The United Nations Must Go!

[jbg]

The United Nations was founded out of the ashes of World War II for the noble purpose of ensuring that the earth would never know war or genocide again. The embers of the Nazi gas chambers were still hot. The barely alive, near corpses of Holocaust survivors staggered in the camps of Buchenwald, Auschwitz, Dachau, Bergen Belsen, Treblinka and other such place. The Nazis had finished slaughtering millions of people for no other reason than that they didn't fit the definition of "Aryan" (as if Hitler was blonde and blue-eyed).

Japanese had just concluded an epic slaughter of Chinese. Numerous Japanese were cremated in the fires of Tokyo, and died in the mushroom clouds of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The world literally stank of slaughter and death.

The "solution" to the problems starting WW I hadn't worked. The French, Brits and US levied an oppressive "peace" on the Germans, which meant there was no peace. The Middle East went from feudal satrapy under the Ottomans to a tinder box under the League of Nations mandates. Thus, progressives throughout the world united to form the UN out of the ashes of WW II.

Then things went badly wrong. Postage stamp nations were created at a furious pace after the post-colonial abdications by Britain, France, Belgium, Portugal and the Netherlands. The people in their former colonies were left in utter misery. "One man, one vote, one time" ensured that dictators sprung up, destroying whatever spunk and initiative these new nations possessed. India and Pakistan degenerated into war and famine.

The formation of the UN did nothing to solve any of these problems. A corrupt crew of bureaucrats sprang up whose only mission was self-preserviation. The dictators of these new countries picked "ambassadors" who got the cushy privilege of living it up in New York City, and running wild. Imagine the heaven of being supported by your own (corrupt) government, being able to amass thousands in unpaid parking tickets, and having as a "job" attending a debating society overlooking the beautiful East River of New York City. Simply irresistable. If is were only the waste involved, the UN would be inexcusable and in need of abolition.

Foreign aid is now largely administered through multilateral, faceless agencies. Thus, people in lands throughout the world can scream "death to the United States" with impunity. The United States is still largely funding the aid, but the check bears the name "United Nations". Thus, the US spends all of the money, receives all of the vilification, gets none of the influence that should come with aid.

Even worse, the aid does not reach the people. Do you really imagine that those pitiful people waving their arms in UNICEF posters really get a penny? No, the money is in their dictators' Swiss bank accounts.

The Western nations get the distinction of being pilloried for a pair of underwear winding up on an Iraqi prisoner's head, while, unabated by the UN, slaughters continue in Rwanda, Sudan, Burundi, et. al. The UN does nothing about Robert Mugabe's destruction of Zimbabwe, once a comfortable, middle class land. The UN grinds out a diet of one-sided resolutions against Israel, while ignoring the constant atrocities in Arab lands. Where was the UN on the recent attempt to murder Benizer Bhutto (she escaped unharmed and 149 other innocents were blown up).

The UN is wasting money that ought to benefit the unfortunate. It is worse than the most reactionary conservative dreams that George Wallace or Ross Barnett could dream up.

The UN must go!!!!

[ScottSA]

I agree with your conclusions, although the argument itself is a bit broad and imprecise, even at times wrong.

[DogOnPorch]

As they say...the UN is the 3rd World debate club, as noted.

Foreign aid is now largely administered through multilateral, faceless agencies. Thus, people in lands throughout the world can scream "death to the United States" with impunity. The United States is still largely funding the aid, but the check bears the name "United Nations". Thus, the US spends all of the money, receives all of the vilification, gets none of the influence that should come with aid.

Maybe they should put the thing in Mecca...oh wait...that wouldn't work.

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Many African leaders refuse to send their troops on peace keeping missions abroad because they probably need their armies to intimidate their own populations.

---Kofi Annan

[Black Dog]

The Western nations get the distinction of being pilloried for a pair of underwear winding up on an Iraqi prisoner's head, while, unabated by the UN, slaughters continue in Rwanda, Sudan, Burundi, et. al. The UN does nothing about Robert Mugabe's destruction of Zimbabwe, once a comfortable, middle class land. The UN grinds out a diet of one-sided resolutions against Israel, while ignoring the constant atrocities in Arab lands. Where was the UN on the recent attempt to murder Benizer Bhutto (she escaped unharmed and 149 other innocents were blown up).

The UN is wasting money that ought to benefit the unfortunate. It is worse than the most reactionary conservative dreams that George Wallace or Ross Barnett could dream up.

The UN must go!!!!

Funny thing is, I agree that the UN is useless, but for completely opposite reasons. The general Assembly is a circle jerk while the real power rests with the self-serving membership of the SC. But that latter factoid would undermine your whole premise so, as is your wont, you pretend it is not so.

[Higgly]

Would one of those postage stamp nations include Israel?

