Allow me to set the scene by quoting the opening paragraph of the introduction to Stephen C. Schlesinger's remarkable new book, "Act of Creation: The Founding of the United Nations":

"Four times in the modern age," English historian John Keegan has written, "men have sat down to reorder the world — at the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 after the Thirty Years War, at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 after the Napoleonic Wars, in Paris in 1919 after World War I, and in San Francisco in 1945 after World War II." Such is the march of human history that all these events — except for the most recent one — collapsed in disagreements that eventually led to renewed wars. The fortunes of the last of these, the San Francisco Conference, are still not known. However, what happened in that California city that produced the last of these grand compacts has already had an enormous impact over the past six decades. Indeed, the founding of the United Nations, in far more sinister circumstances than faced any of the U.N.'s predecessors — namely the age of nuclear weaponry — is affecting the survival or demise of humanity.

   Today, for a fifth time in history, it is imperative for humankind to gather "to reorder the world." Civilization has failed to achieve the first aspiration of the United Nations Charter:

WE THE PEOPLES OF THE UNITED NATIONS DETERMINED to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind....

   As we survey world political society and the barren, ugly, violent landscape it shows us, no human being with even the most elementary sense of the values of love, law and peace can avoid the conclusion that the moment is here to end war. And it can be done! All we need is confidence that if enough of us want to do it, we can do it!

   We need to study how history unfolds. Sometimes change occurs very slowly; other times it develops in spurts. A few random personal observations:

• Thousands of years ago, tribes had wars and the winners ate the losers. This is no longer the custom.
  
  
• In the early 1800's in the U.S., the abolitionists marched for the end of slavery. People thought they were crackpots. Yet, 70 years later, after a very bloody civil war, slaves were freed.
  
  
• Kings were divine, got their authority directly from God. But one day a bunch of guys in Boston threw a lot of King George's tea in the harbor, and that pretty well ended that notion.
  
  
• A good way to settle disputes between two men was to give each a gun, tell them to stand back to back, have them march ahead to the count of ten, turn around, and shoot at each other. The one who was dead lost the duel. Then somebody got the idea that it might be better to have the two settle their dispute in a court of law.
  
  
• Along the way, a few kings thought it might be convenient to establish some "colonies" around the world. They would tell the colonies what to do — or else! However, as time went by, the colonies decided they were unhappy with the deal, and began giving the colonizers a hard time. In the end, the colonizers set the colonies loose.
  
  
• In 1946-47, through a fluke resulting from my academic studies in the U.S. Navy at the University of Minnesota, I became a teaching assistant in economics at the University of Southern California. I taught my students that communism would never work: the competition of a market economy is necessary to insure efficiency. I said: "You can't set the price of sausage in Vladivostok from Moscow!" Four decades later communism itself demonstrated that, indeed, it would not work.
  
  (Today, I am saying something quite different: yes, competition and the free market are necessary to assure efficiency, but at this moment in history the system is on a disastrous course. The population of the world is around six billion individuals, with about one-third of them living on less than $2 a day, and a half of those barely existing on less than one dollar a day. At the same time, many millions are living in affluence. This is WRONG — and quite unnecessary! There must be established — at the global level — a minimum of democratic regulation to guarantee that the poorest third of humanity is lifted out of the abysmal conditions under which it now struggles.)
  
  
• In 1953, when I was a young civilian reporter on the Army newspaper, Stars and Stripes, based in Darmstadt, West Germany, I went to Strasbourg to cover an effort to transform the six member Coal and Steel Community into a European Political Community, with its own constitution. There was a lot of enthusiasm for the idea, but Charles de Gaulle shot it dead. But the concept did not die, and it is vibrant today in the European Community.
  
  
• It was conventional wisdom 20 years ago that while apartheid in South Africa was an immoral phenomenon, it would probably be around for a very long time and not disappear without a terrible battle. But, surprise, apartheid did go quietly, and South Africa is doing pretty well.
  
  
• When the founding fathers of the United States of America met in Philadelphia in 1787 to draft a constitution, the last thing they had in mind was to give the power to vote to women. But, baby, you've come a long way since then, and you're still going strong.

   So, change is possible, even basic change in the social system. And it should be obvious — although obviously it's not — that the top priority on the global agenda at this point in history must be the abolition of war. Those who argue otherwise are asleep in the dustbin of history. The questions that must engage us now are these:

• What is the best long-range game plan to end war?
  
  
• What are the first practical steps toward ending war?

   It is clear that in the fifth try at achieving world order, global society must change its fundamental structure from the obsolete system based on sovereign nation-states to an arrangement whereby a planetary political body can resolve problems in the common interest. That political body can only be the United Nations.

   Two critical problems prevent the United Nations from confronting the daunting array of today's questions effectively.

   The first is that the decision-making system in the world today is grossly dysfunctional, not to mention being egregiously undemocratic.

   The Security Council, with its 15 members, five of them permanent and with a veto, is not representative of the present day real world. In fact, Article 23 of the U.N. Charter still lists the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (which no longer exists) and the Republic of China (which is no longer a member of the U.N.) as permanent members. The Russian Federation and China are now treated as bona fide representatives of those countries, which is a strong argument for the case that the U.N. Charter has a high degree of flexibility and that explicit language changes in the U.N. Charter do not necessarily need to be made in order to effect major structural alterations in the U.N.

   The U.N. General Assembly is equally absurd in the present historical context. With minuscule states like San Marino and Vanuatu holding the same voting influence as the United States and China in the Assembly, it is totally impractical to expect serious decision-making authority to be awarded the Assembly. Delegates would do well to recall the experience of the U.S. Founding Fathers in Philadelphia in 1787, when the convention was near collapse. A compromise emerged: have two legislative houses — one based on equal sovereignty of states; one based on populations. Compromises were made by the score, but agreement on wording was finally reached. George Washington was hopeful but dubious. He was quoted by Gouverneur Morris as saying:

"It is too probable that no plan we propose will be adopted. Perhaps another dreadful conflict is to be sustained. If to please the people, we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how can we afterwards defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair. The event is in the hand of God."

   The current world political situation requires a basic change in the factors weighted in decision-making. It is not enough to weight only national sovereignty and population. The elemental fact of military, economic and political power must also enter the equation if this effort for common sense is to come to pass. (See T² resolution, which follows)

   In sum, our small, perhaps unique, planet is at a crossroads of unknown dimensions. Will our better or worst instincts prevail? (We have plenty of both!) It is up to all of us together!