On 20 Jan 2006 at 0:00, HP3000-L automatic digest system wrote:

> This speaks volumes about the ineffectiveness of the UN as an
> international peacekeeping body.

Rather, what it shrieks to those who choose to hear is that the 
reason the UN remains ineffective is that it possesses no 
independent means of enforcing the laws which the states of the 
world have formulated and agreed to abide by, but whose rulers 
refrain from upholding when inconvenient for themselves.  This is 
an ancient conflict of interest which is, if not intractable, is at 
the very best only amenable to slow and incremental resolution.

In short, the UN lacks teeth because the rulers of the USA, UK, 
France, Russia, China, and India, Canada and most other advanced 
states do not wish it to have any.  To turn this situation on its 
head and then argue that this "proves" the worthlessness of such an 
organization is like organized crime holding up the example of 
Chicago in the prohibition era as demonstrating the universally 
irredeemable corruption of the courts and law enforcement, implying 
thereby the pointless expense of having any at all.  

If one wishes to make changes in how one is governed then one must 
first compose oneself to accepting those changes and understand 
that their effects may not be immediately pleasing to ones own view 
of how things should be.  Naive, if all too human, fear of such 
change is commonly exploited by those who know that they are 
thereby misdirecting the generally honourable beliefs and 
tendencies of their subjects solely in order that their private 
advantage is preserved and their base interest secured, usually at 
their subjects' expense.  

To give but one present day example of evasion, GWB seemingly does 
not even wish to be held to account by the constitution of his own 
country.  He believes, evidently, that torture, unrestricted secret 
surveillance of citizens, and arbitrary arrest without trial are 
all appropriate behaviour for the government of a modern democratic 
state.  Apparently it is sufficient that an accused be classified 
as a belonging to a group that "deserves no better treatment." 
Membership in such groups being ascertained at the sole and 
unappealable judgement of the authorities, frequently on the basis 
of confidential intelligence that cannot be revealed or subjected 
to public scrutiny lest such jeopardize "national security".  
Cherished legal controls on arbitrary state behaviour like "habeas 
corpus" and the presumption of innocence are simply swept away as 
"archaic".

It is hardly surprising therefore that the sycophants in GWB's 
administration and his supporters in the general population 
depreciate any attempt to establish additional oversight and legal 
recourse beyond that already in existence.  Perish the thought that 
U.S. sovereignty be in any way transgressed! Yet, the present 
behaviour of the US administration is only a hair's-breath away 
from deeming any objection to their policies as disloyal and 
subject to the same treatment meted out to other "terrorists."  In 
general, and lamentably, the rest of the world's governments are 
not that much different.  

In Japan for example, the conviction rate for those accused 
criminal offence approaches 99% and methods that are 
indistinguishable from torture are routinely applied by the state 
to extract confessions.  This is a country that wishes to obtain a 
permanent seat on the UN security council.  No doubt their ruling 
classes have a significant interest in insuring thereby that the 
UDHR is never fully applied to Japan's domestic situation.  

Likewise China and India both have domestic regimes that employ 
significant human rights abuse to counter legitimate political 
dissent.  These governments are not much interested in extending 
the reach of the UN into their own situations either.  Burma 
(Myanmar) and Nepal are other current examples of domestic regimes 
that have no interest in international legalities restraining their 
hand. Countries such as Germany and Japan pursue unconscionable 
domestic policies towards resident workers of alien ethnic 
backgrounds and their governments likewise have no great desire to 
answer to an international body on their legality.

Despite the obfuscating bluster of the neo-conservative movement, 
however, it really is in the long-term interests of the citizens of 
western style states, whether presently democratic or not, that the 
UN possess the power to effect redress of such problems.  For the 
alternative is that, when India and China come to posses sufficient 
economic power, their way will become the right way even here, 
whether we will it or not.

And that day will come.  In 1905 the primary economic and military 
power on the planet was the UK.  I rather suspect that in 2105 it 
will not be the USA.  It would be prudent therefore, like the good 
steward, that while ones strength remains one should prepare a 
world that will remain comfortable long after ones day in the sun 
is gone.

