The American Experience with Police in Peace Operations

This book looks at the role of international civilian police (CIVPOL) in peace operations from the US perspective. Specifically, it focuses on the issue of why the United States, as the architect of the Dayton Accords, agreed to create an International Police Task Force (IPFT) in Bosnia that the drafters of the agreement believed would not work. To answer that question, the study looks at the history of US involvement with foreign police forces from the days of ‘gunboat diplomacy’ at the turn of the Twentieth Century through the failure of the Office of Public Security during the Cold War. The book also examines a number of peacekeeping case studies to determine whether there were adequate ‘lessons learned’ to have guided US negotiators. Finally, the book presents the results of interviews with the diplomats and military officers who drafted the Dayton agreement to provide the answer. These first-person accounts also offered insights into the problems that confronted the IPTF and the international police mission in Kosovo. In conclusion, the study draws upon the case studies and the Bosnia and Kosovo experience, plus US Presidential Decision Directive-71 and the Brahimi Commission Report to offer recommendations for improving the use of international civilian police in current and future peace operations. This book is first in The Academic Series published by Canadian Peacekeeping Press. The author, Robert M. Perito, is a Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, DC and an Adjunct Professor in the Program on Peacekeeping Policy at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.