Jean Marie Guehenno, UN Under Secretary General for Peace Keeping Operations said that a strengthened UN Darfur peacekeeping force will not really be on the ground till well into next year. There are currently almost 20000 peacekeepers on the ground, 16000 from the AU, and about 4000 from Thailand, Bangladesh and Nepal. Sudan is furiously pushing against the inclusion of non-African peacekeepers into the peacekeeping force. For obvious reasons. Keep out the non Africans, and the pathetic under powered and equipped African forces cannot stop the genocide carried out by the Arab Sudanese regime!
Darfur is huge and you need logistics to keep the peace. If you don't have trucks, helicopters, fuel, a supply chain, heavy equipment, armoured personnel carriers, ammunition, etc. etc. what will these extra bodies do?
wave flags and sing "she will be coming down the mountain"? But guess what?
while simple equipment such as trucks and fuel can be arranged by even countries such as Nepal and Bangladesh, to deploy attack and transport helicopters requires a serious commitment from a serious army. And that means one of the western powers. Helicopters are one of the most maintenance intensive pieces of equipment. Closely followed by tracked vehicles. Very finicky and needs loads of maintenance. Look at where Darfur is based. Where is the equipment going to come from? Who will pay for it? If a Mogadishu like situation happens like it did when 10 African peacekeepers were killed recently , who will go in for rescue of these peacekeepers? and how? and from where?
See my previous posts on this half baked abortion of a mission here
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