian government is still figuring out how to further contribute to the Iraq mission. But in the meantime it has extended the Canadian military commitment to lead the Role 2 Medical Treatment Facility in Erbil, Iraq, until March 31, 2019. This extension is in response to a request from the United States, the Department of National Defence stated Monday.
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| Erbil, Iraq. January 23, 2017 – Canadian Armed Forces medical personnel take part in a simulated patient training exercise at the Role 2 hospital in Erbil, Iraq. (Photo: Courtesy of Sgt Josephine Carlson, US Army) |
The current Canadian commitment to Iraq is the following: An air mobility Detachment comprised of a CC-150 Polaris aerial refueling aircraft and two CC-130J Hercules aircraft for tactical airlift; Tactical helicopters; A CAF-led Role 2 medical facility; Training, advising, and assisting Iraqi security forces; Intelligence support; and Support to NATO Training Capacity Building Iraq program.
What's the point of peacekeepers when they don't keep the peace?
With the current debate on Canada's return to Peacekeeping UN operations, this article by Chris McGreal was published by The Guardian in September of 2015, and it still reads well today.
Enjoy,
Originally Published September 2015
From Rwanda to Bosnia, Haiti to Congo, failures raise questions about future of United Nations blue helmets
Rwanda, 1994. The nadir of many lows for UN peacekeeping.
Hundreds of desperate Tutsis sought refuge on the first day of the genocide at a school where 90 UN troops were under the command of Captain Luc Lemaire. Here, they were surely safe from the Hutus and their machetes.
The UN flag flew over the school. The Belgian peacekeepers were armed with a machine gun, planted at the entrance. These soldiers were the world’s army. The Tutsis could not imagine they would stand by while people were slaughtered.
The 39-year-old captain feared otherwise. The UN in New York had ignored warnings that the genocide was being planned and the security council was pulling out peacekeepers in response to the mass killing.
Within days, the UN command decided there was more important work for Lemaire and his men than protecting Tutsis. The peacekeepers were ordered to abandon the school in order to escort foreigners to the airport and out of Rwanda.
As the soldiers left, Tutsis begged to be shot rather than left to the militia’s machetes. Within hours, the 2,000 people at the school were murdered by gun, grenade and blade.
Lemaire’s contingent kept a sporadic video diary of the wretched events. At one point a shaky camera captures a sandbagged machine-gun post and a pickup truck of Hutu militiamen sweeping by.
The video then focuses on the soldiers’ log. It reads: “New York didn’t agree to change the rules of engagement.” The peacekeepers were not to be permitted to save Tutsis. The camera’s microphone picks up an anonymous voice: “There are killings and New York doesn’t give a damn.”
From Rwanda to Bosnia, Haiti to Congo, failures raise questions about future of United Nations blue helmets
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| A UN tank helps civilians evacuate from Kigali, Rwanda, 1994. Photograph: Scott Peterson/Getty Images |
Rwanda, 1994. The nadir of many lows for UN peacekeeping.
Hundreds of desperate Tutsis sought refuge on the first day of the genocide at a school where 90 UN troops were under the command of Captain Luc Lemaire. Here, they were surely safe from the Hutus and their machetes.
The UN flag flew over the school. The Belgian peacekeepers were armed with a machine gun, planted at the entrance. These soldiers were the world’s army. The Tutsis could not imagine they would stand by while people were slaughtered.
The 39-year-old captain feared otherwise. The UN in New York had ignored warnings that the genocide was being planned and the security council was pulling out peacekeepers in response to the mass killing.
Within days, the UN command decided there was more important work for Lemaire and his men than protecting Tutsis. The peacekeepers were ordered to abandon the school in order to escort foreigners to the airport and out of Rwanda.
As the soldiers left, Tutsis begged to be shot rather than left to the militia’s machetes. Within hours, the 2,000 people at the school were murdered by gun, grenade and blade.
Lemaire’s contingent kept a sporadic video diary of the wretched events. At one point a shaky camera captures a sandbagged machine-gun post and a pickup truck of Hutu militiamen sweeping by.
The video then focuses on the soldiers’ log. It reads: “New York didn’t agree to change the rules of engagement.” The peacekeepers were not to be permitted to save Tutsis. The camera’s microphone picks up an anonymous voice: “There are killings and New York doesn’t give a damn.”
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| General Ratko Mladić of the Bosnian Serb army, left, drinks with Dutch colonel Ton Karremans, second right, in the Bosnian village of Potočari, on 12 July 1995, the second day of the massacre. Photograph: Anonymous/AP |
The betrayal of the Tutsis in Rwanda was a low point for UN peacekeeping but not an isolated one. A year later, Dutch peacekeepers failed to stop the massacre of 8,000 Muslim men in Srebrenica, a supposedly UN “safe area”, the most notorious mass killing by the Serbs in Bosnia.
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Not long before, there had been the debacle in Somalia where a US-led UN humanitarian operation turned into a bloody conflict against a powerful warlord. By then Angola was already back at war after its UN peacekeeping mission collapsed amid accusations it contributed to the breakdown of peace.
Other disasters – the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Sierra Leone – were still on the horizon even as the UN peacekeeping department’s budget doubled and doubled again with growing numbers of missions.
70 years and half a trillion dollars later: what has the UN achieved?
There were good reasons to question the point of UN peacekeeping in the 1990s and to wonder if it was not costing as many lives as it was protecting by offering an illusion of security. The murdered Tutsis at the school might have stood a better chance if they had fled to Uganda.
Two decades later, those responsible for peacekeeping – UN officials, countries on the security council assigning missions, militaries contributing the forces in blue helmets – say the lessons of the 1990s have been learned. Protection of civilian lives is now a priority. UN soldiers no longer have their hands tied in using force to defend the innocent. Perhaps most important, the failures of two decades ago stripped the UN of the illusion that an election and a few soldiers in blue helmets is enough to sustain peace.
But even as peacekeeping has ballooned to become by far the most expensive of UN departments (in 2015 it will cost nearly $9bn to keep 120,000 blue helmet soldiers and policemen deployed in 16 countries from Mali to Cyprus and Haiti, compared with just $500m at the end of the cold war), it is dogged by challenges.
The politics of the UN security council continues to hamstring action over some conflicts, such as Syria and Darfur. Other missions drag on indefinitely, such as in the DRC and Haiti. There is friction between the UN and some governments over who has ultimate command over peacekeeping troops, which has resulted in conflicting orders with disastrous consequences. Then there are spreading conflicts against armed Islamist groups in central and west Africa.
“In the last 15 years, the number of missions, number of crises have drastically multiplied,” said Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general. “In addition to using military and police forces, we have been deploying a lot of special political missions. This is preventative diplomacy. If we can prevent at the time of symptoms of a crisis, we can save a lot of human lives and human resources.”
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Jack Christofides, who is on leave from the UN as director of peacekeeping operations for central and west Africa, described peacekeeping as “extremely taxing at the moment”.
