What Bangladesh’s army learned abroad
Since 1988, Bangladeshi soldiers have served as United Nations peacekeepers in 43 world trouble spots. Now, in their home country, they may be applying lessons learned from those assignments – lessons such as empathy, mutual respect, and reconciliation between foes.
On Monday, after Bangladesh’s longtime leader Sheikh Hasina Wazed fled the country following weeks of police crackdowns on protesters, many people are counting on the army to restore full democracy under civilian rule. They want a new government to address the protesters’ main demands: fair government employment and an end to corruption.
“We will not achieve anything else through fighting and violence,” army chief Waker-Uz-Zaman said in a televised address as he announced plans for talks with various political parties to form an interim government.
Will the military be able to quickly guide the country back to a healthy democracy? From 1975 to 2011, Bangladesh endured 29 successful or attempted coups. It is unclear to what extent, if any, the army may share responsibility alongside the police for the violent repression of civilians. In a meeting with General Zaman on Friday night, the BBC reported, junior officers expressed concern that imposing a curfew might require them to fire on civilians. The next day, military leaders openly defended the right of citizens to protest.
That stance may have roots in a military ethic shaped more by the force of reason than by bullets. A four-star general with a master’s degree from King’s College in London and a reputation for integrity, Mr. Zaman assured Bangladeshis that “all killings, all injustices” will be “examined.” His promise of transparency reflects a key lesson in rebuilding societies torn by conflict. As a U.N. peacekeeper in Liberia, General Zaman observed the role that truth-telling played in the West African country’s search for reconciliation after a brutal civil war.
“Please keep up your trust in the army,” he asked in his afternoon address. “We will restore peace to the country.”
Fortified with the news of Sheikh Hasina’s abdication, Bangladeshis greeted soldiers in the streets with joy. Their sense of relief and possibility reflects a key lesson from U.N. peace missions. As Paul Williams of George Washington University wrote for The Africa Center for Strategic Studies, “Peacekeepers are never in total control of their legitimacy because it depends on the perceptions of other actors.”
An army conditioned by decades of peacekeeping has so far won the goodwill of the citizens it serves. “As a nation we have a new moral stance and we will make the best of it,” Sayem Faruk, an entrepreneur in Dhaka, the capital, told The Financial Times. “We won’t let politicians like these take over again.” Now, the renewal of stability depends on keeping the people’s confidence through equality and honest governance.
