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1 Paper prepared for the panel ‘Natural Born Peacemakers? The Constitution of Peace Policy in Small States in Western Europe’ at the Annual Convention of the International Studies Association, San Diego, April 1-4, 2012. From Peacemaker to Warmonger? Explaining Denmark’s Great Power Politics Anders Wivel University of Copenhagen, Department of Political Science Øster Farimagsgade 5, P.O.B. 2099, DK-1014K Copenhagen Denmark E-mail: [email protected] Tel: +45 35 32 33 58, Fax: +45 35 32 33 99 Draft, March 27, 2012, Please do not quote or cite without permission from the author Introduction Denmark’s security policy is activist, militarized and conducted in close cooperation with the world’s only superpower. Denmark has played an active role in a global culture war promoting liberal western values and the country has participated in a number of military conflicts eagerly putting its soldiers in harms way. Denmark has supported the United States foreign and security policy on a number of high profile and often controversial issues including the strikes against Iraq in 1998, participated in the war in Kosovo in 1999 without a clear mandate from the UN and the

Transcript of From Peacemaker to Warmongerfiles.isanet.org/ConferenceArchive/4ce029b476d24c8... · From...

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Paper prepared for the panel ‘Natural Born Peacemakers? The Constitution of Peace Policy in Small

States in Western Europe’ at the Annual Convention of the International Studies Association, San

Diego, April 1-4, 2012.

From Peacemaker to Warmonger? Explaining

Denmark’s Great Power Politics

Anders Wivel

University of Copenhagen, Department of Political Science

Øster Farimagsgade 5, P.O.B. 2099, DK-1014K Copenhagen

Denmark

E-mail: [email protected]

Tel: +45 35 32 33 58, Fax: +45 35 32 33 99

Draft, March 27, 2012, Please do not quote or cite without permission from the author

Introduction

Denmark’s security policy is activist, militarized and conducted in close cooperation with the

world’s only superpower. Denmark has played an active role in a global culture war promoting

liberal western values and the country has participated in a number of military conflicts eagerly

putting its soldiers in harms way. Denmark has supported the United States foreign and security

policy on a number of high profile and often controversial issues including the strikes against Iraq

in 1998, participated in the war in Kosovo in 1999 without a clear mandate from the UN and the

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military mission in Afghanistan from 2002 and – more controversially - the invasion of Iraq in 2003

and the ensuing efforts by the United States to fight the Iraqi insurgents (Larsen 2009; Wivel 2005).

An impeccable ally delivering exactly ‘the kind of output that NATO kept calling for: deployable

expeditionary forces that were sustainable in terms of national logistics and reinforcement and that

could be put in harm’s way in the combat zones where NATO now needed to be engaged’

(Ringsmose and Rynning 2008: 55-56), Denmark’s contribution to peace after the Cold War has

increasingly been its willingness to go to war. In sum, despite fitting almost any conventional

definition of a small state, the Danish contribution to peace shares a number of characteristics with

traditional great power politics.

This is a significant change compared to the Cold War period. As a member of a Nordic bloc of

small states promoting peace, détente and global equality, Denmark was largely a follower of the

Swedish lead (Mouritzen 1995) and consistent with this position the Danish contribution to peace

was conducted mainly in a UN context. Even on foreign policy issues with a distinct Nordic profile

such as human rights and solidarity with the Third World, Denmark played it safe, and while

voicing its general support of human rights, various Danish governments were reluctant to condemn

specific human rights abuses (Holm 2002: 24-25). In alliance politics Denmark was a reluctant –

even latently neutral (Holbraad 1991) – NATO member since 1949, but did not play a significant

role in shaping the policy of the organisation and was repeatedly reprimanded by American and

British officials for its less than average defence budget (Ringsmose 2009). In short, NATO

membership was seen as a necessary evil for protecting national security interests, but not viewed as

a legitimate or even relevant instrument for the promotion of peace in general.

This paper seeks to explain the transformation of the Danish contribution to international peace by

exploring how the link between European integration and global peace engagement in Danish

security policy is conditioned on a combination of historical and contemporary factors. The

argument proceeds in four steps. First, I illustrate how the Danish contribution to peace is

embedded in a Danish foreign policy doctrine usually referred to as Danish foreign policy activism.