“We’ve got more troops, we’ve got a bigger budget, we deployed in all sorts of very very difficult places, much more difficult than we’ve ever been, and we’re stretched, we’re really stretched,” he said.
“If you think of the old deployments in places like Lebanon and Bosnia, there is a certain infrastructure you could use and work with. The troops coming were generally from countries that had the means to launch expeditions. Today, when you’re talking about northern Mali and central Africa, you have both extremely dangerous conditions and geostrategic locations which are very difficult to get to.”
The UN is also grappling with persistent accusations of rape and sexual exploitation by its peacekeepers, which is further undermining confidence in the organisation, particularly in some of the countries where its soldiers are deployed.
And there are added demands as the US presses for peacekeepers to take on a more aggressive role, particularly against armed Islamist groups in Africa. President Barack Obama is jointly hosting a summit with Ban in New York later this month to seek commitments to strengthen peacekeeping with better trained troops, equipment and intelligence resources, to the alarm of some of the countries that provide substantial contingents of troops in blue helmets.
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| Indian soldiers gather before their departure to Sudan on a UN peacekeeping mission. Photograph: Raveendran/AFP/Getty Images |
India, which has sent more soldiers on UN missions than any other country – 180,000 on 49 missions – is openly challenging the move towards what some see as mostly rich and powerful countries on the security council sending the poor to fight and die.
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“India is completely committed to peacekeeping provided peacekeeping is what we know it to be,” said India’s ambassador to the UN, Asoke Kumar Mukerji. “The soldiers in the blue helmets, under the blue flag, are impartial. They are not supposed to be partisan. If somebody wants soldiers to go in and fight they should hire mercenaries, not take UN soldiers.”
UN peacekeeping came into its own with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the diminishing of ideological rivalries that had dominated international politics since the second world war.
Early successes in Cambodia, Namibia, Mozambique and El Salvador generated an overconfidence in the ability of UN soldiers to keep the peace. Each of those countries had an accord that former warring parties wanted to maintain.
The UN learned the hard way in Angola, Rwanda and Bosnia that where the UN wants peace more than those in conflict, then the illusion of peacekeeping can perpetuate instability and cost lives.
Out of the disasters of the 1990s came a new model including an ethos of “responsibility to protect”. No longer would UN forces stand idly by while innocent people were murdered. That has helped drive a rapid expansion of peacekeeping to become the UN’s single largest operation.
In 1991, the year the Soviet Union collapsed, the peacekeeping budget was just $490m. Over the past decade it has leapt from $3.8bn to about $9bn as the size and length of missions has expanded. More than 100,000 UN peacekeepers have served in Haiti since 2004 and close to 250,000 been deployed to the DRC over the past 15 years. There is little prospect of either mission ending soon.
Today, UN troop deployments in the DRC, Sudan and Darfur each cost more than $1bn a year, with Mali and Central African Republic not far behind. The most expensive outside Africa is Haiti, with a budget of $500m.
The emphasis on Africa is in part a reflection of the enduring nature of some conflicts on the continent, but also the politics of the security council. The UN might have had large peacekeeping missions in Syria and Ukraine, were it not for Russian objections.
As the scale of peacekeeping has grown so have the questions about its role. Most particularly, are peacekeepers there to monitor peace or to enforce it? It’s a source of increasing friction between the major powers on the security council that approve UN intervention and some of the countries which provide the troops.
In 2000, British forces landed in Sierra Leone after UN peacekeepers stood aside or fled an advance on the country’s capital, Freetown, by a notoriously brutal rebel group, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF). Several hundred peacekeepers surrendered to the rebels.
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A British general, David Richards, was sent in by London to evacuate foreign citizens. Confronted with the RUF’s horrific record and the imminent killing of large numbers of civilians, he defied his instructions and used UK troops to spearhead a counter attack.
Richards, who went on to become Britain’s chief of the defence staff, said he was “staggered” to find that the Indian UN force commander, Major General Vijay Jetley, interpreted his mandate as that of a neutral intermediary. In Richards’ view the UN should have been siding with the elected government against rebels breaking a peace agreement.
“I had a real argument with Major General Jetley about this. The Indian hierarchy were very reluctant to lose a single person on a UN operation,” said Richards. “They were very reluctant to fight and that permeated quite a lot of the other contingents as well, to the point where I remember going in to the UN headquarters on my first day there in May 2000 and finding Jetley. I said General, we’ve got to stop the RUF, you’ve got to tell your people to fight. At least hold their positions. He was very reluctant to do it.”
India said its troops were sent to monitor the peace, not enforce it. The UN mission in Sierra Leone was further complicated by antipathy between some of the national forces, particularly Jetley and his Nigerian deputy, Brigadier General Mohammed Garba.
In an internal UN report, Jetley accused Garba and other senior Nigerians of being more interested in smuggling diamonds than keeping the peace. Nigeria’s military responded by accusing the Indian general of “trying to justify his ineptitude, inaction and inefficiency in the leadership of a
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“India is completely committed to peacekeeping provided peacekeeping is what we know it to be,” said India’s ambassador to the UN, Asoke Kumar Mukerji. “The soldiers in the blue helmets, under the blue flag, are impartial. They are not supposed to be partisan. If somebody wants soldiers to go in and fight they should hire mercenaries, not take UN soldiers.”
UN peacekeeping came into its own with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the diminishing of ideological rivalries that had dominated international politics since the second world war.
Early successes in Cambodia, Namibia, Mozambique and El Salvador generated an overconfidence in the ability of UN soldiers to keep the peace. Each of those countries had an accord that former warring parties wanted to maintain.
The UN learned the hard way in Angola, Rwanda and Bosnia that where the UN wants peace more than those in conflict, then the illusion of peacekeeping can perpetuate instability and cost lives.
Out of the disasters of the 1990s came a new model including an ethos of “responsibility to protect”. No longer would UN forces stand idly by while innocent people were murdered. That has helped drive a rapid expansion of peacekeeping to become the UN’s single largest operation.
In 1991, the year the Soviet Union collapsed, the peacekeeping budget was just $490m. Over the past decade it has leapt from $3.8bn to about $9bn as the size and length of missions has expanded. More than 100,000 UN peacekeepers have served in Haiti since 2004 and close to 250,000 been deployed to the DRC over the past 15 years. There is little prospect of either mission ending soon.
Today, UN troop deployments in the DRC, Sudan and Darfur each cost more than $1bn a year, with Mali and Central African Republic not far behind. The most expensive outside Africa is Haiti, with a budget of $500m.
The emphasis on Africa is in part a reflection of the enduring nature of some conflicts on the continent, but also the politics of the security council. The UN might have had large peacekeeping missions in Syria and Ukraine, were it not for Russian objections.
As the scale of peacekeeping has grown so have the questions about its role. Most particularly, are peacekeepers there to monitor peace or to enforce it? It’s a source of increasing friction between the major powers on the security council that approve UN intervention and some of the countries which provide the troops.
