Unifil is 40 years - Its establishment and early life

Unifil born out of the Middle East crisis, is 40 years, established by Security Council Resolution 425 on March 19, 1978.

Genesis of Israeli Invasion

In the early hours of March 11, 1978, an Israeli bus carrying Israeli citizens and heading towards Tel Aviv was attacked near the Israeli coastal town of Hertzliya. A large number of the passengers were killed and several more wounded. Palestinians resident in South Lebanon were the immediate suspects of this heinous, murderous attack and, of course, the Israelis were expected to respond to this act of extreme brutality and provocation.

In the early hours of March 15, 1978, the much-awaited retaliation commenced with air strikes shelling from mortars and other artillery pieces and finally complemented by ground assault troops supported by other heavy weapons. A large number of the villages and houses of the South Lebanese was reduced to rubble and the farms infested with unexploded and improvised explosive devices (IEDs), mostly bombs and land mines, thereby depriving the local Lebanese of their means of livelihood since they could not go to farm. Water pumps and electric poles had equally been destroyed by the constant shelling from mortars, artillery pieces and airstrikes.

The retaliatory invasion, code-named “Operation Litani”, was a blitzkrieg attack also strategically aimed at driving the armed Palestinian fighters northwards from the Litani River to ensure that the coastal Israeli towns, including Haifa and Nahariya, were outside the range of the Katyusia rockets which had become a regular source of menace to the Israeli residents.

Establishment of UNIFIL

To stop further loss of lives, destruction of homes and property, as well as the immense suffering of the population of the region, the United Nations (UN) went into session and on March 19, 1978, exactly 40 years today, passed its Resolution 425 (Res 425), setting up the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, a peace-keeping mission with the acronym, UNIFIL.

Res 425 was unanimously approved by the 15-member council, including its five permanent members.

Goals of Res 425 and approach towards attaining them:

To achieve its objective of stopping the onslaught of the South Lebanese, the following were passed as its mandate;

1. To determine cessation of hostilities by Israel:

2. To confirm Israeli withdrawal;

3. To restore international peace and security;

4. To assist the Lebanese Government to restore its authority in the area; and

5. To establish and maintain itself in an area of operations to be defined through negotiations with the parties.

It should be noted that the Security Council Resolution is the Mandate, i.e. the authority for the secretary General (SG) to set up the required peacekeeping mission and execute the tasks detailed in the mandate.

It should be noted further that for any peacekeeping mission to succeed, the authorities will need the unalloyed support and cooperation of the parties concerned which, in the case of UNIFIL, were Israel, Lebanon and the Palestinian authorities, then chairman Yasser Arafat. This support and cooperation are the sine qua non for a successful mission and its absence is recipe for the mission’s failure. This requirement explains why our illustrious compatriot, highly admired and respected former SG, Dr Kofi Annan, declined to continue his mediation efforts in the Syrian crises when he could not secure President Assad’s support for his mission.

In conformity with this principle, the Chief Coordinator for Peacekeeping Operations, Lt. Gen. Ensio Siilasvuo, and I set out the following day, after receiving the SG’s instructions to meet with the parties, with the principal objective of briefing them on the demands of Res 425 and the absolute need for their blessing for UNIFIL to succeed in its operation.

Gen. Siilasvuo was my highly respected mentor in peacekeeping. He was my boss in the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF), then the Force Commander, and I was his Deputy and Chief of Staff, then with our (HQ) in Heliopolis, Cairo and later in Ismailia. When I was posted from UNEF to Jerusalem to head the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO) as the Chief of Staff, he was promoted, at a later stage and posted to Jerusalem to head the newly created office of the Chief Coordinator, in contemporary UN parlance, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG). I replaced him in this office, albeit under a different title when I left UNIFIL and went back to UNTSO in 1981.

It is interesting to note that even though the responses by the Israelis and Palestinians were positive, their translation into action on the ground was extremely difficult and not always encouraging.

Major obstacles facing UNIFIL to fully execute its mandate

Assisting the Lebanese Government to restore its authority in the area implied deploying the Lebanese army to the Southern border with Israeli. However, unlike the previous three withdrawals by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF on April 11,14 and 30 when the evacuated areas were formally handed over to UNIFIL and I personally took them over and immediately deployed UNIFIL troops there, the final areas evacuated on June 13 were handed over by the IDF to their Lebanese surrogate army, headed by Major Saad Haddad. The areas controlled by Haddad and his men paid, clothed, fed and equipped by the IDF was a NO GO AREA for the officially recognised Lebanese military personnel. This was the so-called Christian enclave which the IDF controlled, thus giving them the free access to enter Lebanon with gross impunity.

