“We believe that both parties should accept Scandinavian peacekeepers and we’re working with Scandinavian governments to put together a peacekeeping force that could deployed into the region to keep a ceasefire,” U.S. National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien said last month, referring to fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave. It didn’t take long for Russia to respond—by brokering a peace deal and sending in peacekeepers of its own.
Until the recent outbreak of all-out war in Nagorno-Karabakh, the situation in the disputed region was regarded as a so-called frozen conflict—not quite war but not quite peace. This is becoming the norm; indeed, all over the world, the gray zone between war and peace is growing. But there’s good news. A model thought up by Napoleon more than two centuries ago may be the perfect answer to not-quite-war conflicts.