In 2000, British forces landed in Sierra Leone after UN peacekeepers stood aside or fled an advance on the country’s capital, Freetown, by a notoriously brutal rebel group, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF). Several hundred peacekeepers surrendered to the rebels.
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A British general, David Richards, was sent in by London to evacuate foreign citizens. Confronted with the RUF’s horrific record and the imminent killing of large numbers of civilians, he defied his instructions and used UK troops to spearhead a counter attack.
Richards, who went on to become Britain’s chief of the defence staff, said he was “staggered” to find that the Indian UN force commander, Major General Vijay Jetley, interpreted his mandate as that of a neutral intermediary. In Richards’ view the UN should have been siding with the elected government against rebels breaking a peace agreement.
“I had a real argument with Major General Jetley about this. The Indian hierarchy were very reluctant to lose a single person on a UN operation,” said Richards. “They were very reluctant to fight and that permeated quite a lot of the other contingents as well, to the point where I remember going in to the UN headquarters on my first day there in May 2000 and finding Jetley. I said General, we’ve got to stop the RUF, you’ve got to tell your people to fight. At least hold their positions. He was very reluctant to do it.”
India said its troops were sent to monitor the peace, not enforce it. The UN mission in Sierra Leone was further complicated by antipathy between some of the national forces, particularly Jetley and his Nigerian deputy, Brigadier General Mohammed Garba.
In an internal UN report, Jetley accused Garba and other senior Nigerians of being more interested in smuggling diamonds than keeping the peace. Nigeria’s military responded by accusing the Indian general of “trying to justify his ineptitude, inaction and inefficiency in the leadership of a
multinational force.”
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| An Indian UN soldier watches an RAF Chinook helicopter land at the UN headquarters in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/AFP/Getty Images |
Such differences of opinion over the role of UN peacekeepers were replicated 12 years later in the Democratic Republic of the Congo as rebels advanced on the eastern town of Goma. The Indian commander of part of the largest peacekeeping force in the world ignored orders from UN officials to defend the town and called the Indian defence ministry in New Delhi to ask what he should do. He was told not to resist. The rebels seized Goma to the anger of Ban Ki-Moon, who regarded it as a “personal humiliation”, according to a senior UN official.
By then members of the wider UN mission in the DRC had come to look like bystanders to mass killing, rape and terror. Richard Gowan, until recently research director at the Centre on International Cooperation, a thinktank in New York that works closely with the UN on peacekeeping, said Indian forces in Sierra Leone and the DRC were taking orders from the defence ministry in New Delhi, not the UN commanders on the ground.
“It’s very clear that there are directions from New Delhi to avoid all risk, and that there are parallel lines of command between New Delhi and their guys in the field. That’s true of a lot of countries. A lot of field officers, if they get any order to take a significant risk in a peace operation, they’ll immediately phone home. That’s making it almost impossible for some force commanders to get anything done because they have no true control over their own units,” he said.
Most western nations will not put boots on the ground as frontline peacekeepers and so the UN is dependent on the goodwill of those countries prepared to deploy troops such as India, Bangladesh, Rwanda and Nigeria, making it hard to assert its authority.
The UN lost confidence in Jetley in Sierra Leone but when the then secretary general, Kofi Annan, tried to remove him, the Indian government threatened to pull out all of its forces. Annan’s successor, Ban, ran into the same threats from New Delhi when he tried to remove the Indian UN commander after the Goma debacle.
Rwanda and Srebrenica prompted a greater emphasis on protection of civilian lives, and involvement in rebuilding failed states instead of negotiating peace treaties, standing back and hoping it all worked out. Gowan said that while the “responsibility to protect” ethos was laudable it had also led to ill-thought-out missions.
“Sometimes in peacekeeping, the security council says ‘Good God we need to have a mission’ and that mission is stuck together,” he said.
Gowan pointed to Darfur, where he said the UN intervention came as a politically panicked response to public pressure over the mass killings by the government-allied Janjaweed militia.
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“For political reasons the US and the UK insisted on having the mission. I’ve spoken to UK officials since who’ve said: ‘We had no real idea what this mission was meant to do. We were just under such public pressure to come up with an answer and the answer was peacekeeping.’ That was definitely true for the Bush administration as well,” he said.
“Darfur has been a quagmire from the beginning. The frank reality is no one believes that the mission is working but no one dares pull it out because they fear the moment it goes there will be an even greater spike in violence and the security council will be held responsible. It’s become a slow burning disaster.”
Philippe Bolopion, the UN director at Human Rights Watch, said the principal reason for the failure of the Darfur mission, a hybrid operation with African Union forces, was deadlock on the security council.
“When permanent members of the security council can’t agree to stand up to an abusive government such as Sudan’s, and you have weak peacekeeping troops on the ground, it’s almost a perfect storm where peacekeepers are not going to protect civilians properly,” he said.
Members of the security council routinely prioritise national interests over the needs of the peacekeeping missions
“Permanent members of the security council routinely prioritise their national interest over the needs of the UN peacekeeping missions they have mandated, as a result often undermining them. Russia and China have done this by opposing more sanctions against the Sudanese government even when it pushes peacekeepers around in Darfur.”
The responsibility to protect has had a more positive impact elsewhere. Peacekeepers in South Sudan turned their bases into de facto refugee camps protecting tens of thousands of people. That would have been unlikely 20 years ago.
But the ethos has been severely challenged by the fallout from the security council mandate for military intervention in the 2011 Libyan revolution to protect civilians in Benghazi. Russia accused Nato of abusing it to support the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi. That in turn has complicated UN action on Syria.
By then members of the wider UN mission in the DRC had come to look like bystanders to mass killing, rape and terror. Richard Gowan, until recently research director at the Centre on International Cooperation, a thinktank in New York that works closely with the UN on peacekeeping, said Indian forces in Sierra Leone and the DRC were taking orders from the defence ministry in New Delhi, not the UN commanders on the ground.
“It’s very clear that there are directions from New Delhi to avoid all risk, and that there are parallel lines of command between New Delhi and their guys in the field. That’s true of a lot of countries. A lot of field officers, if they get any order to take a significant risk in a peace operation, they’ll immediately phone home. That’s making it almost impossible for some force commanders to get anything done because they have no true control over their own units,” he said.
Most western nations will not put boots on the ground as frontline peacekeepers and so the UN is dependent on the goodwill of those countries prepared to deploy troops such as India, Bangladesh, Rwanda and Nigeria, making it hard to assert its authority.
The UN lost confidence in Jetley in Sierra Leone but when the then secretary general, Kofi Annan, tried to remove him, the Indian government threatened to pull out all of its forces. Annan’s successor, Ban, ran into the same threats from New Delhi when he tried to remove the Indian UN commander after the Goma debacle.
