Foreword
New opportunities and possibilities emerge for development when the style of thinking and planning is changed to an unconventional model. In these papers, I have endeavored to reverse the process of thinking by first defining the ultimate ideal and then later coming back to list the constraints, to be attacked one by one.
By and large the accepted and practiced model of thinking approaches the problems from the constraints and in the process constraints weight down on the thinking and a lot of possibilities are hopelessly dismissed on their first coinsurance.
These papers talk about making the whole world prosperous, which as an ultimate object of the international system is possible after all. But not everything that needs to be done to make the whole world prosperous are covered in these papers. These papers which at best define a direction are not elaborate enough to be a vivid master plan or blueprint for world development. Many of the basic ideas indicated do not fall in line with the present programs of the governments and the international system. Besides an exhaustive analysis of the needs of the world is not made in these papers and the various proposals do not cover everything that needs to be done to make a more prosperous world. Various facets of the problems outlined are yet to be thoroughly examined and a more thorough examination is yet to be made. At best these few pages could be described as musings on world development) and the thinking is not rigid in any way) or random pieces of a large picture that is yet to emerge in its totality.
These papers originated on the theme of a draft resolution that I introduced as a participant from India at The International Model United Nations organized by Junior Chamber International and held at the United Nations headquarters at New York during July 29- August 2, 1991. Originally what I had said in the draft resolution was that it is no longer necessary for member states to distance themselves from another, it is prejudicial to internationalism for member states to be nationalistic and patriotic and called upon the member states to look beyond their national interests and strengthen the united nations. The draft resolution introduced a specific proposal that the political structure of the united nations be improved and that a resource base be founded for the united nations.
After the model united nations I elaborated on the theme, more clearly defined the idea as a research theme and am submitting it as Sample of written work to The Society of Fellows, Harvard University. I have not had at all any formal education in international development, foreign policy or government. I am not well read either.
These papers do not follow a standardized academic or diplomatic format and there could be errors in expression among other shortcomings. These papers may please be treated as papers of the 'first draft' status, to be further worked on and improved.
Muthusamy Sivasubramanian, Theni, India. 09 November 1992.
On making the whole world prosperous
Towards more ambitious developmental objects
Extensively widening the demands on the international system both by the developing and the developed nations
By the help of God the world is progressing towards the realm of world peace. Not long ago the only object of the international system was to stop war, but today the demands on the international system is wider than peace keeping and as varied from reducing the mortality rates of the world's children to preserving the planet earth for the generations to come.
Not only do the developing nations have demands on the international system - demands for access to markets, access to technology, fair prices for raw materials and commodities, debt relief and more favorable financial flows, - which are for the purpose of comparison, simple demands, but also the developed world whose demands are more complicated in nature developed nations are unable to reconcile the need to promote repatriation of the illegal immigrants with the ideals of generously proclaimed human rights; in the course of history they have built a massive nuclear arsenal but now find it necessary to ensure that the spread of nuclear capability is restricted; on their own they find it difficult to control the illegal economy of the underworld; the legitimate national economy is upset when there are differences in monetary policies of different nations such as different interest rates that cause currency fluctuations; the present economic system of the world has a tenuous and artificial base which is highly vulnerable to manipulation; urban decay, traffic congestion, pollution and environmental degradation are some of the several other problems which the developed world would find it difficult to solve independently.
As the imbalance in development remains and widens not only the developing world, but also the developed world would have persistent problems.
Strengthening the weak without weakening the strong
The present economic system is such that when the weak economies are strengthened the strong economies are jeopardized. This is unacceptable.
The ideal which the world leaders may strive to attain to the extend that is practically attainable, is to increase the income of the third world citizen to that of the developed world without causing a decline in the income of the citizens of the developed world and at the same time not reducing the prospects of higher income. The ideal to aim and get as close as possible is to make the whole world wealthy as expressed in an ancient prayer "Lokas Samastas Sukino Bavantu" (Let the people of the whole world prosper).
