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Originally posted by Yoepus yup

Ah yes ... you can always count on me for my anti-UN support. Unless the UN actually becomes an effective institution of course

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Originally posted by George Smiley We're supposed to be the civilised ones. We're the ones supposed to be setting an example. Without that, there is no legitimacy, and, as you say, UN rulings are not worth the paper they are written on. What happens when governments/states act in any which way they please with no legitimacy? The people revolt and attack. Exacty the same in the international community. When the rulers (America and the West) act any which way the please with no legitimacy, the little countries (the ones we fuck over) will revolt and attack...

So I guess what I am hearing from you is regardless of the ineptitude an inaction of the worlds ruling body (the U.N.) that no government can act upon what they see as a threat to humanity or sovereignty of humanity without approval and unanimous compliance of at least the permanent members of the security council. Right?

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Originally posted by Q5echo So I guess what I am hearing from you is regardless of the ineptitude an inaction of the worlds ruling body (the U.N.) that no government can act upon what they see as a threat to humanity or sovereignty of humanity without approval and unanimous compliance of at least the permanent members of the security council. Right?

Your catching on quick aren't you!

No, no nation should act without the endorsement of the UN. How can we try war criminals like Milosovic (or any modern day Hitlers should they arise) with any form of legitimacy when the worlds most powerful nation refuses to live by the same laws it would enforce on others?

You have no right what so ever to criticise any country or non state actor (terrorists) if you are no better yourselves. In fact, if you act uncivilised (or your values, views and beliefs are uncivilised) then you deserve to be treated in an uncivilised way...and right now, the actions of the American government with the backing, from the look of it if this forum is anything to go by, of the American people, is not in any way acting civilised...

Georgey, thats cute.

So better be dead and civilized than a live and uncivilized ?

You sitll think international law can be legally binding and that the US is its biggest opponent. It's simply adorable.

The only way you can have binding legal law is if you can enforce it.
And the USA is the enforce. Sorry if you don't like the "cowboy sherrif" image that goes with the law.

Once the world doesn't look like the wildwest, the USA won't have to look like the cowboy you despise.

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Mmmmmm, no, didn't expect a die-hard supporter of the current Israeli regime to show any signs of being civilised...force of habit eh?

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The only way you can have binding legal law is if you can enforce it. And the USA is the enforce. Sorry if you don't like the "cowboy sherrif" image that goes with the law.

Again, try and think outside the Israeli example! Law enforcers themselves, in a civilised society, have to abide by the law they enforce, otherwise they have no legitimacy. Where there is no legitimacy in a law, nobody will abide by it

What are the implications of that in the international community?

What are the implications of that in relation to mine and your personal safety?

I have no problems what so ever in America enforcing international law and I would applaud it for doing so. However, if America itself refuses to abide by the laws it enforces, why would anyone else want to? And why should they? And why should Americans react with such disgust and surprise when they are attacked?

The same goes for any situation where there is a lack of legitimacy...

Georgey, but what law has the US violated?

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quote:

Originally posted by George Smiley Mmmmmm, no, didn't expect a die-hard supporter of the current Israeli regime to show any signs of being civilised...force of habit eh? Again, try and think outside the Israeli example! Law enforcers themselves, in a civilised society, have to abide by the law they enforce, otherwise they have no legitimacy. Where there is no legitimacy in a law, nobody will abide by it What are the implications of that in the international community? What are the implications of that in relation to mine and your personal safety? I have no problems what so ever in America enforcing international law and I would applaud it for doing so. However, if America itself refuses to abide by the laws it enforces, why would anyone else want to? And why should they? And why should Americans react with such disgust and surprise when they are attacked? The same goes for any situation where there is a lack of legitimacy...

Wheeeee lemme resurrect some of my old UN threads!


The problem with the UN's effectiveness did NOT stem from America's flagrant dismissal of the UN's role with respect to Iraq (granted they aren't helping things). The UN's LONG history of credibilty problems and lack of effectiveness is one the reason why the US was so willing to ignore the UN. Anyway, I wrote this post a long time ago:

