Military Spending Up, But Armed Conflicts Down

by Thalif Deen

(IPS) UNITED NATIONS -- Contrary to widespread popular belief, the number of armed conflicts, genocides, human rights abuses, military coups and international crises has dropped significantly since the early 1990s, according to a study released Oct. 17.

Among the key findings by the Human Security Center at Canada's University of British Columbia: The number of armed conflicts has declined by more than 40 percent since 1992. The deadliest conflicts (those with 1,000 or more battle deaths) dropped even more dramatically -- by 80 percent.

The number of military coups and attempted coups has declined by 60 percent since 1963. In 1963, there were 25 coups or attempted coups; in 2004, there were 10. "All failed," says the study.

Britain and France, followed by the United States and Russia/Soviet Union, have fought most international wars since 1946.

But most armed conflicts now take place in the world's poorest countries, primarily in Africa. But as incomes rise, the risk of war declines, the report argues.

The highest death tolls do not come from actual fighting, but from war-exacerbated disease and malnutrition. These "indirect" deaths can account for as much as 90 percent of the total war-related death toll.

The three-year study was funded by the governments of Canada, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and Britain.

"Over the past 30 years, the collapse of some 60 dictatorships has freed countless millions of people from repressive rule," says Nobel Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

"The number of democracies has soared, interstate wars have become increasingly rare, and all wars have been less deadly," he says in a foreword to the study.

Although wars and war deaths are down, some 60 armed conflicts are raging worldwide. And there are still gross abuses of human rights, widespread war crimes, and ever-deadlier acts of terrorism, according to the study.

"The wars that dominated the headlines of the 1990s were real -- and brutal -- enough. But the global media have largely ignored the 100-odd conflicts that have quietly ended since 1988. During this period, more wars stopped than started," the study says.

Professor Andrew Mack, who directed the study, says these "extraordinary changes" have attracted little discussion "because so few realize that they have taken place."

"No international agency collects data on wars, genocides, terrorist acts, or core human rights abuses," he said. "The issues are just too politically sensitive. And ignorance is compounded by the fact that the global media give far more coverage to wars that start than those that quietly end."

Titled "Human Security Report 2005," the study cites three major political reasons for the decline.

The first is the end of colonialism. From the early 1950s to the early 1980s, colonial wars made up 60 percent to 100 percent of all international conflicts. "Today there are no such wars," the researchers note.

Second is the end of the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union, which was responsible for one-third of all conflicts in the post World-War II period.

"This removed any residual threat of war between the major powers and Washington and Moscow stopped fueling 'proxy wars' in the developing world," they say.

Third is the unprecedented surge of international activities designed to stop ongoing wars and prevent new ones starting in the wake of the Cold War.

This was spearheaded primarily by the United Nations, resulting in a six-fold increase in preventive diplomacy missions (to stop wars starting) and a four-fold increase in UN peacekeeping missions (to end ongoing conflicts).

At the same time, says the study, there was also a four-fold increase in UN peacekeeping operations (to reduce the risk of wars re-starting) and a 11-fold increase in the number of states subject to UN sanctions (which can help pressure warring parties to peace negotiations).

Currently, there are 16 UN peacekeeping operations, with nearly 17,000 troops in countries ranging from Lebanon and Georgia to Haiti and Sierra Leone. The cost of these operations amounts to $3.87 billion in 2004-2005.

A recent study by the Rand Corporation, a U.S.-based think tank, found that two-thirds of the UN's peace-building missions had succeeded.

The annual cost of peacekeeping missions has been modest -- well under 1 percent of global military spending, which has now reached Cold War levels of more than $1 trillion annually.

The cost of running all of the UN's peacekeeping operations for an entire year is less than what the United States spends in Iraq in a single month, according to the study.

The U.S. military budget for 2005 is an estimated $421 billion, while it plans to spend about $2.2 trillion over the next five years. China and Russia each spent about $50 billion in 2003, and Japan and the U.K. about $41 billion each.

"The United Nations did not act alone," the study points out, "The World Bank, donor states, regional organizations and thousands of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) worked closely with UN agencies -- and often played independent roles of their own."

But the United Nations, the only international organization with a global security mandate, has been the leading player, the study added.

Explaining why today's wars kill fewer people, the study says the major wars of the Cold War era typically involved huge armies, heavy conventional weapons, and massive external intervention. They killed hundreds of thousands -- sometimes millions.

But the overwhelming majority of today's wars are low-intensity conflicts fought with small arms and light weapons. They typically pit weak government forces against ill-trained rebels and rarely involve major engagements.

"Although often brutal, they kill relatively few people compared with the major wars of the Cold War era -- typically hundreds rather than tens of thousands of thousands."

The decline in the battle-death toll is also attributed to the huge increase in the number of refugees and internally displaced persons in the 1980s.

Had these millions not fled their homes, hundreds of thousands -- possibly far more -- could have been killed, the study argues. "So the increase in displacement is likely one of the reasons for the decline in battle-deaths."

That the world is getting more peaceful, however, is no consolation to people currently suffering in Darfur (Sudan), Iraq, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo or Nepal, the study concludes.