Any developed nation of today was once undeveloped and as the nation developed an overall economic uplift happened. It is not that unemployment and poverty are eliminated, but by and large, the people of the developed nations live well and nation can support the unemployed and the poor.
The developed nations have not impoverished the prosperous of their people to make the poor prosperous but merely caused their national economies to prosper and more and more people flourished. When one man bought his second car the other man did not lose his first.
This overall uplift has been proved to be realizable among people of a nation, and it is possible to realize it among the nations of the world.
The possible flaws in this thinking apart, what obstructs such thinking is the fact that the whole world is fragmented. The world is not administratively divided like states within a nation, but politically divided as fragments of nationalistic and conflicting boundaries.
For the world to progress the fragments of waring nations have to become regions of friendly nations. With a climate of profound international relations it becomes possible to evolve and implement comprehensive developmental plans to make the poor nations wealthy without making the rich nations poor.
The world will be a more prosperous place to live if we could reorient the world economy to higher worldwide development. It is understandable that the present economic order can not be disturbed abruptly otherwise there would be unpleasant effects on the world economy.
This new approach has to be introduced smoothly over a long period of time and the transition would be highly desirable for all the nations of the world if planned to take effect smoothly.
The essential prerequisite is an acceptably strengthened united nations. When the United Nations was founded international peace was the need of the hour and so this was the primary object of the international system. But the needs today are vast and the objects of the united nations have to be redefined so as to be far more emphatic about the world prosperity and far more ambitious than what was enunciated in the charter.
World Development
World Development has to be a desirable proposition for the nations of the world, if it is to be carried out without injustice done to any one nation, systematically.
It is time that the nations realized that one nation can not develop in isolation. The world, especially the economy of nations, is becoming increasingly interdependent. When one country in the world undergoes an economic crisis, it has repercussions on the economies of the rest of the world.
A virus found in one continent travels undetected across the oceans and the world wakes up with a dreadful epidemic for which there is no cure at the moment, despite all the scientific and medicinal advances the world has made.
If there is an oil spill on the sea, accidental or strategic, the oceans of the world get polluted. It is of concern to the whole world when someone acquires the capability to build nuclear weapons.
It is as much irresponsible to stand by and watch a child die every other second elsewhere in the world as it is to watch a vengeful soldier mounting a nuclear warhead on his aircraft.Beyond Nationalism
What comes in between is nationalism. It does not reach an inquiring young mind why someone stop stop at and would not move beyond from being a nationalist and a patriot. Nationalism in excess is highly prejudicial to internationalism.
Nationalism is showing compassion towards anyone living on one side of the border but not on the other.
The people of a nation think more about their nation, feel better about their nation, right from their childhood when theory learn more of their national history at school than the history of the world. After they grow up the narrow view of the world learnt at school does not broaden because by and large the media places its emphasis on regional and national coverage and the people's views are largely restricted by the importance the media gives to the region and nation as against the whole world.
This limited thinking should broaden and the nations of the world should think beyond their national interests and become responsible for all that happens all over the world and not only in their nations and cause to develop the whole world.
United Nations
Possible limitations on independent international initiatives
The world is a better place to live today than it was a 100 years ago. The progress that the world has made so far is to be attributed not only to the United Nations but also to a few nations whose independent initiatives have exceeded the efforts of the United Nations.
States that have been noticeably active both within the international organization and outside the system have substantially contributed to the progress of internationalism. But progress can not always be a straight line from darkness to light and history is not a guarantee that the future will be a linear extension of its course. The people's perception of priorities change from time to time and the government of a nation with an international outlook may not be able to pay the level of attention that it wishes to give for international development especially when the nation faces a decline in economic growth rate or a state of political uncertainty or both as how it happens.
Secondly there are times when an independent initiative taken by a country attracts criticism from several other nations, largely because the initiative is taken independently.
Thirdly national governments change from time to time. When a new government gets elected it may announce newer international programs that may be more benevolent, but may not be a linear extension of the programs of the previous government there by causing to lose consistency of developmental involvement.
Such factors necessitate that the international organization has to be strengthened as a permanent foundation to bear the larger responsibilities with the direct initiatives by independent governments taking a supplementary role.
