Just something else Democrats and Republicans are diametrically apart on is the value of the UN to America. With China and Russia having veto power within the UN’s Security Council, we are subject to the tender mercies of countries that will stop at nothing to harm American interests every chance they get. You would be hard-pressed to find unanimity on any issue that benefits our country at the UN. China and Russia have blocked Western interests at every turn for the last forty years.
Having hobbled us at the UN, China, and Russia unveiled their next political weapon to isolate us…BRICS. Russia and China lead what amounts to a shadow UN, presently including nearly three dozen other countries effectively aligned against dominant U.S. and Western leadership.
Many of my fellow conservatives are either unaware or simply don’t care that this dynamic exists, believing that it is high time the U.S. stepped back from trying to run the world. Let’s take a deep breath and unravel this knot to understand how the moving pieces constrain us going forward.
We hold out the UN as the world’s preeminent world body, which it is no longer, yet remains our central world forum, with America providing between 22 and 25 percent of the UN’s funding, more than the next ten nations combined. The following three topics have great significance to our future stability and success and over-rely on an even-handed UN:
- Trade—we rely on the UN to promote a peaceful world open to reciprocal trade. Understand how different our economy is today vs. what it was fifty years ago by understanding that U.S. manufacturing makes up only 11% today, down from 31% fifty years ago. We depend on the UN to maintain that dynamic without interruption. We are vulnerable to world events, which we now have much less control over due to our weakness at the UN and the rise of mirror UNs over which we do not influence at all.
- America’s status as the world’s reserve currency—let’s illustrate the problem of a hostile UN to U.S. interests and an ascendent BRICS strategy. The U.S. will eventually no longer be the world’s reserve currency. Why does this matter?
Did you know that for the first time this year, we will spend more on interest than our entire Defense budget? That means the U.S. will lose its safe harbor advantage, which will lead to our Treasury Department being unable to sell our debt at today’s preferential interest rates. With the U.S. deficit exploding, projected to be $1.6 trillion in this current fiscal year, and rising, interest will eat up our budget year by year until it becomes unsustainable and we default. This, my friends would be Armageddon, and we’d see our standard of living diminish quickly in lock step with our global influence. Domination of the world is what BRICS strategy is all about.
- Military alliances—many nations are, unfortunately, fair-weather friends of ours. For now, some fight with us, support us in the UN, and help us maintain a formidable block of rich and powerful nations. All this changes when the U.S. can no longer perform its essential functions as the world’s undisputed leader. At the root of our power is our unprecedented financial strength that allows us to maintain the most powerful military in the world. What happens when we don’t have enough money to pay for all our social programs? When borrowing is no longer an option, we’ll start eating our muscle, our military; this is the inescapable conclusion.
If you think this article strayed off course a bit, we haven’t. At the root of any discussion on America’s future is how smart or stupid we are and what the trend line is. Obvious proofs like allowing Iran to chair a UN committee on Human Rights reveal to the world that we’ve lost not only our mind but the UN’s standing to lead a moral world. Another example can be found in that the UN’s UNRWA headquarters in Gaza housed the Data and Intelligence Center for Hamas in a bunker directly beneath. UNRWA even provided the power to the complex! Direct access from UNRWA’s headquarters to the bunker below existed. How could this not have been known by many UN personnel?
UN’s Secretary General António Guterres calls for an immediate ceasefire to end ‘epic suffering’ in Gaza. He’s been in the tank for the Palestinians and Hamas since…forever. Guterres sites as reasonable, Hamas demands that “Israel lay down its arms, pay for the reconstruction of Gaza, reinstate the Hamas governance, lift its blockade, and agree to turn over scores of violent Palestinian prisoners who have been convicted of crimes in the Jewish state.” All despite statements by Hamas officials saying they are prepared for any scenario, including a drawn-out war, and that allies like Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah will join the battle if Israel goes too far.
Guterres says, “The two-state solution is the only path to a just, lasting peace.” Why? Where is the evidence that supports a two-state solution as anything but a codification of Palestinian demands for the destruction of Israel? What would change? How would a newly minted Palestine provide for its people? Where would the industry and resources come from? Indeed, tens of billions of dollars in charitable aid will be pledged, but where would it wind up? Who would manage the process? The very same UN agencies that are complicit in the killing of thousands of Jews and thousands more Palestinians Hamas kills for challenging their ideology?
UNRWA operates in Gaza and the West Bank with the permission of Hamas and the Palestinian Authority. Without that cooperation, the UN could not function in that rabidly hostile environment. This also means that Hamas and the PA decide who gets resources, with Hamas and the PA taking a significant portion of the aid largely provided by funding from the U.S. The recently passed Senate bill would provide over $3 billion more in direct assistance to the UN for use in Gaza and the West Bank. With the UNRWA likely the conduit for most of this aid, what are we thinking?
With the continued diversion of humanitarian aid used to support Hamas and the PA, we are literally funding Israel’s enemies. We already know that this money, as has past assistance, has been diverted to build war infrastructure, fund fighters, and buy war materials. And it will be again.
There was a time when the UN was an aspirational world leader doing good things. Today, the U.S. and its allies fund an organization that no longer does the great work it once used to do. The UN, through a fractured Security Council and many member nations seeking to bring the West to its knees, is counterproductive to our future. Many know and understand this, but few are willing to challenge the dogma and beliefs that undergird so much of what the UN stands for today. It is reasonable to assert a higher control over the body or reduce or eliminate funding our demise.
God Bless America.
Allan J. Feifer—Patriot
Author, Businessman, Thinker, and Strategist. Read more about Allan, his background, and his ideas to create a better tomorrow at www.1plus1equals2.com