This day of 29th May is a solemn occasion that shouldn’t be obfuscated under the usual rhetoric of the world. A day of great remembrances, gratitude, and reflection
INTERNATIONAL DAY OF UN PEACEKEEPERS
COLONEL SATISH SINGH LALOTRA
The world over, ‘strife’ has been a stark reality that has been a wont of man since the time he learnt the habit of walking on this earth. Global strife often stems from human nature, where individual choices compound into massive societal conflicts. To understand where this strife comes from and how it manifests in the world, certain key drivers and expressions have to be taken into consideration that range from individual choices, economic inequality, information overload, insatiable greed and the everlasting need for dominance over each other, to name a few. If indeed man has been overwhelmed by these above-mentioned facets in the past, is it any wonder that the same man has been striving hard to interject an organisation or a collective body in his affairs that takes care of these dissensions in the best possible way.
The League of Nations and the UN, formed immediately in the aftermath of the First and Second World Wars, respectively, were two such world bodies that came into existence to quench the so-called ‘war-appetite’ of human beings and to restore a sense of sanity on this planet that seemed to be forever consumed by these conflagrations. The former (League of Nations) succumbed again to the evil machinations that were a legacy left behind by the unequal ‘Treaty of Versailles’ signed by the world powers after the termination of World War I.
The second world body, the UN and its efficacy in dousing the worldwide conflicts is still being evaluated on the anvil of its doings in the last more than eight decades of its formation. The UN peacekeeping force is one such cog in the vast machinery of this world body that has been keeping the wheels of this organisation running smoothly without any hiccups. And hence a small effort via my article on ‘International Day of UN Peacekeepers’ that is being rung year after year on 29th May, the world over.
The ‘International day of UN Peacekeepers’ is an annual extravaganza held on 29th May to pay tribute to the men and women who have served and continue to serve in the ‘UN Peacekeeping forces’ operations for their unstinted professionalism, dedication and courage as also to honour the memory of those who fell in the line of duty far away from their homes trying to douse foreign fires of human conflict. This day of 29th May is a solemn occasion that shouldn’t be obfuscated under the usual rhetoric of the world. A day of great remembrances, gratitude, and reflection.
India, in particular, with its vast reservoir of mythological instances of peacekeeping, has always been well-suited and poised to take on much bigger roles of world peacekeeping that has been till date its wont since the time the first Indian peacekeeping force cut its teeth in the famous ‘Korean war’ of the early 1950s.
Lord Krishna’s peacekeeping mission before the famous war of the Mahabharata, which entailed him to travel to the Kaurvas court in Hastinapur as a final peace envoy, has been a ‘standard bearer’ for the country’s peacekeeping efforts that seldom finds any equal till date. Similarly, Sage Dadhichi’s ultimate sacrifice by willingly giving up his life, providing his bones to forge the ‘Vajra’ (thunderbolt) to end the violence and restore cosmic balance between the ‘Sur’ and ‘Asur’, is a shining example of a peacekeeper. The same is being epitomised by today’s UN Peacekeepers, who by laying down their lives in the conflict zones of the world are on an UN-enviable mission.
This international day of seminal importance, held on 29th May, was designated by the UNGA resolution 57/ 129 on December 11 2002, after an official request of the Ukrainian peacekeepers association and the government of Ukraine to the UNGA to celebrate the day in 2003. The date of 29 th May marks the anniversary of the creation of the ‘United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO)’ IN 1948 to monitor the ceasefire after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, which was the first ever UN peacekeeping mission.
The day is marked at the UN Headquarters in New York City with the presentation of the ‘Dag Hammarskjold Medal, honouring peacekeepers both living and posthumous, statements by the president of the UNGA and the Secretary General, as well as a press release regarding the state of UN peacekeeping missions and the continued necessity of their work. In the long and checkered history of UN peacekeeping operations all over the world, the role of NNRC( Neutral Nations Repatriation Commission) headed by India,/ Lt Gen KS Thimmaya, and consisting of Czechoslovakia, Poland, Sweden and Switzerland, during the Korean War to oversee the repatriation of POWs of both North & South Korea is a shining example of armistice.
It was indeed an ‘un-enviable’ task for the NNRC to repatriate the POWs of the Korean peninsula who had earlier refused to be sent back to their respective countries when the guns fell silent across the 38th parallel. The fact that Gen Timmy (Thimmayya) was able to accomplish the same, put India first among firsts in the league of peacekeeping operations then and even now. Just to rewind a bit about the background of these unsung heroes. UN peacekeeping was born at a time when Cold War rivalries frequently paralysed the UNSC.
