There has been controversy and criticism of the UN organization and its activities since at least the 1950s. In the United States, an early opponent of the UN was the John Birch Society, which began a "get US out of the UN" campaign in 1959, charging that the UN's aim was to establish a "One World Government." Charles de Gaulle of France also criticized the UN, and was not convinced that a global security alliance would help in maintaining world peace, preferring that the UN direct defence treaties between countries.
There has been criticism that the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States), who are all nuclear powers, have created an exclusive nuclear club whose powers are unchecked. Unlike the General Assembly, the United Nations Security Council does not have true international representation. This has led to accusations that the UNSC (United Nations Security Council) only addresses the strategic interests and political motives of the permanent members, especially in humanitarian interventions. For example, protecting the oil-rich Kuwaitis in 1991 but poorly protecting resource-poor Rwandans in 1994. Similarly, UN was quick to take a military action through NATO against Libya in 2011 against repressive regime, but as of September 2012 it still hasn't taken any decision on whether to take any action against Syria.
Another criticism of the Security Council involves the veto power of the five permanent nations. As it stands, a veto from any of the permanent members can halt any possible action the Council may take. One nation's objection, rather than the opinions of a majority of nations, may cripple any possible UN armed or diplomatic response to a crisis. For instance, John J. Mearsheimer, (a neorealist) claimed that "since 1982, the US has vetoed 32 Security Council resolutions critical of Israel, more than the total number of vetoes cast by all the other Security Council members." Since candidates for the Security Council are proposed by regional blocs, the Arab League and its allies are usually included but Israel, which joined the UN in 1949, has never been elected to the Security Council.
The Council has repeatedly condemned Israel for its militant actions against the Palestinians. On the other hand, critics contend that, while Israel has the United States to rely on to veto any pertinent legislation against it, the Palestinians lack any such power. This was best demonstration during the recent Palestinian statehood bid, which was modelled after Israel's unilateral declaration of statehood, only to be shot down by the United States.
Other critics object to the idea that the UN is a democratic organization, saying that it represents the interests of the governments of the nations who form it and not necessarily the individuals within those nations. World federalist Dieter Heinrich (an idealist) points out that the powerful Security Council system does not have distinctions between the legislative, executive, and judiciary branches as the UN Charter give all three powers to the Security Council. Another concern is that the five permanent members of the UN Security Council are five of the top seven largest arms exporting countries in the world.
Other critics and even advocates of the United Nations question its effectiveness and relevance because in most high-profile cases, there are essentially no consequences for violating a Security Council resolution. An example of this was the Bangladesh liberation war and the 1971 Bangladesh atrocities committed by the Pakistan Army on Bengali Hindus. Critics of the UN argued that the UN was completely ineffective in preventing the genocide, and that military intervention by India was the only thing to stop the mass murder. Another such case occurred in the Srebrenica massacre where Serbian troops committed genocide against Bosnian Muslims in the largest case of mass murder on the European continent since World War II. Srebrenica had been declared a UN "safe area" and was even protected by 400 armed Dutch peace keepers, but the UN forces did nothing to prevent the massacre. In the 21st century, the most prominent and dramatic example is the Darfur crisis, in which Arab Janjaweed militias, supported by the Sudanese government, committed repeated acts of ethnic cleansing and genocide against the native population. This far, an estimated 300,000 civilians have been killed in what is the largest case of mass murder in the history of the region, yet the UN has continuously failed to act against this severe and on-going human rights issue. Also, in 1967, Richard Nixon, while running for President of the United States, criticized the UN as "obsolete and inadequate" for dealing with then-present crises like the Cold War.