the ability of independent state security actionswith respect to the united nations security council
DESCRIPTION
The actions taken by allied actors in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 have posed many questions as to the role of the United Nations in the post Cold War international relations. The possibility of unilateral measures superseding the role of the United Nations Security Council has been brought to the forefront of global security in the 21st Century. This concern brings us to the question postulated by the heading given to #6 of our Term Paper Essay Titles „[d]id the allied interventions in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 undermine the Security Council‟s role or do they reflect the fact that major powers will always pursue their own security interests irrespective of international regulation of the use of force?‟TRANSCRIPT
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The Ability of Independent State Security Actions
With Respect to the United Nations Security Council
Marcus P. Williamson
December 2008
Introduction, Definitions, and Outline
Introduction
The actions taken by allied actors in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 have posed
many questions as to the role of the United Nations in the post Cold War international
relations. The possibility of unilateral measures superseding the role of the United Nations
Security Council has been brought to the forefront of global security in the 21st Century. This
concern brings us to the question postulated by the heading given to #6 of our Term Paper
Essay Titles „[d]id the allied interventions in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 undermine
the Security Council‟s role or do they reflect the fact that major powers will always pursue
their own security interests irrespective of international regulation of the use of force?‟
This question‟s importance is undisputed in determining the abilities of individual
actors and the role that the United Nations (UN) is able to play according to international law.
If there is no ability for the UN to act in security situations that are applicable to individual
states, then the UN limited to acting in a confined aptitude. If individual players did act
outside their defined abilities than consequences to those actions should be addressed by the
„international community‟. The conclusions that are reached here will show that the actions
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taken in these specific instances were within the bounds defined by the international
regulation of the use of force, and did so without undermining the United Nations Security
Council‟s self-defined role while protecting their own national security interests.
Definition of Terms
In investigating this question, three terms must be defined. They are: 1) the role of
the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), 2) major powers, and 3) international
regulation on the use of force. Each will be looked at in turn, and the definitions provided
will be the basis for understanding as they are used throughout the paper.
The role of the UNSC is defined in this respect by many different citations all sourced
from the United Nations Charter (UNC, 1945), the first of which will be mentioned here, but
others will be discussed at length later in this essay. The first aspect of this definition comes
from Chapter VII of the UNC (Ibid.) which states „The Security Council shall determine the
existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression and shall make
recommendations, or decide what measures shall be taken in accordance with Articles 41 and
42, to maintain or restore international peace and security (Article 39).‟ While
straightforward in its declaration of the right to determine what is and is not an aggressive
action or a breach of international security, one important note is that the UNSC is not
allowed to delegate this power to another actor, be it a nation, state, collective security group,
or other (Sarooshi, 1999: 33). Maintaining this power is limited to actions taken by the UN
as well. As it will be discussed later in the second section of this discussion, the role of
independent actors plays a significant factor in determining the answer to this paper‟s
premise.
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The second term that must be quantified is that of a „major power‟. This ambiguous
term is not limited to individual states, but could range from large multi-national corporations
to collective security groups. In order to help classify what a major power is for the purposes
and limitations of this discussion, a major power will include nuclear states as outlined by
Coate, et Al. (1997: 26) for the purposes of military superiority and collective security groups
such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), but will not include economic
groups such as MNCs (Multi-National Corporations) or the European Union. While these
economic groups are major powers, the restrictions of this essay force the discussion to be
limited to only military powers. Further investigation into the ability of economic powers
needs to be developed, but will not be mentioned here.
The final term that will be defined for the purposes of this essay is that of
international regulation on the use of force. UNC Chapter VI (1945) brings about the initial
grounds for defining this by stating that „[n]othing in the present Charter shall impair the
inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a
Member of the United Nations (Article 51)‟ and „[s]hould the Security Council consider that
measures provided for in Article 41 would be inadequate or have proved to be inadequate, it
may take such action by air, sea, or land forces as may be necessary to maintain or restore
international peace and security. Such action may include demonstrations, blockade, and
other operations by air, sea, or land forces of Members of the United Nations (Article 42)‟.
