The Impact on the United Nations of Security Developments in Europe.

The security relationship between the United Nations and Europe has become more entwined than ever before in the decade since the end of the cold war. What is new in Europe is the emergence of a variety of actual and potential conflict situations that require limited response, as opposed to defense against a massive military threat.

Today's international force in Kosovo and the NATO-led (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) force in Bosnia and Herzegovina operate under UN mandate. The civilian United Nations Mission in Kosovo is led by a French official, appointed by and responsible to the Secretary-General. Earlier, the United Nations conducted, in a veritable combat zone, a humanitarian relief operation in Bosnia, under the protection of a UN-mandated force of 15,000 troops. In addition, a sizeable UN force was deployed as a preventive measure in Macedonia. Such UN operations were unheard of in the days of the cold war when European security was governed by the NATO-Warsaw Pact stand-off.

On-the-ground involvement of the United Nations in a continent which boasts the most sophisticated security alliance in history might seem redundant. Yet, this decade has taught us that security can be jeopardized in many ways short of military attack, and preserving it requires more than military capabilities. The United Nations offers tools and experience in conflict prevention and post-conflict peace-building that can be adapted to European needs today. At the same time, many of Europe's well-developed security institutions may provide lessons or "best practices" for the United Nations itself and for other regions. To make possible such mutual benefit however, it is urgent to develop effective communication and information exchange among the several European security institutions and between them and the United Nations.

Despite the frictions and unseemly polemics which have sometimes characterized early cooperative efforts with the United Nations, considerable progress has been made in Bosnia. Post-conflict operations in Kosovo may also benefit from a clear commitment to work together among the several institutions involved.

Among European security institutions, NATO is clearly the foundation, the chief forum for discussions about developing crises and for military planning and operations to deal with them. However, a number of other organizations also have important roles to play, especially in preventing or defusing crises and in the repair or renewal of civil society after a conflict has ended. Across a spectrum, from military through political to economic focus, they include the Western European Union (WEU), the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Council of Europe, the European Union (EU), and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Each has its own founding history, purpose and membership, although there is overlap among them. Many countries in and outside Europe belong to or are affiliated with two or more of these institutions. All have undergone considerable change in facing the challenges that have pressed Europe since the end of the cold war.

NATO has admitted three new members from central and eastern Europe and has developed partnership relations with a number of countries of the former Soviet bloc. It has also adapted from a defensive mode to one capable of mounting limited peacemaking operations. Earlier in the decade, NATO could hardly conceive of such engagement to the point where a NATO spokesman admitted privately that involvement in Bosnia would be "the end of NATO".

The EU has now begun to think of itself as an instrument to promote security in a broad sense. It has already admitted three new members from northern and central Europe, is negotiating with six more aspirants and will likely expand that list soon. The mere possibility of EU membership has inspired several States in Europe to resolve potential disputes.

The WEU has become a link between NATO and the EU, which aspires to a common security vocation of its own. As the EU augments its role of promoting stability through economic development, the WEU will probably merge with it to become a vehicle for bringing about a "European Security and Defense Identity", or common defense policy. Less heralded but no less important has been the institutionalization of the OSCE through the establishment of a secretariat in Vienna and auxiliary offices elsewhere. The OSCE focuses on human rights and minority questions, parliamentary cooperation and so forth. It has special missions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and a number of other less well-known trouble spots in Europe.

The end of the cold war, and the Kosovo crisis, have led to renewed and more intensive talk in Europe of an independent European security capability "separable from but not separate" from NATO. The idea is for Europe to have the ability to respond to a crisis affecting it, which the United States might not want to get directly involved in. This aim is also fuelled by a recurring wish that Europe could have a stronger voice when differences arise with the United States on how to respond in a given crisis. In any event, the drive for such an independent capability on the part of Europeans springs not only from such differences, but a desire to be able to do more on their own behalf. This will define the security agenda within Europe for the foreseeable future. Strengthened capabilities in high-tech warfare, intelligence, communications, airlift and so on, many feel, can enable Europeans to do more on their own, reducing dependence on American forces and views on tactics and diplomacy.

The conduct of the war in Kosovo, and the diplomacy that finally helped bring about a ceasefire there, brought numerous instances of European countries' disagreement with United States actions, although the NATO alliance hung together, just. The Kosovo experience has made Europeans face up to the fact of their military dependence on the United States. Of course, the United States itself, which has continually called upon Europeans to put more into defense, would welcome the development of a strengthened European security and defense capability--and even a more independent European security voice--if it produced a stronger, more effective European role in the NATO alliance.

The United States supplied 80 per cent of warplanes for the Kosovo operation and would be more than happy to see Europe take up a more effective effort on its own behalf. However, Americans also remain wary of anything that would undermine the United States influence, through NATO, in dealing with important security problems in Europe. Moreover, Washington might not be so happy when more confident Europeans took positions on particular issues at variance to those Washington-favoured. Yet, this may be the trade-off for Washington to gain a Europe that can "get its act together" and contribute more effectively in taking care of its own affairs and acting as a stronger supporting partner of the United States.