I identify three fundamental characteristics of this doctrine and argue that these characteristics defy

our expectations about small state behavior. Second, I provide a brief overview of the Danish

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contribution to peace during the Cold War. Third, I discuss of how the Danish contribution to peace

has changed since the end of the Cold War. Fourth, I conclude the paper.

Denmark: the anti-small state? Defining Danish foreign policy activism

Activism has defined Danish foreign and security policy in general as well as the specific Danish

contribution to peace since the end of the Cold War. In Danish political discourse, activism is seen

both as an accurate description of policy content and as a normative ideal shared among all

influential foreign policy-makers. Activism is regarded as a specific characteristic of the present

foreign policy and is viewed as different from both traditional small state policies in general and the

specific foreign policy of Denmark from 1864 - when Denmark lost the three duchies Schleswig,

Holstein and Lauenburg to Prussia and Austria, and effectively became a small state - and until the

end of the Cold War.

The Danish contribution to international peace since the end of the Cold War has been embedded in

Danish foreign policy activism. Danish foreign policy activism is defined by three fundamental

characteristics. All three of them have been accentuated since the end of the Cold War.

First, the most fundamental goal of Danish foreign policy activism is to promote a set of values

deemed important by Danish foreign policy-makers. The earliest Danish attempts at formulating a

post-Cold War foreign policy focused on the possibilities for common security, the promotion of

democracy and human rights and the Danish contribution to global economic, social and sustainable

development (Holm 1997; 2002). These values have served as the ideational baseline for Danish

foreign policy since the end of the Cold War. For the first decade after the Cold War they were

formulated as the starting point for an innovative approach to a new post-realist security order. They

were seen not so much as a break with the past, but as a realization of the foreign policy objectives,

which had been ‘overlayed’ by the bipolar superpower conflict of the Cold War (cf. Buzan 1990).

Since 2001 the values of Danish foreign policy activism were contrasted with two stereotypes. First,

Danish foreign policy activism was framed as a liberal defence against authoritarian forces

associated with repressive regimes around the world in general and the terror bombings of

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September 11, 2001 in particular. Thus, activism was seen as a necessary instrument for providing

the conditions for peace in a global culture war against anti-liberalism. Second, foreign policy

activism was formulated as an ideological encounter with what was deemed the passive, pragmatic

foreign policy adaptation of the past. Activism was more than a strategy for maximizing influence

and security in the unipolar world order, it was part of a more general ideological ‘war against the

past’ stressing the importance of making sacrifices in order to live up to the moral obligations of

policy-making and contrasting this view with Danish foreign policy during the Second World War

and the Cold War.

Second, Danish foreign policy activism is internationalized in the sense that policy options are

viewed in a European and increasingly global context (Holm 2004). During the first few years after

the Cold War, Danish foreign policy was focused on stabilizing Denmark’s geopolitical

neighbourhood. Denmark was among the first to formally recognize the Baltic independence from

the Soviet Union and supported Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania politically, economic and militarily.

During the 1990s the geographical focus of Danish activism moved from the Baltic Sea area to

Europe in general. Denmark identified stabilization and integration through conflict resolution and

enlargement of the EU and NATO as core foreign policy priorities. Increasingly, and in particular

after September 11, 2001, the geographical focus of Danish foreign policy activism was expanded

to a global scale.

Finally, Danish foreign policy activism is militarized. Military means are viewed as legitimate

policy instruments when pursuing ideationally defined international objectives (Rasmussen 2005).

The militarization of Danish foreign policy activism evolved from being primarily focused on

military means to further peace and development in Europe in close cooperation with international

organizations to increasingly accepting and even supporting the use of military means outside

Europe and without necessarily demanding that military mission are institutionally embedded.

Denmark views asymmetric and indirect threats from terrorism, failed states and the spread of

weapons of mass destruction as important threats to the international order and finds that a military

response is sometimes the best solution if approved by international society. As exemplified by

Danish participation in Kosovo in 1999 and Iraq in 2003, Denmark has a permissive understanding

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of international society. In this understanding the use of force is not necessarily subject to direct

approval from the UN Security Council. The events of September 11, 2001, accelerated this

development.