The well-planned creation of this corridor in the South preventing UNIFIL to assist the Lebanese Government deploy its troops to the South was the major obstacle for UNIFIL to fully accomplish executing its obligations as demanded by Res 425.

However, after 28 years of still pursuing its tasks, ie, the IDF finally, by Res 1701 August 11, 2006, coming into effect on August 14, 2006 abandoned the Christian enclave concept and the Lebanese Army now has an effective presence on its Southern border with Israel. UNIFIL has thus, fully supported the SG to fully satisfy the demands on him by Res 425 and attained fully the goals and achieved the objectives of UNIFIL and his mandate.

UNIFIL is 40 years today-March 19, 2018 Hurray!!!

Possibility of the withdrawal of their troops.

However, where the sustenance of the casualties is fully justifiable, the SG and mission will receive the total support of the concerned government.

In my peacekeeping experience, there are principally three situations where casualty sustenance can be fully justified.

First, in self-defence; second, in defence of the mandate and third, in protection of property, with national and the sponsoring authority.

These constitute some of the BASIC MANDATORY RULES of ENGAGEMENT for peacekeepers and should be clearly spelt out in the mission’s Standing Operation Procedures (SOPs).

Between April 6 and 11 1980, UNIFIL fought its mini-war in At Tiri to stop the loss of Hill 880, a dominating feature in the Dutch and Irish AOs, the consequence of its loss to the De facto force (DFF) of Major Haddad and the IDF would have seriously jeopardised the operations of both Irishbatt and Dutchbatt and ultimately called into question the credibility of UNIFIL to defend the mandate and itself.

This was the first time that the mission’s Force Mobile Reserve (FMR) with its heaviest weapons, i.e. its TOW anti-tank weapons, were deployed and fired.

UNIFIL won its major war at least during my command. In this armed confrontation, we sustained casualties – Fiji and Irish soldiers. DFF equally lost some of its men, apparently higher than UNIFIL’s.

However, the admiration expressed by contributing governments, members of the Security Council and the SG for UNIFIL’s defence of its mandate was most appreciated and a major morale booster for the entire UNIFIL and its troops.

I could not help but commend Lt Col Jack Kissane, the CO of Irishbatt, whose visionary leadership in establishing his unit’s presence on Hill 880 before the DFF could move its men and weapons there. He contributed immensely to our victory and I have always paid my highest respect to him. My deepest regrets were also extended to governments whose courageous men were lost in action in the At Tiri armed confrontation.

Some harrowing moments in UNIFIL’s early life

Some peacekeeping missions in the process of stabilising the situation militarily in preparation for its complementary and umbilical peacemaking partner do sustain considerable casualties and UNIFIL is no exception.

On April 18, 1980, two of my Irish soldiers were kidnapped and murdered. This killing in cold blood in revenge of our victory in At Tiri shocked the entire world. The UN SG was outraged and summoned the contributing countries to a summit in Dublin, Ireland. This was a psychological show of force and a morale booster for UNIFIL’s command and troops. The following countries were represented at the Summit: Fiji, France, Ghana, Ireland, Italy, Nepal, The Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Senegal and Sweden. They met to express their disgust, abhorrence and outrage at the murder of their two defenceless peacekeepers of the international community.

At this stage, I wish to express my highest respect and appreciation to Sir Brian Urquhart and his highly professional directors and staff of his noble secretariat. This is the Office of the Under-Secretary-General for Special Political Affairs (OUSGSPA), the secretariat which handled matters going to and coming from the SG. Sir Brian, a respectable war veteran, of World War II, was the boss of all peacekeeping missions and all Force Commanders held him very high for his astuteness, professionalism and sound judgement. Sir Brian’s expertise and professional conduct of the summit and the handling of the entire murder episode was highly commendable. I have always respected and admired him and will always hold him in the highest esteem.

The death of the Swedish Master Warrant Officer on March 29 through a landmine accident was the very first UNIFIL accident. Deaths of French Corporal Alain Godiris on April 23, Senegalese Corporal Victor Sina, Sergeant Roussa Fall and Sergeant Bocar Dealle – all killed from landmines on May 1 within 24 hours of arriving in UNIFIL’s area of operations from Damascus – made it abundantly clear what difficulties both UNIFIL troops and South Lebanese civilians had to face from mines.

Initial difficulties UNIFIL faced

Difficulties that confronted UNIFIL in its initial establishment were political, operational and administrative.