How might all this affect the United Nations?

First, several well-established, non-military institutions in Europe in combination strengthen Europe's security in many, often little appreciated ways. They promote economic well-being, foster democratic institutions and methods, build habits of cooperation, foster mutual confidence, improve conditions for minorities and monitor human rights issues. Organizations like the Council of Europe and the OSCE have been very busy since the opening of the East. In the past few years, the number of OSCE special missions, for example, has quadrupled, while its financial and human resources remain severely limited. Continued expansion and improvement of this kind of work by European institutions, combined with an improved European defense capability, ought to reduce the need for the United Nations to expend its assets to Europe, thus allowing them to be used elsewhere.

A stronger, more independent European capability would also presumably be available to the United Nations. Europe's leaders and several of its major national political parties favour close cooperation with the United Nations. Though reluctant to act outside of the "NATO area", they might be more willing to do so under UN mandate. A related though indirect benefit to the United Nations might be the ability of a Europe with its own defense capability to encourage closer United States cooperation with the United Nations.

The Europeans give high priority to such cooperation. Many of their Governments and political parties are extremely concerned that the air campaign in Kosovo, undertaken without specific UN authorization, does not constitute a precedent. Their views in what looks likely to become a continuing discussion over rights of intervention and requirements for a UN mandate will be important as the world community strives to define the ground rules for undertaking peacekeeping operations.

Finally, there is the improved synergy that should develop between the United Nations and several European security institutions. As they work to find better ways to avert crises, deal with conflict and support failed or newly emerging States, the United Nations and these European organizations will have much to share in "best practices", lessons learned and mutual reinforcement. Policing, monitoring elections and introducing lines of separation between hostile neighbours are areas where the United Nations has decades of experience. Europeans, on the other hand, have worked hard and with success at building stable institutions over the long term, promoting democracy and respect for human rights in new States, instituting military confidence-building measures, and furthering political and economic integration. The United Nations as a global organization and Europe as a regional one have much to gain from working closely together in crisis prevention.

For best results, however, they both need to improve in a number of areas, and the United States could play a positive, catalytic role in this. Europe will not attain a common independent defense or a single foreign-policy voice early or easily--if at all. This goal will require a long-term commitment of will and public resources and no little ingenuity. Cooperation among Europeans must be developed further in defense production, for example, and clever ways of applying comparative advantage must be worked out among countries that want to cooperate but fear to yield any further measure of sovereignty.

The United States could help by ending its own ambivalence toward a self-sufficient European defense role. Washington should reinforce its many declarations of support by actions to help further the goal in practical ways.

One step would be to relax American regulations that inhibit United States-European defense cooperation. The United States could also continue efforts to promote the Allied's interoperability in defense equipment, technology and tactics. Further, the United States could encourage the Europeans to create more innovative crisis-prevention instruments under their so-called "Petersberg Tasks", from a WEU declaration of June 1992, outlining a commitment to develop capabilities ranging from humanitarian and rescue operations to more traditional peacekeeping and military peacemaking functions. The Petersberg Tasks were adopted by the EU through the Amsterdam Treaty, which also gives the European Council a directive authority over the WEU. Practical capabilities to carry out the tasks are still being developed.

Along those lines, the United States is working with other OSCE participating States to improve national means of providing to the OSCE Secretariat civilian personnel in various skill areas. This is to ensure a standing capability for rapid deployment of special teams to crisis spots. Such an improved rapid deployment capability could also help European States respond more effectively to urgent appeals from the United Nations for civilian resources.

The United States should also adopt an attitude of more forthright cooperation toward the United Nations. An obvious first step is for Washington to pay its arrears. Another would be for the Administration and Congress to refrain from carping at the United Nations as an institution. Its failures are often owed to circumstances beyond its control--political obstruction or financial limitations. As a creature of the international community, it can only be as strong or as effective as its members will allow.

Personalizing disagreements, moreover, can undermine respect for the institution as a whole. To illustrate, the then United Nations Secretary-General was much vilified in certain quarters in the United States as he tried to cope during the difficult UN Protection Force operation (pre-Dayton period) in Bosnia. He had called upon United Nations members to increase the troop level in Bosnia from about 15,000 to 40,000. He never got those numbers from Member States though--and he and the United Nations were roundly criticized for not "measuring up" to the task. Yet, when the NATO-led Implementation Force, agreed at Dayton, relieved the smaller UN contingent in Bosnia, it went in with no less than 60,000 troops!

Of course, improvements had been necessary at the United Nations to respond more effectively to fast-moving developments in the Bosnian war and, certainly, additional improvements can be made to make UN crisis-management efforts effective. But success can only come in an atmosphere of cooperation and shared effort. The results will benefit Europe, the United Nations, the United States--and the world community.

Jack Seymour Is Senior Fellow at British-American Security Information Council (BASIC), Washington, D.C. He was assisted by Simon Stanleigh, also of BASIC, in preparing this article.