E-Mail Exchanges with Sir Brian Urquhart (2000): History of the UN

E-Mail Exchange with Sir Brian Urquhart (2000): Institute of International Studies, UC Berkeley

E-Mail Exchange with Sir Brian Urquhart, former Undersecretary General of the UN, with students at Marin Academy High School, 5/31/00

Had the UN been in existence before World War II, what specific actions do you think the UN would have taken? Would the UN have been able to prevent the arms build-up in Nazi Germany?

Julia

It was absence of the capacity for collective action that allowed the rise of Nazi Germany and militarist Japan. It was the lesson of this failure that caused the Charter to devote its main attention to international peace and security and action against aggression. Because the United Nations was formed in the years directly after World War II was over, I would think it was difficult for the forum to be truly effective in solving problems that came up right at that time. Is this true, and how long did it take for the UN to begin acting? This is linked to the above: Did the UN have a chance to become active in India and/or Pakistan around the time of their independence and partition?

Eva

The predecessor of the United Nations, the League of Nations, took more than two years to begin functioning. The United Nations was already operational in January, 1946, less than six months after the end of World War II. The UN Security Council made a number of efforts to deal with the problem of Kashmir. It policed the armistice line in Kashmir between India and Pakistan and it mandated a plebiscite to be supervised by the United Nations under the leadership of Admiral Chester Nimitz. Unfortunately, India persistently refused to allow to this to go ahead, and the situation remains one of the world's time bombs.

Were you present at the UN General Assembly meeting in October of 1960 when Nikita Khrushchev banged his shoe against his desk? Did this display make you lose respect for the Soviet Union?

Greer

I was present during the Khrushchev shoe banging, which was grotesque and deeply embarrassed his Soviet colleagues. I didn't have too much respect for the Soviet Union anyway, so Khrushchev didn't seem to me to make much difference.