These three characteristics of Danish foreign policy defy expectations on the contribution of small

states to international peace. We would expect the effects of the international system to play a

decisive role in small state foreign policy as they are by definition unable to rely solely on their own

capabilities for protection against outside enemies and have little influence on international affairs

(Elman 1995). However, Denmark’s contribution to international peace is formulated as part of a

broader project aimed at promoting the values deemed important by Danish policy-makers

internationally. Also, we would expect small states to be mainly focused on their geopolitical

vicinity as their ability to project power is limited. However, Denmark has increasingly focused on

international affairs outside Europe, in particular the Middle East. Finally, we would expect small

states have strong interest in levelling the playing field in international relations though

institutionalization. Small states benefit from institutionalization of international affairs.

International institutions make traditional power capabilities (i.e. military power) less important,

because they create common rules for all despite power disparities. In addition, institutions

highlight the use of power, because of the formalization of what is agreed by institution members to

be acceptable behaviour. Thus, international institutions help levelling the playing field

international relations and therefore small states have a strong interest in institutionalization

(Neumann and Gstöhl 2006: 20). Yet, Denmark has pursued a policy consistent with a permissive

understanding of international society using military means as foreign policy instruments and

accepting military intervention without UN approval and even without being embedded in

international organizations such as EU or NATO.

Denmark: the peacemaker? The separation of national security and peace promotion

During the Cold War, peace promotion and national security were seen as two different sides of

Danish foreign policy. In general, Denmark acted cautiously, pragmatic and reactive in relation to

the two superpowers. Danish Cold War foreign policy was based on a functional

compartmentalization between four so-called ‘cornerstones’, each identifying a central area of

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foreign policy and for each area an international organization, which Denmark could use as a

platform for promoting its foreign policy interests: Security policy/NATO, economic

cooperation/EU, identity politics/Nordic Council, value promotion/UN (Due-Nielsen and Petersen

1995: 38; Hækkerup 1965). These cornerstones reflected the delicate balancing of domestic and

international demands on foreign policy-makers: NATO and the EU were primarily viewed as

institutions of necessity, whereas the Nordic Council and the UN were viewed as institutions of

choice. In reality, this was more a triangle than a quadrangle as the UN was used mainly as a

platform for projecting Nordic and to a lesser extent European interests and values on to the global

arena.

Although foreign policy cooperation took place across the four areas, national security policy was

primarily a matter of Atlantic cooperation and secondary a matter of global or all-European

cooperation (Due-Nielsen and Petersen 1995: 39). In accordance with this compartmentalized view

of Danish participation in international relations, security policy was seen primarily as a pragmatic

solution to the significant loss of power experienced by the Danish state from confident leader of a

Baltic empire in the 13th

century to ambitious leader of a Scandinavia still better integrated in the

European state system during the 14th

, 15th

and 16th

centuries until being reduced to a middle power

and finally a small state as a consequence of unsuccessful military encounters with Sweden and

Germany from the middle of the 17th

century until the loss of Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg in

the 1864 war with Germany (cf. Petersen 2005). History had made Denmark into a small state

without the necessary means to secure its own survival. NATO was seen as a pragmatic solution to

this problem, and the Danish defence budget was viewed more as a membership fee paying for

protection than as a direct contribution to the peace and security of Europe or even Denmark (cf.

Ringsmose 2009). In terms of its own national security, Denmark was viewed by itself and others as

a security consumer.

In contrast, when it came to promoting international peace, Denmark was part of a Nordic bloc

pursuing its interest mainly through the UN. The bipolar superpower conflict had created a global

political system. Developments in one part of the system has implications for other parts of the

system and even a small European state like Denmark needed to develop policies on the global

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conflicts between East and West and North and South. Developments in Denmark’s geopolitical

vicinity could no longer be understood without reference to the global context. For Denmark and

the other Nordic countries this meant that they needed to find their place in the international

security order. Although this was a challenge, it also created room for a Nordic bloc in international

relations. This bloc was characterised, internally, by being a security community and, externally, by

its unique approach to world politics promoting what the Nordic countries themselves (and

sometimes other countries as well) saw as a progressive foreign policy agenda of peace,

disarmament, cooperation, human rights, ecologically sound development and solidarity with the

Third World. Creating a strong international society characterised by adherence to universal rights

rather than great power politics was one of the fundamental issues promoted by all Nordic countries

during the Cold War. International cooperation and peaceful relations were central as well. The

Nordics tended to see their own security community as exemplary and actively promoted peaceful

relations between East and West (cf. Wæver 1992; Mouritzen 1995).

