Wake Up, UN
In August, the United Nations confirmed that their peacekeepers instigated the Haitian cholera epidemic that swept away many lives. At first denying its association with the outbreak, the United Nations has finally taken responsibility for one of its latest mess-ups. Established in 1946 with the hope of preventing conflicts like World War II from recurring and to ensure collective security, the organization has once again proven its inability to respond objectively and effectively. More importantly, the event begs the question: do we even need the UN?
Though the UN’s charter encouraged member states to “take effective collective measures for the prevention and removals of threats to peace,” the actions of the UN couldn’t be more petty and biased. The Security Council (the main governing body of the UN) was set up to appease the interests of the most powerful states in the world. The five permanent members—USA, UK, France, China, and Russia—often exploit their veto power to shut down any resolution that could potentially harm them or their closest allies. The Cold War made compromise within the Council almost impossible, and US support for Israel and China’s aggression in Tibet and Taiwan further complicated issues.
When Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990, the countries on the Security Council trembled in fright—not because Iraq was breaching international law, but rather because much of the world’s oil was at stake. Having just deposed Gorbachev, Russia willingly sacrificed its relationship with Saddam Hussein in order to improve its reputation with the West. Yes, the Persian Gulf War was a true success, but think twice before you call it a UN success; US generals led the operation with the most troops and assumed the most casualties.
While the countries in the United Nations patted themselves on the back for their fight against Hussein, militant Serbian and Croat rebels tortured the majority Muslim population of Bosnia; the Tutsi and Hutu rebel groups battled themselves to the death in Rwanda. The UN deployed a lightly armed peacekeeping operation (UNPROFOR) to parts of Bosnia—but there was no peace to keep! Instead of providing troops with the resources and instructions to fight off the Serbian perpetrators, the UN mandated that its troops remain neutral and distribute food and medicine to civilians who were still in harm’s way. In 1995, the Serb forces overran one of the UN’s “safe havens” in Srebrenica, overwhelming the peacekeeping forces and massacring 8,000 Muslim men and boys. In Rwanda, the Belgian peacekeeping force pulled out of the country when the fighting broke out, and the world watched in childish awe as close to one million Tutsis died. Absent a compelling financial interest (oil), the United Nations acts halfheartedly and carelessly to uphold its charter. In most cases, the UN’s mistakes are not the result of external factors, but rather its members’ apathy towards devastating events that occur in small countries.
The United States tested the UN’s power to prevent unilateral action when it invaded Iraq in 2003. China, France, and Russia looked down upon the United States’ doctrine of preventive war, and vetoed any proposal to enter Iraq. Without explicit UN support, the United States and Great Britain went ahead with their plans, proving that private state interests inevitably prevail over tacit UN barriers.
The list of UN failures could go on and on. One could rescind the UN for its weak response to the Sudanese government’s systematic killings in the Darfur region, or become infuriated about rape committed by peacekeepers in the Central African Republic. But all of these horrific stories would be deviating further from the question posed in the beginning: do we need the UN? Yes, we do. While the organization cannot hinder its members from free-riding on other states’ actions, it nonetheless creates an image of global cooperation and forces some dictators to hesitate before committing illegal undertakings. Despite unsuccessful humanitarian interventions, the UN arranges forums for countries to debate policies and formulate implementable solutions. The cholera outbreak is a wake-up call, a distressing reminder that the UN must not only write eloquent, verbose resolutions, but also execute them in an organized fashion.