Handing over the final stretch of Lebanese sovereign land by the invading IDF on June 14 to their surrogate DFF who consistently opposed the deployment of legitimate Lebanese army troops to their Southern border constituted the major challenge to UNIFIL in the execution of its mandate of March 19, 1978. This political obstacle persisted for 28 years, i.e. until IDF finally abandoned the DFF and surrendered the Christian enclave to its rightful owners, the Lebanese Government. This enabled UNIFIL to assist the Lebanese Army deploy to the Southern border, thereby fully executing its mandated obligations demanded by Res 425.

Frequent restrictions on UNIFIL movement through the Christian enclave by the DFF infiltration and encroachment attempts respectively by PLO and DFF/IDF, the land mines as observed above, firing on UNIFIL’s positions from time to time were the day-to-day operational challenges that faced UNIFIL in its embryonic years.

Since a peacekeeping mission has the basic duty to keep its AO peaceful and protect the inhabitants, units were obligated to prevent or stop any form of infiltration and encroachment. Efforts to execute these functions very often resulted in armed clashes and confrontation, as was the case of At Tiri.

Non-standardisation of equipment, in particular vehicles consequently, their third-line maintenance and repairs posed the major administrative difficulty for UNIFIL. However, the extremely hardworking, excellent and highly trained and skilled in vehicle mechanical experts greatly helped the mission overcome these major administrative challenges. I have always respected our Norwegian technicians and mechanics of UNIFIL’s Normaintcoy.

UNIFIL – How interim turned to be 40 years!!

Is it not intriguing to note that a peacekeeping mission not expected to go beyond its initial mandate of six months would be clocking 40 years today, March 19?

As has been the practice that became standard, at least commencing with me at the very inception of the mission, I was always invited to be present at the Security Council during preliminary discussions leading to the periodic extension of the mission’s mandate.

A few days prior to UNIFIL’s first extension, the SG, invited me to his office on the 38th floor to brief him and to respond to a few pertinent issues concerning UNIFIL’s operations. At a point in our meeting, he called the French President, then Mr Giscard D’ Estaing, and appealed to him for his support for the full extension of the mission’s mandate.

After a prolonged discussion, the President would only agree to four months extension, i.e. September 19, 78 to January 18, 79. The second mandate followed the same fate but was given five months extension. Subsequent requests by the SG for the full six months were readily agreed to by the entire 15 members, including the five Permanent Members and that has been the case for the rest of UNIFIL’s life.

I am, therefore, overjoyed, excited and extremely happy to see UNIFIL at its fortieth, hurray!!! Whiles rejoicing, I wish the peace-loving nations of the world will join me and UNIFIL to remember all those who have given up their lives for the sake of peace to the South Lebanese.

On this very occasion of UNIFIL’s 40th anniversary, I wish to express my deepest appreciation, thanks and gratitude to all the contributing governments not only for providing troops but also for their solidarity and unwavering support for the mission. To all the troops who have served and continue to serve the cause of peace in Lebanon, I thank them for their commitment and dedication.

I was fortunate to have some highly committed and dedicated personal staff, both military and civilian, my principal staff officers, both military and civilian, senior administrators all at the headquarters; the mechanics, technicians, drivers, security personnel and all those who have contributed to UNIFIL’s survival; I say many, many thanks.
My profound thanks to the parties to the conflict for co-existing with us. UNIFIL has survived for 40 years and may be there for some time to come; we need one an other and the mission will continue to have their full cooperation. UNIFIL’s presence in the area is also for their own good.
To the South Lebanese, I say “a huge thank you” for warmly hosting me and my troops. Do please continue to be UNIFIL’s brothers and sisters since we will continue to need each other.

The support I enjoyed from my home authorities was immensely encouraging and kept me going, especially in those difficult and heartbreaking moments. To all my fellow Ghanaians, my profound thanks and appreciation.

Sir Brian and my friends in the OUSGSPA, I am very grateful to you for your guidance, support, cooperation and friendship. Major-General Timothy Komla Dibuamah, my Ghanaian compatriot, who was the Military Advisor (MA) to the SG was also part of the Secretariat. His regular telephone calls to me from New York kept my spirits very high since I felt too lonely in Naqoura, UNIFIL’s HQ. I am most grateful to him.

The support from my family was very special and I will always cherish their love and warmth. I am extremely grateful to them.

UNIFIL has grown in strength, both in size and capacity. With its naval capabilities, its growth has no bounds, may it continue to grow from strength to strength and support the peace process in the Middle East. It still remains my very firm belief and conviction that for as long as the Middle East conflict persists, UNIFIL’s services will continue to be required.

UNIFIL, Happy 40th Birthday.
MARCH 19 , 2018