The UN Military Staff Committee

The UN Military Staff Committee is a misunderstood organ, and never really worked as it was initially envisaged. This book charts its historic development as a means to explain the continuous debate about the reactivation of the Military Staff Committee and, more generally, the unsatisfied need for the Security Council to have a mili- tary advisory body so that it does not only depend on the Secretariat to make its decisions on military and security affairs. The author takes a clear stand for the establishment of a military committee with real weight in the decision-making process of the Security Council related to peace operations. The Security Council remains the only international body making decisions in peace and security, authorizing military deployment without advice from a col- lective body of military experts and advisers. Recreating such a body is the missing part of all UN reform structures undertaken in past years. As the number of UN troops deployed increases, this book will be an important read for all students and scholars of international organisations, security studies and international relations.

Alexandra Novosseloff is a Senior Visiting Fellow at the International Peace Institute in New York. She is also a research associate at the Centre Thucydide of the University Paris 2-Panthéon-Assas where she held her PhD in Political Science and International Relations. She has written a number of books, policy reports and articles on the UN Security Council and on UN . Global Institutions

Edited by Thomas G. Weiss The CUNY Graduate Center, New York, USA and Rorden Wilkinson University of Sussex, Brighton, UK

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Sovereign Rules and the Politics of International Economic Law (2018) by Marc D. Froese

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Global Governance and (2018) edited by Scott Kennedy This page intentionally left blank The UN Military Staff Committee Recreating a Missing Capacity

Alexandra Novosseloff First published 2018 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2018 Alexandra Novosseloff The right of Alexandra Novosseloff to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested

ISBN: 9781138042209 (hbk) ISBN: 9781315173863 (ebk)

Typeset in Times New Roman by Taylor & Francis Books Contents

List of illustrations viii Acknowledgments x Abbreviations xii

Introduction 1 1 History of the improbable creation of the UN Military Staff Committee 5 2 The consequences of the paralysis of the Military Staff Committee 54 3 Recurrent attempts at reform and reactivation of the Military Staff Committee since 1948 87 4 Current developments and looking into the future 120 Conclusion 144

Bibliography 150 Index 152 Illustrations

Figures 1.1 A meeting of the Military Staff Committee of 4 February 1946. 25 1.2 Announcement of a meeting of the MSC, 2017 29 1.3 Suggested layout for structure of Military Staff Committee by the British Foreign Office in 1944 33 2.1 Departments of the UN Secretariat in 1946 63 2.2 Structures of the Department of Security Council Affairs in 1946 63 2.3 Organization of the Office of Military Affairs 73 2.4 Structure of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations in 2001 78 2.5 Structure of the peace and security architecture in the UN Secretariat in 2017 80 4.1 Meeting of the MSC with the military advisers of the Elected Ten, November 2017 121 5.1 The MSC with the military advisers of the non-permanent members in the Security Council chamber, November 2017 145

Tables 1.1 Staffing of the secretariat of the Military Staff Committee 37 1.2 Nationalities of the liaison officers of the Military Staff Committee 38 1.3 Estimate of the overall strength of the armed forces at the disposal of the UN Security Council 43 2.1 List of the Military Advisers of the Secretary-General 72 4.1 Number of field missions led by the Military Staff Committee (as of end of 2017) 125 List of illustrations ix Boxes 1.1 Chronology of the work of substance of the Military Staff Committee since 1946 7 1.2 List of projects, declarations and proposals for the establishment of a new international organization (1940–1945) 11 1.3 Functions of Security and Armaments Commission (US Proposal) 15 1.4 Tentative proposals by the for a General International Organization (22 July 1944) 18 1.5 Military Staff Committee (Foreign Office Proposals, November 1944) 20 1.6 (Provisional) End of the work of the Military Staff Committee 45 2.1 Office of the Military Adviser of the Secretary-General in 1960s 69 3.1 Program of work of the Military Staff Committee in 2010–2011 112 4.1 Program of work of the Military Staff Committee in 2011–2012 123 4.2 Program of work of the Military Staff Committee in 2015–2016 127 Acknowledgments

