SPECIAL REPORT OFFICE OF CURRENT INTELLIGENCE UNITED NATIONS PEACE-KEEPING OPERATIONS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79-00927A004000030001-6
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: S
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• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Sequence Number: 1
• Content Type: REPORT

OCI No. 0274/63C
Copy No. 77
SPECIAL REPORT
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OFFICE OF CURRENT INTELLIGENCE
UNITED NATIONS PEACE-KEEPING OPERATIONS
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
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5 April 1963
UNITED NATIONS PEACE-KEEPING OPERATIONS
The United Nations' charter
gives responsibilities for main-
taining peace to the Security
Council; but this function has
passed by default to the General
Assembly and the Office of the
Secretary General because of
cold-war developments and the
Soviet abuse of the veto. As a
consequence, the UN's peace-keep-
ing operations have been under-
taken on a more or less ad hoc
basis, financed in some cases
from the regular budget and in
others by special assessment.
There have been few, if any,
common denominators in the UN's
various approaches to critical
situations.
ization together with four Mixed
Armistice Commissions since
1948 to oversee the truce be-
tween Israel and the Arab states.
In 1956, following the Suez
crisis, a 5,000-man Emergency
Force was dispatched to the
area for the same purpose to
patrol the Gaza strip and the
Sinai peninsula.
Two smaller "temporary"
operations were undertaken in
1958; namely, the establishment
of a "UN presence" in Jordan
and a UN Observer Group in Leb-
anon. Both were set up with
a view to preventing a local
incident from escalating into
regional conflict.
With the exception of the
Korean command--which in reality
was a United States operation
under a UN umbrella--these peace-
keeping operations have, however,
had one important characteristic
in common: none of the five per-
manent Security Council members
has been allowed to participate
in any sizable military way. The
resulting dependence on the less
powerful "nonaligned" countries
has been an added handicap for
the UN operations, particularly
since many of these countries
lack any well-established tra-
dition in the disciplined use
of military force.
Middle East
Until the Congo crisis
broke, UN peace-keeping activities
were centered mainly in the Mid-
dle East. There the UN has main-
tained a Truce Siinervision Organ-
The UN Truce Supervision
Organization (UNTSO), a body
of neutral observers, has the
over-all responsibility for super-
vising the uneasy Arab-Israeli
armistice with the aid of the
four Mixed Armistice Commissions
(MACs). These groups have been
beset by many difficulties,
chief of which has been Israel's
obstructionism and its public
campaign to discredit the UN
effort. In addition, the Arabs
and the Israelis try to outdo
each other in the number of
complaints submitted.
UN personnel have been able
to cope with this kind of fric-
tion, but Arab "fedayeen" raids
(large-scale, commando-type at-
tacks) and the Israeli Sinai
campaign in 1956 have shown con-
clusively that UNTSO and the
MACs cannot prevent large-scale
1
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warfare whenever this is the
intention of either side. There
is little question, however,that
removal of UNTSO or a drastic
reduction of its functions could
lead to a resumption of open
warfare.
The UN presence in Jordan,
sometimes called the Spinelli
Mission after the ambassador in
charge, was set up by the UN
Secretary General in compliance
with a General Assembly resolu-
tion of 27 September 1958. On
paper, the mission's job was
to check up on the implementa-
tion of a mutual pledge by sev-
eral Arab states to stop inter-
fering in each other's internal
affairs. In practice, however,
the mission functioned primarily
as a clearinghouse for complaints
of subversive activity against
Jordan by the United Arab Re-.
public. It was gradually phased
out, and finally dissolved in
September 1959.
Although the Spinelli Mis-
sion was only a show of the UN
flag, it probably indicates the
kind of machinery Secretary Gen-
eral Thant has in mind for pro-
moting a settlement of the cur-
rent Yemeni-UAR-Saudi conflict.
In Lebanon, a Security
Council resolution of 11 June
1958 authorized the formation
of an observer group (UNOGIL in
UN parlance) to prevent the in-
filtration of personnel and arms
into Lebanon for subversive pur-
poses. The most significant
aspect of this operation was the
speed with which the UN was able
to install a military observer
group at a point of crisis.
The first contingent of UNOGIL
was on the premises within eight
days, and it reached with rela-
tive rapidity a peak strength
of 579 officers and men. All
had to be from UN members accept-
able to the host country. Al-
though it was unable to stop the
flow of Syrian arms into Lebanon,
UNOGIL's symbolic character prob-
ably aided in diminishing local
tension and facilitated the with-
drawal of American forces.
The UN Emergency Force
(UNEF) was established by the
General Assembly in November
1956 to patrol the Gaza strip
and Sinai areas after the with-
drawal of the British, French
and Israeli invasion troops.
The force is still a going con-
cern although seriously ham-
pered by the reluctance of UN
members to support it with men
and money.
The UNEF was the first UN
peace-keeping force to be armed,
and it established several other
precedents also. The late Sec-
retary General Hammarskjold--
in an October 1958 report to
the General Assembly on the
experience gained by the UN in
operating UNEF--recommended that
any future UN police force be re-
cruited only on an ad hoc basis
after an emergency situation
had arisen. In other words,
the UN's experience with UNEF
convinced Hammarskjold--and many
UN members--that it was neither
necessary nor feasible to create
a permanent UN stand -by peace force.
