The UN's effectiveness was seriously limited by the combination of the cold war and the veto which the "victorious powers" of the second world war granted themselves. But even its limited capacity for action was undermined by the failure of the US to pay its dues and the failure of member countries generally to commit sufficient troops to provide effective deterrence in one operation after another. There was a window of opportunity with the ending of the cold war, but the other factors continued to cripple it. The problem with Bosnia, for example, was not the UN, it was the fact that so few troops were committed that the mission had to be scaled down to "protecting humanitarian intervention" in the vain hope that the presence of these inadequate forces would deter Milosevic, Karadzic and friends. Similarly, the force in Rwanda was derisory, but there only Africans were being killed, so that didn't really matter to the masters of the universe.

However impefect, the UN as an attempt to introduce the rule of law into international relations is in my book better than the rule of brute force. The current crisis drawn out of thin air by the Bush clique has now damaged the UN so badly that I reluctantly conclude it's really time to go back to the drawing-board. The UN and the League of Nations were both born out of world wars. Do we have to wait for another one before trying again?