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Some of the reasons why I think Kofi Annan and the UN is largely ineffective: The recent events in Iraq have brought the United Nations into the spotlight more than ever before. However, if we look back at previous failures, we should not be surprised by the current display of ineffectiveness. The United Nations did little to stop the genocide in Cambodia or the actions of China in Tieneman Square. The genocide in Rwanda was ruthlessly carried out under the nose of the United Nations. In fact, Kofi Annan was the head of U.N. peacekeeping at the time and did nothing. A cable sent to Annan in January 1994 advising of the likelihood of a campaign of genocide in Rwanda got a response advising that the United Nations should "avoid entering into a course of action that might lead to the use of force and unanticipated repercussions." The use of force, at least by the U.N., was avoided and there were no "unanticipated repercussions." There were, however, the anticipated repercussions of a systematic campaign of murder and terror in which an estimated 800,000 Tutsis were slaughtered in Rwanda. More recently, the civil war in the Congo has resulted in claims just last month of cannibalism, rape, torture and kidnapping by the rebel forces, apparently supported by Uganda. Estimates are that approximately 2 million people have died in this fighting since 1998. Uganda and the Congo are both member nations of the U.N. But Kofi Annan, rather than proposing swift action against clear and widespread atrocities, is reserving his harshest criticism for the United States. And now the much-celebrated International Tribunal for Rwanda has become yet another UN bureaucratic disaster. Repeated UN investigations have found widespread mismanagement, wastage, incompetence, and corruption. The Tribunal has prosecuted a fraction of the Rwandan genocide suspects it holds in custody. It has even been criticized by its own Appeal Court of prosecutorial incompetence and failing to observe elementary due process considerations. Sadly, the Tribunal, which should have brought justice to the region, has instead become another multi-million dollar UN boondoggle. Srebrenica, a name now associated with one of the worst crimes in Europe since WWII or as Judge Riad of the ICTY described it, ``..... a place where thousands of men were executed, hundreds buried alive, men and women mutilated and slaughtered, children killed before their mother's eyes, and a grandfather was forced to eat the liver of his own grandson.'' These are truly scenes from hell written on the darkest pages of human history. The UN created a safe haven in Srebrenica and encouraged civilians to enter en masse so as to be under UN military protection. Only one condition applied--entry into the UN safe haven required Muslim fighters to surrender their weapons. This they did, hoping that if ever the need arose they would get them back. They were to be sorely disappointed on that score. When it became apparent that General Mladic was separating the men from the women and then killing them in the nearby fields, the Dutch UN troops began pleading for UN military support. But, just like Rwanda, the UN leadership once again became paralyzed and failed. They dithered over air strikes, they refused to send in troops to help the beleaguered Dutch and in the end, just as with Rwanda, the UN withdrew their troops. This permitted General Mladic to remove an estimated 5,000-8,000 Muslims from in and around the UN compound in Potocari and slaughter them. To this day the United Nations and no UN official has ever been held criminally or civilly liable, let alone even publicly admonished, for their massive failures in Srebrenica. All the families of the thousands of victims can do now is pick up the pieces of their broken families and attempt to restart their lives. East Timor. In late August 1999, the UN and now Secretary General Annan, called for elections on the small island country of East Timor despite disturbing evidence that hard line elements in the Indonesian military were preparing to cause wide spread public disorder so as to disrupt the elections. The UN failed to provide adequate protection for the civilian population. Dili was burnt to the ground and East Timor was engulfed in violence. After weeks of killing and millions of dollars of damage, the Australian government sent in ground troops to restore order to East Timor; but by then, it was too late to save East Timor from UN bungling. Sierra Leone. So bad was the UN's conduct in Sierra Leone in June 2000 that their long time supporter and friend, Medicins Sans Frontieres, felt compelled to speak out and complain. MSF complained bitterly that the UN troops fled a RUF attack on the Sierra Leonean town of Kabala. In so doing MSF said that the UN had failed its mandate to protect civilian populations, many of whom were sick women and malnourished children in the MSF hospital. Cambodia. There is now mounting evidence that UN Peacekeeping troops actually caused an explosion of AIDS in Cambodia in 1992. In January of last year Richard Holbrooke, the then US Ambassador to the UN, launched an unprecedented attack upon the UN during his last UTN address saying ``..... it would be the cruelest of ironies if people who had come to end war ..... were spreading the most deadly of diseases ..... it will kill more people and undermine more societies than even the most critical conflicts we discuss here.'' And despite Ambassador Holbrooke's warnings there are concerns that right now in East Timor UN staff could be causing yet another AIDS epidemic. Some things just never seem to change.

Anyway I have about a million other posts on this topic ... lemme go see if I can find them.

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Last edited by occrider on Mar-24-2004 at 01:26

good one Georegy!! Now you've really done it! You've finally done it man. NOW you got him started

good luck buddy.. If you need me, I'll be running to a nuclear bunker.

