Editing United Nations Security Council (section)

== History ==

=== Background and creation ===
{{Further|History of the United Nations}}
In the century prior to the UN's creation, several international treaty organizations and conferences had been formed to regulate conflicts between nations, such as the [[International Committee of the Red Cross]] and the [[Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907]].{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=5}} Following the catastrophic loss of life in [[World War I]], the [[Paris Peace Conference, 1919|Paris Peace Conference]] established the [[League of Nations]] to maintain harmony between the nations.{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=8}} This organization successfully resolved some territorial disputes and created international structures for areas such as postal mail, aviation, and opium control, some of which would later be absorbed into the UN.{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=10}} However, the League lacked representation for colonial peoples (then half the world's population) and significant participation from several major powers, including the US, the [[USSR]], Germany, and Japan; it failed to act against the 1931 [[Japanese invasion of Manchuria]], the [[Second Italo-Ethiopian War]] in 1935, the 1937 [[Japanese occupation of China]], and Nazi expansions under [[Adolf Hitler]] that escalated into [[World War II]].{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=13–24}}

[[File:Cairo conference.jpg|thumb|[[Chiang Kai-shek]], [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] and [[Winston Churchill]] met at the [[Cairo Conference (1943)|Cairo Conference]] in 1943 during [[World War II]].]]
[[File:Yalta Conference (Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin) (B&W).jpg|thumb|British Prime Minister [[Winston Churchill]], US President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] and Soviet general secretary [[Joseph Stalin]] at the [[Yalta Conference]], February 1945]]

On New Year's Day 1942, President Roosevelt, Prime Minister [[Winston Churchill|Churchill]], [[Maxim Litvinov]] of the USSR, and [[T. V. Soong]] of the [[Republic of China (1912–1949)|Republic of China]], signed a short document, based on the [[Atlantic Charter]] and the [[Declaration of St James's Palace|London Declaration]],<ref>{{Cite book|last=United Nations|first=Dept of Public Information|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=98U8YSrp1YUC&q=%22The+first+of+the+specific+steps+that+led+to+the+establishment+of+the+United+Nations+was+the+Inter-Allied+Declaration%22%22|title=Everyone's United Nations|date=1986|publisher=UN|isbn=978-92-1-100273-7|pages=5|language=en|access-date=5 December 2020|archive-date=15 January 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230115074545/https://books.google.com/books?id=98U8YSrp1YUC&q=%22The+first+of+the+specific+steps+that+led+to+the+establishment+of+the+United+Nations+was+the+Inter-Allied+Declaration%22%22|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last1=Tandon|first1=Mahesh Prasad|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=P5g6AQAAIAAJ&q=%22(1)+London+Declaration%22|title=Public International Law|last2=Tandon|first2=Rajesh|date=1989|publisher=Allahabad Law Agency|language=en}}</ref> which later came to be known as the [[United Nations Declaration]]. The next day the representatives of 22 other nations added their signatures.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.un.org/en/aboutun/history/declaration.shtml |title=Declaration by United Nations |publisher=United Nations |access-date=1 July 2015 |archive-date=3 July 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150703023233/http://www.un.org/en/aboutun/history/declaration.shtml |url-status=live}}</ref> The term "United Nations" was first officially used when 26 governments had signed the Declaration. By 1 March 1945, 21 additional states had signed.{{sfn|Osmańczyk|2004|p=2445}} The term "[[Four Policemen|Four Powers]]" was coined to refer to the four major Allied countries: the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the Republic of China.<ref name="sheriff">{{cite journal |last=Urquhart |first=Brian |author-link=Brian Urquhart |title=Looking for the Sheriff |journal=The New York Review of Books |date=16 July 1998 |volume=45 |issue=12 |publisher=New York Review of Books, 16 July 1998 |url=https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1998/07/16/looking-for-the-sheriff/ |access-date=2019-06-07 |archive-date=9 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220309235120/https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1998/07/16/looking-for-the-sheriff/ |url-status=live}}</ref> and became the foundation of an executive branch of the United Nations, the Security Council.{{sfn|Gaddis|2000}}

