The Useless, Inept, And Political United Nations - Time For It To Disappear

What a great idea Woodrow Wilson had when after World War I he initiated the creation of The League Of Nations, the precursor of today's United Nations.  WWI had been 'the war to end all wars', but Wilson, as any good diplomat and serious student of history knew, wars would never end, but an agency to limit or mitigate them would be at least a welcome gesture.

War, civil conflict, strife, sectarian and religious violence had been a part of history since the first human settlement, so it was a good thing that the war was called the first world war, for there surely would be others. 

 

And what could be more sane, more thoughtful, more inclusive, collaborative, and compassionate than a world body dedicated to peace and international harmony?  Everyone would have a one man, one vote in the General Assembly, assuring that even the smallest and most politically insignificant country would have a say in world affairs.  

The Security Council would be a small group of elite, powerful nations residing permanently and acting as a reasonable filter through which the demands of the majority would flow - a kind of representative system not unlike that of the United States where the Senate was created to act as the same filter, or rather brake, to the often feverish demands of the many. 

Alexander Hamilton was very wary of the majority and majority rule.  He understood that for all the good will and native patriotism of the republic's settlers, they could only be counted on for parochial interests and when it came to public policy would never look beyond farm, hill, and dale. An august body of the well-heeled would be the ideal intermediary between the masses and governance. 

Hamilton would be turning over in his grave if he could see what the Senate has become, nothing more than the same venal, self-interested, highly partisan rubes found in the House. 

The founders of the United Nations should have been better apprised of American history when they set up the machinery of international adjudication.  Of course the Soviet Union and the United States would never agree, and the Communist veto assured only the most congenial decisions for Russia.

As for the General Assembly, what could one expect from the representatives of the Third World, the vast majority in the body.  Whipped up by Soviet shills and operatives and with the promise of Communist largesse, the African nations could be called on to vote against American capitalist interests and to initiate the most self-serving and insolent motions against the US.  The General Assembly, increasingly Muslim and radically progressive, became an 'anti-Zionist', anti-Israel, and anti-Semitic body. 

 

Because of this generalized socialist, progressive ethos of the General Assembly, the technical agencies that were created to promote world order and wellbeing became the tools for the implementation of this agenda.  

UNESCO, the most politicized agency of all became the advocate for the 'free flow of information', a policy designed to do just the opposite. Small African countries were encouraged to publish their take on information, news, and events regardless of its foundation or veracity.  The truth or at least some measure of objectivity was less important than the 'freedom' of speech.  

The Food and Agriculture Organization and the International Labor Organization became advocates for collectivization in both farm and factory - free market solutions and options were ignored or dismissed out of hand.  The World Health Organization, the oldest of the technical agencies and therefore the most bureaucratic became an interventionist meddler, interfering and obstructing the legitimate policies and programs of national agencies. 

The Population Fund became little more than a branch of Planned Parenthood, militantly demanding universal, unlimited abortion everywhere.  'Reproductive Rights' was the innocent-sounding cover for this aggressive program, and no opposing pro-life views were permitted.  The same was true for its intimidating, inflexible promotion of breastfeeding, so universal and absolute that no accommodation was given for women who worked and whose income was significantly beneficial for family welfare. 

Throughout these social service organizations a progressive operational philosophy dominated - the ends were more important than the ends. 'Collaborative, participatory, inclusive' operations, regardless of how they resulted in inefficiency and poor outcomes, were promoted as the 'long term solutions to endemic problems'.  Meanwhile untold thousands of 'beneficiaries' died for lack of a direct approach to vaccinations and child care. 

The UN peacekeeping forces have always been a joke.  These 'blue helmets' deployed to war zones with no mandate to use force of any kind and only to act as peaceful intermediaries, were useless supernumeraries, often sexually and financially corrupt - a ragtag, poorly trained, feel-good responsive contingent worth nothing. 

 

The problem of the United Nations is more fundamental and goes beyond inefficiency, corruption, and political venality.  The very idea of international peace adjudicated by a third party is fallacious.  Conflicts have always been settled between adversaries alone. International 'cooperation' has always been the alignment of allies, nothing more.  

Where mediation from a third party seems reasonable, as in the current Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Palestine conflicts, it is always partisan and meddling. In rare cases, such as the Northern Island conflict, mediated and resolved thanks in large part by the American President Clinton, outside intervention works but works best within a well-defined geopolitical framework not the idealistic stage of the United Nations. 

Why should Iran, China, Russia, Israel, or North Korea listen to the empty blandishments of the United Nations.  Machiavellian realpolitik has always been the currency of international conflict and always will. 

 

So, when President Trump got up on the podium at an international gathering at the United Nations headquarters in New York and lambasted the organization for all its faux idealism, empty promises, and ineffective programs, the American Left howled and called him a traitor to world peace, a wild man, an unhinged xenophobic autocrat. Saner observers understood the point.  

Many European nations have been frustrated and angered by the arbitrary decisions of the European Union, interventions they say deprive them of their sovereignty; and so they understand Donald Trump's criticism of the United Nations and back him for his outspoken stance. 

Conflict, the nasty side of Darwinism, is as much a part of the evolutionary equation as sweetness and light. Competition is the foundational philosophy behind all human interaction, and as Darwin understood, it is the force behind evolutionary change.  Are their victims in the survival of the fittest?  Of course - the weak and ill-prepared - but that is no reason to deny the natural, inevitable, interminable course of history. 

Europe is just waking up to the fact that their generosity and social consciousness, permitting tens of thousands of illegal immigrants into their countries, was wrong-headed.  These radicalized Muslim newcomers are at war with the West, know nothing but victory and defeat, and have been militant since Mohammed and his tribe burst out of Saudi Arabia and into Jerusalem and across Africa into Spain. 

Borders, walls, and armed perimeters are natural human expressions.  Peace reigned during the Cold War not because of peaceful negotiations but MAD - mutually assured nuclear destruction. 

So it is time for the United States to withdraw its support and its taxpayer dollars from the United Nations - a pittance in economic terms, but a bold statement of realpolitik and political reality.