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Ok so I'm having a hard time finding my old criticisms of the UN. That's ok because I always have time to add new stuff. Going back to the UN's failures during the Balkan war, I think the dutch failure in Srebrenicia is a prime reflection of the fundamental flaws of the UN.

A report conducted by the Netherlands Institute for War Documentation concluded that while the Dutch were to blame for failing their peacekeeping dutes, they also faced an impossible task assigned by the UN. First of all, a 750 man strong force equipped with apc's, anti-tank guns, and machine guns was slated to protect the "safe haven" from Serbian forces equipped with tanks and heavy artillery. This half-assed protection force then proceeded to disarm the Bosnian forces (only) as per the 1993 cease-fire agreement. When the Serbs initiated hostilities once more in 1996, the Bosnians requested their arms back only to be rebuked by UNPROFOR since it was "their" responsiblity to defend the enclave. After Serb inititated hostilities, the Dutch requested NATO airstrikes but were refused by UNPROFOR headquarters to relay the requests to NATO. Eventually the Serbs siezed 400 UN hostages from Sarajevo as a means to end any threat of UNPROFOR airstrikes. The dutch eventually capitulated to Serbian demands and relinquished the "safe haven" after being outgunned and isolated. So in the end, after much analysis and admittance of guilt such as this:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/521825.stm

What does the UN conclude? Koffi: "Peacekeepers must never again be deployed into an environment in which there is no ceasefire or peace agreement." Well that's a bloody great plan! Here's my plan: I'm not going to buy a lottery ticket unless I'm sure I can win! What kind of mandate does this establish for an international body designed to regulate the rules and actions that countries are supposed to follow? The UN argument is this: if you're a bad boy, we'll scold you and tell you to go to the corner. If you're a REALLY bad boy then we're going to whimper in the corner while we send you threatening emails establishing our resolve! Case in point ... what has the UN done with Korea?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2928095.stm

They can't even condemn the actions of N. Korea, much less take any action, in response to their pulling out of the Non-Proliferation Treaty!

I've also seen a long history of UN incompetance, ineffectivness, and one-sidedness with respect to Israel. In the 1950s Israel was criticized for launching retaliatory strikes against Palestinian fedayeen bases in neighbouring Arab countries, while the UN said nothing of cross-border terrorist provocations. During the Suez Conflict of 1956, a series of Security Council and General Assembly resolutions condemned Israeli "aggression" against Egypt, with no reference to legitimate Israeli complaints about Egyptian military provocations such as Nasser's closure of the Straits of Tiran to the Egyptian support for and encouragement of Palestinian terrorist incursions from Gaza, to the Egyptian-Czech arms deal. To top it all off, in the spring of 1967, Secretary-General U Thant's willing and hasty sprint to capitulate to Nasser's demand for the withdrawal of UNEF from Sinai merely exacerbated the path towards war.

As Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Abba Eban said at the time: "What is the use of a United Nations [peacekeeping] presence if it is, in effect, an umbrella which is taken away as soon as it begins to rain?" And General Rikhye (the Indian commander of UNEF in the Sinai thought) was "bitterly disappointed - the UN could have tried any number of delaying tactics."


Ultimately, resignation to delegate comprehensive responsibility towards the UN has been a failure time and time again. Give me a UN worthy of support and I shall support it. Otherwise I'm not goint to embrace its false sense of "protection" in crafting foreign policy.

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Originally posted by Yoepus good one Georegy!! Now you've really done it! You've finally done it man. NOW you got him started good luck buddy.. If you need me, I'll be running to a nuclear bunker.

Bring it on biatch!!! Surely by now you know how much I love arguing with people?!?!

occrider...I do acknowledge your valid concerns over the UN but you have assumed a lot a bout the UN that needs clarifying...

For a start, the UN does not have an 'army' or a military force.

The UN is not supranational like the EU is, so UN 'laws' are not binding if they cannot be enforced.

What is the UN? And who controls it? Well, as we are talking militarily (only a small part of what the UN actually does but anyway) it is gonna be the Security Council...USA, UK, France, Russia, China plus others. So when the 'UN' fail to act, it is not the UN but those on the Security Council. If they oppose action, it is not gonna happen 'legally'.

You said the UN was ineffective against China...well no shit Sherlock they are on the Security Council.