Yet, in present parlance, reform of the UN in practice means 
acquiescence of the secretariat to the whimsical political desires 
of the United States administration.  The secretariat resists such 
importunism as most people in the UN realize that a law subject to 
the influence of those who wish to remain immune from its effect is 
no law at all and that abject acceptance of such conditions would 
inflict immeasurable damage upon its reputation in the rest of the 
world.  

For it is a principal of democratic rule that the governed and 
governors alike serve under the same law and are equal before it.  
This is not to deny that the UN, like all large organizations (such 
as the US Federal government), suffers considerably from careerism, 
nepotism, croynism and outright corruption. Just that the end 
actually sought by self-styled reformers is not correction of any 
of these things.

I would have you recall the amount of public debate in the USA that 
occurred regarding one recent president's curious and self-serving 
definition about what constituted "sex" and contrast it with the 
presently muted public discussion over the point at which state 
sanctioned systematic abuse crosses the legal line into torture.  
Which discourse takes as its starting point the indefensible 
premise that any systematic abuse of a prisoner is acceptable under 
any circumstance.  Is this the type of world most of the citizens 
of DVH's cherished "Western Civilization" wish to leave as a legacy 
for their children?


"si cupitis pacem oneratis non"


P.S.

On the efficacy of using aerial bombardment of a defenceless civil 
population to effect political change:


> Knight Ridder Newspapers
> 
> http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/13594370.htm
> 
> WASHINGTON - U.S. warplanes have carried out hundreds of airstrikes
> in Iraq in the past two years, bombing and strafing insurgent
> fighters and targets almost daily. And the air war, which has gone
> largely unnoticed at home, could intensify once American ground
> forces start to withdraw.
> 
> Since Iraq doesn't have a working air force, U.S. jets are expected
> to provide air cover for Iraqi troops for at least several more
> years.
> 
> Some analysts have raised questions about how effective air power
> can be in a counterinsurgency war. A key fear is that Iraq's mostly
> Shiite Muslim and Kurdish army will use American and allied bombing
> missions for revenge attacks on the Sunni Muslim Arab minority,
> which provides most of the insurgency's fighters.
> 
> "If we allow that to happen, then in essence we'll be doing the same
> thing we accused Saddam Hussein of doing," said Larry C. Johnson, a
> former CIA and State Department official. "We'll just be
> substituting one tyranny for another." 

I draw attention the the noteworthy fact that the possibility that 
some of these target may not have been what they were alleged to be 
is not even raised in this article.  Thus the consciences of the 
audience are not even pricked by the possibility that many of these 
raids are against suspected targets whose actual composition is not 
ascertained beforehand and whose consequences are not 
systematically investigated thereafter.  

This is hardly prudent military practice since it leaves unanswered 
and unanswerable the rather important strategic question of whether 
these activities are having a desired effect or not.  So the 
conclusion is that the US military and civil authority would rather 
not know.  Which generates the need for sites like 
iraqbodycount.org and leads to some interesting and uncomfortable 
questions regarding US military competence beyond the mere 
technical mastery of the rather mundane work of killing people.  
This remarkable lack of introspection has been commented upon by 
others than myself:


> Richard Norton-Taylor and Jamie Wilson in Washington
> Thursday January 12, 2006
> The Guardian
> 
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1684561,00.html
> 
> A senior British officer has criticised the US army for its conduct
> in Iraq, accusing it of institutional racism, moral righteousness,
> misplaced optimism, and of being ill-suited to engage in
> counter-insurgency operations.
> 
> The blistering critique, by Brigadier Nigel Aylwin-Foster, who was
> the second most senior officer responsible for training Iraqi
> security forces, reflects criticism and frustration voiced by
> British commanders of American military tactics. What is startling
> is the severity of his comments - and the decision by Military
> Review, a US army magazine, to publish them.
> 
> American soldiers, says Brig Aylwin-Foster, were "almost unfailingly
> courteous and considerate". But he says "at times their cultural
> insensitivity, almost certainly inadvertent, arguably amounted to
> institutional racism".
> 
> The US army, he says, is imbued with an unparalleled sense of
> patriotism, duty, passion and talent. "Yet it seemed weighed down by
> bureaucracy, a stiflingly hierarchical outlook, a predisposition to
> offensive operations and a sense that duty required all issues to be
> confronted head-on."



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