InterFET: An Account of Intervention with Consent in East Timor

Abstract

The obligations of the ‘international community’ in the face of humanitarian catastrophe are deeply vexed. In such cases, ‘global public opinion’ sometimes looks favourably on the use of force to save strangers, also articulated as a global ‘responsibility to protect’. For better or worse this view is rarely reflected in decisions of the Security Council. The argument in this article is that the deployment of InterFET in East Timor in September 1999, and events preceding it, showed that humanitarian intervention is a doctrine unlikely to be employed without the consent of the ‘target’ state. It shows that while decision-makers are influenced by normative concerns, such as the imperative of saving lives, respect for national sovereignty continues to take primacy in an anarchical global society. The processes surrounding coerced consent, such as coalesced in the East Timor case, bear close examination for their potential to influence state behaviour, and thereby assist UN member states to avoid war and save strangers.