Have human institutions evolved sufficiently to cope with the modern world? When it comes to national security, the answer appears to be: No.
Ever since the emergence of individual nations, their governments have sought to secure what they consider their “interests” on an ungoverned planet of competing nations. Amid this international free-for-all, nations tended to pursue national security or national advantage through military might.
Of course, the downside of this arrangement was that it produced military confrontations and wars. Moreover, with advances in modern science and technology, nations began to press ever more devastating weapons into military service. Not surprisingly, vast slaughter ensued.
Over the years, as national leaders and members of the public recognized the drawbacks of an anarchic world, they turned toward developing institutions of global governance, including international law, a League of Nations, and eventually the United Nations. International security, they believed, would help to maintain national security.
Unfortunately, though, since the creation of the United Nations in 1945, the governments of many nations have failed to honor their professed commitments to international security.
Currently, the governments of Israel and Russia provide striking examples of this throwback to the nation-centered, might-makes-right approach to world affairs.
Despite the fact that the nation of Israel owed its creation to a 1947 UN agreement for the partition of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states, the Israeli government has forced the removal (and barred the return) of most of the Palestinian population, annexed additional Palestinian land, militarily occupied the remainder of Palestinian territory, and consistently blocked Palestinian statehood.
This June, amid the vast carnage caused by an indiscriminate Israeli government response to a Hamas terror attack, Benjamin Netanyahu ignored a UN Security Council resolution, drafted by the United States, calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, where 37,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, had already been killed. In July, the Israeli government denounced as “absurd” the ruling of the International Court of Justice that Israel’s 57-year occupation of Palestinian territory, demolition of Palestinian housing, and establishment of Israeli settlements on Palestinian land were illegal. This October, the Israeli government took the unprecedented step of barring the UN Secretary-General from entering Israel.
The Russian government of Vladimir Putin also has no compunctions about violating international law. In 2014, it defied the UN Charter (which prohibits the “use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state”) by using its military might to seize and annex Crimea, arm separatist groups in eastern Ukraine, and dispatch its armed forces to bolster the separatists. Although condemned by the UN General Assembly, Russian military aggression continued and, in February 2022, the Putin regime, in the most massive military operation in Europe since World War II, launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. In early March, with UN Security Council action blocked by a Russian veto, the UN General Assembly―by a vote of 141 countries to 5 (with 35 abstentions)―demanded the immediate and complete withdrawal of Russian military forces from Ukrainian territory. Later that month, the International Court of Justice ruled that Russia should “immediately suspend” its invasion.
Nevertheless, the Putin regime continued its massive military assault, as well as its defiance of international law. On September 30, 2022, Putin announced Russian annexation of four Ukrainian regions and plans to defend them “with all our strength.” In response, the UN General Assembly, by a vote of 143 countries to 5 (with 35 abstentions), called on all nations to refuse recognition of Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian land. Yet, despite these and other condemnations by key international institutions, Russian imperialist aggression has persisted, leaving roughly a million people dead or injured, millions more as refugees, about a fifth of Ukraine under Russian military occupation, and much of Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure in ruins.
These and other blatant violations of international law have convinced some observers that international security is a fiction, and that nations are better served by returning to the traditional national security model based on national military might.
But a more sensible conclusion is that international institutions, if they are to succeed, need strengthening. Instead of reverting to a system of national power politics―which has repeatedly led to war, destruction, and massive suffering over the centuries―why not institute stronger global governance?
Recognizing that the veto has often sabotaged the mission of the UN Security Council, UN members increasingly support carving out exemptions from its use.
There are also serious efforts underway to give the UN General Assembly greater power to handle international security issues, to increase the number of nations accepting the compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice, and to secure wider ratification of the founding statute of the International Criminal Court.
Moreover, in late September, 130 heads of state, meeting at the United Nations in a Summit of the Future and pressed by more than 10,000 civil society representatives, adopted a Pact for the Future―the culmination of a years-long process to update the world organization. According to a UN press release, the Pact represented “a strong statement of countries’ commitment to the United Nations, the international system and international law,” and included “the most progressive and concrete commitment to Security Council reform since the 1960s.” Predictably, at the last moment, the Russian government introduced amendments to water down the Pact. But the delegates rejected this effort by an overwhelming vote.
Influential forces, from civil society organizations (which drafted a People’s Pact for the Future) to prominent national leaders, called for even more substantial measures to strengthen global governance. At a General Assembly meeting one day after the Summit, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called for “reforming the Security Council,” particularly its “veto power,” and “revitalizing the General Assembly, including in matters of international peace and security.”
These actions exemplify a growing recognition that there will be no national security without international security.
Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).