The idea of writing a book on the Military Staff Committee came out of several discussions on peacekeeping with military officers in New York. A discussion with General Thierry Lion, the current head of the French Military Mission to ’s Permanent Mission to the , reminded me of the path taken by the MSC for some years, and in particular since I have published my earlier book on this mili- tary institution in 2008 (Le Comité d’état-major: Histoire d’un organe en sommeil, 2008, Centre Thucydide / Sociological Association of the UAE, 114 pages). Furthermore, as shown by the selected bibliography at the end of the book, no major book, article or study had been written in English on this institution since the beginning if the 1990s, the latest work being from Jane Boulden (“Prometheus Unbound: The History of the Military Staff Committee,” Aurora Papers, Ottawa, Canada: Canadian Centre for Global Security, no.19, August 1993, 43 pages). So I wanted to bridge that gap, all the more so as I kept a deep interest for the MSC since the completion of my PhD on “The Security Council and the Use of force” (undertaken at the University of Paris- Panthéon-Assas). When I submitted my book proposal to Thomas Weiss, he also found that justice needed to be given to the history and the role of the MSC throughout the years. I would like to thank him for supporting that project. The study of this unknown institution helps readers understand better how the UN is functioning and the lacunae of peacekeeping operations. This book owes a great deal to the numerous discussions I had for many years with the military advisers in New York, in particular at the French mission (Pascal Vinchon, Patrice Sartre, Jean Baillaud), and at the UK mission (Mike Redmond, Mark Maddick, Tim O’Brien). I would also like to thank Thierry Lion and Vadim Pivovar (current liaison officer to the MSC) for helping me get access to former and current military representatives in New York, as well as for their Acknowledgments xi insight in the current work of the MSC. And many thanks also to colleagues and friends who provided advice and comments on various drafts of this book which helped me shape my thinking and my writ- ing: Victor Casanova Abós, Jim Della-Giacoma, Robert Gordon, Mark Easton, Mark Maddick, Mike Redmond, Paul D. Williams. Abbreviations

AMISOM African Union Mission in Somalia AU African Union C-34 Committee of the 34 (i.e. General Assembly Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations) DFS Department for Field Support DPA Department of Political Affairs DPET Division for Policy, Evaluation and Training DPKO Department of Peacekeeping Operations E10 Elected Ten (i.e non-permanent members of the Security Council) EU European Union FRUS Foreign Relations of the IOT Integrated Operational Team MSC Military Staff Committee NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization OMA Office of Military Affairs ONUC Opération des Nations Unies au Congo (UN Operation in the Congo) OROLSI Office for the Rule of Law and Security Institutions P5 Permanent Five (i.e. permanent members of the Security Council) PSC Peace and Security Council (of the African Union) SCAD Security Council Affairs Division SMC Strategic Military Cell TCCs Troop-Contributing Countries UN United Nations UNCIO United Nations Conference on International Organization (, 1945) UNPROFOR United Nations Protection Force USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Introduction

