Volume 19, Issue 1 -

This paper contributes to the literature concerning burden sharing in specific crisis response operations. We provide a quantitative expression of burden-sharing behaviour of the NATO and Non-NATO allies during the International Security Assistance Forces operations in Afghanistan from 2001 to 2010. We conclude that the military contribution of the United States, as expressed by the average number deployed, surpasses the total contributions of the NATO EU and Non-NATO countries. However, the relative contribution of the United Kingdom, as expressed in terms of relative population size and Gross Domestic Product exceeds the contribution of the United States. We also conclude that the relative numbers of casualties of the United Kingdom, Denmark, and Canada exceed the burden of the United States.

The US Department of Defense (DoD) and the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) are the two institutions responsible for the medical care of military personnel and Veterans. DoD’s major policy and operational personnel changes impact the VA by modifying the characteristics of Veterans presenting at the VA for medical health care. The challenges to VA resulting from DoD’s changes over the past four decades include managing the large influx to the VA of aging Veterans; accommodating the Veterans from Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF); responding to the expanded role of female service members in DoD; accepting increased numbers of National Guard and Reserve Components resulting from extended deployment and expanded operational role.

While piracy has been an old plague, its economic costs have increased enough in the Horn of Africa since the end of 1990s to push major countries to look for specific actions, either at national level or through coordinated missions. Maritime insecurity can then be analyzed as an “international public bad” requiring a collective solution. The conceptual framework of public goods appears useful to understand how to deal with piracy as well as identify the theoretical grounds to supply maritime security as an international public good. Such a theoretical framework then helps analyze more particularly the NAVFOR Atalanta mission. Even though this is not the only on-going operation, European Union’s mission appears as the most visible reaction against piracy on the high seas and it is fruitful to understand both benefits and limits of such collective action against piracy.

The US has withdrawn from Iraq and is planning to do likewise from Afghanistan in 2014. This article argues that the US has been fighting at least 5 wars, most of which are unannounced and undeclared, and are fought with air power and robotics technology.

A simple model of public good expenditure is developed where government service levels are affected by a potential insurgency. Counterinsurgency measures can reduce the effectiveness of resistance and alter the level of support for the government. In general, a very limited counterinsurgency is not useful; the government would rather alter the policy mix to reduce support for insurgents. In some cases, enhanced counterinsurgency capacity can lead to more rather than less resistance as the mix of projects adjusts to account for the lower effectiveness of resistance.