Subject: ONU AND USA
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X-Comment: The Transnational Radical Party List
Play it again, Sam
Marco De Andreis
It's hard for a country used to acting unilaterally to conform to
multilateralism and interdependence
(1994 - RADICAL NEWS, November 16th 1993)
Whether we like it or not, the United State's guidelines play a key role in
the future of the United Nations. This both for historical reasons (the
U.N. is an American invention) and financial ones (the Americans provide
for a quarter of the U.N. budget and almost a third of peace-keeping
operations costs). Unfortunately, the unquestionable difficulties the U.N.
missions in Bosnia and Somalia are facing have given a helping hand to the
so-called realists, i.e. those who believe that force regulates
international relations, and that each State should do no more than pursue
its own national interests. Henry Kissinger, national security adviser and
secretary of State under the Nixon Administration, misses out on no
opportunity to repeat that the United States should never have gotten
involved in Somalia, and that it would do good to withdraw as soon as
possible. The Soviet antagonist having disappeared, there are no vital
interests to be defended in the Horn of Africa, and the safety of the U.S.
citizens does not depend on what is going on in Mogadishu. Judging from the
opinion polls, these U.S. citizens seem for the most part to favour the
withdrawal of the troops from Somalia.
In theory, President Clinton should take little heed of Kissinger and his
opinions, since his electoral foreign policy platform envisioned instead
multilateralism and the pursuit of global interests based on consent. But
in practice this American administration is so seriously at a loss when it
comes to defining foreign policy that a complete swing back to the realist
approach cannot be ruled out.
But are the realists truly realist? To what extent are theories and men
that have characterized the cold war still in contact with reality? Very
little, in our view, and this is clearly revealed by the narrow-mindedness
with which the question of the national interest is still posed. Is it not
in the interest of the citizens of any nation that the law regulate
relations among individuals and among States? The fact that entire
populations are being decimated by malnutrition or war can only jeopardize,
in the long term, the safety of the remaining inhabitants of the earth. We
need only think of the phenomenon of the refugees. Democracy and rule of
law coincide perfectly with the interests of any given person. Particularly
so if this person is a U.S. citizen, since these concepts underlie that
country's set of political values; and secondly because their upholding
should no longer be subordinated to the need of avoiding a nuclear
conflict, as it was during the cold war in Kissinger's time. These
considerations, which are so self-evident to the transnational radical
party, sound relatively new in the American political debate. Partly
because it is objectively hard for a country used to acting unilaterally to
conform to multilateralism, interdependence, and discussing their actions
on the international scene with others. And also because this is unknown
territory for everyone, not just the U.S.: the Charter of the United
Nations has never been fully applied, and these are but the first attempts
of the international community. Groping in the dark and committing
miscalculations is only logical. But the only solution is to keep on
trying, drawing on past experience. With hindsight we now know a lot of
things: that the Serbian expansionism should have been stopped at its
onset; that the Somali factions should have been disarmed while delivering
humanitarian aid for the population; that, always in Somalia, it would have
probably been better to negotiate with all factions rather than to
concentrate all forces against one in particular. And so on.
The capability of handling the instruments of mediation, the peaceful
solution of the conflicts, the preventive measures, the threat and use of
military force, is not something a complex and massive organization such as
the United Nations can easily learn. A number of specific circumstances,
moreover, have further complicated matters. It is a well-known fact, for
instance, that the current Secretary-General Boutros Ghali has a
particularly strong personality, which ultimately conflicts with what
Washington considers an implicitly acquired right, i.e. commanding
operations where there is a strong U.S. participation. However, there is no
alternative but to continue affirming the international law and extending
the role of the United Nations. This is proved also by the fact that the
American public opinion itself, which seems to favour a withdrawal from
Somalia, deems unacceptable that Haiti is prevented from inaugurating the
democratically elected president. The case of Haiti is a far cry from the
nonchalance and determination with which the United States invaded Granada
ten years ago.
Both the U.N. and the United States are halfway through the crossing, and
pushing them forward is another of the "insane" and "unrealistic"
objectives of the transnational radical party.
Marco De Andreis.
