Yalta conference issues the call for the San Francisco sessions The Yalta conference issued the call for a meeting at San Francisco in April 1945 and directed that invitations to attend be sent to those nations which had declared war upon the common enemy by March 1, 1945. Plans for the assembling of the delegates went forward rapidly during the early spring of 1945 and by late April all was ready for the history-making conference.* 2. The San Francisco Conference and the United Nations Charter The United States delegation to the United Nations conference which opened on April 25, 1945 at the War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco was headed by Edward R. Representative Stettinius, Jr., who had succeeded character of the United States delegation at San Francisco Cordell Hull as Secretary of State on December 1, 1944. Mr. Hull was a member of the delegation and its senior advisor, but his failing health did not permit him to travel to the West coast for the meetings. Other members of the American delegation were Senators Arthur Vandenberg and Tom Connally, the ranking Republican and Democratic members of the Foreign Relations Committee; Representatives Charles Eaton and Sol Bloom, their counterparts on the House Foreign Affairs Committee; Harold E. Stassen, former governor of Minnesota and then a naval officer on active service; and Dean Virginia Gildersleeve of Barnard College. In addi tion, 42 national organizations such as veterans' groups, women's associations, trade unions, church bodies, and educational societies were invited to send consultants to assist the delegation. A sizable staff from the governmental departments in Washington was continually in attendance to give expert advice and aid to the appointed delegates. Charter drafting, not peace-making the task of the conference In the American approach to the San Francisco conference there can be seen an attempt on the part of the planners to avoid some of the criticisms which hampered President Wilson in 1918-1919. Both political parties were ably and, in the opinion of most observers, satisfactorily represented. Besides, the conference was not called to make the peace. That would be left for later meetings of the allied nations. The task of the con.ference was to take the Dumbarton Oaks proposals and forge them into a charter for the preservation of world order. The charter would have to stand by itself. It would not be tied into a treaty of peace embodying territorial changes, reparations, assessments of guilt, and terms of occupation. Fifty nations meet at San Francisco Forty-five nations joined with the United States at the opening of the United Nations Conference on International Organization." Anthony Eden, Foreign Secretary, represented Great Britain; Foreign Commissar Molotov, the Soviet Union. Recently liberated France sent a delegation headed by Georges Bidault; China's T. V. Soong, Foreign Minister, was the leading delegate from the Far East. Notable representatives from the various smaller nations of Latin America, Europe, the Near and Middle East, and farther reaches of the globe swelled the number of delegates to about 200.(51) step of the way. Probably no world conference has ever received the publicity accorded the United Nations meeting. Even today with television coverage of important international gatherings the audience reached by reports from San Francisco was by comparison a large one. The conference did not always operate smoothly. Difficulties raised by the Russians were given the greatest play in the democratic countries. But the small nations-especially the Latin Americans, the Arab bloc, and occasionally members of the British Commonwealth-also caused delays. The Russian obstructions and objections were easier to dramatize. But the small nation tactics were equally effective in slowing the work of the delegates. One Russian objection dealt with the efforts of the United States and Britain to limit the influ National objections raise obstacles to rapid agreement ence of the Lublin faction of the reestablished Polish government. The Soviet Union had sponsored and recognized the Lublin group while the Anglo-American choice was the Polish government-in-exile which had been based in London. A compromise was reached whereby the way was left open for Poland to join the United Nations at a later date. After the close of the San Francisco sessions the United Kingdom and the United States recognized the Polish government which was composed of both elements-the Lublin group and the London group. Poland was allowed to sign the Charter and thus became one of the founding members of the organization. The Latin American opposition centered upon the question of Argentina. Although Argentina The question of Argentina had been lukewarm in its support of inter-American unity during the war the Argentine government had finally declared war on Germany and Japan at the last minute. The other Latin American republics were firm in their demand that Argentina be admitted to the conference. Commissar Molotov opposed the admission of an allegedly Fascist regime while anti-Nazi Poland was excluded. However, the United States, wishing to preserve inter-American harmony, voted for the entry of Argentina and Molotov's motion was defeated 31 to 4 on April 30th. The small nations as opposed to the Big Five of the United States, the United Kingdom, the The position of the small nations Soviet Union, China, and Francewere ably led by Herbert Evatt of Australia. Their design was to prevent big power domination of the conference by insisting upon the greatest possible degree of equality. The most obvious weakness in their tactics was the inevitable tendency of such a combination to break into regional groupings and thereby open the way for the large powers to play one geographical combination off against another. Still, the small nations maintained a large measure of unity and were represented at San Francisco by some of the ablest delegates there. The veto problem The most serious disagreements, however, came over the veto question. The Russians demanded that any one of the Big Five should have the right to veto any substantive decision of the Security Council. This appeared to the small nations to constitute a restriction on action which would destroy the basic purpose of the organization. The Russians finally gave waypossibly because of the personal appeal by Harry L. Hopkins to Josef Stalin. Hopkins was then in Moscow, sent by President Truman to try to arrange for greater Russian cooperation in postwar dealings. The veto