This recognition by the UNC allows for individual members of the UN to act under their own
accord under self-defense actions. While this becomes confused when regarding the Chapter
VII ability of the UNSC to define what its own abilities are in certain situations, further
discussion of this term will occur later in this paper to aid in clarifying this issue.
Understanding the Post-Internationalism Approach
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Post internationalism is a theory presented by James N. Rosenau in his book
Turbulence in World Politics: A Theory of Change and Continuity (1990). The ideals listed
in this work specify the essential tenants of post internationalism. They are: the shifting
continuity of international relations (p 67), the issues with fixed theories that only work in the
current established international system (p 21), the rising power of SFAs (sovereignty free
actors) (p 114), and the development of relations between groups of all sizes and levels
internationally (p 141).
Again, due to the limitations of this essay, a full discussion of this theory is not
possible. While the inferences of this idea are clearly displayed here, the specifics are not.
This essay is not meant to be an introduction of this approach, but merely a superficial
application of it. Using this supposition will help to apply the ideas that are discussed within
the framework of the hypothesis due to the fact that the military engagements mentioned
were not direct wars by a state against a state, but rather actions of a allied group of states
against SFA groups. This shifting policy is not limited to these two engagements, but does
present itself as specific examples of modern conflict around the globe.
Outline
The question that is posed as the premise for this essay is did the allied interventions
in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 undermine the Security Council‟s role or do they
reflect the fact that major powers will always pursue their own security interests irrespective
of international regulation of the use of force? The evidence that will be presented
throughout the body will come to the resounding conclusion no. Investigating the UNSC‟s
delegation of state security to individual security collectives and individual nations, we will
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find that Regional security groups come first for defense. While the UNSC‟s role is not
undermined in any way, it is limited in the actions that it may take in certain situations. The
ability of these sovereign groups has a higher ability though international law than the UN,
and will always act first before the UNSC has the opportunity to act upon a situation.
The approach to the discussion will include an investigation into the difference
between humanitarian and security actions, with specific regard to the UN‟s shifting role in
such actions since the end of the Cold War. That discussion will be followed by an
investigation into the role of „post-internationalism‟ as presented by J.N. Rosenau. Through
this process, we will see that the ability of the UN to perform in security situations is limited
to actions against states and not the all important role that sovereignty-free actors (SFAs) are
portraying in modern international politics.
Security in the Post-Internationalist World
The UN has had a shifting definition with regards to its role in peacekeeping since
1992. With the combined effects of the end of the Cold War and UNOSOM, The tendency
has tended toward humanitarian interests, and shifted from the original outline of state
security in the global setting (Murphy, 1996: 284). This has presented a new look at the task
outlined in the UNC (Article 2) and brought about the implications given in the treaties
formed during and following WWII defined throughout Chapter V of the UNC. Looking at
this shift through a post-internationalist view, it will become clear that the current situation of
state security is legally protected not by the UN, but by individual states and collective
security agreements.
The UN‟s Shifting Humanitarian Role
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Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan stated in 1999 that humanitarian concerns
will take precedence over state sovereignty, thus shifting the ability of the UNC away from
protecting states to defending individual persons (Miller, 1999). These main factors have led
to the UN‟s limited role in military actions. Without the express demand for a humanitarian
intervention, there is no legal precedence established for force. The actions taken by
UNOSOM in 1992-93 have provided the tipping point in the situation. While deliberately a
humanitarian action, the difficulty of securing the situation militarily allowed for individual
nations to withdraw their military support. The ability to do this without the major power
balancing threat provided a shocking reality for planners within the UN structure. Unable to
require nations to commit troops to individual actions, the constraints of acting in the era at
the „end of history‟ proved to be anything but.
The UN mission to continue working through Article 51 of the UNC (Ibid.), the use
of force has been delegated to individual states or collective security groups is a member of
the UN is attacked by an outside force. This limitation of the use of force has left the ability
of the UN and its member countries to be perceived as victims waiting for an attack. Without
„first-strike‟ capability, the ability for preventative measures to be enacted by state-actors is
limited. The threat that comes from surrounding predatory players who can prey on others
that are confined by the inability to legally act unless attacked first.