Détente policy was conditioned on the geopolitical location of the Nordic region between East and

west, but the particular geopolitics location of Denmark was different from neutral Sweden and

Finland and fellow NATO-member Norway that shared a long border with the Soviet Union. To

Denmark peace promotion through détente was not as much a question of national security as it was

a question of promoting a specific set of values associated with Danish society and in that sense

closer related to development policy. It allowed the Danes to project an image of Denmark as a

social-democratic (i.e. a ‘third way’ between US liberal capitalism and Soviet communism), peace

loving, well-intentioned nation promoting peaceful solutions through negotiation rather than war

(Petersen 1983: 76). Although global in its focus by nature, the policy had spill-over effects into the

realm of national security and alliance politics that it had been politically and institutionally

separated from: Denmark did not allow foreign bases or nuclear weapons on Danish territory and

even questioned the use of military forces unless they were used for peacekeeping (Browning

2007), and from 1982 to 1988 Denmark responded to a hardened US rhetoric towards the Soviet

Union and the intensification of the Cold War by footnoting a series of communiqués, thereby

expressing Danish dissatisfaction with superpower relations (Petersen, forthcoming).

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Comparing Cold War Danish peace promotion with the characteristics of present Danish foreign

policy activism discussed above, we are able to identify one important similarity and two important

differences between then and now. First, there is an important element of continuity. Peace

promotion now and then begins from a strong ideational starting point: articulating and ‘exporting’

Danish values is the goal more than preserving national security. This contrasts with the

conventional storyline about Danish policy, which views post-Cold war Danish policy as a liberal

(ideological) break with the realist (pragmatic) past. At the same time, there are two important

elements of change. First, the ideological starting point has changed. Danish peace promotion

during the Cold War took its point of departure in the social-democratic egalitarian values of the

welfare state, whereas peace promotion today has a starting point in liberal ideology. Second,

whereas Danish peace policy during the Cold War could be characterized as anti-militaristic and

skeptical towards great power politics, Danish peace policy after the Cold War is based on the

active use of military instruments in close cooperation with the world’s only superpower. The next

section discusses this policy shift by discussing the development of Danish peace policy after the

Cold War.

Denmark: the warmonger? The military road to a peaceful world

By the end of the Cold War the priorities of Danish foreign policy changed considerably. Despite

initial confusion on what to make of the end of the Cold War and, in particular, the ensuing

European dynamics with deepening European integration (Wæver 1992), and a general reluctance

towards German unification (Mouritzen 1996), consensus soon emerged in the Danish foreign

policy elite that Europe’s new security order should be seen as ‘a unique window of opportunity’

allowing a new foreign and security policy based on so-called ‘active internationalism’ (Holm

2002: 21, 22-23).

Denmark reacted to the transformed security order following the revolutions of Central and Eastern

Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union faster and more radically than most other states in

Europe (cf. Elbjørn and Wivel 2006). A new ‘activist’ policy was initiated by the end of the Cold

war as a successful Danish attempt to help the three Baltic countries to rebuild their states and

become integrated in European and transatlantic institutional structures and was subsequently

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developed as a new foreign policy doctrine making common security and the spread of democracy

and human rights the foundation of Danish foreign policy from 1993 and onwards. As noted in the

1997 Danish Defence Commission’s 1998-white paper, Fremtidens Forsvar, after the end of the

Cold War, Denmark now enjoyed unprecedented security in a highly institutionalized security

environment, which allowed Danish foreign policy decision makers to focus on the ‘indirect’ threat

to Danish security stemming from instability in Europe in the absence of a ‘direct’ which had

disappeared with the Soviet Union (Danish Defence Commission 1998: 17). Soon, the country

‘involved itself to an unprecedented degree in international peacekeeping, peace-building and

peace-making operations’ (Rasmussen 2005: 28-29).