Following the 1943 [[Moscow Conference (1943)|Moscow Conference]] and [[Tehran Conference]], in mid-1944, the delegations from the Allied "[[Four Policemen|Big Four]]", the [[Soviet Union]], the UK, the US and the [[Republic of China (1912–1949)|Republic of China]], met for the [[Dumbarton Oaks Conference]] in Washington, D.C. to negotiate the UN's structure,<ref>{{cite video |year=1944 |title=Video: Allies Study Post-War Security Etc. (1944) |url= https://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.39024 |publisher=[[Universal Newsreel]] |access-date=28 November 2014}}</ref> and the composition of the UN Security Council quickly became the dominant issue. France, the Republic of China, the Soviet Union, the UK and US were selected as permanent members of the Security Council; the US attempted to add [[Brazil]] as a sixth member but was opposed by the heads of the Soviet and British delegations.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|p=9}} The most contentious issue at Dumbarton and in successive talks proved to be the veto rights of permanent members. The Soviet delegation argued that each nation should have an absolute veto that could block matters from even being discussed, whilst the British argued that nations should not be able to veto resolutions on disputes to which they were a party. At the [[Yalta Conference]] of February 1945, the American, British and Russian delegations agreed that each of the "Big Five" could veto any action by the council, but not procedural resolutions, meaning that the permanent members could not prevent debate on a resolution.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=10–13}}

On 25 April 1945, the [[UN Conference on International Organization]] began in San Francisco, attended by fifty governments and a number of non-governmental organizations involved in drafting the [[United Nations Charter]].<ref name=unmilestones>{{cite web |url=https://www.un.org/aboutun/milestones.htm |title=Milestones in United Nations History |publisher=Department of Public Information, United Nations |access-date=22 November 2013 |archive-date=11 January 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120111074909/https://www.un.org/aboutun/milestones.htm |url-status=dead}}</ref> At the conference, [[H. V. Evatt]] of the Australian delegation pushed to further restrict the veto power of Security Council permanent members.{{sfn|Schlesinger|2003|p=196}} Due to the fear that rejecting the strong veto would cause the conference's failure, his proposal was defeated twenty votes to ten.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=18–19}}

The UN officially came into existence on 24 October 1945 upon ratification of the Charter by the five then-permanent members of the Security Council and by a majority of the other 46 signatories.<ref name=unmilestones/> On 17 January 1946, the Security Council met for the first time at [[Church House, Westminster]], in London, United Kingdom.<ref name=about>{{cite web |url=https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/content/what-security-council |title=What is the Security Council? |publisher=United Nations |access-date=15 January 2021 |archive-date=1 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220901050345/https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/content/what-security-council |url-status=live}}</ref> Subsequently, during the 1946–1951 period it conducted sessions at the United Nation's interim headquarters in [[Lake Success, New York]], which were televised live on [[CBS]] by the journalist [[Edmund Chester]] in 1949.<ref name="nyt-1951-05-19">{{Cite news |last=Rosenthal |first=A. M. |date=May 19, 1951 |title=U.N. Vacates Site at Lake Success; Peace Building Back to War Output |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1951/05/19/archives/un-vacates-site-at-lake-success-peace-building-back-to-war-output.html |access-date=July 26, 2022 |issn=0362-4331 |archive-date=July 26, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220726230531/https://www.nytimes.com/1951/05/19/archives/un-vacates-site-at-lake-success-peace-building-back-to-war-output.html |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://untappedcities.com/2021/05/19/united-nations-lake-success/ |title="The United Nations Headquarters in Long Island's Lake Success" First Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly in 1947 at Lake Success on untappedcitites.com |date=19 May 2021 |access-date=16 January 2023 |archive-date=19 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210519170543/https://untappedcities.com/2021/05/19/united-nations-lake-success/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/television-broadcast-of-a-new-series-reporting-the-sessions-news-photo/647173796?adppopup=true |title=''United Nations in Action'': Photograph of Edmund Chester, Larry LaSueur, Lyman Bryson at the interim headquarters of the UN General Assembly Lake Success, NY, March 8,1949 ongettyimages.com |date=2 March 2017 |access-date=16 January 2023 |archive-date=13 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230113182015/https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/television-broadcast-of-a-new-series-reporting-the-sessions-news-photo/647173796?adppopup=true |url-status=live }}</ref>

