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LET'S ADDRESS THE REAL PROBLEM
By Tim Siggia
November 27, 2004
Much has been opined about the future of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan with regard to whether or not he should resign his office. While most Americans tend to disagree with President Bush on this -- Mr. Bush supports Annan's continuance in office -- it might be suggested that the oil-for-food scandal is only the tip of the iceberg, and that the real problem lies with the United Nations itself.
When President Harry Truman rendered U.S. sponsorship to the fledgling United Nations on Oct. 24, 1945, he did so with all the good intentions of Woodrow Wilson, who, a few generations earlier, had conceptualized the League of Nations. Like Wilson, he envisioned the United Nations as a world forum through which international disagreements would be resolved peacefully, by way of diplomacy rather than arms. The League of Nations was, of course, a generally acknowledged failure. The United Nations is a failure also, but with a significant difference that so far has served as the sole distinction between the U.N. and its predecessor: the fact that to date few have been either inclined or willing to acknowledge that failure.
Consider what the United Nations was supposedly organized to do, and what it has actually done. Was not the top priority of this world body supposed to be the prevention of war? How many wars has the U.N. prevented? Or, for that matter, stopped? As noted, the U.N. Charter was first approved in 1945, directly after the end of the war that wasn't supposed to happen. (World War One, history buffs will remember, was supposed to be the War To End All Wars.) How many wars have happened all over the world since Oct. 24, 1945? The answer to that would probably be a real challenge to Google, but the United States itself has been involved in a few: Korea, Vietnam, Gulf I and Gulf II come to mind. And no, liberals, the United States didn't start those wars, regardless of what you've been programmed to think. One man, alone, could have prevented those last two -- and he chose not to.
The sad truth is that, as history tells us over and over again, the force of arms can be successfully dealt with only by an opposing force of arms. Debate clubs -- and let's face it, that's all the U.N. really is, in the end -- never have deterred would-be tyrants bent on the subjugation and domination of other nations, and they never will. Strongly-worded U.N. resolutions did not stop Saddam Hussein. He not only laughed at these paper tigers, but ended up dictating to U.N. inspectors where, when, and under what terms they could inspect for the weapons he knew they would never find.
Despite a debt of between $1.3 and $1.5 billion that the United States is said to owe the United Nations in back dues, the United States is still the U.N.'s top contributor, having coughed up an estimated one-quarter of their total revenue, in addition to having provided the real estate. What have we gotten in return for this investment? A permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council. Period. The fact is that in matters of foreign policy the U.N. opposes the United States roughly 80 percent of the time. During the Cold War, they were essentially a mouthpiece for communism. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, they have become a mouthpiece for the Third World. How ironic it is that President Bush continues to support a man whose opposition to his positions on practically everything is virtually guaranteed!
Kofi Annan has clearly demonstrated that he deserves removal as Secretary-General of the United Nations. Such removal, however, would be an act more symbolic than substantial. Corruption in the United Nations did not begin with Kofi Annan, nor will it end with him. The real question that needs to be addressed is, how much longer can the United States afford membership in an organization which, (a) has failed in its stated objective stop and prevent wars, (b) has historically and acted in a manner consistently contrary to the interests of the United States, (c) has achieved a level of corruption that makes the Teapot Dome scandal look like a tempest in a teapot by comparison, (d) has been a financial drain on American taxpayer dollars, and, (e) has roughly doubled the number of diplomatic immunity cases in the United States? The answer should be obvious: the United States should have long ago withdrawn from the U.N., and the U.N. in return ought to move its headquarters to a location more hospitable to their true goals of globalism and world government. Paris, Berlin and Moscow come to mind as possible alternatives to New York.
The United Nations will be sixty years old next October. During that time, it has failed every test of justification for its existence. The big difference is that today's powers-that-be are unwilling to acknowledge that failure. Instead, they keep pouring money into it, hoping that it will eventually prove itself worthy of world respect. Must the United Nations continue to fail for another sixty years before the truth is finally admitted?
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