Rwanda and Srebrenica prompted a greater emphasis on protection of civilian lives, and involvement in rebuilding failed states instead of negotiating peace treaties, standing back and hoping it all worked out. Gowan said that while the “responsibility to protect” ethos was laudable it had also led to ill-thought-out missions.
“Sometimes in peacekeeping, the security council says ‘Good God we need to have a mission’ and that mission is stuck together,” he said.
Gowan pointed to Darfur, where he said the UN intervention came as a politically panicked response to public pressure over the mass killings by the government-allied Janjaweed militia.
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“For political reasons the US and the UK insisted on having the mission. I’ve spoken to UK officials since who’ve said: ‘We had no real idea what this mission was meant to do. We were just under such public pressure to come up with an answer and the answer was peacekeeping.’ That was definitely true for the Bush administration as well,” he said.
“Darfur has been a quagmire from the beginning. The frank reality is no one believes that the mission is working but no one dares pull it out because they fear the moment it goes there will be an even greater spike in violence and the security council will be held responsible. It’s become a slow burning disaster.”
Philippe Bolopion, the UN director at Human Rights Watch, said the principal reason for the failure of the Darfur mission, a hybrid operation with African Union forces, was deadlock on the security council.
“When permanent members of the security council can’t agree to stand up to an abusive government such as Sudan’s, and you have weak peacekeeping troops on the ground, it’s almost a perfect storm where peacekeepers are not going to protect civilians properly,” he said.
Members of the security council routinely prioritise national interests over the needs of the peacekeeping missions
“Permanent members of the security council routinely prioritise their national interest over the needs of the UN peacekeeping missions they have mandated, as a result often undermining them. Russia and China have done this by opposing more sanctions against the Sudanese government even when it pushes peacekeepers around in Darfur.”
The responsibility to protect has had a more positive impact elsewhere. Peacekeepers in South Sudan turned their bases into de facto refugee camps protecting tens of thousands of people. That would have been unlikely 20 years ago.
But the ethos has been severely challenged by the fallout from the security council mandate for military intervention in the 2011 Libyan revolution to protect civilians in Benghazi. Russia accused Nato of abusing it to support the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi. That in turn has complicated UN action on Syria.
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| A UN flag flutters amid the rubble of the Lebanese-Israeli border town of Maroun al-Ras. Photograph: Patrick Baz/AFP/Getty Images |
Finding common ground on sub-Saharan Africa has generally been less difficult because of fewer strategic rivalries. The debacle in Goma prompted the UN to put together a fighting force of soldiers prepared to go into combat. South Africa, Tanzania and Malawi volunteered to send troops to join the Force Intervention Brigade in part because they were weary of the persistent instability in the region.
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“We were all embarrassed, humiliated at the end of 2012 when Goma fell,” said Christofides, who oversaw UN peacekeeping operations in the DRC from 2011 until earlier this year and was an architect of the intervention brigade. “Everybody has that image of peacekeepers sitting on top of an APC [armoured personnel carrier] and this group of ruffians walking into Goma. That was a low moment for everybody.
“When we recommended the mandate of the intervention brigade, the security council did not need much persuading. You have some very far-reaching language in the mandate about targeted offensive operations. That’s not language you see in resolutions of the UN. Neutralising armed groups, preventing their expansion, disarming them.”
The UN also deployed drones for the first time to help monitor the movements of the rebels and to verify Rwanda’s denials that it was supplying the insurgents. The drones are not armed although that appears the next likely step, if not in the DRC then in some other conflict where the UN is involved, given their increasing use in the Middle East by the US and its allies.
The intervention brigade has been successful in changing the dynamic in eastern Congo by pushing back the rebels and providing a degree of stability to begin the reconstruction of functioning systems of government, such as the courts – although regional politics has played a large part too. But the operation has also deeply alarmed countries such as India, which fears it sets an example for the future of peacekeeping.
Christofides doubts that the force intervention brigade provides a model for other peacekeeping missions. Senior UN officials, some of whom were strongly opposed to the creation of the brigade but now judge it a success, are deeply wary of the UN taking on a similar role in other conflicts. The DRC, they say, was a unique situation.
But even if the force intervention brigade is not replicated, it fits with a wider agenda by the major western powers to remake UN peacekeeping as a partner in military campaigns. For them, the lesson of British intervention in Sierra Leone or the recent French deployments in Mali and Central African Republic against armed Islamist groups is that better trained and equipped forces launch the initial assault and then the UN comes in as backup. But for that to happen, UN peacekeeping has to up its game.
Obama is leading the push with his New York summit on 28 September to seek pledges of troops, equipment and intelligence resources to a revamped peacekeeping operation.
Washington regards peacekeeping as a national security issue and a “good bargain”, as one official put it. The US picks up the tab for a quarter of the UN’s $9bn peacekeeping budget, but it is a fraction of the cost of the Pentagon or invading Iraq.
Moreover, if other countries are sending their forces then the US does not have to risk the lives of American soldiers. Previously, the US mostly regarded peacekeeping in Africa, in particular, as a humanitarian issue. Now, given the nature of the conflicts in Mali, Nigeria and Central African Republic, Washington views it as strategic.
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“We were all embarrassed, humiliated at the end of 2012 when Goma fell,” said Christofides, who oversaw UN peacekeeping operations in the DRC from 2011 until earlier this year and was an architect of the intervention brigade. “Everybody has that image of peacekeepers sitting on top of an APC [armoured personnel carrier] and this group of ruffians walking into Goma. That was a low moment for everybody.
“When we recommended the mandate of the intervention brigade, the security council did not need much persuading. You have some very far-reaching language in the mandate about targeted offensive operations. That’s not language you see in resolutions of the UN. Neutralising armed groups, preventing their expansion, disarming them.”
The UN also deployed drones for the first time to help monitor the movements of the rebels and to verify Rwanda’s denials that it was supplying the insurgents. The drones are not armed although that appears the next likely step, if not in the DRC then in some other conflict where the UN is involved, given their increasing use in the Middle East by the US and its allies.
The intervention brigade has been successful in changing the dynamic in eastern Congo by pushing back the rebels and providing a degree of stability to begin the reconstruction of functioning systems of government, such as the courts – although regional politics has played a large part too. But the operation has also deeply alarmed countries such as India, which fears it sets an example for the future of peacekeeping.
Christofides doubts that the force intervention brigade provides a model for other peacekeeping missions. Senior UN officials, some of whom were strongly opposed to the creation of the brigade but now judge it a success, are deeply wary of the UN taking on a similar role in other conflicts. The DRC, they say, was a unique situation.
But even if the force intervention brigade is not replicated, it fits with a wider agenda by the major western powers to remake UN peacekeeping as a partner in military campaigns. For them, the lesson of British intervention in Sierra Leone or the recent French deployments in Mali and Central African Republic against armed Islamist groups is that better trained and equipped forces launch the initial assault and then the UN comes in as backup. But for that to happen, UN peacekeeping has to up its game.