In a few years Denmark effectively transformed itself from what was often considered the weakest

link in NATO to a Nordic and European avant-garde in defence policy. Denmark sent combat

forces abroad and reformed its defence forces ‘[e]ven before the new security environment had been

fully realized’, and the goal of taking full advantage of the new security environment was shared by

foreign policy makers as well as the Danish Armed Forces, who ‘enthusiastically embraced

expeditionary military operations as the new sine qua non, and pushed actively for greater

professionalization and internationalization of the Services’ (Saxi 2010: 416). The events of

September 11, 2001, accelerated this development. Danish defence was transformed into a two-tier

system focused on internationally deployable forces combined with ‘total defence’ aimed at

preventing terrorist attacks on Denmark and cushioning Danish society from the consequences in

the event that it should happen (Heurlin 2007: 71-72). Territorial defence forces were finally

abolished in 2004 and conscription was reduced to four months now serving primarily as a means to

education in total defence and as a way of recruiting for professional forces (Saxi 2010: 417).

Initially, the European Union was to play a major role in Danish peace promotion as well as in

foreign and security policy in general. According to a government white paper on the ‘principles

and perspectives in Danish foreign policy’ in 1993, the EU and the EPS were now the most

important platforms for Danish foreign policy influence (Danish Government 1993). For the Danish

foreign policy elite, the four cornerstones, which had served as a compass for Danish foreign and

security policy during the Cold War, now seemed to be exactly the pillars underpinning European

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integration.1 As summed up by Foreign Minister Niels Helveg Petersen in 1996 ‘Today we need the

Union for three main reasons […] First, we need it for reasons of security […] The theory of ‘Peace

through Integration’ has stood the Test of History. Today, war is literally unthinkable among

members of the EU […], second, […] to produce common solution to common problems […] More

and more policy problems have international aspects that demand international action […] thirdly,

we need the Union to promote our values and defend our interests at the global level’ (quoted in

Larsen 2000: 43). This signalled what was already a fact: the Nordic bloc in the UN had been

subsumed by a larger and more influential European bloc promoting many of the same issues of

peaceful co-existence, environmental issues, human rights and development (Laatikainen 2003).

Also, Denmark participated actively in the CFSP. On the civilian aspects of the CFSP in particular

Denmark, Sweden (in particular) and Finland successfully influenced policy content, even in the

face of big member state opposition (Jakobsen 2009). Viewing EU enlargement as an important

instrument, for some time even the most important instrument, for promoting peace and stability,

the Danish government played an active and successful role in the Eastern enlargement finally

decided at the Copenhagen summit in 2002.

Danish commitment to the EU as the central institutional framework for Danish peace promotion

seemed robust even in the wake of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington on September

11, 2001, and in the aftermath of the so-called Cartoon Crisis in January-March 2006. The fight

against terror and the spread of weapons of mass destruction were (predictably) moved to a more

prominent place on the foreign policy agenda and explicitly mentioned as specific foreign policy

priorities in the new foreign policy agenda published by the Danish government in 2003. However,

the mentioning was relatively brief and official statements continued to emphasize the importance

of the EU, which was seen as the central forum for fighting terrorism (in close cooperation with the

UN and the United States), and the United Nations was as the key instrument in preventing the

spread of nuclear weapons (Danish Government 2003: 20-21). In 2004 this was followed up by a

government white paper on terrorism underlining the continued importance of the UN, EU and

NATO (Danish Government, 2004), and in globalization strategy of the Danish government stating

that ‘the EU is an will increasingly be the most important international framework for Denmark in

the management of the challenges of globalisation’ (Danish Government 2006: 11).