Larger purpose for the United Nations
The founding fathers of the United Nations defined three basic purposes of the United Nations (each of which was seen as a counter to the aggressive policy of the axis Powers that had culminated in World War II)
- To maintain international peace and security;
- To develop friendly relations among nations;
- To achieve international cooperation of an economic, social, cultural or humanitarian nature and encourage respect for human rights.
The world today is far more harmonious today and international relations are effectively maintained.In the process the world has become far more interdependent today than it was forty seven years ago.
The world today needs the United Nations to effectively address problems such as economic development and environment than essentially revolve its concerns around the need for military restraint.
It implies that the United Nations has to have a more ambitious object - not merely international harmony, but more emphatically, world prosperity as the ultimate purpose.
With a view to cause the whole world to develop, the objects of the UN have to become more emphatic and ambitious, with world prosperity as the ultimate purpose.
A more functional political structure of the United Nations
United Nations has a political structure which is too cautious. It does not have a President (Executive) and the Secretary General's authority is limited. The Secretary General is to be empowered issue by issue by the General Assembly, as opposed to the President of an evolved presidential form government., who heads the Executive with the parliament and judiciary functioning separately but blindingly.
The political structure of the U.N. is incomplete without a President. The world had just seen two world wars and nationalistic priorities were dominant and the world had not yet began to think truly international when the United Nations was conceived.
The world political environment of this day is not the same as it was 47 years ago. World politics today is much more evolved than it was at the time of the Dumberton Oaks and San Francisco Conferences.
From its inception till the present the United States of America has been a major determinant in the evolution and activities of the United Nations. President Wodroo Wilson's 14 points started a debate which eventually resulted in the formation of the League of Nations, which later gave way to the formation of the United Nations. United States was the major force behind the 1974 World Population Plan of Action, which established the Universal Rights to Family Planning and was instrumental in founding the United Nations Population Fund. The US Declaration of Human Rights inspired the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
The evolved form of the American Government could also be adopted by the United Nations. The united nations could be governed by an international government, headed by; a President, electe4d by the Heads of Government or the Heads of State of the members states of the United Nations for a predetermined period (may be 5 years), with his powers balanced by the U.N. General Assembly and differences adjudicated by the International Court of Justice.
The President should be able to function independently as head of the Executive without having to wait for the approval of the General Assembly in every move he is to make. At the same time the Executive has to be balanced. The U.N. General Assembly could do that very effectively. The International Court of Justice can determine what is and what is not excessive exercise of power or unconstitutional.
As it is considered it is important to remember that:
1. The political equations between nations are changing and would continue to change for the better.
2. All the nations as members of a stronger United Nations would continue to be sovereign, perhaps more sovereign than now, because with a stronger United Nations, thereat of war between nations could be nearly eliminated.
3. A stronger United Nations would not be a government issuing directives to nations, but one that would get the nations ot modify its policies and programs to accommodate international considerations through diplomatic discussions with the nations concerned., or by coordinating discussions and programs between member states.
4. The stronger United Nations would be of a participatory government, in the sense that the United Nations General Assembly becomes world parliament in which all nations are the members of parliament.
With a strengthened united nations with a well evolved and acceptable control structure it becomes possible to evolve and implement significant programs to make a more prosperous world.
Generating Revenues for the United Nations
Because the UN does not have vast resources at its disposal, it depends entirely on contribution from its member states.
It should be possible for the United Nations to reduce its dependence on contributions from member states if the United Nations can generate income, some form of International Income as National Income is to its member states. If the United Nations has to generate revenues on its own, it is necessary that the U.N. creates a resource base, in the form of a geographic zone.
U.N. does not have its own freely accessible geographical territory, not even the size of the smallest state in the world. It is ironical that the United Nations, which ought to be working towards a borderless world has its premises landlocked within the boundary of some its member states. Today not even one square inch of the world, on the world map, is permanently international or non-national. The exceptions are the high seas and the frozen continents.
