Speaking out, blowing the whistle on wrongdoing

The third part adds some words on the ultimate possibility of an advanced whistleblower system worldwide. Although far from being realisable today, it nevertheless offers the possibility of ending some of the excesses that we see on our TV screens - constant conflict, with thousands of people fleeing their homelands. It includes a wide-ranging series of conflicts, from the bitter conservative/liberal disputes and attacks on basic democratic thinking to actual war. Solving these problems is a dream, but with the ever-growing capabilities of the human race, it is achievable. By speaking out against these inadequacies in the human endeavour, we can achieve that dream.

Some German generals opposed Hitler in starting WWII. They did not believe Germany would win. In May 1938, the army leadership was made aware of Hitler's intention of invading Czechoslovakia, even at the risk of war with Britain, France, and the Soviet Union. The Army Chief of Staff, General Ludwig Beck, regarded this as not only immoral but reckless, since he believed that Germany would lose such a war. Hans Oster and Beck sent emissaries to Paris and London to advise the British and French to resist Hitler's demands, and thereby strengthen the hand of Hitler's opponents in the Army. Neville Chamberlin's visit to Munich in 1938 and his agreement with Adolf Hitler to dismember Czechoslovakia put off the possibility of military opposition to Hitler.

Chamberlin's visit to Munich is now regarded as a great stupidity. He promised "peace for our time". This optimism was short lived, as the Munich Agreement was broken within a year and Britain went to war over the Nazi invasion of Poland. Chamberlin was forced to resign the premiership on 10 May 1940, after Germany invaded the Netherlands, Belgium and France. Beck was involved in the 1944 von Stauffenberg plot against Hitler and was killed during the purge that followed. Hans Osler was hanged in Flossenbürg concentration camp, in Nazi Germany in 1945.

There were a number of German generals who did not want Germany to go to war . Britain had a formidable Navy. France had the world's strongest land army. Together the French and British air forces were superior to the Luftwaffe. As events demonstrated, Germany was eventually out gunned and lost the war.

But the possibility is there that whistlebowing can avert a war. The blower of the whistle would be a senior member of the aggressor government, who wanted to prevent the war. He, or maybe she, may do so for the same reasons as the German generals in WWII. They thought their country could not win. Or they may be a player in the power struggle in the aggressive country – they wanted the top spot. They could reveal to the United Nations the aggressor's intention to invade a neighbouring country. There is an office for the United Nations Development Program in every country in the world. The UN has the objective of preventing war, of ensuring peace , so would use its blue helmets to prevent war,

The fourth section suggests that this approach would fail unless steps are taken to strengthen the UN capability to prevent war. There are many examples of UN failures today:

• The current crisis in Ukraine
• Inability to stop the Rwandan genocide in 1994
• Not being able to end the Israel-Palestine conflict
• Failure to prevent the 2017 Rohingya genocide in Myanmar
• The Kashmir dispute being the oldest and most serious of all is unresolved since 1948
• Bosnia, where Dutch UN Peacekeepers failed to prevent the Srebrenica massacre in which Bosnian Serb forces murdered over 8000 Bosnian Muslims
• Syria, where protests clamouring for political change, evolved into a civil war
• Papua New Guinea, where local indigenous people clamour for independence from Indonesia
• The Vietnam War raged for 19 years and cost the lives of two million people. The UN proved powerless to stop it.

This writer has endeavoured to determine why the United Nations has failed to achieve its objective of ensuring a peaceful world. I have identified three possible reasons.

1. The veto power of the five founding nations

2. Reliance on countries willing to provide peacekeeping troops, instead of using its own policing forces

3. Incompetence on the part of the Secretary General, who is dependent for his appointment on the five veto wielding countries.

To summarise the fourth section: It we can strengthen the United Nations' capability to prevent war, we can add the ultimate capability to a whistleblowing action preventing war