The United Nations, as its name suggests, was created for the specific purpose of uniting the nations. The United Nations is supposed to stop indivdual nations from acting alone against another nation and subsequently the world. Rash actions by individual nations are what start world wide conflict. World War Two started when Germeny disregarded the rest of the world and invaded Poland.
And so, the actions of the Unites States against Iraq, which were voted against by the United Nations, are rash and diregarding the rest of the world. It is important that the united states stays a part of the United Nations so that other nations will not break away because of selfish beliefs.

U.S. seeks help from French
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The Associated Press
April 9, 2004 | PARIS (AP) --
Washington has asked Paris for a role in an international protection force for U.N. employees in Iraq, but it is too early to respond, the Foreign Ministry said Friday.
"I can confirm that France was approached by the American authorities on the question of protecting the United Nations in Iraq," Foreign Ministry spokesman Herve Ladsous said.





Cheney is currently on an Asian tour begging South Korea and Japan not to abandon the invasion/occupation of Iraq.



I wonder, Medea, what your alternative is in foreign relations? The 'W' regime hasn't handled a single foreign relations problem well since taking office. Their attempts have been ham-handed, colored by the arrogance that is the hallmark of this regime. Even 'W' "buddy" Putin is calling for an end to the mess in Iraq.
If we didn't have the U.N. running interference for 'w' in some of these situations we'd be at war with most of Europe and half of Asia.

And...
The world cannot force the US to stay in the UN, but without the world's only superpower the UN becomes rather obsolete.
We (the rest of the world) cannot do anything about it. You can just hope that the US will stay and follow UN resolutions, but as Bush just proved, the US will break UN resolutions when it doesn't suit them anymore.

I'm just hoping the next US president will have far more savy in global relations.

The US has always broken resolutions when they don't suit "national interests" and we've vetoed more resolutions than any other member ever has. I wouldn't count on a new president to change that much.

What many people seem yet to understand is that the Bush admin is a mere symptom that a plutocratic force, which has been pushing against the confines of democracy for decades now, has finally progressed to a point of being able to reveal itself without much consequence (hence the arrogance).

America, the greatest democracy of the 20th century, will spend the first half of the 21st century being consumed by the effects of this force, so it's important for the UN to re-evaluate itself and prepare for the loss of it's American champion (and founder).

There is hope. The African Union is building a 15,000 troop force to counter future "rash actions" and the European Union is also planning a UK-French-German rapid-deployment force with the same objective. All contributing nations are current members of the UN.

The UN has two HQ's. One in New York, the other in Geneva.

I agree that the African Union and EU efforts to create their own peacekeeper corps is helpful for international stability, but the fundamental problem still remains.

If the US ever were to outright violate a UN resolution, the remaining member states could not do anything about it. Sanctions would be counterproductive, military action would be unfeasible too, just some stern words. Not that I believe this will happen, but this issue still remains. The UN will only function when the US agrees with the general consensus, if the US disagrees no effective resolution will take place.

'Tis ill times we are witnessing.

I would actually welcome a US/UN divorce.

The UN, in order to be effective and have the moral authority to represent mankind, should only be an organization made up of democracies. Non- democratic nations should not be allowed to join but instead be represented in "non-member councils" within the UN. However, these non-democratic nations would never be able to vote on UN agendas, etc. The new UN would create incentives to attract non-democratic countries into the circle of civilized nations and the UN would take an active role to protect democracies from tyranny and terror (protection with teeth) as a unified entity driven by principle and not special interest (i.e France´s challenge to US power and french economic interests in Iraq).

The US will never relinquish its democracy and its superpower status to an organization resembling a "Ship of fools".

I read a wonderful article the other day in the Journal of International Law which was written in October of 2001. It said that the US attacking Afghanastan without the concent of the SC would compromise the entire meaning of the UN charter. It also went on to say that if the US was to extend the war on terror to any other country besides Afghan without the concent of the SC that it would further demise the meaning of the UN charter, and eventually set a precidence that the UN is to be used only when it agrees with your own message.

Thought it was a fairly unique look being right after 9/11 and almost predicting the Iraq conflict and what we experienced and what was said related to that.

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Free Ice Cream!!

Funny, your definition of an ideal UN still doesn't justify the US violation of resolutions. France is only one country, with one security council vote. France wasn't alone in disapproving the Iraq war. Why isn't Russia being criticized the same amount?

It's true that the huge influx of questionable democracies into the UN since the 60's has created a large amount of countries generally bulliable by their trade partners; or the sheer vote numbers Islamic countries have (i.e. kicking the US out of the Human Rights commision), doesn't really represent "world" opinion. The security council countries are getting slightly out of date. As some have acknowledged, the UN needs some serious reform. Pulling support from the UN won't help in doing this.

With all due respect Spooklord,

I am not addressing the US position in Iraq with my previous comment. I am only stating that my proposal above should be our goal at reforming the UN to give it legitimacy. I would welcome joining a UN that is truelly a democratic club with goals to incentivize those that are not democracies to evolve and join the rest of us.

As the UN is now it resembles a club of democracies, dictatorships, and rogue states. How can such an organization represent human kind?

I did not mean to signal out France, but they are an example of a true democracy in the UN and you see how they only followed their own political agendas to undermine the US. I am not saying the US was correct either. However, I did not include China or Russia because these countries are not true democracies like yours or mine. That is why I just noted France. I also assumed liberating the Iraqi people from a dictator was a humane objective (I do not use the WMD argument for going to Iraq) and in the best interest for the world. It is noble to bring peace, tolerance and freedon to all the peoples of the world. Don't you think?

However, why not try to reform the UN as I have indicated in my previous thread? It could work, and you know what, I would support my country joining such a reformed organization and forcing it to abide by its consensus. This would be good for all mankind.

However, as it is now the UN is just a Ship of Fools.

Please, let's try to keep the funny remarks in the humor section.