Founding an Income generating mechanism for the United Nations
If the United Nations is to generate international revenues for world development, it is necessary that it creates a geographical base, that could in effect be the property of all the nations of the world.
A geographical base would open up opportunities for the UN to create a central economy. UN can create a central econonmy by housing non-tariff and several other forms of global trade, global industry and global banks to create an economy, which will generate revenue for the United Nations.
1. The Zone could be, to start with an area of not less than 100,000 hectares granted on lease for a period of, may be 499 years, to the United Nations by broad minded member states in consideration of a value. The land may be acquired on lease or even as outright purchase. 100,000 hectares of developable wasteland could cost between US $ 30 million ot US $ 300 million.
2. If the land has to be developed as an industry and trade district, the infrastructure could be developed at a cost of between US $ 1-10 billion. The foundation cost must be met by a fund set up by all the member states by making a one time contribution and the notional or actual profits earned on the basic infrastructural investments is to be non-dividendable. The total tax revenue or the earnings on the basic infrastructural investment made by all the member states in union, is not to be dividendable to member states but to be utilized for International Development.
3. The United Nations can create a mega company with a capital base of between US $10-25 billion dollars, subscribed by the member nations and private investors.
4. The capital base of $25 billion dollars would enable the company to borrow, on conservative banking norms $225 billion. So the total resources available for investments could be $250 billion. The United Nations could invest this quarter of a trillion dollars to promote companies, with a clearly defined object of making profits.
5. The capital base has to come from member nations and from private investors, who will earn a taxable dividend on their investment. The tax rate has to have a floor rate of 25% on which there will be no concessions to any of the share holder nations, and a voluntary higher rate of any proportion above 25% . All the tax revenue goes to the United Nations.
6. Such tax revenues could be partly reinvested in United Nations owned companies and the income generated by these companies could add to the United Nations fund for World Development.
It is understandable that member states may not be prepared to sacrifice their international business and banking houses to the United Nations. But if a new international land zone in the world is to come into existence as owned by all the nations, it would be an international trade and industry zone, which could foster new international mega cartels of the size and scope of the Airbus Industrie, European Space Agency and Intelstat.
Secondly, it is important to remember that the management and work force will be drawn from the member nations, part of most of the profits earned will be added to the national income of the member states as the investment in these companies have to come from governments and the private investors of the member nations, the input commodities have to be bought from the member nations and so on..
Also, it is necessary to remember that even after the foundation of a geographical zone for the United Nations, the United Nations would not have as much land as it would need for locating the industries. Some of the projects could be located in the UN member nations and if it is done that way, it amounts to attracting UN sponsored investments that would generate employment in the nation of location which is as beneficial as the present foreign investments.
Only a consortium of national investments could create certain mega and ultra mega business establishm
ents. To illustrate without going into aspects such as the economic feasibility or profitability at this stage, it is not possible for a private industrial house or for a single nation to establish an insurance company that would insure national governments against external developments that cause huge unfair economic hardship for the nation, or against natural calamities such as an earthquake that cost the nation billions of dollars of unplanned expenditure.
At present every time there is a natural calamity of a vast scale, most developing nations are forced to appeal for international aid which is some times sufficient and arrives in time, and sometimes not. Even for a developed nation such as the United States of America, it should make sound economic sense to insure the national treasury against such unforeseen demands as a natural calamity or against currency loss during recession.
International construction projects such as the Tunnel between England and France are at present shared by the governments and private investors of nations involved. There is a possibility that there are intercontinental projects at present and more in the future, such as intercontinental roads, railways and waterways. Such projects could be under the jurisdiction of the United Nations.
We already have a world bank and an International Monetary Fund which are under the aegis of the United Nations. The United Nations can found a Global Bank - a global commercial bank with the major banks of various national and interested private banks of every nationals subscribing and dividend-earning shareholders to finance trans-national cartels, to make commercial lending to those nations who have a high credit ranking (The object is to earn profits for the bank which would be taxable by the United Nations or jointly taxable by the United Nations and the investing nations.)
