That the United Nations should have a standing military force

My Case

1. The United Nations relies on volunteer military forces, military forces that commit human rights violations like Rwanda (detains and tortures suspected political dissidents¹), Senegal (Soldiers killing civilians because they were lucky enough to be survivors in their internal strife²), and Egypt (arbitrarily demolishes homes and arrests, tortures, and kills residents³). These nations are the largest contributors⁴ and show that we shouldn't be surprised that when human rights abusers volunteer forces, we get human rights abuses in UN peacekeeping. It's so bad that in 2006, there were 357 sexual allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse against UN peacekeepers.⁵ These are only the vocalized allegations, and don't take into account the possible thousands that don't come forward. By allowing the UN to have their own standing army, they can then create a more streamlined process for dealing with these issues, as well as implement training that stops these problems from happening as frequently.

2. Peacekeeping forces would now be able to act quickly to ensure the successfulness of peacekeeping operations. Very simply, the current system isn't efficient enough according to Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon in 2015.⁶ It can take months between the decision to send troops and actually sending said troops.⁷ This lack of effectiveness has made the UN a failure at peacekeeping attempts. The Rwandan genocide, which had hundreds of thousands dead in months could've been prevented if the UN had taken quicker action.⁸ Even worse than that, it took 8 years to send troops to assist in the Darfur conflict of Sudan. If the UN had a single standing military force, they would then be able to act as quickly as a decision is made. This would lead to far greater success for UN peacekeeping attempts.

3. Lastly, the current system of UN peacekeeping utilizes colonial power structures to exploit. If we look at the three biggest nations that contribute soldiers, they're all developing nations. Almost all of the nations that donate soldiers are developing nations that are trying to make profit off of the UN's reimbursement set up. They're having to use their populations to try and make money to sustain their development. These soldiers their utilizing are under the whim of the security council, which happens to be only developed countries that utilize settler-colonial power structures to influence global politics. If there was a standing army, this would give a lot more power to the secretary general, which is a position that is chosen by the general assembly and not the security council. Since the world has more individual developing nations than individual developed nations, the general assembly would be able to utilize the UN's peacekeeping job to best combat settler-colonial interests.

Conclusion

Without a standing UN army, the UN will continue to commit human rights violations while not even effectively carrying out their tasked goals all under the whim of settler-colonial interests. With this, I have affirmed the resolution, so Vote Pro.

Sources

1.https://www.hrw.org/report/2017/10/10/we-will-force-you-confess/torture-and-unlawful-military-detention-rwanda

2.https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6a99517.html

3.https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/egypt

4.https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/troop-and-police-contributors

5.https://www.e-ir.info/2020/02/20/sexual-abuse-in-un-peacekeeping-the-problem-of-viewing-women-as-a-quick-fix/

6.https://www.un.org/press/en/2015/sc12130.doc.htm

7.https://forward.com/news/11552/calls-grow-for-creation-of-standing-un-army-00437/

8.https://www.trtworld.com/americas/twelve-times-the-un-has-failed-the-world-21666