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At the beginning there were many things that influenced the creation of the United Nations.
At the end of World War II the countryside in Europe was a wasteland from the scourge of war. Many people were dead, many more were homeless. The major powers were splitting into communist versus democracy. The mechanisms for fighting war were now so advanced that the world was able to kill millions without much effort, but with the right amount of money. The colonial states of the major powers were beginning to want and rebel for their independence. The League of Nations failed at stopping more war. The leaders of the time wanted to stop the scourge of war from plaguing future generations. They wanted to find a way to peace by creating better human rights around the globe and thus hopefully rid the world of those things that create war, poverty, illiteracy, and violent force.
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This is the image of Hiroshima two minutes after the 1945 nuclear explosion during World War II.
The technological advancement was the time was also moving a very accelerated rate, ninety percent of the famous scientists up to then were still living. The world now had atomic power within its grasp. At the end of World War II, the United States showed the world what that could mean. There was a need to make sure that this did not happen again. |
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The Predecessor: The League of Nations.
The League of Nations was formed after World War I as part of the Versailles Treaty. The aims of their covenant were to promote arbitration for setting international disputes, to bring about the reduction of armaments, to study and remove the causes of war, and to promote world interests in all fields of human work. With the United States not ever joining the League of Nations it was weaken from ever solving any major disputes. Although at the beginning they were able to settle some disputes it was unable to successfully stop the second World War when Japan invaded Manchuria and China, when Italy took control of Ethiopia and Albania, and as Germany absorbed Austria and Czechoslovakia. Even though the League was unable to stop World War II the leaders of the Allied Nations still saw a need for a system outside of specific countries’ government. The League of Nations was not actually voted out until 1946 in favor of going with the more stable version, the United Nations.
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The Colonial States Needed Their Own Rights.
The League of Nations also set up a way of looking after those countries that were still under colonial rule of a mother country. This was brought over into the United Nations in the form of the Trusteeship Council, but was also set up to help these countries gain their independence and has since succeeded. The Trusteeship Council was actually suspended in 1994 since there were no longer any countries still under colonial rule.
There Was A Need For Human Rights.
A major part of the United Nations Charter deals with the need to define the basic human rights. This is mainly due in fact to the extreme violation on human rights during World War II. Germany was trying to completely obliterate the Jewish peoples in Europe. There was also a notion that not every country had the same benefits that the major powers had. The majors powers were now given a way to help those in need.
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The Scourge of War.
This image was taken in the Soviet Union in 1942. The survivors of violent outbreak look for friends and relatives. |
The Wounded.
This image was taken in 1945 in Okinawa, south of Japan. |
