Carol Ely wrote:
>There was nothing political in the statement that war is a threat to the world's culture heritage, which museum professionals are committed to protect.
>
Dear Colleagues,
I have pasted below a speech by Dr. Robert Muller, one of the key
figures associated with the founding of the UN. As museum professionals
who govern interpretation for our culture and posterity, I urge you to
read it because you will be very surprised at his view of the current
world situation.
Terri McNichol
Ren Associates
Subject: HOPEFUL PERSPECTIVE: AN APPRECIATIVE VIEW OF THE
GLOBAL DIALOGUE ABOUT THE WAR - SYNOPSIS OF REMARKS BY DR.
ROBERT MULLER, FORMER UN ASSISTANT SECRETARY GENERAL
Dr. Robert Muller, former assistant secretary general of the United
Nations, now
Chancellor emeritus of the University of Peace in Costa Rica was one of
the people who witnessed the founding of the U.N. and has worked in support
of or inside the U.N. ever since. Recently he was in San Francisco to be
honored for
his service to the world through the U.N. and through his writings and
teachings for
peace. At age eighty, Dr. Muller surprised, even stunned, many in the
audience that
day with his most positive assessment of where the world stands now
regarding war and peace.
A synopsis of his remarks is below:
"I'm so honored to be here," he said. "I'm so honored to be alive at
such a miraculous
time in history. I'm so moved by what's going on in our world today."
Dr. Muller proceeded to say, "Never before in the history of the world
has there been a global, visible, public, viable, open dialogue and
conversation about the very legitimacy of war".
The whole world is now having this critical and historic
dialogue--listening to all kinds of points of view and positions about
going to war or not going to war. In a huge global public conversation
the world is asking-"Is war legitimate? Is it illegitimate? Is there
enough evidence to warrant an attack? Is there not enough evidence to
warrant an attack? What will be the consequences? The costs? What will
happen after a war? How will this set off other conflicts? What might be
peaceful alternatives? What kind of negotiations are we not thinking of?
What are the real intentions for declaring war?"
All of this, he noted, is taking place in the context of the United
Nations Security
Council, the body that was established in 1949 for exactly this purpose.
He pointed out that it has taken us more than fifty years to realize
that function, the real function of the U.N. And at this moment in
history-- the United Nations is at the center of the
stage. It is the place where these conversations are happening, and it
has become in
these last months and weeks, the most powerful governing body on earth,
the most
powerful container for the world's effort to wage peace rather than war.
Dr. Muller was almost in tears in recognition of the fulfillment of this
dream.
"We are not at war," he kept saying. We, the world community, are WAGING
peace. It is difficult, hard work. It is constant and we must not let
up. It is working and it is an
historic milestone of immense proportions. It has never happened
before-never in
human history-and it is happening now-every day every hour-waging peace
through a global conversation. He pointed out that the conversation
questioning the validity of going to war has gone on for hours, days,
weeks, months and now more than a year, and it may go on and on. "We're
in peacetime," he kept saying.
"Yes, troops are being moved.
Yes, warheads are being lined up. Yes, the aggressor is angry and upset
and spending a billion dollars a day preparing to attack. But not one
shot has been fired. Not one life has been lost. There is no war. It's
all a conversation."
It is tense, it is tough, it is challenging, AND we are in the most
significant and potent
global conversation and public dialogue in the history of the world.
This has not
happened before on this scale ever before-not before WWI or WWII, not
before
Vietnam or Korea, this is new and it is a stunning new era of Global
listening, speaking, and responsibility.
In the process, he pointed out, new alliances are being formed. Russia
and China on the same side of an issue is an unprecedented outcome.
France and Germany working
together to wake up the world to a new way of seeing the situation. The
largest peace
demonstrations in the history of the world are taking place--and we are
not at war! Most peace demonstrations in recent history took place when
a war was already waging, sometimes for years, as in the case of Vietnam.
"So this," he said, "is a miracle. This is what "waging peace " looks
like."
No matter what happens, history will record that this is a new era, and
that the 21st
century has been initiated with the world in a global dialogue looking
deeply, profoundly and responsibly as a global community at the
legitimacy of the actions of a nation that is desperate to go to war.
Through these global peace-waging efforts, the leaders of that nation
are being
engaged in further dialogue, forcing them to rethink, and allowing all
nations to
participate in the serious and horrific decision to go to war or not.
Dr. Muller also made reference to a recent New York Times article that
pointed out that up until now there has been just one superpower-the
United States, and that that has created a kind of blindness in the
vision of the U.S. But now, Dr. Muller asserts, there are two
superpowers: the United States and the merging, surging voice of the
people of the world.
All around the world, people are waging peace. To Robert Muller, one of
the great
advocates of the United Nations, it is nothing short of a miracle and it
is working.
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