Obama is leading the push with his New York summit on 28 September to seek pledges of troops, equipment and intelligence resources to a revamped peacekeeping operation.
Washington regards peacekeeping as a national security issue and a “good bargain”, as one official put it. The US picks up the tab for a quarter of the UN’s $9bn peacekeeping budget, but it is a fraction of the cost of the Pentagon or invading Iraq.
Moreover, if other countries are sending their forces then the US does not have to risk the lives of American soldiers. Previously, the US mostly regarded peacekeeping in Africa, in particular, as a humanitarian issue. Now, given the nature of the conflicts in Mali, Nigeria and Central African Republic, Washington views it as strategic.
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| Cambodian mine experts demonstrate their work in the UN-controlled buffer zone in Cyprus. Photograph: Barbara Laborde/AFP/Getty Images |
“I’m now in the process of reaching out to developed countries. I’ve been speaking to many presidents and prime ministers to diversify the participation of peacekeeping forces,” he said.
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“If we can diversify and have more countries, particularly some big countries, if they can send their own troops in addition to assets and financial support, that would be much appreciated.”
UN officials privately concede there is little chance of the US putting its forces under UN command. Congress would never stand for it. But Washington is joining the UN in pressing other developed countries to play a bigger part in peacekeeping.
The UK currently has fewer than 300 soldiers deployed on peacekeeping missions, mostly in Cyprus. “We’ve been having goodness knows how many discussions with British officials with a view to getting them more involved,” said Christofides. “We’re still drawing too many troops from a few parts of the world and not enough from other parts of the world. And I don’t just mean Africa versus the west, but other countries in Asia and Latin America that could contribute a bit more.”
Another senior UN official put it more bluntly: “Britain has a reputation for lecturing without contributing.”
The UK is expected to announce a contingent of peacekeepers for South Sudan at the New York summit, but numbers are not known.
Richards wants to see Britain make a greater contribution. “The Ministry of Defence and, I have to say sadly, the armed forces, don’t really see the UN as proper soldiering. This is a cultural ignorance that’s grown up over many years. The Americans share it writ large: UN ops is what second- and third-world nations do but proper armies, we pick and choose,” he said.
Richards said countries whose forces had experience in Afghanistan and Iraq could put that to good use in UN operations. “I think that’s a pretty good role for the British armed forces in this era when there’s so many nasty things going on in the world. The Americans really need to decide to do it as well,” he said. “I think at a low level, our young officers would love to do it. There is a higher level political/military reluctance and snootiness about it.”
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| A UN peacekeeper patrols in a street in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. Photograph: Issouf Sanogo/AFP/Getty Images |
India strongly opposes a move towards more forceful peacekeeping. “When it has been used as a tool to ensure that a peace agreement is observed so that peace building can take place, or as a tool to facilitate a political resolution, it works,” said Mukerji, the Indian ambassador to the UN.
“But if peacekeeping is to be seen as peace enforcement, then unfortunately we can’t see the UN charter allowing such a radical departure of the use of peacekeeping.
“Peacekeeping is not an end in itself. The end is political stability and peacekeeping is just a tool to bring about political stability. What’s happening now is the cart is being put before the horse. I think that’s a very unfortunate development.”
Gowan is sceptical for different reasons. “I think that we may be stumbling into an enormous strategic trap because if we have learned over the last decade that very highly capable Nato forces, US forces, actually can’t suppress Islamic extremist groups, why on earth do we think slightly strengthening UN missions is going to give us a tool that allows us to fight terrorists?” he said.
“But if peacekeeping is to be seen as peace enforcement, then unfortunately we can’t see the UN charter allowing such a radical departure of the use of peacekeeping.
“Peacekeeping is not an end in itself. The end is political stability and peacekeeping is just a tool to bring about political stability. What’s happening now is the cart is being put before the horse. I think that’s a very unfortunate development.”
Gowan is sceptical for different reasons. “I think that we may be stumbling into an enormous strategic trap because if we have learned over the last decade that very highly capable Nato forces, US forces, actually can’t suppress Islamic extremist groups, why on earth do we think slightly strengthening UN missions is going to give us a tool that allows us to fight terrorists?” he said.
Female Soldiers to Be Central Part of Mali Deployment
The Canadian Press, published in The Guardian
Canada will deploy helicopters and troops – including female soldiers – to Mali in support of an ongoing UN peacekeeping mission, the government has announced.
The 12-month deployment will also include an infantry unit and military trainers.
A date for Canada’s first deployment in Africa since its troubled mission to Rwanda in 1994 and the exact number of troops that will be sent have yet to be decided.
The foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, said the unit heading to Mali would include female soldiers.
“One of our priorities is to increase women’s participation in peacekeeping,” she said.
The announcement is less ambitious than the Liberal government of the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, had initially planned. Shortly after coming to power in late 2015, Ottawa had indicated it would send up to 600 troops to Mali.
Ministers later put the plans on hold amid fears of casualties, angering allies who said they felt let down, and prompting some to speculate the delay could hurt Canada’s bid for a non-permanent seat at the UN security council.
In recent months, jihadists have ramped up their activities in central Mali, targeting domestic and foreign forces in outbreaks of violence once confined to the country’s north.
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Four UN peacekeepers were killed and four wounded in late February when a mine exploded under their vehicle in central Mali.
The peacekeeping mission, known by the acronym Minusma, currently has 12,000 military personnel and 1,900 police.
They have been deployed in Mali since 2013 to counter the jihadist insurgency and general lawlessness.
The Canadians, according to Sajjan, will conduct reconnaissance, facilitate medical evacuations for the 57 UN partner nations already on the ground in Mali, and help plan missions in the country.
James Bezan, defence spokesman for the official opposition Conservative party, accused the Liberals of sending troops to a highly dangerous country for partisan promises.
“This is about Justin Trudeau’s selfish political ambition to win a seat on the UN security council, and he is using our troops as political pawns,” Bezan told reporters.
Canada is running for one of the council’s 10 non-permanent seats in an election that will take place in 2020.
Canada will deploy helicopters and troops – including female soldiers – to Mali in support of an ongoing UN peacekeeping mission, the government has announced.
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| An RCAF Griffon flies over a village in Iraq during OP IMPACT. Griffons will be deployed to Mali to provide escort to the Chinook transport helicopters. |
Defence minister Harjit Sajjan told reporters that Canada would deploy two Chinook transport helicopters and four Griffon attack helicopters to provide armed escort and protection in the fight against Islamist militants in Mali.
The 12-month deployment will also include an infantry unit and military trainers.
The foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, said the unit heading to Mali would include female soldiers.
“One of our priorities is to increase women’s participation in peacekeeping,” she said.
The announcement is less ambitious than the Liberal government of the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, had initially planned. Shortly after coming to power in late 2015, Ottawa had indicated it would send up to 600 troops to Mali.
