United Nations: Sixty years of “Broken Promises”
by Sandra Giovanna Giacomazzi
A new film about the United Nations was recently released in a very limited number of cinemas across the United States. Nothing like the blockbuster thriller “The Interpreter” with Sean Penn and Nicole Kidman, this new film, “Broken Promises”, is a low budget documentary produced by Citizens United, a grassroots conservative group. “Broken Promises” tells the story of how the United Nations has failed the objectives of its mission since day one of its foundation.
The film begins with the words of Joshua Muravchik of the American Enterprise Institute. “The idea was that the main victorious powers in World War II would continue to work together after the war through the United Nations to keep the peace, but this turned out to be a stunning lack of foresight, because the USSR, rather than being a policeman, was the main criminal in the world scene after World War II.”
Only a year after the UN’s foundation, Winston Churchill warned the world of what he saw as a fundamental flaw. Observing the Soviet Union and its aggression in Eastern Europe he wondered how a world organization dedicated to peace could include a totalitarian state as member of its Security Council.
In the words of Churchill, “We must make sure that its work is fruitful, that it is a reality and not a sham, that it is a true temple of peace in which the shields of many nations can someday be hung up and not merely a cockpit in the Tower of Babel.”
The film denunces how the organization has become precisely that tower and how it has greatly failed both in its omissions, like in Ruanda, as well as in its interventions, like Srebrenica.
It offers several first-hand testimonies from former staff members who were involved in various UN field missions in which they complain about how ill-prepared and untrained they were for the missions that were assigned to them. One law student who had no knowledge of military operations found himself having to handle prisoner-of-war exchanges. A secretary in Cambodia who was specialized in election logistics suddenly found herself in charge of intelligence operations!
In a televised debate between David Bossie, co-producer of the film and president of Citizens Unites and David Schorr of the Stanley Foundation, Schorr maintained that it was possible to reform the United Nations while Bossie affirmed that it would be better to start all over again with a new organization governed by bona fide democracies only! Schorr said that the misdeeds of the United nations are not the fault of the organization, but of its member countries and their governments and leaders. However, his point does more to confirm Bossie’s: “In fact, that’s the point. Too many member countries are not democracies.” According to Schorr, the United Nations has existed for 60 years and “we can’t just get rid of it and start all over.” Bossie claims the contrary: “There is nothing to say that we've been wrong for 60 years, therefore we have to continue to be wrong for the next 60.
A suggestion for Citizens United: Get busy translating and dubbing their film and make it available to the European market. Maybe it can repair some of the anti-American damage done by other works like that of Michael Moore.
Sandra Giovanna Giacomazzi was awarded the Mario Soldato Prize for journalism in 2002 and the Mario Pannunzio literary prize for journalism in 2003. She writes for the Roman daily, L’Opinione delle Libertà.
giogia@giogia.com
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