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In the early 1990s, Canada had over 3,000 troops deployed in peacekeeping missions around the world. Today, it has only a few dozen.

Canada is not the only Western country to have greatly reduced such missions. The drop in numbers, military experts say, demonstrates the changing nature of conflict in a post-Cold War world.

Major Tim Dunne is a retired officer in the Canadian Armed Forces. He was deployed in several peacekeeping operations. Now, he is a researcher for the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. He said United Nations peacekeeping is „falling out of fashion.” In other words, it is becoming less common and popular.

Dunne told VOA that before the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, most international conflicts were driven by competition between the United States and the Soviet Union. He said this created the need for a neutral army to stand between them.

Dunne said that most modern conflicts, like in Syria and Iraq, are too complex for peacekeeping to work.

„The factors that allow for effective peacekeeping aren’t there anymore,” Dunne said.

It is not only Canada that is rethinking the value of United Nations’ peacekeeping.

Emily Estelle works for the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute. Estelle points to the lack of public support in Western nations for the costly and sometimes dangerous missions.

She used the Sahel, an area in Africa, to explain the change in operations.

She said France leads the counterterrorism operation in Mali but is working to end its involvement and the operation. She said it is in part because of pressure within France and an upcoming election.

She also said Mali and Somalia, which is facing a similar situation, would not be able to replace the influence peacekeepers have, „if and when they withdraw.”

In Canada’s case, the country’s long-standing history to U.N. peacekeeping operations has largely been replaced by involvement in NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) operations. These include involvement in the operation that defeated the Islamic State extremist group in Iraq and Syria and the NATO operation, now ending, in Afghanistan.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s administration has promised to deploy more troops and police to international peacekeeping. But the proposed numbers remain only in the hundreds.

Charlie Herbert is a former top-level NATO advisor to the Afghan Ministry of the Interior and a former director at the Defense Academy of the United Kingdom.

Herbert said Britain is showing some interest in bringing new life to U.N. peacekeeping. He sees this as a reaction to the decision to pull NATO forces out of Afghanistan.

He told VOA, „The withdrawal from Afghanistan marks the end of an era.”

He also said the withdrawal provides the chance for „…all Western nations to reconsider the use of their military as an instrument of their foreign policy.”

He said Britain is using this as a chance to reinvest in high-end peacekeeping operations. It remains to be seen if other Western countries will follow Britain’s lead.

The Gettysburg National Military Park is in the small town of Gettysburg in the eastern state of Pennsylvania.

Much of the area around Gettysburg still looks like it did in the 1860s, during the American Civil War. The town is in the middle of good farmland. Roads pass through Gettysburg that lead to Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and other eastern cities. It is hard to believe that two huge armies fought there.

One fighting force was the United States Army of the Potomac, commanded by General George Meade. The other was the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia led by General Robert E. Lee. Lee’s troops had moved north into Pennsylvania from Virginia.

Lee believed that a Southern win of a battle on Northern land would force a negotiated settlement of the Civil War and mean independence for the Confederate States.

The battle of Gettysburg began on July 1, 1863. About 170,000 soldiers fought for three days. When it ended on July 3, more than 50,000 soldiers were dead, wounded or missing.

Lee’s army lost the battle.

Many visitors start their visit to Gettysburg at the Gettysburg Museum of the Civil War. The museum has a large collection of Civil War objects. The museum has more than 1 million artifacts, from soldiers’ private notebooks and clothing to maps of the battlefield.

The museum also houses the Gettysburg cyclorama painting. This kind of artwork completely surrounds the people looking at it.

The painting shows the artist’s vision of the final major attack of the battle on July 3, 1863. Over time, it has come to be called Pickett’s Charge. George Pickett was one of several Confederate commanders ordered to make the charge.

The Confederate soldiers reached a point close to the northern lines and headquarters. Today, the point is called the „High Water Mark.” Northern forces then turned the Confederates back.

The charge failed. Southern forces would never again reach so far north. Soon after the battle, people began to visit Gettysburg to try to understand what happened there. One of those visitors, on November 19, 1863, was President Abraham Lincoln. He was invited to help dedicate a burial ground for Union soldiers killed in the battle.

Lincoln spoke for just two minutes. But his speech, known as „The Gettysburg Address,” is one of the most famous pieces of American oratory.