Saviour of the world

The nation building missions of the US & UN aren’t fake always


There might be ample reasons to blame the US for its imperialistic policies and United Nations for being weak and non transparent but if scrutinised, there are innumerable reasons for praising them too. The US and UN are often blamed for being too interventionist but the truth that should not be ignored is that their interventions somehow and somewhere have worked in favour of building nations, to a greater extent! It is said that peace and prosperity can’t be gifted - they can only be earned. But, for all those countries who failed to claim the same, the world hould not forget how hard the US and UN have strived to help them in fetching the same. However, the US and UN are distinct in their approaches when it comes to their nation building
operations. For instance, the US invades a country while the UN never does it. US operations are very expensive compare to operations run by UN. UN spends $4 billion every year currently in its 17 nation building operations worldwide which is equal to one month’s spending of the US in Iraq. But howsoever different approaches they adopt, they have had significant contributions. The US endeavour in stabilising and democratising Germany and Japan during the Cold War era is outstandingly praiseworthy. History testifies how hard US fought to save Germany from anarchy. Japan was another challenge which made US realise that defeating emperors was easier than rebuilding and reconstructing a nation. It later formed two global bodies – Far Eastern Commission and Allied Council for Japan to engage elite countries for development of Japan and make sure that all of the surrender terms made in the Potsdam Agreement were fulfilled. The rest is history of how Japan emerged as a democratic, peaceful and a prosperous
nation. However, of all the US led operations during the post Cold-War era, Bosnia and Kosovo have been successful while Somalia and Haiti proved to be less fruitful. According to the Brookings Institution, America's sending of troops to a new country once in a decade notwithstanding, since Clinton’s regime it went up to once in every alternative year. UN had only 14 peacekeeping operations in the last four decades during Cold War but that had increased to 40 in the decade after the Cold War. Though its performance in Congo, Mozambique, Namibia, Cambodia, Eastern Slavonia, El Salvador, Sierra Leone and East Timor isn't satisfactory but considering all the parameters from bringing peace to democratisation and ending wars, they
weren’t complete failures either. There is now peace in most of these countries except Congo. Moreover, six out of above stated eight countries are democratic nations today. The struggle in Afghanistan and Iraq might not yield expected results yet. And both the US and UN are already being criticised for the same. Yet the situations weren’t very different when they fought in
Japan, Kosovo or Cambodia. People criticised the US severely then but they praise the US today for what it has done for them. When Iraq or Afghanistan will emerge democratic and peaceful in a decade or two's time, same people who criticise today will praise them tomorrow. That's perhaps the predicament of being leaders or change agents! Damn if they do, damn if they
don't, criticism would remain.