You said there has been a one sided approach to Israel, well I agree, Israel has not had to comply with any resolutions passed against it, and America has seen to it that a great deal many other resolutions have not been able to be passed in the first place. Yet compare that with Iraq, where sanctions killed 500,000 people (how's that for terrorism?)

The failure over the Balkans was not the UN's fault. That was due to the ineffectivness of the EU countries who thought they could deal with it themselves (and that is why the EU then set in motion plans for a Common Security and Defence Policy to ensure it had the capabilities to take part in these kind of missions where America was reluctant to becom involved)

The UN does need to be reformed, especially with regards to the Security Council (I would argue for qualified majority voting on all issues)

But the major issue facing the UN is the US, whether you like it or not. If the US lives by the laws of the UN then fine, it can work, but if the US choses to ignore the UN everytime it does summat America does not agree with then it cannot work ever. Now I'm not singling out America cos I dont like it or blame it for all the worlds problems (cos neither of those are true) but I am singling it out by default...America is the most powerful nation on Earth, and can get away with doing what it likes...but that means the UN will not work when other countries, because of what they see America doing, ask themselves why they should abide by international law when America does not have to...

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Originally posted by George Smiley occrider...I do acknowledge your valid concerns over the UN but you have assumed a lot a bout the UN that needs clarifying... For a start, the UN does not have an 'army' or a military force.

Wonderful ... so we're to place our trust in an impotent organization.

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The UN is not supranational like the EU is, so UN 'laws' are not binding if they cannot be enforced.

Exactly. So the UN's "laws" are only applicable to countries that choose to respect them, yet are dismissable by countries that decide not to.

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What is the UN? And who controls it? Well, as we are talking militarily (only a small part of what the UN actually does but anyway) it is gonna be the Security Council...USA, UK, France, Russia, China plus others. So when the 'UN' fail to act, it is not the UN but those on the Security Council. If they oppose action, it is not gonna happen 'legally'. You said the UN was ineffective against China...well no shit Sherlock they are on the Security Council.

Sigh ... exactly ... so stop trying to make excuses for the UN and recognize its critical faults. It is a flawed institution analogous to the League of Nations.

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You said there has been a one sided approach to Israel, well I agree, Israel has not had to comply with any resolutions passed against it, and America has seen to it that a great deal many other resolutions have not been able to be passed in the first place. Yet compare that with Iraq, where sanctions killed 500,000 people (how's that for terrorism?)

Ok and why is it that the US always fails to approve resolutions against Israel? Hmmmm could it be because the UN is extraordinarily one-sided in coming up with UN resolutions against Israel vs. UN resolutions against the Palestinians?

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The failure over the Balkans was not the UN's fault. That was due to the ineffectivness of the EU countries who thought they could deal with it themselves (and that is why the EU then set in motion plans for a Common Security and Defence Policy to ensure it had the capabilities to take part in these kind of missions where America was reluctant to becom involved) The UN does need to be reformed, especially with regards to the Security Council (I would argue for qualified majority voting on all issues)

Tell you what ... I'm going to set up a club that has complete authoritative rule over the world. Board members shall be you, yoepus, that Q5 guy, and whoever else posted in this thread. I'm not particularly concerned with how qualified you are but the club is going to be set up to rule the world. Wait ... what do you mean the administration of the world is going poorly? NOTHING is being done??? The cabinet members are arguing too much? They don't even have cars to get to work???? Well CLEARLY there's nothing wrong with the institution of the club ... the problem is the cabinet members! Oh well ... since we can't fire them I guess there's nothing we can do. Dooooooo doo dooo dooooooo .

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But the major issue facing the UN is the US, whether you like it or not. If the US lives by the laws of the UN then fine, it can work, but if the US choses to ignore the UN everytime it does summat America does not agree with then it cannot work ever. Now I'm not singling out America cos I dont like it or blame it for all the worlds problems (cos neither of those are true) but I am singling it out by default...America is the most powerful nation on Earth, and can get away with doing what it likes...but that means the UN will not work when other countries, because of what they see America doing, ask themselves why they should abide by international law when America does not have to...

The UN was rendered impotent since its inception. The sooner people realise that it's a flawed institution that is setting itself up for failure the better. It's an institution analagous to the Italian parliament of the 1900s and it's nothing more than a 21st century league of nations with a shiny new name. Stop trying to excuse the UN on the part of its constituent members and start recognizing the failures of the institution itself.

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Last edited by occrider on Mar-24-2004 at 15:46