Why UN peacekeeping is no longer such a Good Thing

The Canadian major media, in this case the CBC, are finally waking up to reality--do read the whole thing, quite good indeed (via GAP):

The sad, unlamented end of UN peacekeeping

Many Canadians look forward to the day this country can leave the war in Afghanistan behind and return to the softer challenges of blue-helmeted peacekeeping.

There is still a dogged belief that UN-sponsored peacekeeping, a term introduced by then secretary of state for external affairs Lester Pearson in 1956, is our true national vocation.

In 1990, fully 10 per cent of all UN missions were staffed by Canadians and the image of blue-helmeted Canadian soldiers policing the world's flashpoints — from Cyprus and Sinai to Kashmir — became almost as iconic as the beaver.

But those days are gone. It's time to face the harsh reality.

United Nations peacekeepers patrol in territory held by Laurent Nkunda's rebel movement near Rutshuru, 80 kilometres north of Goma, in eastern Congo in November 2008. (Jerome Delay/Associated Press)

Canada has avoided traditional peacekeeping missions in all but a very few and rather minor instances for more than a decade now precisely because the Pearsonian model of soldiers acting as diplomats and friendly neighbourhood referees is almost impossible to replicate in this far more chaotic era.

The lines between internal disputes and war have becoming blurred to the point where factions and armed movements rather than national states now dominate conflict zones.

In these mash-ups, countries flounder, while non-state armies flourish and often several renegade or rebel groups — even criminal armies and now, of course, pirates — compete within the beaten-down body of a damaged nation...

More here, here, here, here, here, here (towards end), here, and here.