I Still Hate The UN

Yesterday Kofi Annan told Security Council ambassadors that renewing US immunity from international prosecuation would undermine international law.

Simply put, thats pretty rich coming from our dear friend Kofi. Sudan sitting on the Human Rights Commission is, as far as Kofi is concerned, NOT in violation of international law. The fact that they are committing genocide as I write this apparently is apprently of no concern to the Human Rights Commission.

Regardless, I wonder if Annan understands the consequences of not renewing US immunity? Like many things at the UN, war crimes law is a wonderful thing to support, plus it allows you to claim the moral high ground and to claim to others that you care for the less fortunate.

Still though, the UN has to accept that any good it wants to do in the world can only be done through the barrel of a gun. We may not like this fact but it is a fact nonetheless. Getting back to Sudan, how exactly does the UN plan to end the genocide there unless they go in armed against the wishes of the government of Sudan? The past decade of 'dialogue' with the Sudanese government has failed to end the genocide leaving the souls of perhaps over 1 million people sacrificed due to UN in-action.

Could any of you UN supportors out there explain to me how this is a perfectly valid means for the UN to live up to its mandate?

The same goes for when the Taliban controlled Afganistan. How did the UNs public denunciations of the Taliban have any affect on the number of crimes they committed? Did the UN have any plan to end these crimes before the US invaded?

Same story regarding Saddam and Iraq. If the US didn't invade and Saddam remained in power, what plans did the UN have to prevent him from abusing his people?

I guess in its simpliest terms I don't understand when the UN assumes that dictators and thugs will live up to the standards that it tries to apply to democracies. OK, maybe that isn't fair statement. What I should say is that I don't understand how the UN expects to stand up to dictators and tyrants by requiring the people who do the dirty work to act like angels.

Take our police forces for example. As police, they are expected to live up to very high standards of personal conduct. But the fact remains that we give them special privilages/responsibilities we do not give to the general public. If we didn't we'ld have chaos on the streets.

While we don't allow citizens to kill when performing the duties of their job we do give that responsibility to our police. And we rightly do not hold police to the same standards as we do citizens or criminals when they must exercise that responsibility.

The list of responsibilities we bestow on our police forces that we do not extend to every citizen is endless. Most people would agree that as a whole this is a good thing and necessary to ensure the peace. They still agree with it even though they know that out there somewhere is a 'bad' cop.

Getting back to the UN, it is amazing that so many people assume good things can come by denying the US war crimes immunity. If it prevents some members of the US military from committing war crimes, how many lives will be saved? A couple of hundred? A thousand?

Since denying the immunity will prevent US military action for fear of politically motivated prosecutions, is that a high enough total knowing that you'll never be able to prevent another genocide again?

The UN has to learn that angels don't do the dirty work.