In the early 90’s, they often have over 3000.
Did they ever wear a blue beret?
It doesn’t seem like he’s smart enough to learn from that if he’s telling such transparent lies.
Its kinda scarey that he is Law Enforcement and the OP is afraid of a smackdown.
Those are cops seconded to the UN, not troops.
ask him to show you the secret handshake. because there are soldiers from many nations then there are UN troops that can’t speak to each other. they then have a secret handshake to recognize who is a friendly.
In any case, my answer to Northern Piper’s question remains the same. As you can see by looking through those UN documents, at various times in the past the US has contributed large numbers of troops to UN peacekeeping forces.
Maybe he’s a **Farscape **fan.
My brother, a US Navy officer, did a stint as an individual (in a place called Western Sahara, IIRC), as his last assignment on active duty. He was at some small place with officers from several other countries.
Oh, that kinda peace keeper.
MINURSO. I suspect your brother was a military observer rather than a peacekeeper. Observers are often included in peacekeeping missions and are indeed usually chosen individually, but they are distinct from peacekeeper,s, which are regular military forces under UN Command.
That is interesting. Since I did receive the story second-hand, would the observer scenario prove more likely? AFAIK he spent no more than three years in the service. I do know he has no access to his benefits, like when he bought his house, or the various surgeries he has had.
Are you sure he had no “access” to benefits? My sister is a vet, and never claimed VA medical or mortgage benefits simply because she didn’t need to. She has private insurance (she’s had a number of fairly serious conditions over the years), and got her mortgage through her credit union.
Ok, probably, but that’s a distinction without a difference in my book.
Agreed. One of my Canadian friends who was a UN peacekeeper with his Canadian Forces unit was also asked to be an individual observer. This he did, but he always retained his CF benefits, pension, etc. As long as he remained in the CF, regardless of his role (UN peacekeeper, observer, whatever), his pay and benefits were looked after by the Canadian government.
Peacekeepers are armed and can and do take action against parties. Military Observers are unarmed and can do nothing except report.
Military observers are almost always officers. Was he an officer?
Dude! You are so far behind the times. It is now Navy Seal ops teams.
Try and keep up, OK?
His unit may have been assigned to UN peacekeeping duties, but there is **no **scenario under which that assignment would be the cause of his losing his benefits. He received a dishonorable discharge for some other reason… and based on your description, I don’t think it’s too hard to figure it out.
There is no way to check/verify a person’s military records without their permission. But here’s an overview of the process from the National Archives, in case you want to explore it.
If he really was in Somalia, he could tell you off the top of his head the approximate dates and the name of his unit. And that’d be easy to verify. But if, as you suspect, the story is just made up, he won’t have that info.
It is quite possible for an individual to be sent on a UN mission distinct from his unit, and I know some that have. Usually this is simply because the units sent on mission need extra bodies, and so draw volunteers from other units. When Canada has a largish contingent somewhere that’s not at all uncommon; during the UNPROFOR mission in Yugoslavia a lot of people from reserve units were sent from their units individually to do stints with UNPROFOR. They didn’t send the whole unit, just dribs and drabs of people as manpower needs dictated. (They were very prestigious assignments and people competed for them.)