Introduction - the political and moral limits of Western military intervention to protect civilians in danger; fatal attraction? - air power and the West; the RMA and intervention - a sceptical view; implications of the Weinberger doctrine for American military intervention in a post-desert storm age; missing the story - the media and the Rwandan genocide; the doctrine gap - the enduring problem of contemporary peace support operations; fighting for Freetown - British military intervention in Sierra Leone; the role of monitoring and verification; Bosnia and Kosovo - interpreting the gender dimensions of international intervention.