Continuing through Article 42 (UNC, Ibid.), the UNSC has the right to „pass the
buck‟ as it were when committing to the actual conflict. With „permission‟ from the UNSC,
and individual state or security collective can engage in military conflict legally. While this
statute reads as a pro-state security measure, the threat that now exists with possible
engagements with SFAs promotes a legal problem. State on state action has been reduced in
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the latter half of the 20th
Century, but this new arena of conflict has stranded the UN in its
actions due to the limits of its own charter.
Fenton (2004) continues with this thought. Through the „norm of non-intervention‟
that has been the accepted action of interstate engagements provides the basis for the UNC (p
6). Due to the limits that it introduces to specific situations, the UN role has been steadily
selective over the past 20 years. With UN military actions now specifically targeting post-
conflict and humanitarian civil confrontations, the role for state security measures has been
left to individual nations. The most capable of which are major powers.
UN General Assembly resolutions 2625 (1971) and 61 (1986) have outlined the threat
considered by international sovereign states. These dictate that the UN condemns terrorist
actions, and will allow for individual states to act within their own best interests to contain
the threat posed to them. While these resolutions were introduced at a time before the global
security shifted its focus towards these actors, they have been applied to modern conditions.
This has led to the ability to portray any enemy as a „terrorist‟ combatant, and lead to global
identification of small groups as terrorist organizations, after which they can be legally
engaged under the premise of state security.
The ability for states to act within their own self interest is also contained within the
tenants of the UNC. Under Chapter V, major powers are able to act in their own self interest.
Outlining the abilities of the five permanent members of the UNSC, Chapter V also
specifically states actions that major powers may impose. Among these are: armament
limitations on individual states (Article 26) and a rather vague implication of superiority on
international issues (Article 24). This specifically gives major powers the right to not only
act independently, but also influences the UN in need specific actions. While previously
checked by global balance, this check has been relatively eliminated. While the uni-polar
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hegemony that now exists is most likely transitionary (Mittelman, 1996: 233), the current
situation that it presents is a concern for major powers to act within their own interests.
Understanding that the most potent threat to states are SFAs, the ability for a nation to
act in their own interest under the auspices of state security takes precedence. These means
are within the realm of international law, and a topic that the UNSC is willing to allocate to
individual players and security groups for their initial action until a humanitarian need can be
established.
International Politics Following 11 September 2001
„We will work with the U.N. Security Council for the necessary resolutions. But the
purposes of the United States should not be doubted. The Security Council resolutions
will be enforced -- the just demands of peace and security will be met -- or action will
be unavoidable. And a regime [Iraq] that has lost its legitimacy will also lose its
power.‟
-United States President George W. Bush,
Address to the United Nations General Assembly, 12 September 2002
This idea has been presented throughout current United States foreign policy,
particularly in respect to the actions in Afghanistan since 2001 and Iraq since 2003. The
standard previous to this for the United States had been the shifting consideration between
isolationist and participation. Now that consideration has shifted to the thought of
unilateralist verses multilateralism (Anderson, 2004: 36-7). Now commonly referred to as
the „Bush Doctrine‟, this strategy has been implemented not only in reaction to the attacks on
the United States on 11 September 2001, but as a reaction to repeated acts against the United
States for many years (Cooley, 2002: 196). The results of previous engagements through
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Cold War proxy battles had left a strong SFA that had taken its mission abroad, built on the
foundations of what Pakistani Ambassador to the UN Shamshad Ahmad referred to as a
„Kalashnikov culture‟ (Risen and Miller, 2001).
The thought of „4th
Generation‟ warfare has embraced both the tenants of post-
institutionalism and the „Bush Doctrine‟. As international relations shifts from the nation
state status quo that has been in effect since the Treaties of Westphalia in 1648, the
continuous change that is a standard acceptance of many differing theories now must be
adapted to include not just „sub-state actors‟, but SFAs, or sovereignty free actors (Mansbach,
2004: 21).
