The UN military training school in the Curragh has been grooming Irish and foreign soldiers for peacekeeping duties since 1993. Berna Cox observed exercises this week in the Glen of Imaal
When Irish troops first participated in a UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon in 1958, the business of peacekeeping was basic and unsophisticated. One UN veteran described it as going to referee a boxing match in somebody else's back yard. The remit had a narrow focus and operated on the principle of containment. Don't let a bad situation get any worse.
Modern peacekeeping has moved on. The emphasis now is on planning, negotiation, enlargement and integration. In simple terms, it is recognised that re-establishing the status quo of pre-conflict days is not always a solution. Brokering a change by consultation and co-operation with civilian and military authorities and examining the conflict in wider economic and social terms is the baseline.
In addition to the refereeing skills of old, personnel involved in modern peacekeeping need to be communicators, negotiators, managers, analysts, planners, strategists and humanitarians. Quite a tall order and complicated by the fact that these skills are generally being put to use in an area of conflict - quite often literally a war zone. These people need to get it right first time, so they go to peace school first.
The United Nations Training School Ireland was established in 1993 and is at the Defence Forces Training Centre at the Curragh, Co Kildare. It prepares Irish troops for overseas missions and also shares its experience and knowledge with civilian and academic establishments.
Since its inception, the school has trained 220 international army officers representing 47 countries in the business of peacekeeping. The courses run for international officers are of three weeks duration - two weeks of intensive theory and demonstration followed by a week of practical simulations in the Glen of Imaal in Wicklow.
The 22 participating students representing 14 countries were being instructed in the skills needed to be a staff officer and/ or a military observer in an area of conflict or disaster.
The courses at UNTSI are regularly over-subscribed when other similar schools internationally have difficulty filling places. According to Col Dominic Timpson, the school commandant and a veteran of eight peacekeeping missions, that reputation has been gained internationally because of the qualities possessed by the State's Defence Forces.
"We're even-handed," he says, "and we have absolutely no colonial baggage in any of the countries we've been to. We're very well trained and have a natural affinity and friendliness when dealing with people." Above all, he says, it's the training, experience and professional education that has contributed most to their success.
The course programme for the international officers reflects the changing role of the peacekeeper and includes instruction on mine awareness, biological and chemical hazards, stress management, survival skills, media awareness, negotiation and mediation skills. The general aim of the course, according to Timpson, is to give instruction relevant to the situations these people might encounter on a peacekeeping mission.
In the practical simulations, the emphasis is on relevance and reality.
The simulations are designed by peacekeeping veterans with Defence Forces personnel playing the roles of the hostile forces, civilians and media personnel. Even though they are unknown to the students, some of the role players will try to alter their physical appearance in an effort to look more menacing and intimidating - normally clean-shaven personnel might grow beards for weeks in advance in an effort to make them look less "military".
The realism aimed for in the simulations was certainly achieved in this week's exercise in the Glen of Imaal. One such scenario involved a routine patrol of three observers encountering the aftermath of an incident. A car was apparently abandoned and there are two male bodies on the ground.
One is dead, the other critically injured. There is a woman screaming hysterically; her clothes are torn and covered in "blood". The patrol manages to elicit from her that the dead man is her husband; the injured man is her brother. Her child has been taken and she has been raped. She screams at the peacekeepers. She cannot be calmed.
An enthusiastic television news crew happens along and adds to the melee. The personnel become intrusive and demanding. The woman continues to scream. The wounded man continues to bleed and moan.
Given that this is the immediate aftermath, there is a strong possibility that the perpetrators of the atrocity are still in the locale, there is a possibility that the nearby car is booby trapped.
The scene has all the elements of a nightmare and, even armed with the knowledge that this is a simulation, it has the capacity to upset and disturb.
Mika Ylönen is a 32-year-old captain in the Finnish army preparing to go on his first peacekeeping mission to Iraq and Kuwait. He was one of the observers confronted with this simulation. How did he cope?
"I got things wrong," he says. "I tried to touch her . . . to comfort her . . . to calm her down. Immediately I knew it was wrong. Some cultures don't allow them to be touched . . . I learned a lot".
Ladd Shepard, a 29-year-old captain in the US Marine Corps, is going to Ethiopia and Eritrea. He leaves UNTSI today and arrives in Eritrea on 9.30 p.m. tomorrow.
The biggest problem in Eritrea and Ethiopia, he says, is landmines. Millions of them. When he gets there, it will be the rainy season. Old mines tend to surface then. On the simulated exercises in the Glen of Imaal, he probed too hard with a mine probe and had a leg blown off.
"I'm so glad I came here," he says. "I can make my mistakes here. I've learned so much."
The course was, according to Col Timpson, very successful. "They learned a lot," he says.