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Also on this occasion Ham-
marskjold advanced the principle
that forces of this kind ought
to be equipped with light arms
but not include troops from the
five permanent members of the
Security Council. He also pro-
posed a number of operational
procedures, including the fol-
lowing: 1) UN forces would be
sent into a danger area only with
the consent of the country in-
volved; 2) a UN force should
use its weapons only in self-
defense; 3) either the Security
Council or the General Assembly
would set the framework on how
UN forces should be used; and
4) ultimate decisions on field
operations would be left to the
Secretary General.
As a consequence of the dis-
pute over Kashmir, a UN Military
Observer Group for India and Pak-
istan (UNMOGIP) was established
by the Security Council in 1948
to supervise the cease-fire line
running through that territory.
Staffed primarily by personnel
from the US, Britain, and the
older Commonwealth countries, this
organization has been notably ef-
fective in handling numerous po-
tentially explopi.ve incidents.
General R.H. Nimmo of Aus-
tralia, the officer in command,
believes that his group, composed
of about 30 men manning a total
of 10 observer posts, is adequate
under existing circumstances. It
is, however, obviously incapable
of coping with any large-scale
military operations.
The UN has also had a hand
in the peaceful settlement of
the Netherlands-Indonesian dis-
pute over West New Guinea. The
UN Temporary Executive Authority
(UNTEA)--under the direction of
a civilian chief,Dr. Djalal Abdoh
of Iran, assisted by some 1,500
Pakistani troops--took over the
administration of West New Guinea
from the Netherlands on 1 October
1962. On 1 May of this year,
the UN will turn over the area
to Indonesia under the terms of
an agreement negotiated by US
Ambassador Bunker, signed by
Indonesia and the Netherlands,
and endorsed by the UN General
Assembly.
The primary purpose of this
operation is to maintain a peace-
ful transition period between
the departure of the Dutch admin-
istration and the take-over by
Indonesian authorities. While
many UN members believe that
Charter principles regarding
self-determination of all peoples
were compromised by this virtual
gift to Sukarno, nevertheless
the UN adminstration has so far
effectively fulfilled its limited
mandate.
The current effort in the
Congo (ONUC) is the UN's most
ambitious undertaking to date.
In many respects, it has also
been the most frustrating. Fi-
nancing the operation has brought
the UN to the brink of bankruptcy,
and operations frequently have
been rendered ineffective because
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of poor coordination between
headquarters in New York and
forces in the field.
Ever since the force was
established in July 1960 by the
Security Council, it has re-
ceived directives--at times
in conflict with one another--
from the General Assembly and
the Secretary General as well
as from the council. Local com-
manders at times took matters
into their own hands, as was
the case when UN troops took
over the key Katangan mining
centers of Jadotville and Ki-
pushi. Thus, while the ending
of the Katangan secession was
a success for the UN, the con-
duct of operations is scarcely
a model of efficiency for the
future.
UN forces in the Congo, at
one point 18,000 strong, are
now down to about 12,000. Thant
plans to reduce this to about
6,000 by 1 July. His main pre-
occupation--now that the mili-
tary phase seems to be ending
--is to pare UN military costs
and to round up funds for a
massive UN-sponsored economic
and technical assistance pro-
gram.
Financing
There is no uniformity in
the way the UN pays the expenses
of its peace-keeping operation.
The undertakings in Kashmir,
Jordan, and Lebanon were fi-
nanced out of the regular budget.
The costs of the West New Guinea
operations are shared by the
two countries concerned. UNEF
and ONUC get their funds from
separate accounts; in UNEF's
case this is called a "special
account" while in ONUC's it is
an "ad hoc account."
The handling of UNEF and
ONUC accounts marked an innova-
tion in UN finances in that
special cost-sharing arrange-
ments were developed. These
arrangements included voluntary
contributions from member states
--chiefly the United States--
and also provided for a formal
apportionment of the remaining
expenses among all member states.
It is these assessments that
the Soviet bloc, France, and
many of the lesser UN members
have either failed or refused
to pay. UNEF has, in recent
years, been costing the UN about
$20 million per year,ONUC about
$120 million a year.
In 1962 the General As-
sembly set up a 21-member com-
mittee to try to draw up a new
scale of assessments for fi-
ancing peace-keeping operations.
The eight less developed coun-
tries representing Asia, Africa
and Latin America on the com-
mittee were "shocked, dismayed,
and astounded" when the United
States announced that it would
pay no more than its regular
assessment of 32.02 percent to-
ward any future peace-keeping
operations.
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These countries then put
forward a new proposal under
which costs of such future oper-
ations would be borne almost en-
tirely by the "industrialized
members." Under this proposal,
the first $5 million would be
raised by assessing the entire
membership at their present reg-
ular percentage. The share of
the industrialized members in
the next $95 million would rise
on a sharply graduated scale
starting with 50 percent and
finally reaching 90 percent. On
29 March the committee adjourned
without reaching an agreement.
A special session of the
General Assembly to discuss
finances is scheduled to con-
vene on 14 May. Prospects now
seem remote for finding a gen-
erally satisfactory formula
that is financially workable
and which all members will honor.
Unless the ticklish problem
of financing peace-keeping op-
erations on a more equitable
basis is resolved, however,
the UN will be in a poor posi-
tion to mount any but small-scale
undertakings. (CONFIDENTIAL)
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