I have to shake my head and sigh whenever these prophetic
(or pathetic) fantasies appear about the UN. Far from being a
powerful world ruling 'wild beast', the UN is an underfunded,
bureaucratic forum for third world countries to spout nonsense.
And military power? You've got to be kidding!
Some years ago, the Village Voice ran an expose about UN soldiers
and their mission ineffectiveness. Many of them are from poor
countries - little more than low paid mercenaries with meagre
incentive to risk their lives in distant lands for causes they
barely understand. The government issuing troops might get paid
- and then give SOME of that money to the troops. Additionally,
UN troops have been accused of poor discipline and committing
war crimes including torture of captives - any of you Canadians
remember an inquiry about this several years ago in regard to
Somalia?
Adding to all this, because soldiers are drawn from different
nations, the command structure can be unworkable. Do the soldiers
speak the same language? In Somalia, I recall that some US soldiers
may have been technically commanded by one or more Turkish officers.
In short, if it amuses you, you can believe that the UN is a
fearsome world-ordering conspiracy. The reality involves
begging the US congress for men and money for far away missions
that accomplish little. The UN doesn't want to go to Afghanistan -
I don't blame them!
If there's another terrorist attack on NYC, I wanna be safe
at UN headquarters - after all why waste a good terrorist effort
on something not worth blowing up?
metatron