The United Nation's fork in the road

By Alan Caruba
web posted September 29, 2003

Prior to President Bush's address to the United Nations on September 23, Kofi Annan, its Secretary General, told the General Assembly that "we have come to a fork in the road." The problem he cited was that of pre-emptive strikes on nations that pose a threat to peace in their region and to the rest of the world. This was why the US is doing the job the UN had refused to do through twelve years of "resolutions" that Iraq's Saddam Hussein ignored.

The essential failure of the United Nations is its inability to resist the many evils extant in the world. It depends on member nations to collectively do the job, but only the United States has shown the will and the determination to advance and protect peace. The answer is not a United Nations with its own military, its own court system, or its own taxation powers. The answer is not a global government that supercedes the right of nations to defend themselves.

His plea ignored the fact that the US had gone to the UN and begged it to authorize some action other than its fruitless "inspections." Bear in mind that inspectors are supposed to inspect, not be some kind of international detectives.

Kofi Annan cited all the usual UN concerns about poverty, the spread of infectious diseases, "climate change and environmental degradation", among others, but only the most naïve person continues to believe the UN is the solution.

Its environmental programs are the problem because it has banned DDT and other pesticides needed to control the vectors of disease. It opposes the building of dams to generate much-needed hydro-electricity in Third World nations. It opposes the use of natural resources that contribute to the prosperity of its member nations. The climate change that exists has existed for 5.4 billion years as part of the natural cycle of change, not as the result of industrialization. Poverty is the failure to advance the spread of capitalism and free trade worldwide.

Instead, non-governmental organizations, using the UN, have turned it into an instrument to achieve a global government in which they, not freely elected representatives worldwide, would determine every aspect of our lives. The UN even has a Commission on Global Government and has published its game plan. It's not even a secret.

The United Nations came into being because, as World War II wound down, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was determined to replace the failed League of Nations with a new international body that would insure a third World War would not occur. History, since then, has made it abundantly clear that the UN has not been able to end conflicts between and within nations, whether it was the North Korean attack on South Korea or the massacre of thousands that occurred in Rwanda. It was unable to respond to the conflict in the former Yugoslavia.

The answer is not to deprive nations of their sovereignty to resolve or respond to threats, but to eliminate yet another failed international institution that more often than not has proven a roadblock to action. That was President Bush's dilemma with Afghanistan and Iraq and he solved it by creating an international coalition to alter the future of the festering Middle East, providing the platform for democracy for its oppressed people, and the promise of prosperity blocked by its various despots.

Global solidarity and collective security are the noble goals Kofi Annan cited, but the reality is that they are achieved only when one or more of the Great Powers demonstrates the courage and the will to alter a future that promises only increased terrorism and the oppression of millions of the world's citizens. All the pretty words will not change that reality.

The United Nations was the creation of the United States. It has drifted into the same sad state as its predecessor, the League of Nations. There are sufficient regional organizations and mutual defense treaties and organizations to insure the enforcement of peace.

We live in a changed world since the end of World War II. The Soviet Union is no more. Its threat has been replaced by those that come, not from a nation-state, but from religious fanaticism. As President Bush has warned, those nations that harbor and support this threat must expect to pay the price for it. And he has patiently put together an international coalition to end that threat, just as the allies of World War II put an end to the threat of Germany's and Japan's totalitarianism in the last century.

The change that is required is not going to happen so long as the United Nations pretends to be the answer. That's not going to happen so long as the United Nations plots to become a global government. That's not going to happen so long as the United Nations remains the captive of repressive Third World nations and even some Great Powers like Red China. That's not going to happen so long as the United Nations seeks to become the final arbiter of every aspect of our lives.

That's why we have the oldest, continuous, living Constitution to insure the United States of America remains the most powerful economic engine on the face of the Earth and the greatest voice for democracy and the dignity of man. Those who hate the United States, both from within and without our borders, know we are the last, best hope of a better world for everyone on Earth.

Kofi Annan is right. The United Nations has reached a fork in the road, but it has long since chosen the path to its own dissolution because of its continued failure to fulfill the lofty dreams of a half-century ago.

Alan Caruba is the author of "Warning Signs" and his weekly commentaries are posted on www.anxietycenter.com, the Internet site of The National Anxiety Center. © Alan Caruba 2003

Other related stories: (open in a new window)

• What Bush really told the UN by Alan Caruba (September 24, 2003)
  Many people listened to George W. Bush's speech at the United Nations on September 23 but Alan Caruba thinks a lot of people missed what he was trying to say
  

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