Ministers later put the plans on hold amid fears of casualties, angering allies who said they felt let down, and prompting some to speculate the delay could hurt Canada’s bid for a non-permanent seat at the UN security council.
In recent months, jihadists have ramped up their activities in central Mali, targeting domestic and foreign forces in outbreaks of violence once confined to the country’s north.
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Four UN peacekeepers were killed and four wounded in late February when a mine exploded under their vehicle in central Mali.
The peacekeeping mission, known by the acronym Minusma, currently has 12,000 military personnel and 1,900 police.
They have been deployed in Mali since 2013 to counter the jihadist insurgency and general lawlessness.
The Canadians, according to Sajjan, will conduct reconnaissance, facilitate medical evacuations for the 57 UN partner nations already on the ground in Mali, and help plan missions in the country.
James Bezan, defence spokesman for the official opposition Conservative party, accused the Liberals of sending troops to a highly dangerous country for partisan promises.
“This is about Justin Trudeau’s selfish political ambition to win a seat on the UN security council, and he is using our troops as political pawns,” Bezan told reporters.
Canada is running for one of the council’s 10 non-permanent seats in an election that will take place in 2020.
Conservatives Demand Debate on UN Mali Mission
By Janice Dickson, iPolitics
Conservative MPs are reiterating their call to have a parliamentary debate on the Liberal government’s decision to support the UN peacekeeping mission in war-torn Mali.
“We have to have an opportunity here in the House of Commons for all Parliamentarians to get out to vote — to get out and debate this mission and also an opportunity to vote on it,” Conservative defence critic James Bezan said after question period Wednesday.
Minister of National Defence Harjit Sajjan and Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland announced Monday that Canada will send Griffon combat and Chinook transport helicopters to the West African nation. Chief of the Defence Staff Jonathan Vance reportedly later told journalists the mission would involve up to 250 Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members, but also told at least one outlet the number is not fixed.
The federal government has made a year-long commitment to the mission, but some have said the mission is too short.
Bezan said Wednesday that the official opposition has yet to receive any confirmation from the government on whether or not there will be a full debate and a vote on the Mali mission.
“We call upon Minister Sajjan, on Prime Minister Trudeau, that if they’re going to deploy our troops to the deadliest UN mission that we need to have an opportunity to pronounce ourselves through a vote after we get all the information through the debate,” said Bezan.
The Manitoba MP added that the government has been calling it a peacekeeping mission, but you can’t have peacekeeping and combat in the same context.
“If it’s a UN mission, the UN doesn’t do combat. We are saying that this will end up being a combat mission. The French are there not under UN command. They’re there as a combat mission. We need more clarification on what Canadians will be doing in this peacekeeping mission,” said Bezan.
Conservative MPs are reiterating their call to have a parliamentary debate on the Liberal government’s decision to support the UN peacekeeping mission in war-torn Mali.
“We have to have an opportunity here in the House of Commons for all Parliamentarians to get out to vote — to get out and debate this mission and also an opportunity to vote on it,” Conservative defence critic James Bezan said after question period Wednesday.
Minister of National Defence Harjit Sajjan and Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland announced Monday that Canada will send Griffon combat and Chinook transport helicopters to the West African nation. Chief of the Defence Staff Jonathan Vance reportedly later told journalists the mission would involve up to 250 Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members, but also told at least one outlet the number is not fixed.
The federal government has made a year-long commitment to the mission, but some have said the mission is too short.
Bezan said Wednesday that the official opposition has yet to receive any confirmation from the government on whether or not there will be a full debate and a vote on the Mali mission.
“We call upon Minister Sajjan, on Prime Minister Trudeau, that if they’re going to deploy our troops to the deadliest UN mission that we need to have an opportunity to pronounce ourselves through a vote after we get all the information through the debate,” said Bezan.
The Manitoba MP added that the government has been calling it a peacekeeping mission, but you can’t have peacekeeping and combat in the same context.
“If it’s a UN mission, the UN doesn’t do combat. We are saying that this will end up being a combat mission. The French are there not under UN command. They’re there as a combat mission. We need more clarification on what Canadians will be doing in this peacekeeping mission,” said Bezan.
HMCS Chinoutimi Returns from Longest-Ever Victoria-Class Submarine Deployment
Royal Canadian Navy Press Release
HMCS Chicoutimi has returned to CFB Esquimalt, B.C. after a 197-day deployment in the Asia-Pacific region, marking a historic milestone for the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) submarine fleet after a nearly 50-year absence from the region. The deployment included numerous opportunities for HMCS Chicoutimi to operate with regional partner navies such as the United States Navy, the Japan Maritime Self Defence Force, The Royal Australian Navy and the French Navy. As part of her deployment, HMCS Chicoutimi visited Yokosuka, Japan, further strengthening the relationship between our two countries.
HMCS Chicoutimi has returned to CFB Esquimalt, B.C. after a 197-day deployment in the Asia-Pacific region, marking a historic milestone for the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) submarine fleet after a nearly 50-year absence from the region. The deployment included numerous opportunities for HMCS Chicoutimi to operate with regional partner navies such as the United States Navy, the Japan Maritime Self Defence Force, The Royal Australian Navy and the French Navy. As part of her deployment, HMCS Chicoutimi visited Yokosuka, Japan, further strengthening the relationship between our two countries.
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| HMCS Chicoutimi file Photo. (The Canadian Encyclopedia) |
“HMCS Chicoutimi’s successful six-month deployment to the Asia-Pacific region is a historic 50-year milestone for the Royal Canadian Navy and our Victoria-Class submarine,” said Harjit S. Sajjan, Defence Minister.
“I am incredibly proud of the work done by the submariners on board HMCS Chicoutimi. Their consistent dedication and professionalism is an inspiration. The advantage that submarines can bring to a battle space cannot be underestimated. They are stealthy, lethal, and persistent. They are an important strategic asset that the Canadian Armed Forces brings to the table when working with our partners and allies around the world,” said Vice-Admiral Ron Lloyd, Commander Royal Canadian Navy.
“HMCS Chicoutimi conducted a well-executed patrol to the Asia-Pacific region to operate with our partners, and allies – a clear signal of the strategic importance of the region to Canada, that reinforces Canada’s commitment to the maintenance of regional peace, and security,” said Captain (N) Chris Robinson, Commander Canadian Submarine Force.
HMCS Chicoutimi deployed on patrol in the Asia-Pacific region as part of a strategic engagement mission, for 197 days. This is the longest Victoria-class deployment to date. Prior to this the longest Victoria-class single deployment was a 101-day North Atlantic patrol by HMCS Windsor in 2015. HMCS Windsor is once again deployed, currently supporting NATO operations in the Mediterranean Sea.
HMCS Chicoutimi operated with the Japan Maritime Self Defence Force (JMSDF) and the United States Navy (USN) for several months, a period which included participation in the annual USN-JMSDF ANNUALEX – a three week bi-lateral exercise which was made tri-lateral for the first time with the inclusion of Canada in 2017.
