Rocky Road

Though the voice of power politics sometimes sounds louder than the voice of reason, the United Nations is the nearest thing the world has to an international forum. Last week, when the U.S. went before the Security Council to seek an affirmation for its intervention in Lebanon, it found itself seriously on the defensive there for almost the first time.

The U.N. corridors and lounges on Manhattan's East River reflected a gathering tension. The Iraqi delegate, whom the Soviet Union tried unsuccessfully to unseat, remained at his post, lonely and forlorn, ignored by most of his fellow Arabs. Ironically, the nation that had butchered Budapest and flagrantly violated the will of the U.N. now posed as the champion of small and weak nations invaded by foreign troops.

The U.S. case itself was pockmarked with the legalisms in which the U.N. delights. Before the Iraqi coup, the U.S. had been determined to stay out of Lebanon, even greeted with relief the findings of the U.N. observers and the possibility of some domestic compromise.* Now, in the face of U.N. reports that no conclusive evidence existed of massive outside infiltration, the marines had landed.

"The Sole Purpose . . ." At the start, Henry Cabot Lodge was painfully on the defensive. He began with a bit of dramatics, which, as things turned out, proved unfortunate, by reporting the murder of Iraq's former Prime Minister and U.N. Delegate Fadhil Jamali. "Only a few weeks ago he was here with us. We heard his voice. We rejoiced in his humor. Now we learn that he was not only murdered but that his body was actually dragged through the streets of Baghdad."* Then, doggedly, but with difficulty. Lodge tried to get around the touchy point that the U.N. was already on the scene in Lebanon. He praised the work of the U.N. observers, while at the same time declaring them inadequate to fulfill their mission. The presence of U.S. troops, he said, "is designed for the sole purpose of helping the government of Lebanon, at its request, in its efforts to stabilize the situation, brought on by the threats from outside." The U.S. would move out just as soon as U.N. troops moved in.

Shrewd, poker-faced Arkady Sobolev of the Soviet Union blustered that the whole U.S. position was "insolvent" on the face of it. The troop landings, he pointed out, had come not as the result of anything that happened inside Lebanon, but were triggered by the coup in Iraq. The U.S. action, therefore, was a "gross intervention into the domestic affairs of the states in this area." Sobolev demanded the immediate withdrawal of the marines.

The argument was a sharp one, but far more damaging to U.S. prestige was the position of Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold. Plainly miffed at the implicit U.S. flouting of the U.N. observers, he pronounced the observers' operation a "complete success."

"Into the Wastebasket." On the second day, Sobolev made the most of the Secretary-General's position. The U.S., he said, had thrown the work of the U.N. "into the wastebasket" while still "singing eulogies to the group." Under the circumstances, said he piously, "no self-respecting state in Asia or Africa, or Europe for that matter, will agree to send troops to pursue the purposes which the American troops are supposed to seek in Lebanon." What was the U.S. doing but resorting to Hitler's "big lie"? Retorted the U.S.'s Lodge acidly: "I must defer to Mr. Sobolev in the knowledge of Adolf Hitler, because his government was once .an ally of Adolf Hitler."

Up to that point, the debate had been for the most part one between the two old adversaries. But now, meticulous, bespectacled Koto Matsudaira of Japan spoke up for the first time to express his government's "misgivings" over the U.S. intervention, and said that he would try to seek some sort of compromise. To add to the U.S.'s discomfiture, bald Omar Loutfi of the United Arab Republic produced a letter from the president of the Lebanese Parliament denouncing U.S. intervention as an infringement of Lebanese sovereignty. Finally, as the second day ended, still another sour note was sounded. Gunnar Jarring of Sweden, echoing the irritation of his countryman Hammarskjold, declared that in view of the American landings, the. U.N. observers should be withdrawn. In effect, this would mean that the U.S. would be left to get out of its predicament as best it could.

"When the Patient Is Sick." By the time the Council reconvened, the British had landed in Jordan. Taking the offensive, Lodge endorsed the British decision, went on to regret the Swedish position. "When the patient is sick," he said, "is no time for the doctor to leave." He insisted that the U.N. observers had not been able to get behind all the rebel lines, cited U.S. evidence of infiltration, added that the shrill incitements of Cairo newspapers and radio alone constituted interference. "Is the United Nations to condone indirect aggression in plain clothes from outside a country?" If it cannot deal with such aggression, said Lodge, leaning forward intently, "the United Nations will break up."

Sobolev dismissed the U.S. evidence as mere hearsay--odna baba skazala ("an old woman said . . ."). Before the voting on the Russian, U.S. and Swedish resolutions began, he jubilantly declared that if his own was defeated, he would call for an emergency session of the General Assembly. Then, using Russia's 84th veto, he killed off the U.S. resolution calling for a U.N. force. Only he and Sweden voted for the Swedish resolution, only he for his own.

At this point the delegate from Japan, worried about the U.S. position, got ready his compromise. He proposed the creation of a larger and really effective U.N. team, which would permit the U.S. to withdraw its troops with some assurance that the independence and integrity of Lebanon would be preserved. If the Russians were really concerned about getting U.S. troops withdrawn, they could hardly object. But who could say that this was what the Russians were really interested in?

* Actually, the real possibility of compromise vanished with the Iraqi coup, which gave such heart to the Lebanese rebels that they abandoned all talk of settlement.

* At week's end the Iraqi government let newsmen see Jamali, who, though under arrest, appeared in good health. According to the rebels, he was found hiding out at a chicken farm with a small fortune in U.S., British and Turkish currency stashed away. When his captors approached him, he is reported to have said: "Let me alone. I am your brother, I, too, am a nationalist."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.