 The obscure UN Military Staff Committee  Structure of the volume

The obscure UN Military Staff Committee The United Nations (UN) Military Staff Committee (MSC) is an obscure and much misunderstood subsidiary organ of the UN Security Council established under Article 47 of the UN Charter. It is not well known primarily because it has never really functioned as initially envisaged. Compared to the provisions of the Covenant of the League of Nations, the MSC was the main innovation at the San Francisco Conference and in the UN Charter. It was meant to embody the co- operation of the great military powers during World War II, a sort of second in command of the Security Council, and a major tool to deal with threats to peace and security. It was intended to both “advise and assist the Security Council on all questions relating to the Security Council’s military requirements for the maintenance of international peace and security,” and to “be responsible for the strategic direction of any armed forces” placed at the disposal of the Council according to special agreements to be negotiated with member states. But as cracks appeared in this co-operation, the MSC was the first organ to bear the consequences of this increasing division and suspi- cion, as it was dealing with the most strategic aspects of the UN apparatus: security and military affairs. Disagreements among the five permanent members of the Security Council (P5) after 1947 led them to regard the MSC with suspicion and viewed it as a threatening instrument of control over the military forces made at the disposal of an international organization. In such context, the ambitions of the drafters of the Charter failed on the realities of the balance of powers, and the structures of the MSC were never able to be developed as the 2 Introduction negotiation of Article 43’s special agreements for making available “armed forces, assistance and facilities” to the Security Council. Deprived of a strategic military tool, the Security Council – and the United Nations as a whole – has developed into a civilian organization where politics dominate and the military considerations of the deci- sions they make is secondary, even on the use of force and strategic military issues. The Security Council has kept ignoring the MSC and, with some exceptions, has not formally requested its help and its mili- tary advice. The challenge of including military advice into UN policy, whether in the Security Council or in the Secretariat, has increased. Nevertheless, for more than 70 years, the MSC has met every two weeks, as its rules of procedure decreed, in a very formal way to decide on the date and time of the following meeting in … 14 days. The MSC therefore never seized its activity. Initially in a “comatose state,” this committee has had over the years more and more substantive discussions on matters being discussed by the Security Council. Each time the Council made decisions under Chapter VII provisions (, Gulf War, peacekeeping opera- tions), some member states raised the issue of the use of the MSC for stronger military advice. In November 2004, the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change report even considered that “Article 47 should be deleted, as should all references to the body in Articles 26, 45, and 46.” In its view, “it is no longer appropriate for the joint chiefs of staff of the five permanent members to play the role imagined for them in 1945.”1 The Secretary-General in his report of March 2005 approved that recommendation. However, China and the Russian Federation refused the insertion of such recommendation in the Final Declaration of the World Summit in September 2005, and on the con- trary, requested “the Security Council to consider the composition, mandate, and working methods of the Military Staff Committee.”2 That paragraph – adopted at the end of the Final Declaration – restarted the discussion on the re-energization of the MSC. In 2010, new personalities and new circumstances led to a slow and partial revamping of the work of the MSC in its informal setting. Since then, the MSC has been working quietly and progressively to become a regular counterpart to the Department of Peacekeeping Operations’ Office of Military Affairs (OMA). However, it is still trying to find its place alongside the Security Council. Unlike organizations such as NATO and the EU which have both a military committee as “the pri- mary source of military advice” to their civilian decision-making body (the North Atlantic Council for NATO and the Political and Security Committee for the European Union), the Security Council is still the Introduction 3 only international organ involved in peace and security operations, making decisions that authorize the use of force without relying on its own dedicated military advisory body. The AU MSC is still in its infancy, but has been created on the same model.3

Structure of the volume This book aims to illuminate this poorly understood organ of the United Nations by tracing its historical development, as a means to explain the continuous debate about its reactivation. The MSC is an institution of its own that has been forgotten by its master, but that could have a role in its decision-making. The book also reflects on the more generally unsatisfied need for the Security Council to have a standing military advisory body so that it does not have to depend solely on the Secretariat to make its decisions on military and security affairs. To better understand the MSC’s current challenges, it is necessary to tell the history of this organ, to explain why it has mostly been kept in a deliberately induced coma, and to analyze the reasons why it has never been fully utilized. This is the purpose of Chapter 1. Then, Chapter 2 looks at the impact of the failed attempt to set up the structures of the MSC, a situation that allowed the UN Secretariat departments to com- pensate this lack of military expertise in the Security Council by developing its own structures. Even if the MSC is not well understood, secret, and useless, its member states did not get rid of it; they did not want to tempt fate by abolishing an organ that could potentially serve some useful purpose in the future. Chapter 3 relates the various episodes when UN member states saw an interest for a renewed reflection on the role of the MSC, until 2009–2010, when the Security Council formally requested its help in having a better oversight on the AU Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), logistically and financially supported by UN assessed contributions. This thereafter led to a slow revitalization of the work of the MSC. Chapter 4 therefore exposes the current work of the MSC and its increasing activities, and the way it has become the main interlocutor of the Office of Military Affairs (OMA) within the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO). As most UN organs, the MSC is developing its activities in an informal way and is now focusing its work on peacekeeping operations and political missions deployed in challenging environments. This chapter also looks at the way a reform of the MSC could happen and tries to make the case for a realistic revision of the MSC. Even if the Council has for the past decades chosen to ignore military advice, can this attitude be sustainable when 4 Introduction it decides on mandates whereby peacekeepers are taking more and more risks in challenging security environments, and while demands are made for ever greater efficiency and accountability of peacekeeping operations? We argue that it is overall likely to take time until the MSC has the weight it deserves within the decision-making process of the Security Council, but a reflection is highly needed for recreating this missing capacity.

