ABSTRACT
Military intervention is a political concept where the definition can change with the debate. Military intervention will often occur when armed forces confront an opponent against the wishes of the de facto or de jure government. Military intervention is therefore closely linked to coercive interference and occasionally, as occurred with the Soviets in Czechoslovakia, it is difficult to separate the act of intervention from the act of invasion. The original peacekeepers who first appeared in 1947 were the observers the UN employed in Greece and also the military attaches in Indonesia recruited to observe the ceasefire between the Dutch and Indonesian freedom fighters. It is the fact that military intervention will invariably stretch the understanding of international law or breach it that is a conspiracy-rich environment. Understandably, the Soviets and Chinese did all they could to thwart America's political and military success, even though there has been a traditional enmity between China and Vietnam.