[jbg]

Funny thing is, I agree that the UN is useless, but for completely opposite reasons. The general Assembly is a circle jerk while the real power rests with the self-serving membership of the SC. But that latter factoid would undermine your whole premise so, as is your wont, you pretend it is not so.

Actually it doesn't, since the UNSC is hamstrung itself by the veto. Even if the veto were removed, the democracies would pull the plug on it by not funding their loopier ideas.

Would one of those postage stamp nations include Israel?

No.

If there ever was a real country with a real heritage, it is Israel. Pray tell, what is the ancient, venerable history of a Nigerian? Is it the Ibo history, or the Hausa? Or some other tribe?

Israel has, neck and neck with the US, Britain and Iceland, about the strongest national identity in the world.

Edited October 31, 2007 by jbg

[Black Dog]

Actually it doesn't, since the UNSC is hamstrung itself by the veto. Even if the veto were removed, the democracies would pull the plug on it by not funding their loopier ideas.

I'm not sure how the SC is hamstrung by the veto. It wasn't the veto, or the UN beauracrats who were responsible for the west's lack of will to deal with Rwanada or Sudan or, well, you name it. If the UN is a mess, it is because the powerful nations, including those of the west, have allowed it and even enabled it to become one.

[jbg]

I'm not sure how the SC is hamstrung by the veto. It wasn't the veto, or the UN beauracrats who were responsible for the west's lack of will to deal with Rwanada or Sudan or, well, you name it. If the UN is a mess, it is because the powerful nations, including those of the west, have allowed it and even enabled it to become one.

I don't see how a sovereign country in its right mind would pay moneys to or delegate their security and safety to some other organization or agency that is nearly without accountability,

[Higgly]

Israel has, neck and neck with the US, Britain and Iceland, about the strongest national identity in the world.

Do you know what a Philistine is, JBG?

[Topaz]

Questions is, if the UN was gone what so you replace it with....the Bilderberg group!! opens the door to the New Worder Order!

[Sulaco]

Do you know what a Philistine is, JBG?

Weren't they an ethnic group, long extinct, who resided somewhere near or on the current territory of Israel. Their name now being hijacked by upstart Arabs who believe in wiping out or subjugating any and all Jews in the Middle East?

Edited November 1, 2007 by Sulaco

[Black Dog]

I don't see how a sovereign country in its right mind would pay moneys to or delegate their security and safety to some other organization or agency that is nearly without accountability,

A typically vacuous jbg response. Maybe you need a better illustration. Let's take Rwanda. was the slaughter there the result of corrupt UN bureaucrats or third-world dictators? Nope. It was a failure of will on the part of the west, plain and simple.

[jbg]

A typically vacuous jbg response. Maybe you need a better illustration. Let's take Rwanda. was the slaughter there the result of corrupt UN bureaucrats or third-world dictators? Nope. It was a failure of will on the part of the west, plain and simple.

Westerners were doing the slaughtering?

New to me.

[M.Dancer]

The west is always to blame even if the Tutsis needed no urging from us to kill the Hutu....without the west we would be blaming Africans for their problems and that is just racist.....

Better us than blaming savage blood thirsty African killers....makes rehabilitation easier if it's our fault....

[capricorn]

Better us than blaming savage blood thirsty African killers....makes rehabilitation easier if it's our fault....

Let's not forget that guilt makes sending billions of dollars in aid seem like the right thing to do.

[jbg]

Let's not forget that guilt makes sending billions of dollars in aid seem like the right thing to do.

And remember who gets the aid, the tinpots leaders that seek it, not the pitiful starving children on the posters.

[marcinmoka]

Foreign aid is now largely administered through multilateral, faceless agencies. Thus, people in lands throughout the world can scream "death to the United States" with impunity

So the principal reason behind your rational of abolishing the U.N is a lack of explicit gratitude? Deep.

Maybe we should campaign for all the Bosnian kids to send Christmas...err...Ramadan.....err. Hanukkah cards to your house. Maybe that would prompt a change of mind, no?

Sure the U.N is riddled with problems, corruption, and *yes I will say it* ingratitude, but will its abolition make the state of affairs any better? True, that for the moment, it does little. But little is better than nothing.

Edited November 1, 2007 by marcinmoka

[jbg]

So the principal reason behind your rational of abolishing the U.N is a lack of explicit gratitude? Deep.

The hand that feeds should not enjoy being bitten.

Sure the U.N is riddled with problems, corruption, and *yes I will say it* ingratitude, but will its abolition make the state of affairs any better? True, that for the moment, it does little. But little is better than nothing.

Sure it would. The money burned on overhead and corruption could be used for direct aid much more efficiently. Imagine real people getting real help.

[marcinmoka]

The money burned on overhead and corruption could be used for direct aid much more efficiently. Imagine real people getting real help.

Ah, you mean sending the Haitians envelopes stuffed with cash rather than manning the ground with Bengali Blue Helmets or what have you.