More such institutions could be conceived and inter-governmental and international private investments encouraged with the object of creating tax-paying International Income.
This would make it necessary for the United Nations to think in terms of a world money as a common currency. The Central Bank of the United Nations could start by selling instruments such as Travelers Cheques, denominated, instead of in national currencies, in what may be called world money, which is to eventually become a central currency and ultimately to become the basis for settling exchange rate disputes.
Reorienting the world economy to higher development
If the desirable high ideal of making the world wealthy is to be attained to the extent possible, comprehensive socio cultural economic programs of world wide reach and impact have to be planned by the world economists to reorient the world economy towards higher development.
A comprehensive program, while preserving jobs and generating more jobs, would simultaneously work on ambitious targets for world population control; it would reconcile technological advances with the trends and needs of the job market; while creating promising new inventions for the society of the future would preserve the wisdom of the ancients.; while continuing to send relief supplies to drought affected areas, would simultaneously make the uncultivable wastelands cultivable; it would combat the underworld activities and at the same time consider offering some form of amnesty along with some rehabiliatory financial concessions in the form of legalizing the illegal wealth in inviolable exchange for reformation and reorienting destructive illegal investments to sometimes as lucrative, but legal and productive investments.
Such comprehensive programs should extend beyond economic planning and cover areas such as developing committed and capable men for the governments of the world and making people more productive and less wasteful.
The Concept of National Waste
If we could evolve a method by which we estimate Gross National Waste as against Gross National Product the combined figure for the world would be alarming. We do not make the optimal use of our natural, human and material resources, which is one of the major reasons why we remain undeveloped.
We spend on arms that we can not and should not hope to use when we could instead be buying equipment to strengthen our internal law and order agencies. We spend on espionage and counter espionage when nations find it impossible to trace intra-national criminals and bring them to the court of law.
We misuse our human and material resources to produce soft drinks when we ought to be perfecting techniques of extracting natural fruit and vegetable juices and preserving them free of artificial preservatives. We build mineral water and carbonated water plants when we might instead be building desalination and water sterilization plants or rather using our human and material resources to explore underground water.
We make paper plates instead of metal ware, built more military intelligence satellites than communication satellites, make wall papers instead of smooth plasters, continue with gasoline engines instead of developing electric/battery vehicles. We throw away surplus food when the cost of storage exceeds the national value of the retained surplus food.Sanctions have contributed to the status quo of world economy
For valid strategic reasons, in the recent past, it has become an accepted practice for nations to impose economic sanctions openly as well as covertly mount an economic offensive that in effect weakened the enemy by the economic hardship that results for the nation. Economic sanctions have been in force for a very long time in the case of Cuba, in the recent past in the case of Iraq, Libya and until recently in the case of several Eastern European Nations.
While the validity or the strategic merit of these sanctions could not be doubted, the point made here is that such sanctions, though strategically valuable, have been weakening the economies of the nations, indirectly and in some cases directly, lowering national production, causing the nations to become weak, which in turn has made the world less prosperous than it could have been.
Sanctions also affect the nations that impose sanctions.
For instance, US Trade embargo on Cuba cost the US companies an estimated $30 billion though 1998, according to a John Hopkins University estimate.
If there is a way out of economic sanctions, the world would prosper sooner.The world order was such that Iraq occupied Kuwait and the rest of the world went to war with Iraq. The US cost of war was $61 billion and it cost the Arab countries $620 billion, according to the Arab Economic Report. If the war did not happen and if the UNDP or US AID were pledged $681 billion, half the poor people of the world would have risen above the poverty line.
Manpower shortage also exists all over the world
A chronic manpower shortage coexists along with the much publicized unemployment problem.
This is because the work force (Research, Executive and Labor force) is not distributed in the right proportion between various field of specialization. For instance in the US, where the unemployment problem is mounting, there may be a shortage of Language Teachers or shortage of computer programmers, because theoretically this category of work force is employed to teach languages to personnel employed in projects of narrow and limited economic and social benefit and most of the available programmers are employed by the military or military industries, so to say.
