Essay 1 210610

Is intervention in another country’s affairs ever justifiable?

Through the progress of humanity, people have witnessed the creation of the
League of Nations, its fall and also the establishment of its counterparts, the
United Nations and ASEAN. The main aim of these organisations is to allow
countries to come together, discuss urgent issues and obtain solutions to these
problems. Intervention will then come in to help alleviate the symptoms of these
problems while the government tries its best to solve them. However, these
interventions have met with some difficulty in helping to solve the issues in the
problem-stricken countries. Intervention may include sending in personnel like
peacekeepers, thinkers or healers and also economic aid. But there is also the
possibility of the effort resulting in more problems than helping to resolve the
existing ones.

Intervention in other country’s affairs is not justifiable as doing so would results

in the worsening of the problem which the intervening country is trying to
resolve. In a country which has a strong sense of national pride, the population
abhors other countries that are here to have a say in their country’s affairs and
ruin the overall state that the country is in. They feel that these countries are not
here to help but to benefit economically from the country during the period it is
down. This can be shown in cases like the Kandahar’s strong opposition to
foreign occupation due to the trivial response given to them after their people
are killed for no reason. Hence the hostility of the locals surged up and have
began opening up its offensive actions and equipping explosive devices to
themselves. From this, we could see how the foreign occupation has lead to
innocent deaths not only to Kandahar but also to the intervening country. Thus
intervention is not justifiable as it would lead to more complications instead.

Furthermore, the intervening country lacks the complete knowledge of the affairs
of the other country and may result in the wrong use of solutions to the
problems. Due to the misinterpretation of the extend, depth, and complexity of
the issue at hand, the failure of the intervention leads to more damage than the
help it provides. For instance, the U.N. peacekeeping force stood by as Hutu
slaughtered some 800,000 Tutsi. Also in Bosnia, the U.N. declared safe areas for
Muslims but did nothing to secure them, letting the Serbs slaughter thousands in
Srebrenica. The organization's meddling was worse than useless: its blue-
helmeted troops were used as hostages by the Serbs to deter a military response
from the West. From these, we can see the extensive harm foreign intervention
can bring to the country and used as leverage against United States.

However, every cloud has a silver lining to it. In several occasions where Mother
Nature decides to unleash her wraith on Earth, there are bound to be some
countries with a severe disruption to their economy. Without the economy
running to rebuild the country, this usually calls for foreign intervention. One
good example is the Singapore and her army. When natural disasters struck
neighbouring countries, a search and rebuilding force are sent over to the
country to help in the search and rescue. Singapore’s army have been the first to
react in the Aceh’s call for help and help rebuild the states affected. Hence we
could see that intervention policies that are well-planned will lead to a positive
effect on the nation rather than result in more problems.

Similarly, the case for foreign intervention is a all-go when there is a possibility of
the issue being a threat to other neighbouring states or even nations. Such
possibilities may include threat to peace, development of the threat to a higher
and uncontrollable level, and also global undermining of peacekeeping
organisations. For instance, the occurrence of the Darfur war which resulted in
approximately 300 000 civilian deaths and also spread to eastern Chad and the
Central African Republic. The Sudan government itself also been accused by
multiple rights group of funding one of the group involved in the conflict. Hence
this is the obvious case where foreign intervention in order to stop the atrocities
committed by the government and the groups involved in the conflict.

In conclusion, foreign intervention is justifiable in several cases where the

government holds no power to the situation at hand. Although the case holds,
there may be problems brought forth by the intervening country. But weighing
the importance of the problems, as long as the most urgent issue is resolved and
foreign disruption to the local lifestyle is not significant, intervention is justifiable.