Tom, > When the "reasoning behind that war" is that it is an enforcement > action pursuant to UN resolutions.
Since when was the enforcement of UN resolutions the ONLY pretext for the war? > France has a veto on the UN Security Council, not in the UN general > assembly. And what of it anyway? The US has a UNSC veto as well. If > you set up an institution with a particular decisionmaking procedure, > the fact that that procedure may occasionally produce results other > than the ones you want isn't a reason for saying that the procedure is > invalid. The first sentence here is true. AND WHAT OF IT ANYWAY? Sir, it is up to the council itself, and not individual members or the general assembly, to determine how resolutions are to be ENFORCED, not if resolutions are passed. Thus, if every country in the UN had agreed it would not have mattered. Here are some of the countries that supported, in case you have forgotten: Afghanistan, Albania, Angola, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Colombia, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Eritrea, Estonia, Ethiopia, Georgia, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Latvia, Lithuania, Republic of Macedonia, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Mongolia, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Palau, Panama, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Rwanda, Singapore, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Tonga, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, and Uzbekistan I suppose, following your logic, if North Korea had missile silos aimed and ready to fire at the US and openly declared on such and such a day and time they would blast us, we should wait for the great UN to decide for us how we should defend ourselves. This is the exact logic many followed when they believed that the League of Nations could prevent WWII. I had issues with the war, both before and now, and won't pretend that I didn't. But its also not black and white as you and your ilk pretend. And I have never argued that the decision was invalid, because no decision was ever made on enforcement. The UN serves a valid purpose, but is severely flawed. Success of sorts in Korea and the Congo did boost its international image. However, many of the problems from the Cold War it could not stem. The effective occupation of Eastern Europe by Russia made a mockery of the promises made at Yalta and other war meetings. The treatment of Hungary in 1956 could not be stopped by the United Nations. Likewise, America's involvement in Vietnam could not be stopped. According to www.genocide.org, since the end of World War II and the founding of the United Nations, over 81 million people have been killed in racial, religious, and political genocides across the world. This number is 1350% greater than all those killed in the Nazi death camps. But now, instead of innocents dying under the swastika, they are perishing under the blue flag of the UN and its farcical peacekeeping missions. Just within the past few years hundreds of civilians where slaughtered in Srebrenica, Bosnia, within eyeshot of 600 Dutch UN peacekeepers who felt they were not authorized to interfere. And in Rwanda, millions were killed in ethnic cleansing campaigns conducted under the nose of another UN peacekeeping mission led by now UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. Just what does the UN think "preventing genocide" means? It is obvious that the United Nations has not only failed in its mission to prevent genocide, but has actually acted as its enabler, leading to the bloodiest 60 years in history. The United Nation's incompetence extends far beyond its peacekeeping missions. In the fight against starvation and disease, time and time again the UN has mismanaged and wasted hundreds of millions of dollars of aid on spurious projects that seem aimed more toward their personal aggrandizement and creature comforts than helping the suffering around the world. For example, in the 1980's, at the height of the Ethiopian famine, the UN spent over $75 million building and upgrading apartment complexes for UN administrators and aid workers in Ethiopia while food supplies rotted on the docks, unable to reach famine stricken areas due to a lack of transportation vehicles. And, more recently, in East Timor, the UN spent over $50 million to build hotels and supermarkets for foreign visitors while neglecting the development of much needed local infrastructure and hospitals. The UN acts like any other European Socialist bureaucracy. The bureaucrats arrogantly assume they know what is best for others at all times and any decision they make is correct for the simple reason that they made it. Above all else, the bureaucrats protect their own, accepting no responsibility for errors, and ensuring that all blame is placed outside of the organization. The end result is the UN being content to give starving people what the United Nations say they need, not what the people require. If people want food and medicine, they get a soccer stadium. If people want a democracy, they are given a UN generated bureaucracy. The people want freedom, they get the status quo. The problem with the United Nations is it wants all the power of a World Parliament but will assume none of the responsibility associated with such power. In effect, the goal of the UN is to dictate world peace on its terms, not facilitate it in a spirit of freedom and democracy. An international body dedicated to the debate of ideas and opening avenues of diplomacy is a wonderful idea, but it will never work so long as the international body feels no accountability to the sovereign nations which compose it or the people of the world it claims to protect. So please, don't attempt to lecture me on the role of the UN. William --- In [email protected], "Thomas L. Knapp" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Quoth wgilbert02: > > > Geof, I wonder if everyone has also forgotten Ansar Al-Islam, the Al- > > Queda affiliate operating in Northern Iraq that tried to poison > > British water supplies a few years ago as well? > > No, I haven't forgotten about Ansar al-Islam, the al Qaeda affiliate > which operated in (Kurdish-controlled and under the protection from > Saddam of US aircraft) northern Iraq. > > > Since when does any sovereign country in the world need > > the permission of the UN to begin a war, irregardless of the > > reasoning behind that war? > > When the "reasoning behind that war" is that it is an enforcement > action pursuant to UN resolutions. > > > Furthermore, the US had more than enough > > votes within the UN to allow military assistance during the invasion, > > but France, who was one of the five countries with veto power, > > threatened to veto it, even if avery country in the UN was in support. > > France has a veto on the UN Security Council, not in the UN general > assembly. And what of it anyway? The US has a UNSC veto as well. If > you set up an institution with a particular decisionmaking procedure, > the fact that that procedure may occasionally produce results other > than the ones you want isn't a reason for saying that the procedure is > invalid. > > The US agreed to veto power for the WII Allied Powers on the UNSC, and > accepted veto power AS one of the WWII Allied Powers on the UNSC. Then > it brought the matter to the UN, not vice versa. > > Tom Knapp > ForumWebSiteAt http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