Human and material resources are misused.
If today the US government wants to rebuild all the downtown residential and commercial areas it would not be able to find investors/ bankers because their money is already invested in projects that may not be of optimal utility to the world, for instance, in a renovation project for a corporate office that does not require renovation. The government may not find enough architects and structural designers for they are employed in commercial projects of least social utility; it may not find enough construction workers for they are building a lavish airport in a tiny island in the Caribbean.It may not be possible for the government to build a transcontinental oil pipe line or to connect the river ways nationally - for there may not be enough of the more skilled engineers, workers and mangers left to be deputed for the projects.
The waste-oriented programs - commercial and noncommercial, absorbs a certain number of certain specialized work categories and because such a demand exists, a proportion of the population prepares for careers that the demand which the waste-oriented industry has generated. A proportion of population, instance prepares for careers in a weapons assembly plant, who would otherwise have prepared for careers in agriculture or medicine.
Demand meets supply - even the wrong demand
Reorienting the world economy to higher development - smoothly
It is understandable that the present economic order can b\not be disturbed abruptly lest there would be unpleasant effects on the world economy. An abrupt transition could cost the nation a million jobs and trillions of dollars.This new approach has to be introduced smoothly over a long period of time and the transition would be highly desirable for all the nations of the world if planned to take effect smoothly.
The world would be a more prosperous place to live if we could reorient the world economy to higher worldwide development.
Help for the world's suffering
George C Marshall proposed the plan to reconstruct post war Europe in a graduation ceremony at Harvard University on June 5, 1947.
We need another Marshall Plan at a point of time when even the prosperous of the nation are suffering from economic hardship - it may not be easy for the developed world to substantially increase its foreign aid budget. There is a recession in the United States, with unemployment mounting, trade deficit accumulating and its budgetary deficit widening. United Kingdom and France have similar problems and Germany is attending to the demands placed on its prosperous economy by the integration that has just happened.
The developing countries have an outstanding debt of $1.3 trillion dollars. Due to debt service demand, among other reasons, in the 80's aggregate net resource transfers to the developing countries shifted from positive to negative.
In 1989, aggregate Long Term net resource flows to developing countries (Net-flows) stood at 63.3 billion dollars. If the population of the developing countries is taken as 4 billion people, per capita resource receipts amount to $4 billion dollars for the year.
There is no way the world's problems will be solved with the present level of money flow.
A new born child dies somewhere in the world every two seconds, 1.5 acres of forests are destroyed every second, 25000 people die every day from acute water shortages and polluted water, 100 species of plant and animal life becomes extinct, more than 75 million tons of top soil is eroded or blown away and tons of toxic waste dumped somewhere in the world - EVERY DAY. If current trends continue 1990s will see 1/3 of the world's productive land erode, 1 million species of plant and animals become extinct and 1 billion people born to compete for increasingly scarce resources.
4 million people face death in Somalia, there is a civil war in Eastern Europe because there is an anachronistic ethnocentricity and a revival of nationalism. Russia, the other Republican republics and Eastern Europe have embraced western ideals at a point of time when the west can not afford to support the transition; on their own these nations neither have the knowledge nor the resources to make the transition work. There is the possibility of "bungled reforms discrediting capitalism before it has time to take root".
Arms race has ended but the arms remain stored. World Peace is desirable but military oriented manufacturing plants can not be closed down. They can not be closed down because the industry can not afford the cost of winding up the units and the governments can not re-employ or at least support those who lose jobs. Unemployment is already mounting. The budgets of governments are already on deficit and there is not enough money to be found to acceptably compensate the owners or substantially aid their diversification.
The world - Developing as well as the Developed world, needs a second Marshall Plan, a Marshall Plan of exponential magnitude, longer time frame, broader and more ambitious objects and of world wide proportion funded not only by the United States but by as many nations as possible to reconstruct not only Europe but the whole world.
Extending the NATO model of military alliance to the whole world
Looking beyond the present and ahead, we could consider an extended NATO type of alliance with all the nations of the world as allies.
