Military strategy and peacekeeping: An unholy alliance?

Despite the increased use of military force in peacekeeping operations in the twenty-first century, these operations are not included in traditional strategic theory. In this article, I outline the logic of four strategies for peacekeeping operations - defence, deterrence, compellence and offence - and trace the use of these strategies in two consecutive UN operations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: MONUC and MONUSCO. The article concludes that all four strategies are indeed used in the two operations, but they are neither comprehensive nor proactive, leaving the true potential of military strategy unrealised.