The hand that feeds should not enjoy being bitten.

Well yes, masochistic tendencies are nothing to write home about but have relatively little to do with the topic at hand.

[kuzadd]

first off the UN has been around longer then ww2, different name, so the myth is a nice story.

Secondly, given that the UN has largely been a lackey of the US until China and Russia, started actually acting in their own interest, the UN has been just hunky dory.

Thirdly the UN has always done the bidding of world leaders, under the guise of "peacekeeping" and more.

Anyway........the UN serves it's purpose, always has.

[jbg]

Anyway........the UN serves it's purpose, always has.

And what purpose could that conceivably be? Good sex for the peacekeepers?

[M.Dancer]

And what purpose could that conceivably be? Good sex for the peacekeepers?

WHO

WFP

IAEA

ICAO

UNHCR

UNICEF

.....for starters.....

[Moxie]

As per the norm the left blame the failures of the UN on the west, sorry but China, Russia and the Islamic States of whatever have control of the UN. The only resolutions they get around to passing are against Israel, usually condeming them for human rights violations. To funny considering what the Islamic States do to women and children. They don't have an ounce of integrity left in my opinion. Contrary to the left's idiology of "Peacekeeping is the most wonderous experience a soldier can partake of" the reality is Soldiers having their hands tied whilst watching genocide and wholesale slaughter off innoncents isn't noble it's cruel. Thankfully, Canada shed her blue beret image and is doing what it should do, taking action against evil.

Blackdog it wasn't the west's fault in Rawanda or Bosnia (remember the French had soldiers training the enemy on the ground during these missions)

As for Darfur it's the Muslim countries along with China, France and Russia that have prevented the WEST from going in and an stopping the slaughter. Every UN vote they veto, stop blaming the west for all that ails the world. Crawl out from under the blanket of facists hatred and see the world for what it is and not what you want it to be. All that lovely oil, China wants it and she'll get it. A couple of million deaths means nothing to the Communist or the French.

Soldiers apologizing to the people who suffered in Bosnia: LO and behold not a westerner amongst them.

Entire Article: http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/10/17/asia/serbs.php

Caption: SREBRENICA, Bosnia and Herzegovina: Twelve years after the Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 men and boys, their widows and mothers met Wednesday with former Dutch soldiers who served as peacekeepers in the Muslim enclave during the Bosnian war.

"Shame on you for coming back here," Sabra Kolenovic, who lost her husband and son in the 1995 massacre, whispered as the soldiers walked into the former factory that served as the Dutch compound during the war.

Questions and accusations accompanied tears as the widows confronted the soldiers about what happened that July.

Bosnian Serbs had overrun the town of Srebrenica, which had been declared a safe haven by the United Nations two years earlier. The Dutch peacekeepers, outnumbered, did not fire a single shot in defense, and the UN did not respond to the Dutch commander's calls for air support.

Srebrenica's Muslims fled to the UN compound seeking protection, but many were not allowed in. Serb soldiers later separated the men from the women and executed the males as the Dutch soldiers looked on helplessly.

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Recriminations, tears and despondency marked the meeting of the two groups in the Bosnian town.

"Today I feel the same helplessness I felt in those days," said a tearful Monique Bergman, who was 20 when she served as a peacekeeper at Srebrenica in 1995. "Not being able to do anything is a horrible feeling, which haunted me for years. For years I have been mentally ill because of what happened here."

"I am trying to understand the pain and anger of the survivors and to show respect to the women and victims."

The systematic execution was the worst massacre

[Black Dog]

Westerners were doing the slaughtering?

New to me.

Don't be fatuous. You know damn well what I was saying.

The hand that feeds should not enjoy being bitten.

And yet they continue to fund it. It's almost as if the powerful states crave the legitimacy that acting under "UN authority" gives when they pursue their policies of self interest. Imagine that.

Moxie:

As per the norm the left blame the failures of the UN on the west, sorry but China, Russia and the Islamic States of whatever have control of the UN. The only resolutions they get around to passing are against Israel, usually condeming them for human rights violations.

Resolutions against Israel are rarely passed because the U.S. vetoes them. And even if they did not, it's not like they would mean anything.

Soldiers apologizing to the people who suffered in Bosnia: LO and behold not a westerner amongst them.

Huh?

Twelve years after the Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 men and boys, their widows and mothers met Wednesday with former Dutch soldiers who served as peacekeepers in the Muslim enclave during the Bosnian war.

[jbg]

Don't be fatuous. You know damn well what I was saying.

Did you mean "facetious"? Engrish preaze.

In fact, you totally befuddled me with that post.

And yet they continue to fund it. It's almost as if the powerful states crave the legitimacy that acting under "UN authority" gives when they pursue their policies of self interest. Imagine that.

Agreed. Time to cut the cord.