U.S. Committed To U.N. Standby Army?

By Boyd Nethercott

The United Nations has begun the creation of a new UN military operation called the "Rapidly Deployable Mission Headquarters" (RDMHQ) as learned from the Office of the UN Under Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, Bernard Miyet. Although the Clinton administration made commitments in September 2000, no apparent reporting or media coverage occurred. Our State Department claims to have notified Congress in September 2000 that Clinton's administration gave "seed money" of $200,000, to "mobilize a worldwide standby army for peacekeeping operations." This initial U.S. donation (admittedly very small) was the first voluntary donation to establish a beginning amount of $2.3 million UN trust fund to start financing the new UN military operations.

Congress now knows about this and some congressional aides have made inquiries to see if the "standby army" contribution was buried somewhere in a larger State Department appropriation fund.

The RDMHQ would be led by a UN appointed "eight member command unit" from UN headquarters in New York City. This is the beginning of a "standby UN army," which was tacitly agreed to by Clinton. The plan is for the U.S. to substantially man and finance the operation! The entire operation would be controlled by Kofi Annan. A precedent may have been set by the previous administration which may affect future presidents who could be committed to obey the UN in building troop forces.

The United Nations Secretariat already has signed "standby agreements" with 72 countries that "have agreed to provide to the UN: troops, or to their capabilities, infantry battalions, engineers, artillery, medical, logistical support and air transport" a UN official said, when asked by the Washington Times.

Princeton N. Lyman was the Asst. Secretary of State for International Affairs whose office coordinated the initial U.S. contributions to the UN. Within the Clinton administration, the decision, after internal argumentation, was justified that the U.S. support for the RDMHQ "stand by army" concept on one hand, and any opposition on the other hand to the idea of a "standing army" were not contradictory! (In other words, one could oppose the idea of a UN standing army and still support the formation of a standby army, which is worldwide, readily deployable forces made up of multi-national troops under control of eight UN established command units operated under the UN Secretary General's office, with previously approved authority by the Security Council.

In my opinion, President Bush has been "blind-sided." He should reverse the support for RDMHQ. But he may have some opposition from within his own State Department! President Bush as the Commander-in-Chief of all U.S. military forces, should not give away troops or money to Kofi Annan.
"The UN is not a peacemaking operation; the UN is not a NATO" said Senator Rod Grams. He added that the U.S. should not give any authority to assimilate our troops into the UN to become a part of a future "World Army."

Some of the member nations of NATO are now committing to support the "Standby Army" while also remaining in NATO. Other nations such as China, North Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, etc. will also be expected to provide trained forces to be placed under UN command.

Americans should be made aware of this great power play by the UN, which in some way appears to be in competition with NATO and policies of sovereign nations.