UN's declaration of independance
By Mike Shannon
When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bans which have bound it to another, and assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which compel them to the separation.
The unparalleled success of the United States of America rests on two mutually supportive and equally irreplaceable principles. The first being the belief in the inherent freedom present in humankind. The freedom not only for each of us to live our lives as we so desire, but to participate -- as equals -- in the governance of our collective lives. The second is the understanding that freedom without the rule of law is anarchy. No nation on earth has ever combined those two principles to greater effect or benefit.
The devotion to the concept of melding individual freedom within the framework of a strict adherence to the rule of law is clearly evident in the quoted passage which proceeds these comments. This document was not just a Declaration of Independence; it was a declaration of intent. Its authors were so determined to conduct their affairs in accordance with the dictates of western civilization that even while in the midst of performing a revolutionary act unprecedented in its scale and scope -- and in the eyes of their erstwhile British sovereign, eminently treasonable -- they went out of their way to do so in a formal, deliberate, and in their opinion, legal manner.
Over the course of the past two plus centuries of the grand experiment that is America, subsequent actions have been taken to abolish laws which experience had proven to be morally flawed, strengthen those which best served the common good and create new ones when circumstances demanded them. The form of government which has evolved from this unshakable belief in the rule of law will never be perfect, but it remains what it has been from its inception: a shining beacon of what humankind is capable of if given the chance.
It took the indescribable horror of the Second World War -- the defining moment of the worst that humankind is capable of if permitted -- to galvanize the American public into projecting their belief in freedom within the framework of the law from a purely domestic concern to the international arena. With the incalculable capacity for carnage that the modern weapons of war had so graphically shown themselves capable of producing, it was all too obvious to Americans of both high and low station that withdrawing back into the safety of our continental cocoon as we had done in the aftermath of the First World War was simply not an option. That a better way to settle the differences between nations had better be found.
The United Nations was the result of that intent.
It is no surprise that the convention by which the charter of the United Nations was first drafted took place in San Francisco. Even less of a surprise is that its permanent home should be built in that most diverse and worldly city of America, New York, for it was at the insistence of the United States government and its people that the United Nations came into being. Our belief in the continued benefit of that effort is now under question as never before.
For reasons that have been discussed at great length elsewhere, the government of the United States in the fall of 2002, by the guideline of international law, petitioned the United Nations to mandate that the regime of Saddam Hussein be completely and totally stripped of any and all weapons of mass destruction. In response to this petition, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1441, which called for said disarmament and details the manner in which it would be verified. In closing, it warned Iraq that if it failed to do so it would "face serious consequences as a result of its continued violation of its obligations."
The ensuing months it has become the public position of the United States government that Iraq has failed to comply with the demands of this resolution. The US government has now once agin petitioned the Security Council to state that Iraq is in material breach of Resolution 1441, thereby authorizing the US and its "coalition of the willing" to take military action to insure compliance.
At the same time, the Bush Administration has maintained that a second resolution is unnecessary, as all the authorization the US requires in already in Resolution 1441. The logic of that position is circuitous in the extreme. Stripping it off all superfluous rhetoric you are left with the core contention that, "We don't need the UN, we have the UN." Dismissing the validity of a body based on the stamp of approval of the same body is quite a stretch.
Unfortunately for the Bush administration it has become highly doubtful they have the support of enough members of the Security Council to guarantee the passage of a Resolution authorizing the use of force. In response to this, Mr. Bush has gone on record as saying if the United Nation fails to act that they are running the risk of becoming "irrelevant." This contention is equal parts threat and self fulfilling prophecy, for without the unconditional support of the world's richest and most powerful how can any international court hope to have any effect and validity?
Equally specious is equating the term "serious consequences" with permission to go to war. In the world of diplomacy such a term cannot ever be taken so literally. (The Russian Foreign Minister was quoted as saying that if the US took military action without UN approval they would be making a "serious mistake with serious consequences." There is not a sane person alive who took that comment as a threat of war.)
By comparison the resolution -- Resolution 678, November 28, 1990-- authorizing the use of force in ousting Iraqi troops from Kuwait did precisely that. It clearly stated those member states, in accordance with the government of Kuwait, were entitled to "use all necessary means" to insure a return of the peaceful conditions in effect prior to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. There was absolutely no ambiguity in that declaration at all.
If the Bush Administration wishes to have the blessing of the international community before they take military action against Iraq, they have no choice other than to do so within the guidelines set by the UN. A compromise resolution, setting a final, definitive date that compliance must be met by, is the only way a consensus in favor of war will be achieved. If the US chooses not to pursue such a strategy -- and thereby to disavow a decent respect to the opinions of mankind -- it will be with ignominious irony that the greatest threat to the integrity, validity and even the very existence of this other imperfect grand experiment will come from the very nation from which it was conceived. |
