Scott Brady, Noetic Senior Consultant, recently authored a chapter on East Timor for a new CNAS report, Security for Peace: Setting the Conditions for a Palestinian State. The report offers lessons for Middle East Peacekeeping by looking beyond the issues of the day and focusing on what an international peacekeeping force to defend a two-state solution might look like. Though no individual case study can replicate the challenges of the Middle East, the authors of the report, extract lessons learned from other peacekeeping operations - including military and political lessons - that could be applicable.

A full copy of the report can be downloaded here.

As one of three case studies presented in this report, Scott explores the series of international peace operations in Timor-Leste since 1999. The lessons of Timor-Leste have much relevance for any potential international intervention in the Middle East, particularly with respect to institution building in the security sector. Scott concludes that among those lessons are the need to emphasize training effective police forces, to devise and implement a strategy for disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) of non-state actors and to rapidly develop institutions to manage and oversee the security forces. He draws upon both primary and secondary sources as well as his own experiences serving two operational tours in Timor-Leste with the Australian Army, including one tour as the J-2 (Principal Staff Officer – Intelligence) for the Australian-led International Stabilisation Force in 2006-07.