US Agent is quite right in stating that in order for peacekeepers to work there has to be peace first.
The last decades have actually seen very few instances in which Peacekeeping operations have been successful. The simple fact of the matter is that Peacekeeprs only work when the opposing sides facing each other want the peace maintained. UN or international forces usually have nor the mandate, nor the will nor the capability to actively keep the peace, they are totally dependant on the will of the people for whom there are supposed to keep it. As long as fighting continues, there’s very little to be done.
Srebrenica is a tragic example – Dutch peacekeeping efforts were worth nothing more than Serb promises. The same goes for UN forces in southern Lebanon who for over 20 years have had no effect whatsoever on fighting in the region. Operations in Somalia didn’t fail because Somalis were “overwhelmed” or because they “didn’t know what peacekeepers were”. They failed because Somali warlords had no interest in any peace that would take away their power, food distribution that would lessen their control of the people.
What good are they then? UN forces are effective as a way to ensure a fragile peace, to allow trust to evolve between opposing forces or to put in place a process that both sides want. An example of this would be UN efforts in Cambodia in the early 90s, leading to elections. Another would be the UN separation forces on the Golan Heights, observing the ceasefire between Israel and Syria. These work because both sides want them to work, yet may be too distrustful of each other.
As long as governments lack the political will to conduct military operations towards bringing an end the fighting, peacekeeping efforts may be quite useless.
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