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December 23, 2004
UN Alternative Update
In an earlier post on the United Nations, I mentioned the PSI (Proliferation Security Initiative) as a possible replacement. Bill Gertz has a story in today's Washington Times that describes the program as largely successful
The war in Iraq has set the United States at odds with some allies, but the international community is strongly supporting a U.S.-led initiative to stop the spread of weapons of mass destruction.Not that I really care what the UN thinks, but so far so good. Here is what the PSI does
More than 60 nations — including Russia and France, two key opponents of the Bush administration's policy toward Iraq — are supporting the 19-month-old Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI). The global effort to halt arms proliferation has also gained favor from the United Nations.
PSI, launched by President Bush in May 2003, was an outgrowth of the administration's effort to prevent weapons of mass destruction from reaching terrorists.It is important to note that the PSI is "an activity, not an organization." It is an ad hoc group of nations working in concert to achieve a particular goal.
Its core participants include the governments of the United States, Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Thailand and Britain.
But more than 40 other states have signed on to its principles and have chosen to keep their participation secret or limited.
The initiative is hoped to be the first step in creating a new global system to control the spread of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and missile systems.
This may be the wave of the future, or at least what we should be working towards. Many of us who see the UN as a failure, and NATO as limited, have been searching for alternatives. But permanent organizations and alliances may not work in a post-Cold War world. The PSI is a model that we should follow closely to see how well it works in upcoming years.
Posted by Tom at December 23, 2004 8:24 AM
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