Off the top of my head, I'd add Cyprus, Angola, and Guatemala. There are plenty more if you look into them. Not all of them are unqualified successes, but in even a great many of the "failures" the UN presence has clearly helped rather than hurt things.
Thanks for those - I forgot about Cyprus and wasn't aware of Angola and Guatemala. I probably should have put a little note at the end of my post saying I don't think the UN is a bad thing. I'm probably half-way between you and DTE on this. I think the UN does some good, it does some bad, but is largely ineffective because of various issues (including things you explain below.
I agree -- and that's because the UN doesn't have any independent authority of its own. It can only do what the Security Council permanent members want it to do, and that if it's assigned sufficient resources. What's more, the UN was set up to prevent conflicts between classical (nation-)states from escalating into armed conflict; things like Rwanda, Somalia, and Darfur were cases of mayhem happening within a single country. The UN doesn't have any good mechanisms in place to handle that sort of situation to start with, so it's hardly a surprise that it's not very effective at handling them. Sort of the way armies aren't very good at doing police work, nor police forces good at fighting wars.
Agreed - I know there was some consideration of this because of the UN genocide convention which *requires* states intervene in case of a genocide, but it's largely been ignored and no one really wants to bother enforcing it.
The Gulf War of 1991 was a UN operation.
Ah, forgot about that.
Look at it this way:
(1) How many offensive wars between (nation-)states have been started since the UN was founded?
(2) What has been the UN response in each case?
(3) What was the outcome?
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I got tired of counting around 1965 or so, because as we both know, there are a lot of things that may or may not count on that list. I'll post the ones I came up with, though:
1) Indo-Pakistan war of 1947 - UN managed to arrange a ceasefire at the end of 1948, resulted in Pakistan controlling 2/5ths of Kashmir and India controlling the rest. (3300 dead)
2) Arab-Israeli War '48 - multiple UN attempts at a ceasefire; resulted in Israel signed Armistices in 1949 and further conflicts later on (12k-19k dead)
3) Korean War, 1950-1953- UN intervention; resulted in a stalemate/return to status-quo. (2.67 million dead)
4) PLA invasion of Tibet, 1950-1951 - No UN response; Tibet is still occupied today. (85k dead)
5) Vietnam War, 1959-1975 - No UN intervention; Vietnam became communist. (5.1 million dead)
6) Sino-Indian War, 1962 - No UN intervention, China established the borders it desired (4,588 dead)
7) Indonesia-Malaysia war, 1962-1966 - No UN intervention, status quo achieved (1k dead)
8) The Sand War (Algeria/Morocco), 1963 - No UN intervention, border closings as a result (unknown number dead)
9) Indo Pakistani War of 1965 - UN ceasefire reached, status quo achieved (11k-15k dead)
I believe that if you did this, you'd find that the UN's track record isn't half bad -- nowhere near perfect, mind, but a far cry from "a complete waste of oxygen."
I don't think they have a good track record but that doesn't mean I want them to stop trying, either.
From where I'm at, the world needs some kind of international forum for global jaw-jaw that can have something approaching the moral authority of "world public opinion." It's bound to be messy, inefficient, occasionally corrupt -- much like democracies are messy and inefficient compared to well-run dictatorships. International relations are by nature anarchic, but I don't see how having something like the UN to give some semblance of structure to the anarchy makes things worse. It's not like the cost is an intolerable burden, or something.
I agree, I'm in favor of the UN sticking around (because we have no real way of gauging how many conflicts may have happened if it didn't exist at all). I don't really buy into the whole Wilsonian Idealist Collective Security idea, but I figure if the UN exists as one more step (even if it's a small one) between "no fighting is happening" to "complete Armageddon", then cool.
And I also think it does a relatively decent job of humanitarian work, so I hope it doesn't stop.