What are some of the characteristics of the conflicts in the post-Cold War world, and in what ways do these characteristics pose challenges to states and organizations such as the United States, the European Union, and the United Nations, who are often called on to intervene?

Some of the most important conflicts around the world in the post-Cold War era have been internal struggles, occurring either within the borders of a nation-state or between constituent parts of a nation-state torn apart by the collapse of communism. The best example of the latter is the civil war that emerged in what was formerly Yugoslavia. This conflict featured efforts by ethnic Serbs to establish a Serb state by forcibly relocating and even killing people from other ethnic groups. While there were atrocities committed on all sides in the conflict, "ethnic cleansing" on the part of Serbs (usually targeting Muslim Bosnians and Albanians) caught the attention of the international community. It proved to be a real challenge for the United Nations peacekeeping forces to manage the violence, and eventually, NATO intervened, attacking Serb military targets throughout Yugoslavia to degrade their capability to wage war against civilians. Several Serbian war criminals were punished by the international community in the wake of the conflict. The United Nations was also challenged by the conflict that emerged in the African nation of Rwanda, which quickly descended into genocide in 1995. As in Yugoslavia, peacekeeping forces struggled to protect populations from attacks in what became a brutal civil war. In Afghanistan, the civil war that followed Soviet withdrawal from the country proved fertile ground for terrorist organizations, which became the most urgent post-Cold War challenge confronting international communities. While European forces joined American forces to attack Al-Qaeda and the Taliban government that supported them after 9/11, Afghanistan became one of many places to spawn international terrorists. This problem has persisted in Iraq and in Syria in particular. Essentially, these organizations have struggled with internal wars (and border-crossing ethnic wars) since the Cold War. This fact has contributed to the formation of terrorist groups. Each of these conflicts posed a unique challenge for the international community and multinational organizations because, while the conflicts were domestic in nature, their ramifications tended to cross borders.