Revising the UN Charter

If the two most terrible wars in history have had any lesson for mankind, it is that a treaty is often worth no more than the paper it fills. Yet today, world peace is more dependent on these pieces of paper than ever before. They bind the United States, for instance, to all of Latin America, most of Europe, and a good part of Asia. In the next few days, study groups of professionals and dedicated amateurs will meet all over the country to pull land haw at the biggest, and also the flimsiest, of the documents--the Charter of the United Nations.

Even in the mellow glow of 1945, the delegates who met at San Francisco to sign the Charter had the foresight to know it was by no means perfect. As a safeguard, they wrote in a provision to allow for a review conference after ten years, if a simple majority in the General Assembly votes to have one. The review is scheduled for next yea. Saturday's UN Day, therefore, marks the end of this first trial period.

Clearly, today's United Nations is not what its founders had in mind in 1945. Instead of a true global organization, it today resembles a giant coalition of the free world against the Soviet Union and its satellites. Wartime U.S. Soviet harmony has turned to dissonant conflict. Envisioned as an agency for collective security, the UN is now, at least in its political functions, little more than a propaganda forum where each side bids for the weight of world opinion. The free world now seeks, and should continue seek, its security through a whole series of regional organization such as NATO and ANZUS, each providing for the national interests of the states in its region more effectively than the present UN Could possible do.

Great Changes Since Beginning

Yet the UN has some very real accomplishments to its credit. Through functional agencies, such as the World Health Organization and UNESCO, it has achieved a degree of international co-operation never before seen on such a scale in peacetime. And even as a propaganda forum, it has at least given clearer focus to the problems that divide the world.

In the nine and one half years between the San Francisco signing land this Saturday, tremendous interpretive changes have been made without altering the structure of the present Charter. The General Assembly's "uniting for peace" resolution in 1950, for example, made it impossible for a Security Council veto permanently to block recommendations for collective action. Through resolutions such as this, originating in the Assembly, many of the most critical faults in the veto system can at least be partially overcome. But since the veto will still be the major topic in a charter review conference, it may be asked whether revision is really necessary now.

There are many who claim that the United Nations can never be an effective agency for keeping the peace unless the veto is completely abolished. Only then could instant collective action against an aggressor be taken on a world-wide scale. In theory, this is true. But today, at least, there simply is no great power which would commit its forces to action anywhere in the world if such action clashed directly with its national interests. In this country, for instance, a revision of the UN Charter would need Senate approval like any other treaty. And a body which almost passed the Bricker Amendment would never conceivably ratify an agreement by which U.S. troops could be committed without this country's consent.

The Soviet Union, of course also would never agree to give up the veto. Yet, in a conference on Charter revision, neither power would want to be branded as obstructionist. If the United States, for example either voted against a review conference or refused to consider abolition of the veto, the USSR would have an effective propaganda weapon to flaunt before the world.

Veto Limitations

This country, therefore should vote for a review conference in 1955, and if measures to limit the veto receive widespread support, the US should back them. Certain limitations such as the Vandenberg resolutions, in 1948 which would have outlawed the veto on questions of membership or the peaceful settlement of disputes, are desirable and would have a reasonable chance of passage in the senate. And a decision to abolish the veto would probably not affect the United States, for this country has always had enough supporters on the Security Council never to need the device. The USSR, on the other hand, would find its policies seriously impeded.

One of the many development not envisioned in 1945 was that a review conference, instead of relieving tension, would probably add to it. Ideally, such a conference should not be held at this time for it would only drive wider the rift between the United States and Russia. Revisions in the political sphere are unnecessary; the free world has come to rely on regional organizations for security. The U.S. and Soviet Russia should settle their differences through the usual channels of diplomacy, not under the klieg lights of a world forum where give and take is impossible and every speech becomes a point of national honor, But if the conference is held, this country must make the best of it, and be prepared to give in to the weight of world opinion. Russia, not the United States, must be proven the obstructor.