Well over ten years ago now, we willingly decided to pretty much ignore the U.N. and the U.N. security council with our decision to invade Iraq. It’d be nice to think that a better system would have forced us to balance our interests against those of other powerful and influential states with some stake in the claim. But make no mistake, the U.N. has got serious problems and seems at times hopelessly outdated and inefficient…attractive to secular humanists and idealists, inclusive of rogues and dictators, and creating lots of bad incentives.
As a result we (and we aren’t the only ones) have to rationally pursue the majority of our self-interest outside the U.N. and still must find common ground and form alliances as we did in Iraq.