Credit Where It is Due on U.S. Financial Support for the U.N.

(Washington, D.C.): According to press reports, the recently confirmed American
Representative to the United Nations Richard Holbrooke has been spending
much of his time
lately as the chief official lobbyist in the Clinton Administration’s campaign to euchre Congress
into paying so-called “arrearages” in U.S. dues. A leitmotif of this campaign is the allegation
that the United States is — in the words of President Clinton and Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright, among others who should know better — a “deadbeat.” The truth of the matter is that
such an appallingly defamatory and anti-American claim can only be made if one
ignores
the full extent of this country’s immense financial contributions to the United
Nations.

Just the Facts, Ma’am

Indeed, the Clinton Administration’s own Defense Department has documented that
the
United States has contributed over $15 billion to peacekeeping operations from 1996
through the first quarter of fiscal year 1999. (This does not count the
remainder of FY99,
which would include massive additional contributions the U.S. made in connection with the war
in Kosovo.) The UN bureaucracy calls these contributions “voluntary,” however. As a result,
they are not credited against America’s “dues.” Neither does the United States get much credit
for making these contributions in any other way, either.

This is due, in part, to the Clinton Administration’s unwillingness to acknowledge these
outlays,
presumably lest they — by so doing — encourage efforts to prevent such generous diversions of
resources and in-kind contributions (in the form of heavy utilization of Defense Department
assets) from the Pentagon to UN and related missions. Thanks to Rep. Roscoe
Bartlett (R-MD),
a senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, however, the DoD is now
required by
law to report on these expenditures on a quarterly basis.

Enter Rep. Smith

In an important op.ed. article in today’s Washington Times, Rep.
Christopher Smith (R-NJ),
drew on this data to counter the propaganda being put out by Amb. Holbrooke, other
Administration flaks and by a public relations campaign funded by Ted Turner
and
orchestrated, sadly, by former Republican National Committee Chairman-turned-lobbyist
Haley
Barber. As Chairman of the House Subcommittee on International Operations and
Human
Rights, Rep. Smith is able authoritatively to make the case that, properly calculated, the
United
States is — as usual — doing far more than its fair share of supporting the United
Nations
and its activities. The following are among the highlights of Rep. Smith’s article:

The Administration is once again trying to railroad Congress on the issue of the
disputed U.N. arrearages. Its argument is simple: Anyone who opposes giving a blank
check to the United Nations must be an isolationist.

This accusation is almost as outrageous as the charge that the United States has
been a deadbeat when it comes to the United Nations. Indeed, it would be far
more accurate to say that the United States is the United Nation’s largest
benefactor.

A narrow focus on the arrearages — the cumulative result of 17 separate disputes
over such issues as U.N. assistance to the Palestine Liberation Organization and
kickbacks paid to communist governments out of U.N. employees’ salaries —
ignores the crucial fact in the equation: The United States contributes about $2
billion to United Nations organizations and activities every year. This is
almost twice the total amount of all disputed arrearages. It is also roughly
three times more than Germany and the United Kingdom pay annually, five
times more than France, and 35 times more than China.

Overall, the United States has paid more than $35 billion in direct payments to
the U.N. system in the first 53 years of its existence. We have also paid at least
$22 billion since 1992 in additional costs in support of U.N.-authorized
peacekeeping missions. These amounts dwarf the total contributions of all
other countries in the world.

The Bottom Line

The debate over U.N. dues should catalyze congressional efforts to end the practice of
considering Pentagon and other U.S. government accounts as slush-funds to be plundered at will
by an Administration determined to enable peacekeeping operations that might otherwise be
deemed unjustified. This practice materially degrades the combat capabilities of the American
military — both by diverting troops from their principal missions and training regimens and by
squandering resources urgently needed to maintain and modernize the force. What is more, it
tends to encourage a lack of discipline with respect to the real costs associated with
international
interventions in conflict or proto-conflict situations, a practice that often exposes the United
States to still more expensive, and un-reimbursed, obligations entailed in sustaining
(or
withdrawing) peacekeeping units.