Funferal

International Diplomacy Madness

You know, the arguments made by the Bush administration are just getting annoying. I know they’ve been flagging this one for a while, but the claim that the security council must do what the US wants in order to retain credibility is just gobsmacking in its inanity.

I’ve seen the claim that the council must back its words (1441 etc) with actions, which at least seems to be a coherent argument. But the claim (in the linked story) that the US is going to do what it wants anyway, so the UN must vote to give them backing in order to continue to appear to matter just makes no sense whatsoever. Doing what the US wants because the US is going to do it anyway will merely send a message (to the US) that the UN will always back any action they want – that the US can count on the UN to provide legitimation of any action it wants to take.

To the rest of the world, a vote which is seen to arise from such pressure will remove the legitimacy of the UN Security Council – it will clearly be seen to be a lackey of the United States. I do not believe that military action is warranted at this time, but a vote based on this logic is one of the worst scenarios I can envisage. [I should mention that I’m limiting my imagination at this stage, because I really don’t want to envisage worse….]