Overview

In 1981 the Organization of African Unity (OAU) mandated and fielded the first regional peacekeeping operation since the Arab League's mission in Kuwait 20 years earlier. Battalion-sized contingents from Nigeria, Senegal, and Zaire were joined by smaller observer contingents from other OAU members in an effort to provide a buffer zone between the two main factions in the Chadian civil war. Mays opens his analysis by providing an overview of the concept of peacekeeping. Several definitions are offered to help distinguish between the various types of peace operations. After examining the concept hegemon, he looks at the ways regional and subregional hegemons utilize peacekeeping operations as foreign policy tools as they protect their interests. Mays argues that Nigeria, as a West African hegemon, served as the moving force behind the mandating and fielding of the OAU peacekeeping mission in Chad. Rather than being purely humanitarian in nature, Nigeria's motivation included the removal of French and later Libyan soldiers from a weak state on its border. However, Nigeria could not perform the task alone. France and the United States were instrumental as well in the mandating and fielding process. French and American interests stemmed from concern over Libyan motives in Chad. Nigeria kept the effort to mandate the peacekeeping operation alive for two years; France proved to be the stimulus behind persuading the Chadian government to accept the deployment of OAU peacekeepers and prompting the Senegalese to contribute a battalion to the mission; the United States contributed by keeping France and Nigeria focused on a peacekeeping solution and helping persuade Zaire to join the mission. Mays offers the first comprehensive examination of the OAU peacekeeping mission and reviews the political and military organization of the force as well as its deployment, redeployment plans, logistics, and operations between the Chadian factions. Utilizing an extensive collection of resources, including interviews with participants, diplomats, and government documents, he provdies a detailed examination of every meeting/conference between 1979 and 1981 that discussed a peacekeeping option for Chad. Factors of success in traditional peacekeeping operations are applied to the OAU mission, and he concludes by reviewing the impact of the 1981-1982 OAU operation on current African peacekeeping trends. An invaluable analysis for scholars, students, and other researchers involved with peacekeeping, international relations, and African studies.

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Discusses a peacekeeping operation by the Organization of African Unity that involved battalion-size contingents from Nigeria, Senegal, and Zaire to separate the sides in Chad's civil war; examines Nigeria as the moving force behind the operation and analyzes its motivations as a regional hegemon. -The Chronicle of Higher Education Shows how, rather than being a strictly humanitarian mission, the OAU's first peacekeeping operation envolved as a foreign policy tool of Nigeria supported by France and the US. -Africa Book Ceatre Book Review ... timely and instructive...Mays has done a good job with his materials, laid out his thesis clearly, and provided strong argument... -The Journal of Military History ?Shows how, rather than being a strictly humanitarian mission, the OAU's first peacekeeping operation envolved as a foreign policy tool of Nigeria supported by France and the US.?-Africa Book Ceatre Book Review ?Discusses a peacekeeping operation by the Organization of African Unity that involved battalion-size contingents from Nigeria, Senegal, and Zaire to separate the sides in Chad's civil war; examines Nigeria as the moving force behind the operation and analyzes its motivations as a regional hegemon. ?-The Chronicle of Higher Education ?...timely and instructive...Mays has done a good job with his materials, laid out his thesis clearly, and provided strong argument...?-The Journal of Military History .,. timely and instructive...Mays has done a good job with his materials, laid out his thesis clearly, and provided strong argument... -The Journal of Military History

.,. timely and instructive...Mays has done a good job with his materials, laid out his thesis clearly, and provided strong argument... -The Journal of Military History

Author Information

TERRY M. MAYS is Assistant Professor of Political Science at The Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina.

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