1 I owe the general point to Larsen (2003).

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Despite this seemingly strong commitment to the EU, there were important limitations to the

European integration of Danish foreign and security policy. After initially rejecting the Maastricht

Treaty in a referendum in 1992, Denmark chose to stay outside EU cooperation on defence policy

as one of four exemptions from the treaty granted to Denmark at the European Council meeting in

Edinburg in December 1992 and ratified in a Danish referendum in May 1993. For this reason,

Danish peace promotion has since primarily taken place under the auspices of NATO, the UN, and

coalitions of the willing, and Danish influence within the ESDP has been limited. Militarization was

an important aspect of Denmark’s active internationalism and contributing to military operations

was viewed by the foreign policy decision-makers as an important means to international influence,

i.e. taking care of national security, as well as promoting international peace (Wivel 2012). Outside

the ESDP, NATO, the UN and coalitions of the willing allowed Denmark to do this. During the

Cold War, the UN had provided the institutional framework for Danish military missions, but from

the mid-1990s Danish participation in international military operations was increasingly conducted

in the context of NATO and coalitions of the willing (see Table 1).

Table 1 Danish participation in international military operations since the Second World War:

Name of

operation

Location International

Framework

Based on what decision

The Danish

Command in

Germany

The Jever area and

Itzehoe (1947-

1958)

The British Zone

of Occupation in

West Germany

N/A

UNEF I Gaza and the Suez

(1956-1967)

UN UN Security Council Resolution

1001 (ES-I) of November 7 1956

ONUC The Democratic

Republic of the

Congo (1960-

1964)

UN UN Security Council Resolution

143 of July 14 1960.

UNFICYP Cyprus (1964-

1994)

UN UN Security Council Resolution

186 of March 4 1964.

UNTAG Namibia (1989-

1990)

UN UN Security Council Resolution

435 of September 19 1978

UNPROFOR I

and II

Various locations

in the Balkans

(1992-1995).

UN UN Security Council Resolution

743 of February 21 1992.

UNCRO Croatia (1995- UN UN Security Council Resolution

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1996) 981 of March 31 1995.

UNPREDEP Macedonia (1996-

1999)

UN UN Security Council Resolution

1982 of November 26 1996.

UNMEE Ethiopia and

Eritrea (2000)

UN UN Security Council Resolution

1312 of June 30 2000.

IFOR Bosnia and

Herzegovina

(1995-1996)

NATO UN Security Council Resolution

1013 of December 15 1995

SFOR Bosnia and

Herzegovina

(1997-2006)

NATO UN Security Council Resolution

1088 of December 12 1996.

AFOR Albania (1999) NATO N/A

OPERATION

AMBER FOX

Macedonia (1999-

2002)

NATO The North Atlantic Council’s

approval of the Operational Plan of

September 26 2001

KFOR Kosovo and

Macedonia (since

1999)

NATO UN Security Council Resolution

1244 of June 10 1999

ISAF Afghanistan (since

2003)

NATO UN Security Council Resolutions

1386 (of November 14 2001),

1413(of May 23 2002), and 1444( of

November 27 2002).

OPERATION

ENDURING

FREEDOM

Afghanistan (2002) Coalition Conducted within the legal

framework of Beslutningsforslag

B37 by the Danish Folketinget (of

December 14 2001).

DANCON/IRAQ Iraq (2003-2007) Coalition Conducted within the legal

framework of Beslutningsforslag

B118 by the Danish Folketinget (of

March 18 2003). 61 voted for the

decision and 50 voted against.

Intervention in

Libya

Libya (Since 2011) NATO UN Security Council Resolution

1973 of March 17 2011. 110 voted

for the decision, no one voted

against, and 69 were not present.

Sources:

Hærens Operative Kommando (2008): International Engagement. Lokated on September 12 2011 on the

following web-page:

http://www.forsvaret.dk/HOK/omhaeren/historie/INT%20Engagement/Pages/Ledelse.aspx

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Folketinget. (2011): Viderestilling til tidligere folketingssamlinger. Located on September 12 2011 on the

following web-page:

http://webarkiv.ft.dk/?/samling/arkiv.htm

Paradoxically, the transformation of Danish defence since the end of the Cold War would fit very

well with a role as an active participant in EU defence policy. Denmark is now a producer of

security, rather than a consumer, and has embraced the idea of denationalization of defence

allowing for specialization, and the militarization of Danish foreign policy allows for the

combination of military policies with civilian policies, which could provide a strong platform for

