Security Council Reform R.I.P. Posted by Suzanne Nossel

State Department Under Secretary Nicholas Burns gave a major press conference today on UN reform, focusing on reform of the Security Council. 

Burns indicated that the US will offer a proposal to link membership to objective criteria that go beyond geography to include things like commitment to non-proliferation and counter-terrorism, financial and troop contributions to the UN, population, and commitments to democracy and human rights.  He said that the US is prepared to strongly back Japan's candidacy and that of perhaps one other permanent member (both non veto-wielding) as well as an expansion of non-permanent seats up to a total Council size of 19 or 20, but no more on grounds of efficacy (its worth reading his high praise for the Council's remarkable efficacy in its current shape and size - I guess we've come a long way since Bush declared the body irrelevant for failure to act on Iraq).

Interesting.  First on objective criteria:  India would be out on grounds of proliferation . . . but in on population and democracy.  Though the US has turned away from Germany's candidacy, an emphasis on financial contributions favors their inclusion.   Is each factored weighted?  Equally?  Will P5 members (namely China) agree to adopt criteria that, if applied to them (which they won't be) would mandate their exclusion?  Upshot:  the membership could debate these issues until Micronesia conquers Mexico without coming to any resolution.

Second, the limitation of new permanent members to just 2 is a non-starter.  If Japan's in then either Latin America, Africa or both (in the event of an Indian or additional European seat) are still excluded.  The vast majority of the UN membership are developing countries, and they'll never accept that.

Third, the limitation to 19-20 members also effectively kills most proposals floated in recent years.  The Clinton Administration had that stance for a while and then became slightly more flexible when the Japanese implored us that the 20 seat limitation was a deal-killer.  So it seems our support for Japan may be aimed only to mollify Tokyo's disappointment that, as a practical matter, expansion ain't gonna happen.

I read this as aimed to gum up the works with another 3-5 years of debate over the criteria.  After the Iraq impasse there seemed to be a brief period when the Administration favored SC reform on grounds that old Europe, etc. had to be balanced out.  But they've now realized they won't get to single-handedly pick who joins the party and that having the likes of Germany and Brazil on board could just make life worse.

Burns said Administration feels strongly that the UNSC reform debate not hold up proposals on other issues, listing issues like reform of the Commission on Human Rights, the creation of a Peacebuilding Commission and a counter-terrorism treaty (more on all those here and elsewhere in the UN archive on this site).   He was also rightfully forceful in rejecting pending legislation that would require withholding US dues.

Bottom line:  unless I am missing something (is this a negotiating position aimed to pave the way for . . . .) after today, Security Council reform is dead for at least a while.

Comments

[Stygius]

Superb points on "objective criteria." I'm assuming proliferation would be re-tooled to 'proliferating' and other 'states of concern' that could reasonably leave India off the list. No point antagonizing a potential strategic ally that also has Russia trying to get cozy with it.

[rosignol]

After the Iraq impasse there seemed to be a brief period when the Administration favored SC reform on grounds that old Europe, etc. had to be balanced out.

-----

Where on earth did you get that impression?

You don't 'balance' anything by adding people who can cast a veto.

[doc]

...you're not missing anything: the UN SC has been a rigged game forever and there is no way the US will willingly allow that to change.

[rosignol]

Not just the US.

Any of the permanent SC members can block any change in the UN charter. I doubt China wants Japan or India to be a Permanent member, with or without a veto, and Russia is unlikely to allow Germany to become one.

So who's left? Brazil? They're not at Japan, India, or Germany's level, nevermind how much real estate they have to their name. Canada has a lot of real estate, too, but it's not a contender.

One thing that SC 'reformers' need to get through their heads is that the idea of having a permanent member from each 'region' is pointless symbolism.

[Vivek]

Funny, if the Bush Administration is proposing to link UN Security Council membership to non-proliferation, financial contributions, troop contributions, and human rights, perhaps the U.S. ought to give up its Security Council seat and veto. After all, the U.S. has been a most inconsistent financial contributor to the UN, withholding its dues for years and years in order to strong-arm the organization into making changes to its liking. It was also the U.S. that scuttled the recent NPT conference with its revanchist ideas about atomic bunker busters & such. And what of America's refusal to contribute troops to collective security operations undertaken under Chapters VII and VIII of the UN Charter, and the wonderful human rights example it's setting at Gitmo?