This could be achieved in several ways. The Rapid Deployment Force, already granted to the Secretary General by the Security Council could be so constituted as to gradually become a world military organization with a balanced and fail proof control structure. It could also be achieved by including for NATO membership the erstwhile Warsaw Pact as well as the remaining countries and transferring control of the larger NATO to UN Security Council, General Assembly and other organs of the United Nations that may be created for the purpose.
The broader alliance could simultaneously constitute a military organization by drawing equitably personnel and other resources from all the members of the alliance or if possible from all the U.N.member states.
The United military organization would require no more than a tenth of the military personnel and other resources to be a complete force.
The alliance could, with the back up of such a military organization positively proclaim that any aggression or a move to war by any nation on any other nation would be considered an attempt to war with the rest of the world.
In the history of the world, wars have been fought for major reasons as well as for ludicrous reasons. The ear of an English sailor sparked a war between Great Britain and Spain in the 18th century. The animosities lasted 9 years.
More recently, in the year 1969, the Latin passion for football boiled over as El Salvador and Honduras competed in an important world cup qualifying match. Riots after the game led to a five day war in which 2000 people were killed and much of the Honduran Air Force destroyed.
With the foundation of the World Security Alliance, it would become very difficult for any nation to be aggressive and the threat of war between nations would be nearly eliminated. Nations could save billion of dollars hitherto over-allocated to defense and utilize them for development, to save the world's children, to preserve the rain forests or to maintain bio-diversity.
Goods such as nuclear weapons that are produced merely to threaten the enemy, aeroplanes and submarines that are built to merely be on guard - one nation builds them merely because someone else is building them - need no longer be produced in such wasteful quantities. Nuclear weapons, especially, were produced in quantities that could destroy the whole world several times over, when nations were still aware that the possession of nuclear weapons could do no more than produce a stalemate. It was said that nuclear weapons could not even be used across the conference table.
Military spending is about 5% of GNP in the industrial as well as the developing countries. About half of the combined spending on health and education in the industrial countries where as the two magnitudes are about the same in developing countries.
A world wide military alliance would not require more than a very small proportion of personnel employed in the militaries of the nations of the world. Once these resources are drawn from the military of all the nations, most of the rest of the world's military resources would be redundant. In such a scenario, military intelligence and counter intelligence could be reoriented to monitor and control the underworld; The military personnel could be reoriented to maintain law and order which at present the nations find it very difficult to maintain.
Billions of dollars of scarce monetary resources could be saved in this scenario.
The model of the French Foreign Legion
The United Nations military organization, could be to the extend that is appropriate, be modeled after the principles of French Foreign Legion, a proud, elite fighting unit, which from an unpromising start in 1831, built its mystique as 'romantic, swashbuckling, totally loyal, terrifying to its enemies, and fearless in the face of death'. The Legion is a unique permanent force, now represented by over 100 nationalities, who have taken the solemn obligation that binds them to serve, not France, but the Legion itself. The force of about 9000 men are eligible to French Citizenship upon their retirement.
The United Nations military organization could be organized with each of the member states deputing 5% of their military men and women. The UN force could be constituted as cosmopolitan divisions of various nationalities, who take the solemn obligation to serve to maintain world peace, and in times of war, fight their own motherlands if need be. The United Nations Military Organization, manned by personnel drawn from the member states' militaries, may be funded by a diversion of the member states' military expenditure, to be based around the world at bases leased to the United Nations in consideration for nominal rents, and equipped with weapons already in surplus in the various national militaries.
With the founding of the United Nations military organizations, well controlled by an elaborate system of checks and balances by all the member nations, it becomes the responsibility of the United Nations to maintain bilateral as well as world peace.
The United Nations' Military Organization could be a World Counter terrorist Force, an elite crack down force, ruthless in its tactics.
In addition to the above, the United Nations could found an intelligence organ, apart from a reinforced Interpol, to deal with trans-national and trans-continental crimes, with a hierarchical advantage over the member states' police, similar to the advantage the Federal Bureau of Investigations enjoys over the State Police organizations.
