Now It's On: Iran Allies With Syria

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4270859.stm

On in more ways than one:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6979561

Unknown aircraft said to fire missile in Iran

I was just rushing back to post about that as well. BBC has a story on it too.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4271011.stm

Guess we sit back and see what this all means. Or, of course, babble speculatively and rabidly. Either or.

Excellent analysis in Slate.

Pulling our ambassador was a strong statement. Now the UN has a chance to prove that it’s worth something – by taking action in support of its October security-council resolution on withdrawal of troops from Lebanon.

Is the UN going to encourage the anti-Syrian opposition and then stand aside while that opposition gets blown to hell by Syria? We shall soon know.

Man, you neocons are shameless. Before we invaded Iraq, it was all ‘Fuck the UN, we’re going in without those pussies!’.

But now that you’ve been burned in Iraq, you look at Syria and say ‘Hey, did you guys at the UN see that? Aren’t you gonna do something?’

Good article on Slate, though.

-Tom

Man, you neocons are shameless. Before we invaded Iraq, it was all ‘Fuck the UN, we’re going in without those pussies!’.

But now that you’ve been burned in Iraq, you look at Syria and say ‘Hey, did you guys at the UN see that? Aren’t you gonna do something?’

Good article on Slate, though.[/quote]
I think you’re reading it wrong, Tom. That was Dan totally calling the UN out, while he actually sits waiting for the corrupted, bloated body of the UN to prove its impotence, thus legitimizing anything the US might feel like doing.

Man, you neocons are shameless. Before we invaded Iraq, it was all ‘Fuck the UN, we’re going in without those pussies!’.

But now that you’ve been burned in Iraq, you look at Syria and say ‘Hey, did you guys at the UN see that? Aren’t you gonna do something?’

Good article on Slate, though.[/quote]
I think you’re reading it wrong, Tom. That was Dan totally calling the UN out, while he actually sits waiting for the corrupted, bloated body of the UN to prove its impotence, thus legitimizing anything the US might feel like doing.[/quote]

Oh good - another UN catfight! :)

Say, what about the new stories that the UN contingent sent to help protect the people being slaughtered in the Congo have now been charged with hundreds of counts of rape and taking sexual advantage of the people there? Just since it looked like it was time for a “corrupt UN” post in this thread.

Seriously thjough - I fall on the side of thinking that the concept of the U.N. is wonderful, but in practice I think it has become pretty corrupt and, while perhaps not useless, pretty ineffective.

Probably, yeah. But the whole “rape by peacekeepers” thing probably isn’t the right angle to take, what with US contracters keeping underage kids as sex slaves: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=united+states+contractor+kosovo+sex+slave

Well, the first article that gave me was one where it talked about the zero-tolerance policies of the U.S. and efforts to find and punish anyone doing it.

But are you saying that both the U.S. and the U.N. are corrupt? ;)

The problem with the UN is of course that it relies on armies of several different countries for both supplying troops and controlling the behaviours of those troops. It is no more or less than the sum of the intentions of its member nations.

Well, it’s the same loose chain of responsiblity problem. Just tactically it’s not a very useful line of criticism.

Regardless, the UN is in serious need of reform. I wish people would stop Bush-bashing long enough to realize that the organization was corrupt and screwed up long before the neocons took power in Washington.

Well, when the suggested conservative reform is “the UN should die and the entire world should just eat our shit” it’s kind of hard to discuss it in good faith.

Remember back in the Iraq war runup how they wanted to get a League of Nations without Europe in it?

I’m curious to know in what way you guys consider the UN to be “corrupt”.

Where do we start? Of course, there’s a difference between corruption, hyprocrisy and incompetence. Oil for Food was corruption. Sudan being on the Human Rights Committee is hypocrisy. The response to the tsunami was incompetence. Annan getting Secretary General after Rwanda happened on his watch is any blend of the three.

The people coming into the UN from the vast majority of member nations are not there because they are paragons of virtue. It’s because they have the connections in the corrupt kleptocracies or authoritarian regimes to get cushy positions milking the US and Western Europeans for all they’re worth.

It’s fine to like the idea of the UN, it’s foolish to ignore the brutal reality of what it actually is.

it’s foolish to ignore the brutal reality of what it actually is.

A representative body, with all the infighting, bureaucratic inefficiency, and conflicting agendas of, say, the Congress of the United States.

No one says the UN is perfect, and no one says it doesn’t need to clean house. But to write it off because it’s rife with the sort of imperfection you’ll find in any human organization is just stupid. I, for one, would rather live in a world with a flawed UN than a world with no UN.

-Tom

I feel that way about Half Life 2 (grudgingly) but not the UN. The UN just doesn’t have enough headcrabs to help out the foreign diplomats.

I really do try to avoid going into a shrieking crap-flinging monkey-rage at the impossible stupidity displayed on this board from time to time, but comparing the UN to the US Congress avoids any kind of understanding of the basic nature of the two (a nature determined by the membership).

Representative bodies are not inherently good things. A representative body that, by and large, represents thugs and criminals, and whose emissaries make a regular practice of engaging in sex slavery wherever they set up for any length of time (see Bosnia and the Congo) - well, dude, if you want that to represent you, you are welcome to it, but you’ll do it without me.

The idea of the UN was a good one. The implementation has turned into a disaster.

Let’s see, calling the nations of the world “thugs and criminals”…exaggerating that UN emissaries “regularly” engage in sex slavery everywhere they’re stationed…yeah, I think we can ignore this post.

-Tom

“Before we invaded Iraq, it was all ‘Fuck the UN, we’re going in without those pussies!’”

Actually, it was more like “This is the UN’s responsibility, so what do you say, fellas?”

The reply was a 14-0 vote on Resolution 1441 and worldwide applause for Bush having brought the matter before the UN. Only later did it become embarrassingly obvious (i.e. explicitly stated) that there would be no military action under any circumstances, and that France would in fact veto any resolution that proposed to militarily enforce 1441. At that point, it was time to say “Fuck the UN.”

History may soon repeat itself, as the UN does not seem terribly interested in enforcing its October resolution calling for the withdrawal of foreign (read: Syrian) troops from Lebanon. Lebanon wants its 28-year occupation to end. The UN says the occupation must end. Does the UN mean what it says? Does it ever? We will find out.

Let’s take a look around today’s United Nations. It would be bad enough if the UN were merely a gathering of nations that did not appreciate the grave threats that rogue regimes pose. But the reality is actually far worse – the UN is all too often a gathering of nations that conduct booming business with those rogue regimes, and vote in the Security Council to protect financial stakes in the continued survival of malevolent, dangerous tyrannies.

That is not a “legal order” worth your respect. At this point in time, no UN action can be taken against Iran – no matter what the IAEA concludes – because an oil-hungry China will veto any resolution against the mullahs. Under such circumstances, the UN is not much more than a puppet theatre for tyrannical spoiler regimes.