Notes 1 A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility, Report of the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change (General Assembly document A/ 59/565), 29 November 2004, para. 77 and 300. 2 Draft Resolution Referred to the High-level Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly by the General Assembly at its Fifty-ninth Session (General Assembly document A/60/L.1), 20 September 2005, para. 178. 3 See Hallelujah Lulie, “Despite Its Crucial Role in Military and Security Matters, the AU MSC Still Has Several Challenges to Overcome,” ISS Today, 25 May 2015. References The first three references are among the most comprehensive books on the practicalities of peacekeeping operations in the Cold War period of time, in the early days of this practice. They give accounts of the birth and early developments of this peculiar political–military practice of peacekeeping. James M. Boyd , United Nations Peace-Keeping Operations: A Military and Political Appraisal (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1971), 261 pages. Larry L. Fabian , Soldiers Without Enemies: Preparing the United Nations for Peacekeeping (Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1971), 315 pages. Charles C. Moskos , Peace Soldiers: The Sociology of a United Nations Military Force (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1976), 171 pages. Indar Jit Rikhye , Military Adviser to the Secretary-General: UN Peacekeeping and the Congo Crisis (London: Hurst & Company, 1993), 355 pages. This book is an account of the creation of the position of military adviser in the UN Secretariat in the early days of peacekeeping operations. Below are referenced articles on the history, role and functions of the MSC in its early days (1945–1950) and making proposals for its reactivation, in particular in the context of the post-Cold War era. The articles of Jane Boulden, Benjamin Rivlin, and Jonathan Soffer are the last of their kind on this topic since the 1990s. Jane Boulden , “Prometheus Unbound: The History of the Military Committee,” Aurora Papers no. 19 (Ottawa, Canada: Canadian Centre for Global Security, August 1993 ), 43 pages. Richard C. Bruning , “The United Nations’ Military Staff Committee: Future or Failure?” The Military Law and Law of War Review 43(1974), 35–78. Ralph Morris Goldman , “Is it Time to Revive the UN Military Staff Committee?” Occasional Paper Series, no.19, (Los Angeles: California State University, 1990), 31 pages. 151 Eric Grove , “UN Armed Forces and the Military Staff Committee: A Look Back,” International Security 17, no. 4 (1993), 172–182. James W. Houck , “The Command and Control of United Nations Forces in the Era of ‘Peace Enforcement,’” Duke Journal of Comparative and International Law 4, no. 1 (1993), 1–69. Benjamin Rivlin , “The Rediscovery of the UN Military Staff Committee,” Occasional Papers Series IV (New York: CUNY, Ralph Bunche Institute on the United Nations, May 1991 ), 14 pages. John G. Rogers , “A Powerless UN Committee,” New York Herald Tribune, 17 January 1953 . Jonathan Soffer , “All for One and One for All: The UN Military Staff Committee and the Contradictions Within American Internationalism,” Diplomatic History 21, no. 1 (1997), 45–69.