American Interests and the U.N.
By John Bolton, former U.S. Ambassador to the UN
Reviewed by David T. Jones, co-author of Uneasy Neighbo(u)rs (which examines US-UN relations)
Text: www.hillsdale.edu/news/imprimis.asp

Most observers of U.S. foreign policy — and particularly of UN affairs — are well aware of John Bolton, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and know where he is “coming from” in commentary on the United Nations. Consequently, his speech at Hillsdale College holds no surprises. Bolton does again what he has done repeatedly — elucidate an articulate scourging of the United Nations' membership and its political process.

U.S. support for the UN has waxed and waned over its 60-year history; the Bush Administration's views — for good reasons — are almost entirely negative. Bolton depicts the UN as existentially hostile not just to U.S. foreign policy objectives, but to U.S. domestic policies and constitutional principles. Thus, according to the UN, the U.S. should accept international “norming” and act only in concert with such consensus in every activity from international military action to eliminating capital punishment and private ownership of firearms.

Bolton argues that the UN's implicit objective is to cut the U.S. down to size so that we hitch our ox to the plow of UN objectives. In fact, the UN has failed miserably in virtually every recent venture, from attempting to alleviate misery/massacre in Darfur to stopping nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran. Instead, its primary achievement is to pass ritualistic condemnations of Israel — essentially for continuing to exist.

Bolton also explores the aftermath of the oil-for-food scandal in which corruption in the purchase and payments for Iraqi oil ultimately lapped at the doors of then-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. The effort to reform the auditing of UN programs led by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volker resulted in a proposal for outside auditors which was rejected two-to-one by the UN Budget Committee — the “one” including the countries supplying 90 percent of UN financing. There is almost a shrug-of-the-shoulders by Bolton — the UN as farce if it were not so expensive.

Nevertheless, the fact that Bolton is depressingly accurate in his analysis and creative in his prescriptions leads nowhere. The UN is not going to change because the U.S. tells it to do so any more than the world is going to conform to U.S. interests. Although Bolton cites Jeane Kirkpatrick to the effect that withdrawing from the UN would be “more trouble than it's worth,” he doesn't bother with any ritualized citation of UN positives. Unable to reform it and unwilling to quit, the U.S. persists as an enabler of its malice.