was retained, but the small powers were placated by the provisions allowing submission of vexatious issues to the Security Council for discussion. The small nations also combined to achieve concessions with respect to the amending process. And, of course, by their very numbers they would always dominate the Assembly where each nation, large or small, would be entitled to only one vote. Purposes Article 1. The Purposes of the United Nations are: To maintain international peace and security ... to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace. To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and selfdetermination of peoples. . . . To achieve international cooperation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion. . . . To be a center for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends. The peaceful settlement of international disputes disputes by peaceful Article 2. The Organization and its Members shall act in accordance with the following principles. The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members. . . . All Members shall settle their international means. . . . All Members shall refrain ... from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state. . . . All Members shall give the United Nations every assistance in any action it takes in accordance with the present Charter, and shall refrain from giving assistance to any state against which the United Nations is taking preventive or enforcement action. . . Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state or shall require the Members to submit such matters to settlement. . . Article 11. The General Assembly The General Assembly ... may discuss any questions relating to the maintenance of international peace and security brought before it by any Member . . . or by the Security Council, or by a state which is not a Member . . . and may make recommendations. . . . The General Assembly may call the attention of the Security Council to situations which are likely to endanger international peace and security. . . . Security Council voting Article 27. . . . Each member of the Security Council shall have one vote.... Decisions of the Security Counci! on procedural matters shall be made by the affirmative vote of seven members. . . . Decisions. . . on all other matters shall be made by an affirmative vote of seven members including. the concurring votes of the permanent members; provided that a party to a dispute shall abstain from voting. Article 34. The Security Council may investigate any dispute, or any situation which might lead to international friction or give rise to a dispute. . . . Article 39. The Security Council shall determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of peace, or act of aggression and shall make recommendations, or decide what measures shall be taken . . . to maintain or restore international peace and security. Article 43. All members of the United Nations undertake to make available to the Security Council, on its call armed forces, assistance, and facili International armed forces for the Security Council ... The United States ratifies the UN Charter to be Article 110, Section 3, of the Charter provided that the document should come into force upon its ratification by the Big Five and by a majority of the other signatories-each ratification accomplished by the respective constitutional processes of the individual nations. The United States Senate received the Charter from President Truman on July 2, 1945. After a series of hearings, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee reported in favor of ratification without reservation or amendment on July 13th. Debate on the proposal began on July 23rd and five days later the Senate voted ratification by a margin of 89 to 2. Formal ratification was completed by President Truman's signature on August 8, 1945. The United States was the first nation of the fifty which signed the San Francisco document to accomplish final ratification. Other signatories completed action during the late summer and early autumn of 1945-France on August 31, China on September The 28, the United Kingdom on OctoUnited Nations' ber 20, and the Soviet Union on Organization October 24 to fill out the requireestablished ment for Big Five ratification. October 24, Meanwhile 24 other nations accom1945 plished ratification, beginning with the Dominican Republic on September 4 and ending with Byelorussia and the Ukraine on October 24th. Thereupon, the United Nations Organization was proclaimed established as of October 24, 1945. October 24th has since been celebrated as United Nations Day. The UN becomes the popular title of the new world body The United States entered wholeheartedly into. the work of the United Nations-the cumbersome name of United Nations Organization was dropped early in the existence of the world body and, with a few exceptions, it was generally referred to as "The UN." During the organizational stage there was considerable discussion of the location of the permanent headquarters of the UN. Finally New York City was selected for the central organs the Security Council, the Assembly, and the Secretariat-while other offices were assigned. to various countries where facilities could be made available. With the first sessions late in 1945 the UN was ready to begin its work. 3. Early Development of the United Nations Late in 1945 the United Nations Preparatory Commission met in London to set up the machinery for operating the new organization. The sessions continued into December. The first meeting of the UN General Assembly opened in London on January 10, 1946 and adjourned February 14th. On October 23, 1946 debates were resumed at temporary quarters established at Flushing Meadows on Long Island, New York. Until permanent quarters were ready for the General Assembly on October 14, 1952 in New York along Land covering several city blocks was made available by the Rockefeller family as a site for the UN's permanent home. The American Congress passed legislation to enable the international organization to function with a degree of extra-territorial jurisdiction in this area set aside for its headquarters and central organs. side the East River on Manhattan Island, the Assembly met in various cities in turn-London, Paris, and New York. The UN begins its work The Security Council, technically always in session, held its first formal meeting in London, January 17, 1946, and then took up headquarters in New York on March 25, 1946. Since April 4, 1952 the Council has occupied permanent quarters in the Secretariat building