=== Cold War ===
[[File:Church House Westminister London 2016 (02).JPG|thumb|[[Church House, Westminster|Church House]] in London where the first Security Council Meeting took place on 17 January 1946]]

The Security Council was largely paralysed in its early decades by the [[Cold War]] in between the US and USSR and their allies and the Council generally was only able to intervene in unrelated conflicts.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|p=35}} (A notable exception was the 1950 Security Council resolution authorizing a US-led coalition to repel the [[Korean War|North Korean invasion of South Korea]], passed in the [[Soviet Union boycott of the United Nations|absence of the USSR]].)<ref name=unmilestones/>{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=58–59}} In 1956, the [[United Nations Emergency Force|first UN peacekeeping force]] was established to end the [[Suez Crisis]];<ref name=unmilestones/> however, the UN was unable to intervene against the USSR's simultaneous invasion of Hungary following the [[Hungarian Revolution of 1956]]{{sfn|Meisler|1995|p=114}} Cold War divisions also paralysed the Security Council's [[Military Staff Committee]], which had been formed by Articles 45–47 of the UN Charter to oversee UN forces and create UN military bases. The committee continued to exist on paper but largely abandoned its work in the mid-1950s.{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|pp=38, 55–56}}<ref name=Chapter7>{{cite web |url=https://www.un.org/en/documents/charter/chapter7.shtml |title=Charter of the United Nations: Chapter VII: Action with Respect to Threats to the Peace, Breaches of the Peace, and Acts of Aggression |publisher=United Nations |access-date=26 November 2013 |archive-date=5 May 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090505055751/https://www.un.org/en/documents/charter/chapter7.shtml |url-status=live}}</ref>

In 1960, the UN deployed the [[United Nations Operation in the Congo]] (UNOC), the largest military force of its early decades, to restore order to the breakaway [[State of Katanga]], restoring it to the control of the [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]] by 1964.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=115–134}} However, the Security Council found itself bypassed in favour of direct negotiations between the superpowers in some of the decade's larger conflicts, such as the [[Cuban Missile Crisis]] or the [[Vietnam War]].{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|pp=61–62}} Focusing instead on smaller conflicts without an immediate Cold War connection, the Security Council deployed the [[United Nations Temporary Executive Authority]] in [[West New Guinea]] in 1962 and the [[United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus]] in 1964, the latter of which would become one of the UN's longest-running peacekeeping missions.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=156–157}}{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=59}}

On 25 October 1971, over US opposition, but with the support of many [[Third World]] nations, along with the [[Socialist People's Republic of Albania]], the mainland, communist [[People's Republic of China]] replaced [[Republic of China]] with a seat on the Security Council; the vote was widely seen as a sign of waning US influence in the organization.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=195–197}} With an increasing Third World presence and the failure of UN mediation in conflicts in the [[Six-Day War|Middle East]], [[Vietnam War|Vietnam]] and [[Indo-Pakistani War of 1965|Kashmir]], the UN increasingly shifted its attention to its ostensibly secondary goals of economic development and cultural exchange. By the 1970s, the UN budget for social and economic development was far greater than its budget for peacekeeping.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=167–168, 224–225}}

=== Post-Cold War ===
[[File:Colin Powell anthrax vial. 5 Feb 2003 at the UN.jpg|thumb|US Secretary of State [[Colin Powell]] holds a model vial of [[anthrax]] whilst giving a presentation to the Security Council in February 2003.]]

