Hmmm okay. And just where exactly was the U.N. when Britain and Argentinia went to war?
Neither Argentina nor Britain called their little war a war - heck, they don't even speak of that war in the same terms. One side fought over the Islas Malvinas and the other over the Falklands. Even to U.N. standards the situation would have been clear - Argentina had invaded the territory of another nation. My guess is Mrs. Thatcher's advisors told her that
a) the United Nations would back up Great Britain but would need time to get their act together. And Great Britain as a former colonial power could count on seeing a couple of decolonized countries voting against her, just for spite.
b) the Argentinian junta would probably ignore any U.N. resolution anyway.
c) the Argentinians would make good use of every day that passed by digging in and fortifying the islands they just had grabbed.
So time was a factor to cut down the impending body count, and the Royal Navy started its engines.
But there's something funny: had the Junta negotiated with Great Britain instead of launching its invasion force, they might have got the islands ... Great Britain had almost forgot about them.
Instead the Junta decided to quell inner unrest by a little campaign against an enemy half way around the globe. Hell what could go wrong?
They lost. And it spelt the end of their rule.
The U.N. is about as powerful as a turtle on it's back. The entire reason they don't do anything to stop the violence is because they cannot. 5,000 peacekeepers from anywhere are no more capable of interceeding in US policy any more than they would have been with the UK's.
That's right. There never was such a thing as a "United Nations Army". The only muscle the U.N. has is what its members decide to lend it. No matter what you think you know: there were not only U.S. soldiers involved in stemming the North Korean tide in the 1950's. Although it probably wouldn't have worked but for General Douglas MacArthur and his landing at Inchon.
And they certainly have done nothing to stem the tide of terrorism from the Mideast. If anything they have rewarded it by recognizing Arafat. This hardly seems a sound reason to follow their lead.
Like most people, the U.N. have discovered that prior to the rise of fundamentalism, the Mideast terror was fueled by the Palestinian situation. With about any resolution concerning Palestinians and Israel blocked by the U.S. - I believe Israel holds the undisputed record when it comes to ignoring U.N. resolutions.
While dredging up the Iraq vendetta explanation makes for a good conspiracy story, I am not going to feel sorry for the ousting of a dictator that openly supported Palestinian terrorists. He was merely part of the larger problem of terrorism. A problem festered by a politically controlled Arab press in theocratic societies.
Hello? Clear your brain - you've recommended a way to do this in an earlier post ...
As far as I know there was not a single Palestinian on a 9/11 plane. And no Iraqis, either. Saudis, yes. Yemenites, sure. Algerians, even.
Al-quaeda recruits among young men disappointed by the Western way of life as they perceive it ... first they turn to the preachers, then they encounter the radical ones eager to fill an empty soul with their purpose: "Fight the Jihad! Kill the Heathens! Go straight to Heaven!"
Palestinians don their bomb belts and go blasting Israeli civilians. Despiccable in itself, but not related to the WTC flights.
But supporting the Palestinians is a political tool to raise the popularity of a regime within the Arab "community" that otherwise has nothing to offer its neighbours.
All those arabs that went to Iraq prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom to fight didn't go there to fight
for Saddam ... they came to fight
against Americans. The nation perceived as the pinnacle of Western civilisation, Superpower No. 1, cultural dominator. "The Great Satan", in short - or "The Whore of Babylon", to use something more consistent with Christian terminology.
I suppose the only way you would be in favor of any military action whatsoever would have been if Britain had been the nation attacked. I guess they didn't show enough live pictures of people leaping to their deaths overseas from the WTC on the BBC, eh? You know, about 200 of those were your citizens. Perhaps you don't feel that's enough to warrant military action, many of us in the States did.
U.S. military action against Taliban Afghanistan to destroy the established Al-Quaeda structures enjoyed a wide political and military support all through the U.N. - it's Turks, Dutch and Germans that patrol the streets of Kabul these days.
But now the Taliban are crawling back out of their hideouts in the Pakistani borderlands (and the cities - General Musharraf isn't that much in control of his country). Afghanistan is still a long way from being even the land it was prior to 1980.
But with Bin Laden gone under deep cover (or maybe he
is dead - without a body found he'll be haunting the U.S. for at least one generation, so it doesn't make much of a difference) the Bush advisors came to the conclusion that this was a good time to finish off the Fat Man in Baghdad.
The Arab press is under tight political control, true enough. But while islamic fundamentalists are on the rise, they are not in charge elsewhere than in Iran.
Not yet, that is - they're rising in power all through North Africa and the Near and Middle East.
FYI, it would have not mattered if the current administration were the Gore Administration or the Bush Administration. If after 9/11 there were no retaliation plans it would have been the equivalent of political suicide. People would have demanded action. I don't care how much of a pacifist someone claims to be, when any country takes a punch in the nose, they will hit back, especially when their citizens demand it.
As I've stated before: gunning for Al-Quaeda and their Taliban supporters was a thing to do. Riding the wave to settle old scores is another.