at the East River site. Public sessions of both the Assembly and the Security Council are held frequently and limited accommodations for spectators are provided in each chamber. For residents and visitors in New York the UN buildings and the open meetings of the representative bodies have proved an interesting attraction as well as an opportunity to observe leading world statesmen in action. Initial expectations of UN The high hopes with which the allied countries inaugurated the UN have not been fulfilled for a number of reasons. Partly this has been because of the impatience with which individuals and nations expect results from mechanisms designed by human minds. Fullfledged maturity at the outset of its history is perhaps too much to ask of any organization which is the product of compromise and political interchange. But practical difficulties also beset the UN from its formative days. Possibly the wonder should be that the UN has in its ten years of existence accomplished as much as it has. It is no secret that a great deal of the trouble under which the UN has labored has been fomented and supplied by the Soviet Union. For a world organization to work effecSoviet tively and productively there has to obstructionism be a will on the part of its constituent members to desire its success. This goes beyond any such matter as the "surrender of sovereignty" or the "principles of collective security." Most of the world now realizes that the Soviet Union, despite the professions of its leaders to the contrary, has demonstrated no particular desire to see the UN succeed. And, at almost every turn of events since 1945, the U.S. S.R. has used its position on the Security Council to delay, confuse, oppose, misinterpret, and finally to veto the attempts of the UN to achieve the purposes for which it was established. To catalogue the instances of Soviet obstructionism, even before the Korean War, would unnecessarily complicate and lengthen this discussion. Some explanation of the early use of the veto and other delaying tactics by the U.S.S.R. in the UN is pertinent. It is only reasonable, however, to point out that it was not the inclusion of the veto power in the UN Charter which caused all the trouble. It was primarily the Soviet misuse of this device. Original position of the United States on the veto The United States and other western nations had desired to preserve the right of veto for various reasons. Insofar as the United States was concerned, proponents of the UN Charter believed that it could not be presented to the American people for ratification unless it contained provisions for this nation to vote against any action which would run counter to our national interest. It was expected that the veto would be used in the Security Council only rarely and then only on the most vital matters of national honor and survival. As an example of the attitude of the American policymakers some phrases from Secretary Stettinius' testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during the hearings on ratification of the UN Charter are quoted. State Department defense of the veto, 1945 SECRETARY STETTINIUS' DEFENSE OF THE "GREAT POWER VETO," WASHINGTON, JULY 9, 1945: . . . I submit that these five nations, possessing most of the world's power to break or preserve peace, must agree and act together if peace is to be maintained. . . . What would happen if one of the five permanent members used the unanimity rule to veto enforcement action against itself? The answer is plain. If one of these nations ever embarked upon a course of aggression, a major war would result, no matter what the membership and voting provisions of the Security Council might be. The Charter does not confer any power upon the great nations which they do not already possess in fact. Without the Charter the power of these nations to make or break the peace would still exist. What the Charter does is to place special and binding obligations upon the great nations to use-in unity together for peace, not separately for war-the power that is already in their hands. The unanimity rule is an expression of those special obligations and of their commensurate respon ... sibilities. another, and more compelling reason why the power of veto is not likely to be abused, or even to be exercised at all except in unusual circumstances. . . . is the compelling desire and need of the five great nations to work together for peace. the requirement for unanimity among the five permanent members. . . is not only essential to the success of the United Nations but . . it recognizes and confirms a power which a majority of Americans believe the United States should have in view of the great responsibilities our country must inevitably assume for the maintenance of world peace. I feel that much of the criticism of the voting provisions of the Charter arises from failure to remember that the United Nations is neither a federal union nor a world state and that voting procedures among its sovereign member nations cannot necessarily be judged on the same basis as voting procedures in a State legislature or in the Congress. The Charter affords full opportunity for later amendments whenever a sufficient majority of the people of the world is ready to go further. Soviet use of the UN as a platform for communist propaganda The western nations apparently had no idea, or even suspicion, that the Soviet representative on the Security Council would use the veto power to prevent discussion of pertinent issues or to end discussions already started. Moreover, the use of the General Assembly and of UN committees by the Soviet Union and its so-called satellite states as sounding boards for communist propaganda was hardly foreseen. Between the Soviet employment of the veto in the Security Council. and the attempts of the communist bloc to utilize the UN as a vehicle for extending communist wartime gains, it is little wonder that the first years of the UN were filled with travail and frustration. In spite of Soviet efforts to thwart progress, the UN did accomplish something in the first years of its existence. Under wartime arrangements troops of the allied nations were to Russia be withdrawn from Iran early in "walks out" 1946. When the Russian governof the ment failed to get its forces out of discussions on Iran by the deadline, the Iranian Iran authorities on January 19, 1946 appealed to the Security Council. The Soviet representative on the Council angrily walked out of the meeting, thus setting a pattern of Russian abstention from sessions when ques See p. 94 above. |