Peacekeeping at that time was primarily limited to maintaining ceasefires and stabilising situations on the ground, providing crucial support for political efforts to resolve conflict by peaceful means. Those missions involved unarmed military observers and lightly armed troops with primarily monitoring, reporting and confidence-building roles. The first two peacekeeping operations deployed by the UN were the UNTSO, as mentioned by me above, and the UNMOGIP (UN military observer group in India and Pakistan. Both of these missions, which continue operating even today, exemplify that certain stark realities of complex geo-strategic importance, which were relevant almost 8 decades back and proved a Gordian’s knot, continue to bedevil the international atmosphere till date.
The dawn of the 1950s saw the earliest armed peacekeeping operation in the form of the first UN Emergency Force ( UNEF1 ) deployed successfully in 1956 to address the Suez Canal crisis. The ONUC( UN Operation in the Congo), launched in 1960, was the first large-scale mission having 20,000 military personnel at its peak, with some of the bitterest fighting undertaken by the Indian peacekeeping contingent with the armed rebels of the beleaguered nation of Congo to help restore peace.
ONUC saw the Indian peacekeeping contingent win its first PVC on foreign shores when Capt Gurbachan Singh Salaria laid down his life true to the traditions of the Indian army, as also that of the tenets of the UN peacekeeping force while battling renegade elements in Congo. The 1960s and 1970s saw the UN establishing short-term missions in the Dominican Republic, West New Guinea, and Yemen. But started seeing larger deployments in Cyprus and the Middle East, as well as in Lebanon.
In 1988, UN Peacekeepers were awarded the ‘Nobel Peace Prize, thereby giving an accreditation to all the peacekeeping efforts thus put in by these unsung heroes from the time of their inception across the globe. At the turn of the century, the UN undertook a major exercise to examine the challenges to peacekeeping in the 1990s and introducing reforms. The aim was to strengthen the capacity building of this force to effectively manage and sustain field operations, wherever asked in the world. Today, a little more than 1.1 lakh military, police and civilian staff currently serve in more than 14 peacekeeping missions, representing a decrease in both personnel and peacekeeping missions, as a result of peaceful transitions and the rebuilding of functioning of states.
So far so good. But for soldiers serving under the blue standard of the UN, what is so different from serving and fighting under the banner of their own country? It is a humongous demand on these peacekeepers that cannot be summarised in a few paragraphs of this article of mine. The battlefield is often morally and emotionally demanding in such peacekeeping missions that require restraint, prowess in mediation between hostile groups, protecting vulnerable communities, and operating amidst uncertainty. It is not that these missions don’t have any strength. They do have plenty of them. One of the greatest strengths of these UN peacekeeping missions lies in their multinational character.
Troops from countries with different backgrounds, histories, cultures, and political systems come together for a common humanitarian purpose. This divergence in the structural buildup of troops from diverse countries in fact become their biggest binding factor , and sends a powerful message to the world community –that despite divisions if they can come together, humanity too can unite for peace. However, peacekeeping missions face some very teething problems too, viz criticism for failing to prevent bloodshed, or violence, as also responding too slowly during an impending crisis. The likes of which draw sharp reaction from the world powers. There have been instances of misconduct that damaged the credibility of missions and betrayed the trust of the local population.
With non-state actors now increasingly taking part in worldwide conflicts that have no front or back compared to traditional armies in combat, it becomes extremely difficult to maintain a façade of neutrality for these neutral forces operating under the UN Mandate. Funding constraints is yet another bugbear that haunts these peacekeeping missions. Adoption of new technology by the armed groups, as has been witnessed in the last few years, to advance their agenda with hogging the limelight for spreading their cause are another fronts that have to be conquered by the UN peacekeeping missions to stay on top of the game.
The proverbial ‘Blue Helmet’ has become an abiding symbol of international service, that has no equals till date in making sure that the inhabitants of war-torn countries have a glimmer of hope whenever these men wearing them land amidst such hapless environs. In an age pockmarked by division, conflict, and uncertainty, the work of the UN Peacekeeping force stands on the mental firmament of this planet of ours as the sole ‘Northern star’ chosen to lead us in the right direction. And perhaps that is their greatest achievement.
(The Author is a retired army officer and a regular scribe of ‘Rising Kashmir’. He can be approached at: slalotra4729@gmail.com)