[Dave Schuler]

I think you're missing something. The Security Council should be a meeting place for security producing countries not security consuming countries. That's the reason for objective criteria and those criteria should include issues of wealth (can you afford to provide security), commitment (how much do you spend on your military and are you willing to deploy it?), and social institutions. In a 21st century in which troops can be deployed anywhere in the world in hours geographical representation is irrelevant.

[Nils Gilman]

Like Nossel, I think we've passed the point of no return. According to Sy Hersh, the Israelis concluded already two years ago (once it became clear that the U.S. was facing an insurgency) that the U.S. had effectively already lost --and have responded by working to secure a friendly Kurdistan out of the Iraqi rubble.

If this is true, then the strategy now should be to leave as soon as possible. No need to set an official timetable for withdrawal; simply delcare victory and start pulling the boys out steadily, much as we did in Vietnam from 1971 forward. Politically, to encourage this choice, the Democrats should argue that, "The war may or may not have been a good idea in the first place. The war may or may not have been winnable when we launched it in April 2003. But now, given the way the war has been waged (with not enough troops on the ground in the first place, with the botched security and infrastructure situation in the immediate aftermath of the war, and with the scandals of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo), now the war is lost. From here on forward, every further American who dies in Iraq is dying not to make victory possible for his country, but only in the vain attempt to salvage George Bush's historical reputation." Of course this position will be attacked as defeatist, and progressives would just have to have the courage to deal with that.

However, there is another possibility, one that Juan Cole put forward last month, namely that we're "just screwed": we may not have passed the "point of no return" and definitively lost, but we certainly face a 10+ year insurgency, one that we should expect will cost 10,000 Americans lives... after which we still may not "win" (in the sense of establishing one or more stable, prosperous, pro-American states in Mesopotamia).

If you believe this is the case, then clearly BushCo should have the courage to say this to the American people, and hope the American people will keep re-electing them. However, it seems pretty clear the Bushies believe that to come clean in this way -- implicitly admitting that they radically miscalculated to begin with -- would result in a royal political shaft at home. And failing to come clean about the long-term costs of the war makes it much harder to sustain the pressure on the insurgents that would make victory even a hope.

Which path you take -- (1) cut and run; or (2) stay the nasty, brutish, and long course -- really depends on two variables: how central you think the Iraq war is to American security, and what you think the chances of "victory" are if we choose (2).

Personally, I think the chances of "victory" in Iraq are so slight, the costs of "victory" so high, and the geopolitical importance of "victory" so questionable, that choosing to cut and run seems like the only reasonable option. It will be a moral stain on our nation, to be sure. But it doesn't seem to me that allowing ten thousand more Americans to die will make the eventual disaster any less of a moral stain.

But what about emboldening the terrorists?! people will cry. What I like to remind the cassandras who worry about the disastrous geopolitical consequences of leaving (not all on the right: see Nossel's point 3, above) is that things may not, and in all probability will not, work out nearly as badly as you think. Remember how the hawks warned that if we lost in Vietnam then all of Southeat Asia would fall, and that eventually we'd be battling the reds on the shores of Malibu? Didn't happen.

In fact, in the larger scheme of things, the GWOT may not be all that important. The larger geopolitical and historical issues are the massive economic imbalance in the global economy, and relatedly, what the economic rise of China (and India) means for geopolitics. It may well be that, whatever the outcome in Iraq, the way the war will be remembered is mainly as a massive, costly distraction for America that accelerated the pace at which China reasserted its traditional position as the center of world civilization.

Finally, the question of what to do in Iraq is in some sense moot. It's clear that for the next three years Bush, if for no other reason that domestic politics (and he never needs any other reason for anything he does), will refuse to choose either of these "reality-based" possibilities. Between now and 2009, therefore, we should expect that at least a thousand more Americans will die, that ten thousand more will be maimed, and that perhaps a hundred thousand Iraqis will suffer similar fates. By failing to choose either "reality-based" option, moreover, Bush makes the option of effectively winning against the insurgents ever more costly, so that by the time we get someone more responsible in the Presidency (let's hope in 2009), they in all likelihood will have no choice left but to cut and run.

So that, in the long light of history, seems likely to be George Bush's (and early 21st century America's) geopolitical legacy: a massive mis-reaction to the tragedy of 9-11 that accelerated the return of Chinese global dominance.

[melior]

Oh, and prospective Security Council members must pledge to never, ever, contradict the US or Israel publicly. Especially not anything John Bolton says.

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