At the end of the Cold War, the United States redeveloped a policy enacted since the
end of World War II that was devoted toward the idea of multilateral engagements with
problem states. The idea that states could be better influenced through relations by many
member nations, formed typically in collective security groups such as the UN or NATO,
usually was enacted through strict sanctions against organized states that possess formal
governmental leadership. By doing this, the idea of threat could be a deterrent towards actors
that might possibly enact irrational behaviors that endanger outside groups of people. As
stated by the United States National Security Council,
“[T]he first duty of the United States Government remains what it always has
been: to protect the American people and American interests. It is an enduring
American principle that this duty obligates the government to anticipate and counter
threats, using all elements of national power, before the threats can do grave damage.
The greater the threat, the greater is the risk of inaction – and the more compelling
the case for taking anticipatory action to defend ourselves, even if uncertainty
remains as to the time and place of the enemy‟s attack (United States National
Security Council, 2006).”
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Along with the idea of a preventative mission against potential enemies, the United
States has included a stance on promoting democracies in nations that are currently under a
style of unbalanced totalitarian regime. With this, the American government has left the
clause purposefully vague as to be redefined time and time again to fit the needs of specific
situations. With the current war in Iraq against terrorist insurgencies that threaten the
fledgling Iraqi democratic government, the United States has determined to maintain a
military presence in the area in order to ensure the safe development of this pro-American
democratic government. As the theory that fair and impartial democracies are inherently
peaceful toward each other, the hope is that the favorable governments that replace irrational
and imbalances tightly controlled ones will pose a smaller threat towards the United States
and their economic interests in the region.
Preventative war policies that the United States has decided to enact is an
announcement to the world that they are now willing to take on anyone who may stand in
their path. Without the needs of collective security groups, the United States feels as though
a unilateral course of action is the best way to ensure their long term security around the
world. Their role in these groups has long been as the major contributor in arms, supplies,
and manpower to aid in actions that are requested by the UN and others. As such, the
international community has reacted with a level of distrust, particularly by those who are not
in step with the current policies enacted by America. While the lone superpower idea had an
air of potential peace building for the future, the reality is that it has not concluded as such.
The United States will only feel secure as long as the rest of the world matches their vision
for the entire world, and will stand by with force if it is not met.
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Summary and Concluding Thoughts
The military focus of the UN since the end of the Cold War has been on humanitarian
concerns, not those of individual state security. Since the UNSC has allowed for independent
actors to proceed in military actions in both defensive and pre-emptive to ensure state
security against SFAs, there has been the relinquishing of authority to major powers that
allows for them to act in their own self interest without undermining the UNSC. This ability
is not surprising due to the fact that the five permanent members of the UNSC all have
individual nationalistic interests at heart, and desire the ability to keep state security a
domestic issue.
The development of 4th
Generation warfare in the post-international age has brought
about a problem for the UN. While established under the auspices of a global war, the
development of SFA importance in the modern world has made much of the original tenants
of the agreement that established the UN into doubt. This opening for states to act against
smaller groups that have been declared enemy combatants of any major nation has set a
dangerous precedence.
Thoughts on Future Occurrences
Terrorism has become a „catch-all‟ phrase in the modern world that is used to collect
international sympathy and justify military actions taken around the globe. The ability to
define any section of an enemy group as a threat to national security by determining that it is
a terrorist group allows for legal unilateral actions to be committed. The new „red herring‟ of
terrorism has become the scapegoat that permits this to happen.
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While 4th
Generation warfare has established itself as the future of global disorder and
peace threat, the auspices of terrorism are not practical justifications for war (Casus Belli).
The ability for global military action needs to be properly defined. As questioned in the
introduction of this paper, the UN is limited to acting in a confined ability that needs to be
investigated further. The premise of this paper looking at the legal aspects of war engaged
beginning in 2001 and 2003 have been shown as legal, but not within the keeping of the
intent of the law. Allowing for a few independent major powers to act despite the best
interests of global security is a key concern for future plans, and is one that cannot be ignored
when discussing the potential of international peace keeping and conflict resolution.
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