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The Thin Blue Line: How Humanitarianism Went to War Hardcover – October 17, 2008

by Conor Foley (Author)
4.0 4.0 out of 5 stars 10 ratings
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The idea that we should “do something” to help those suffering in far-off places is the main impulse driving those who care about human rights. Yet from Kosovo to Iraq, military interventions have gone disastrously wrong.

In this groundbreaking new book, Conor Foley explores how the doctrine of humanitarian intervention has been used to allow states to invade other nations in the name of human rights. Drawing on his own experience of working in over a dozen conflict and post-conflict zones, Foley shows how the growing influence of international law has been used to override the sovereignty of the poorest countries in the world.

The Thin Blue Line describes how in the last twenty years humanitarianism has emerged as a multibillion dollar industry that has played a leading role in defining humanitarian crises, and shaping the foreign policy of Western governments and the United Nations. Yet, too often, this has been informed by myths and assumptions that rest on an ill-informed post-imperial arrogance. Movements set up to show solidarity with the powerless and dispossessed have ended up betraying them instead.
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  1. Print length
    266 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Verso
  4. Publication date
    October 17, 2008
  5. Dimensions
    0.56 x 0.11 x 0.86 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    1844672891
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1844672899
  8. See all details
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Top reviews from the United States

  • Anton Tikhomirov
    5.0 out of 5 stars Its Good
    Reviewed in the United States on September 11, 2013
    Verified Purchase
    I really like Foley's review of humanitarianism in the world. I especially enjoyed the short chapter on the Kosovo war.
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  • David Hillstrom
    5.0 out of 5 stars Exemplary Courage
    Reviewed in the United States on December 20, 2008
    This book is essential. It responds with both compassion and the wisdom of first hand experience to the growing debate over humanitarian crises and how to deal with them. I applaud the author for his courage in volunteering for humanitarian service in some of the most dangerous places on earth. More importantly though I applaud his courage in speaking up forcefully to the growing lobby of liberal interventionists, who urge the US to take up the new `white man's burden' and to assume the mantle of responsibility to protect. Conor Foley has put himself in harm's way during his service and now argues against the tide of growing opinion (supported by the media and such high profile players as CNN's Christiane Amanpour) in favour of a more cautious and pragmatic approach to humanitarian conflicts. Mr. Foley quite literally charts a course along a `Thin Blue Line' between humanitarian compassion and the impulse to intervene, which has in recent years evidently caused more suffering rather than less.

    A few examples of Foley's contribution to the debate may be helpful:

    * The author reviews the traditional role of humanitarian organizations and their tendency toward neutrality in order to accomplish their goals. He then explains how that neutrality has been co-opted by a political humanitarianism favoring intervention.
    * He examines how the policies of the UK government evolved under Tony Blair to abandon multilateralism in favor of liberal interventionism and a special relationship with "the world's strongest state."
    * He explains how the humanitarian effort in Afghanistan "joined the wider counter-insurgency effort." And he laments that he and his colleagues had not signed up for such a role.
    * Foley documents how the US and NATO have lost the good will of the Afghan people over recent years using the methods of secret prisons as in Iraq. And this fact should give pause to those who support additional troop deployments to the country today. Meanwhile the aid that had been promised to the country and for which aid workers went to the ends of the world to deliver never materialized.
    * The author examines the issue of the legality of humanitarian intervention and provides some behind the scenes debates, particularly in the UK, on how legal opinions evolved in order to accommodate Mr. Blair's new policy.
    * He further demonstrates with some background on Bernard Kouchner how the support for liberal interventionism is not limited to the policies of the US and the UK.
    * One of the most troubling details is that the US has exploited the mantle of humanitarian intervention to undermine the UN and to essentially take action when it suited its own national interests, thus establishing new historical precedents. This tendency gave voice to the call by John McCain, during the presidential campaign, to establish a `League of Democracies,' thus further sidelining the role of the UN.

    The author has presented a clear and pragmatic critique to the growing clamor favoring liberal intervention in humanitarian crises. He has not suggested the abandonment of the suffering, but rather a compassionate argument that intervention has often occurred for the wrong reasons and with terribly adverse consequences. He agrees that there is a need to respond to humanitarian crises. But the way to do so is to clarify the issues of legality, to gain broad international consensus (and not proceed with a coalition of the willing) and most importantly to plan the mission and ensure ample material support with an emphasis on humanitarian development and not upon military victory, Clearly in order to achieve such a shift in the debate and the agenda a substantive reform of the UN charter is necessary, not least of which is a change in the status quo on the Security Council and the perquisites of its permanent members.

    David Hillstrom, author of 'The Bridge'
    11 people found this helpful
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  • ewaffle
    4.0 out of 5 stars More wars for peace?
    Reviewed in the United States on October 1, 2010
    Verified Purchase
    Conor Foley calls the roll of genocide, ethnic cleansing, rape as a political/military weapon, mass murder and other horrors of the past couple of decades including a few natural as opposed to man made disasters. He has been at the aftermath of many of them: Somalia (civil and religious war); Kosovo (ethnic cleansing); Sri Lanka (civil war); Indonesia (tsunami); Sudan (ethnic cleansing, civil war); the Kurdish areas of Iraq and Turkey (state sponsored mass killing). Looming over everything is the slaughter of up to 800,000 Tsutis citizens of Rwanda by their Hutu neighbors while the United Nations ignored it or even tacitly encouraged it by pulling out troops. In retrospect it is clear that a couple of regiments of airborne infantry could have slowed and diverted much of the killing saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of people and a division could have stopped the massacre in its tracks.

    The utter barbarity of Rwanda in 1994 is most used to justify "humanitarian intervention" which can range from military and political operations that infringe on the territory and sovereignty of a country on the hawkish end to the more dovish definition of impartial distribution of relief assistance during armed conflict. Foley's view is that most situations, dire though they may seem, are not as straightforward as Rwanda. He was in Kosovo during the height of the Serbian/Albanian battles and through the NATO led air strikes. Foley sees Kosovo as a telling example of "we must do something" which often leads creates more killing and destruction than would have happened without intervention.

    The International Committee of the Red Cross gets high praise from Foley because they insist they won't take sides in any conflict but will work solely to alleviate the suffering caused by combat no matter who is firing the weapons. As other organizations have become more political, feeling they need to denounce human rights violations, such as Doctors Without Borders did in Sudan--which got them kicked out of the country--the Red Cross and Red Crescent organizations are able to continue their work by simply doing it.

    One example is the work of the Red Cross in Guantanamo. While Red Cross personnel knew of human rights abuses, including torture, against prisoners in Guantanamo and Abu Ghirab the were restricted to petitioning the U.S. government. In other words the ICRC wasn't able to go public--and never does. It gets in access to prisoners or to conflict zones because it is specifically and rigorously non-political and is often the only organization that is allowed such access. Its mission is strictly humanitarian, to ease the suffering of inmates and offer food, water and medical care to those caught in warfare and for whom it is a matter of life and death.

    Foley doesn't have many answers--which is to his credit. He realizes that the specifics of humanitarian intervention will vary widely from crisis and be a constant source of debate.
    4 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Anastasia
    5.0 out of 5 stars Great
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 21, 2013
    Verified Purchase
    Explains how we came to accept the notion 'fight for peace' and how humanitarian became a synonym to military. Intriguing.
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  • Margaret K.
    1.0 out of 5 stars One Star
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 9, 2016
    Verified Purchase
    full of factual errors.
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  • Johanna Ohlsson
    3.0 out of 5 stars Three Stars
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 25, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    ok shape
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