HMCS Chicoutimi visited Hawaii, Guam, and Japan during the six-month deployment. The visit to Yokosuka, Japan was the first by a Canadian submarine since the visit by HMCS Grilse in May 1968.
HMCS Chicoutimi conducted two Rest and Maintenance Periods, in Japan and the US territory of Guam, supported by deployed maintenance teams from the RCN Fleet Maintenance Facility based in Esquimalt. These periods further refined processes for deployed maintenance and support activities.
HMCS Chicoutimi is one of four Victoria-class submarines in the RCN. Chicoutimi along with HMCS Victoria and HMCS Corner Brook are based out of CFB Esquimalt, while HMCS Windsor is based at CFB Halifax in Nova Scotia.
Victoria-class submarines are extremely versatile, allowing them to operate in any weather condition for periods of up to 45 days, and perform in a variety of roles to fulfill Canada’s requirements for a balanced, multi-purpose and combat-effective naval fleet.
“I am incredibly proud of the work done by the submariners on board HMCS Chicoutimi. Their consistent dedication and professionalism is an inspiration. The advantage that submarines can bring to a battle space cannot be underestimated. They are stealthy, lethal, and persistent. They are an important strategic asset that the Canadian Armed Forces brings to the table when working with our partners and allies around the world,” said Vice-Admiral Ron Lloyd, Commander Royal Canadian Navy.
“HMCS Chicoutimi conducted a well-executed patrol to the Asia-Pacific region to operate with our partners, and allies – a clear signal of the strategic importance of the region to Canada, that reinforces Canada’s commitment to the maintenance of regional peace, and security,” said Captain (N) Chris Robinson, Commander Canadian Submarine Force.
HMCS Chicoutimi deployed on patrol in the Asia-Pacific region as part of a strategic engagement mission, for 197 days. This is the longest Victoria-class deployment to date. Prior to this the longest Victoria-class single deployment was a 101-day North Atlantic patrol by HMCS Windsor in 2015. HMCS Windsor is once again deployed, currently supporting NATO operations in the Mediterranean Sea.
HMCS Chicoutimi operated with the Japan Maritime Self Defence Force (JMSDF) and the United States Navy (USN) for several months, a period which included participation in the annual USN-JMSDF ANNUALEX – a three week bi-lateral exercise which was made tri-lateral for the first time with the inclusion of Canada in 2017.
HMCS Chicoutimi visited Hawaii, Guam, and Japan during the six-month deployment. The visit to Yokosuka, Japan was the first by a Canadian submarine since the visit by HMCS Grilse in May 1968.
HMCS Chicoutimi conducted two Rest and Maintenance Periods, in Japan and the US territory of Guam, supported by deployed maintenance teams from the RCN Fleet Maintenance Facility based in Esquimalt. These periods further refined processes for deployed maintenance and support activities.
HMCS Chicoutimi is one of four Victoria-class submarines in the RCN. Chicoutimi along with HMCS Victoria and HMCS Corner Brook are based out of CFB Esquimalt, while HMCS Windsor is based at CFB Halifax in Nova Scotia.
Victoria-class submarines are extremely versatile, allowing them to operate in any weather condition for periods of up to 45 days, and perform in a variety of roles to fulfill Canada’s requirements for a balanced, multi-purpose and combat-effective naval fleet.
Levine: More than Helicopters Needed to Help Mali
By: Corey Levine, The Ottawa Citizen
The Canadian government has now set the stage to claim a Schwarzenegger-style “We’re back!” after finally confirming our long-delayed contribution to United Nations peacekeeping in Mali. But after spending a year in the West African nation, I’m doubtful about what 200 soldiers and a few helicopters will achieve.
The Canadian government has now set the stage to claim a Schwarzenegger-style “We’re back!” after finally confirming our long-delayed contribution to United Nations peacekeeping in Mali. But after spending a year in the West African nation, I’m doubtful about what 200 soldiers and a few helicopters will achieve.
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| Canada's contribution to the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali is expected to include up to six helicopters and a sizeable female presence, operating in an area rife with violence. CHRISTOPHE PETIT TESSON / THE CANADIAN PRESS |
Canada’s long association with peacekeeping and reputation as a calm presence in the world’s hot zones has taken a serious hit in recent years. Our contribution to UN missions is at its lowest ebb since the 1990s and we are no longer seen as a relevant actor in today’s multilateral military interventions.
As someone who has worked in conflict zones for the last 20 years, I believe in Canada’s peacekeeping legacy. Like many other Canadians, I was disappointed when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did not live up to his promises to polish this legacy back to its former lustre.
When I first arrived in Mali in November 2016 to provide training to Malian soldiers on humanitarian law, human rights and gender issues as part of the European Union Training Mission, (EUTM), I was surprised at the warm reception I received as a Canadian. Although the Liberal government had publicly mused about the possibility of Canada supporting the UN peacekeeping mission there, by then Mali appeared to have dropped off our foreign policy radar.
Still, diplomats, donors, peacekeepers and even Malians themselves expected that Canada would soon help rescue MINUSMA (the Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali), the UN’s deadliest peacekeeping mission, and the country itself, from the quagmire it had become. And it was hoped that a battalion of Canada’s finest military men and women, tough and experienced from tours in Haiti and Afghanistan, would bring the Pearson back to peacekeeping.
Mali observers continued to remain hopeful, even after it was announced that a Belgian general, with no peacekeeping background, rather than a Canadian experienced in the international arena, had been named to head up the MINUSMA military forces. Had we lost our chance because we had dithered to long about our commitment?
By the time I moved from a Malian military base to the capital, Bamako, in February 2017, responses to my nationality were more quizzical about a civilian Canadian working for a European military mission than hopeful, despite the aid dollars flowing into the country as part of Canada’s 3D approach (diplomacy, defence, development). People stopped asking me to set up meetings with “the Canadians,” and I stopped harassing my friends at the embassy to see if they had any news from their bosses back home about our presumed military contribution to Mali.
Not that there isn’t already a significant international military presence in the country. MINUSMA is the largest, with its approximately 11,000 forces drawn mostly from African nations, but also a few European and Asian countries. It is followed by Barkhane, a French active combat force, whose numbers range from 3,000 to 6,000, depending on whom you talk to. Barkhane, as the “French pillar of counter-terrorism,” differs from MINUSMA, which is a more traditional peacekeeping mission, carrying out “security-related tasks” in support of the peace process. The fact that there is no peace to keep in Mali seems to make no difference at all. (Although EUTM is solely a training and capacity-building mission, I lost a colleague in a terrorist attack in which 11 other colleagues survived).
Then there is the newly minted Force Conjointe G5 Sahel, consisting of troops from Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania and Niger. Supported by various UN Security Council Resolutions and headquartered in Sevare, it is still trying to figure out its role in a region already crowded with competing military and diplomatic initiatives. There are many unanswered questions as to its operational capabilities and political co-operation.