After the Cold War, the UN saw a radical expansion in its peacekeeping duties, taking on more missions in ten years than it had in the previous four decades.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|p=286}} Between 1988 and 2000, the number of adopted Security Council resolutions more than doubled, and the peacekeeping budget increased more than tenfold.<ref>{{harvnb|Fasulo|2004|p=43}}; {{harvnb|Meisler|1995|p=334}}.</ref> The UN negotiated an end to the [[Salvadoran Civil War]], launched a successful [[United Nations Transition Assistance Group|peacekeeping mission in Namibia]], and oversaw democratic elections in post-[[Apartheid in South Africa|apartheid]] South Africa and post-[[Khmer Rouge]] Cambodia.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=252–256}} In 1991, the Security Council demonstrated its renewed vigor by condemning the Iraqi [[invasion of Kuwait]] on the same day of the attack and later authorizing a [[Gulf War|US-led coalition]] that successfully repulsed the Iraqis.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|pp=264–277}} Undersecretary-General [[Brian Urquhart]] later described the hopes raised by these successes as a "false renaissance" for the organization, given the more troubled missions that followed.{{sfn|Meisler|1995|p=334}}

Though the UN Charter had been written primarily to prevent aggression by one nation against another, in the early 1990s, the UN faced a number of simultaneous, serious crises within nations such as Haiti, Mozambique and the former Yugoslavia.{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|pp=66–67}} The [[United Nations Protection Force|UN mission to Bosnia]] faced "worldwide ridicule" for its indecisive and confused mission in the face of ethnic cleansing.<ref>For quotation "worldwide ridicule", see {{harvnb|Meisler|1995|p=293}}; for description of UN missions in Bosnia, see {{harvnb|Meisler|1995|pp=312–329}}.</ref> In 1994, the [[United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda]] failed to intervene in the [[Rwandan genocide]] in the face of Security Council indecision.{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=104}}

In the late 1990s, UN-authorized international interventions took a wider variety of forms. The [[United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone|UN mission]] in the 1991–2002 [[Sierra Leone Civil War]] was supplemented by British [[Royal Marines]] and the UN-authorized [[War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)|2001 invasion of Afghanistan]] was overseen by [[NATO]].{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|pp=110–111}} In 2003, the US [[Iraq War|invaded Iraq]] despite failing to pass a UN Security Council resolution for authorization, prompting a new round of questioning of the organization's effectiveness.{{sfn|Kennedy|2006|p=111}} In the same decade, the Security Council intervened with peacekeepers in crises including the [[War in Darfur]] in Sudan and the [[Kivu conflict]] in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In 2013, [[Secretary-General's Internal Review Panel on United Nations Action in Sri Lanka|an internal review]] of UN actions in [[Alleged war crimes during the final stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War|the final battles]] of the [[Sri Lankan civil war|Sri Lankan Civil War]] in 2009 concluded that the organization had suffered "systemic failure".<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.firstpost.com/world/un-failed-during-final-days-of-lankan-ethnic-war-ban-ki-moon-1133061.html |title=UN failed during final days of Lankan ethnic war: Ban Ki-moon |agency=Press Trust of India |date=25 September 2013 |work=FirstPost |access-date=5 November 2013 |archive-date=30 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131030080724/http://www.firstpost.com/world/un-failed-during-final-days-of-lankan-ethnic-war-ban-ki-moon-1133061.html |url-status=live}}</ref>
In November/December 2014, [[Egypt]] presented a motion proposing an expansion of the NPT ([[non-Proliferation Treaty]]), to include [[Israel]] and [[Iran]]; this proposal was due to increasing hostilities and destruction in the Middle-East connected to the Syrian Conflict as well as others. All members of the Security Council are signatory to the NPT, and all permanent members are [[nuclear weapons states]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.un.org/disarmament/WMD/Nuclear/NPTtext.shtml|title=UNODA – Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT)|publisher=United Nations|access-date=29 June 2017|archive-date=2 May 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160502153934/http://www.un.org/disarmament/WMD/Nuclear/NPTtext.shtml|url-status=live}}</ref>