Ken Menkhaus

Dr. Menkhaus is assistant professor of political science at Davidson College in
North Carolina. From August 1993 to March 1994, he served in Somalia as a
political advisor in the United Nations Operation in Somalia [ UNOSOM].

With the departure of the last
American forces left in So-
malia on March 26, 1994, a
new phase in the United Na-
tions Operation in Somalia (UNOSOM) be-
gins.

Innumerable media analyses have em-
phasized how much is at stake in the suc-
cess or failure of the UNOSOM mission.
For the United Nations, salvaging even
limited accomplishments in Somalia is be-
lieved to be imperative for protecting the
future of multilateralism in the post-Cold
War order and for safeguarding the U.N.'s
role in "peace enforcement." For the
Clinton administration, a successful con-
clusion to the intervention in Somalia is
important in order to avoid the embarrass-
ment of being held responsible for renewed
chaos in a country to which the American
public devoted so many resources and
lives. Finally, U.N. Secretary-General
Boutros Boutros-Ghali has noted repeat-
edly that Somalia itself risks renewed civil
war and another cycle of famine should the
U.N. mission be forced to withdraw before
a viable Somali state is established.

In reality, however, the international
stakes in Somalia may no longer be that
high. For the United Nations, the damage
to its reputation in peace enforcement and
to the notion of multilateral intervention
has already been done. The imagery of
failure, captured in the bruised face of
captured pilot Michael Durant and tele-
vised around the world, will never be sup-
planted by any quiet successes the United
Nations may extract from Somalia in the
coming year. Indeed, the term "Somalia
syndrome" has already come to describe
international reluctance to intervene in
Haiti and Burundi. This is not permanent
damage -- for lack of alternatives, the inter-
national community will continue to call on
the United Nations to play an enhanced
peace-keeping role in a world beset by
ethnic conflict and collapsing states. But it
has, for better or worse, slowed the mo-
mentum of the United Nations in its activist
role in peace enforcement.

For the Clinton administration, once the
last American forces withdraw at the end of
March, media coverage of Somalia in the
United States, which has driven much of
American policy since mid-1992, will plum-
met. Should UNOSOM collapse following
the American exodus, negative coverage
should not be hard for the administration to
ride out, especially if it relies on the inac-
curate but highly effective practice of blam-

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