Mali is at the same time: a civil war with the Arab tribes of the desert north seeking independence from African ethnic groups in the tropical south, its roots in Africa’s colonial past; a dwindling democratic state after a 2012 coup; a threat to Europe as both a source and transit route for migration, and illicit drugs and arms; and the latest front line in the global war on terrorism. Both ISIL and al-Qaida have local organizations in the region.
International soldiers in Mali speak in terms of “terrorist armed groups,” known as TAGs, and “criminal armed groups” (CAGs). Then there are those agitating for an independent homeland. Sometimes the various TAGs, CAGs, and “freedom-fighters” are separate groups; sometimes they are combined. They occasionally splinter off and form new groups with different alliances but with the same leaders. Allegiances switch more often than most people change their bedsheets. Frankly, it’s an alphabet soup of confusion where the enemy is concerned.
There is officially a peace process known as the Algiers Agreement. But the signatories, including the Malian government, have only a tenuous commitment to peace. Then there is the growing insurgency among those fed up with an international presence that has brought little development, despite the aid dollars, and even less respite from the violence (shades of Afghanistan).
It will take much more than a few Chinook helicopters to turn Mali around. But this beginning could be the thin edge of the wedge that leads to more muscular involvement on our part further down the line. Still, like Afghanistan, it’s an unwinnable war.
The real solution to the problems of Mali doesn’t lie in helicopters and troops, but in a sustainable and sustained commitment to economic, political, social and multi-ethnic development of the region.
Corey Levine is a human rights and peacebuilding consultant. She returned to Canada last fall after a year in Mali. It was her 14th mission and 10th conflict country.
BY THE NUMBERS
As of the end of 2017:
43: Number of Canadian peacekeepers deployed worldwide (down from 62 in November);
20: Number (from that total) of peacekeepers who were police officers. Fourteen others were military officers and nine were “experts on mission” (which can include police officers, military personnel and civilians);
6: Number of those peacekeepers who were women (five police officers and one military officer.)
600: The number of troops the federal government promised, in 2016, to make available for UN peacekeeping missions;
150: The number of police officers the government promised to make available.
(Source: The Canadian Press)
As someone who has worked in conflict zones for the last 20 years, I believe in Canada’s peacekeeping legacy. Like many other Canadians, I was disappointed when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did not live up to his promises to polish this legacy back to its former lustre.
When I first arrived in Mali in November 2016 to provide training to Malian soldiers on humanitarian law, human rights and gender issues as part of the European Union Training Mission, (EUTM), I was surprised at the warm reception I received as a Canadian. Although the Liberal government had publicly mused about the possibility of Canada supporting the UN peacekeeping mission there, by then Mali appeared to have dropped off our foreign policy radar.
Still, diplomats, donors, peacekeepers and even Malians themselves expected that Canada would soon help rescue MINUSMA (the Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali), the UN’s deadliest peacekeeping mission, and the country itself, from the quagmire it had become. And it was hoped that a battalion of Canada’s finest military men and women, tough and experienced from tours in Haiti and Afghanistan, would bring the Pearson back to peacekeeping.
Mali observers continued to remain hopeful, even after it was announced that a Belgian general, with no peacekeeping background, rather than a Canadian experienced in the international arena, had been named to head up the MINUSMA military forces. Had we lost our chance because we had dithered to long about our commitment?
By the time I moved from a Malian military base to the capital, Bamako, in February 2017, responses to my nationality were more quizzical about a civilian Canadian working for a European military mission than hopeful, despite the aid dollars flowing into the country as part of Canada’s 3D approach (diplomacy, defence, development). People stopped asking me to set up meetings with “the Canadians,” and I stopped harassing my friends at the embassy to see if they had any news from their bosses back home about our presumed military contribution to Mali.
Not that there isn’t already a significant international military presence in the country. MINUSMA is the largest, with its approximately 11,000 forces drawn mostly from African nations, but also a few European and Asian countries. It is followed by Barkhane, a French active combat force, whose numbers range from 3,000 to 6,000, depending on whom you talk to. Barkhane, as the “French pillar of counter-terrorism,” differs from MINUSMA, which is a more traditional peacekeeping mission, carrying out “security-related tasks” in support of the peace process. The fact that there is no peace to keep in Mali seems to make no difference at all. (Although EUTM is solely a training and capacity-building mission, I lost a colleague in a terrorist attack in which 11 other colleagues survived).
Then there is the newly minted Force Conjointe G5 Sahel, consisting of troops from Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania and Niger. Supported by various UN Security Council Resolutions and headquartered in Sevare, it is still trying to figure out its role in a region already crowded with competing military and diplomatic initiatives. There are many unanswered questions as to its operational capabilities and political co-operation.
Mali is at the same time: a civil war with the Arab tribes of the desert north seeking independence from African ethnic groups in the tropical south, its roots in Africa’s colonial past; a dwindling democratic state after a 2012 coup; a threat to Europe as both a source and transit route for migration, and illicit drugs and arms; and the latest front line in the global war on terrorism. Both ISIL and al-Qaida have local organizations in the region.
International soldiers in Mali speak in terms of “terrorist armed groups,” known as TAGs, and “criminal armed groups” (CAGs). Then there are those agitating for an independent homeland. Sometimes the various TAGs, CAGs, and “freedom-fighters” are separate groups; sometimes they are combined. They occasionally splinter off and form new groups with different alliances but with the same leaders. Allegiances switch more often than most people change their bedsheets. Frankly, it’s an alphabet soup of confusion where the enemy is concerned.
There is officially a peace process known as the Algiers Agreement. But the signatories, including the Malian government, have only a tenuous commitment to peace. Then there is the growing insurgency among those fed up with an international presence that has brought little development, despite the aid dollars, and even less respite from the violence (shades of Afghanistan).
It will take much more than a few Chinook helicopters to turn Mali around. But this beginning could be the thin edge of the wedge that leads to more muscular involvement on our part further down the line. Still, like Afghanistan, it’s an unwinnable war.
The real solution to the problems of Mali doesn’t lie in helicopters and troops, but in a sustainable and sustained commitment to economic, political, social and multi-ethnic development of the region.
Corey Levine is a human rights and peacebuilding consultant. She returned to Canada last fall after a year in Mali. It was her 14th mission and 10th conflict country.
BY THE NUMBERS
As of the end of 2017:
43: Number of Canadian peacekeepers deployed worldwide (down from 62 in November);
20: Number (from that total) of peacekeepers who were police officers. Fourteen others were military officers and nine were “experts on mission” (which can include police officers, military personnel and civilians);
6: Number of those peacekeepers who were women (five police officers and one military officer.)
600: The number of troops the federal government promised, in 2016, to make available for UN peacekeeping missions;
150: The number of police officers the government promised to make available.
(Source: The Canadian Press)
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