Page 16 - Coespu Magazine 2018-2

the commander and the military mission. It is there to assist and serve the military commander in the
execution of his or her military task and the achievement of the military objective.
The essential difference between these approaches and similar activities undertaken in the UN context
is that UN peace operations have an integrated military, civilian, and police mandate and mission
structure. The civil-military relationships between components of the peace operation and between the
peace operation and the rest of the UN system are largely predetermined by the organizational structure
of the specific UN peace operation. In UN-CIMIC, the focus is thus on how best to manage the
coordination of an established UN system.
CIMIC in NATO and EU doctrine is motivated by the need to establish cooperation between the
military force as a separate legal entity, and external (external to NATO or EU) civilian role players in
the same area of operations. To date, each NATO/EU operation has been unique, necessitating civil-
military coordination mechanisms for each specific set of actors in each specific mission environment.
UN peace operations are motivated by the need to maximize coordination among their own
multidimensional components, and to establish cooperation between the UN peace operation and other
actors in the peacekeeping mission area. As the same UN system actors deploy together into most
missions, there has been more room to establish system-wide policies and mechanisms that can be used
in a range of actual
missions.
One of the most
obvious differences
between civil-military
cooperation (as it is
used in NATO
CIMIC) and civil-
military coordination
(as it is used in the
UN context) is the use
of two different
words, “cooperation”
and “coordination”.
In the UN context,
cooperation is viewed
as the strongest
relationship that can
exist between civilian, military, and police components. It is seen as a relationship where the
component partners agree to synchronize their policies and activities to undertake joint action. Most
often, however, the institutional effort necessary to achieve full cooperation can only be achieved and
maintained under special conditions, for a limited time, and for a specific purpose, for example, during
an election. Under normal circumstances, a less intense relationship is preferred. This state is referred
to its minimal form as coexistence, especially in the humanitarian context. This normally implies that
the parties to this relationship exchange information, come together for coordination meetings, and

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