Danish influence on EU peacemaking efforts (cf. Heurlin 2007: 72; Olsen 2011: 20-21). The policy

goals of ESDP missions have been almost identical to official Danish foreign and security goals,

and Danish troops have been training for exactly this kind of missions since the early 1990s (DIIS

2008: 110; Larsen 2000: 102-104). In this respect Denmark is in an ideal position for uploading

policy preferences to the European level. However, at the same time, Danish participation in

military missions under the auspices of the EU is precluded by the Danish exemption from the

Maastricht Treaty, according to which Denmark cannot participate in the ‘elaboration and

implementation of EU decisions and actions which have defence implications’

(http://www.euo.dk/fakta_en/denmark/edinburgh/). This excludes Denmark from participation in

EU military operations as well as EU planning and cooperation on development and acquisition of

military capabilities.

Exclusion from EU defence policy has not excluded what has been perceived by foreign policy-

makers as peace promotion through military activism. Most controversially, Denmark has supported

the US position on a number of military issues and was a co-signatory of the letter of eight in

January 2003 supporting the American position on Iraq and effectively undermining the prospects

for any common EU position on the issue. Subsequently Denmark joined the American-led

coalition in Iraq despite the lack of authorization from the UN Security Council. The Danish

government has consistently supported the invasion of Iraq and the ensuing efforts by the United

States to fight the Iraqi insurgents. Even though human rights concerns have been central to Danish

foreign policy in the post-Cold War era, the government’s critique of the US policy of keeping

prisoners at the US military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, were relatively mild and low-key.

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During the post-Cold War era Denmark has continuously committed a relatively high level of

troops to international operations, and the ‘extensive Danish willingness to deploy a significant

number of forces in high-risk areas in Afghanistan has been met with much appreciation and

applause inside NATO’ (Ringsmose and Rynning 2008: 62). In Libya in 2011, Denmark deployed

six F-16 fighters and one Hercules transport plane along with corresponding ground crews and

being one of the most active and efficient participants in the coalition Denmark dropped a total of

923 bombs and bombed approximately 17% of all targets hit by the coalition in Libya (cf. Saxi

2011).

Danish support for American security policy in general and the Iraq war in particular was in conflict

with Denmark’s continued emphasis on the importance of a rule governed international society with

a prominent place for the United Nations, which is promoted through the EU. These conflicting

aspects of Danish security policy exposed a Danish dilemma between activism and influence and

between a strategy mainly tied to the United States and a strategy mainly tied to the European

Union. Initially designed to maximise Danish influence Danish policy has increasingly been

decoupled from the international institution defined by Denmark itself to be the major arena for

Danish influence on international affairs - the EU – and instead tied to the security policy of the

United States. This dilemma has been ameliorated by the return of the United States to more

traditional Realpolitik after neoconservatism and the transformation of the ‘either NATO or EU’

discussion into a ‘how should we combine the EU and NATO’ debate (Ringsmose and Rynning

2008: 79). For Denmark, however, this might prove to be an even more difficult long-term

challenge than the strained transatlantic relationship during the George W. Bush presidency,

because the Danish defence opt-out prevents Denmark from participating fully in this development.

Conclusion

By its activism and its radical transformation of its armed forces, Denmark has in some respects

been a pace-setter for small states in post-Cold War Europe, although only few chose to follow the

‘super Atlanticist’ policy course chosen by Denmark (cf. Mouritzen 2007). Danish peace policy has

been ‘Americanized’ as a consequence of the Danish defence opt-out. This is a paradox considering

that the close Danish partnership with the United States in military affairs has been a political

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consequence of the reluctance of the Danish electorate to contribute to the creation of a European

superpower with defence capabilities. Facing a Euro-sceptic electorate domestically and having

only limited influence on the development of the EU as a security actor in general as well as being

cut off from contributing actively to ESDP missions despite their compatibility with Danish foreign

and security policy priorities, Danish policymakers have chosen to cultivate the country’s bilateral

relations with the United States.

Danish peace promotion was always an ideational project aiming at promoting values reflecting the

meeting point of the dominant political discourse in Denmark and the limitations and opportunities

following from the global and regional security orders. This was the case during the Cold War and

after. However, the content of the policy changed.

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