WWII and the United Nations

In August 1941, the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, and the American President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, signed the Atlantic Charter on board the HMS Prince of Wales somewhere off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. It was a proposal for international collaboration in maintaining peace and security, as well as economic stability.

Franklin D. Roosevelt coined the phrase “United Nations” on January 1st, 1942 when making reference to the 26 Allied nations which were fighting against the Axis powers - which consisted of Germany, Japan and Italy - in the Declaration by the United Nations. The nations which signed the Declaration were the United States, the United Kingdom, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, China, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Poland, South Africa, and Yugoslavia.

All bold words are defined in the Glossary. Click here to go to the Glossary

As the war progressed and people witnessed the atrocities which came with it, the concept of the United Nations, as an international organization, started taking form. The USSR, the USA, China and Britain signed a declaration at The Moscow Conference, in the Soviet Union on October 30, 1943, which stated that these nations would create an organization to maintain peace and security. Just about one month later, in Teheran in present-day Iran, these countries restated their wish to implement the concept of such an organization.

Even though the USSR, the USA, the UK and China had already expressed their wish to make a United Nations at the conferences of Moscow and Teheran, it was at Dumbarton Oaks, from September to October 1944, that the countries discussed how such an institution would operate, and what it would do. This time, they made sure not repeat the mistakes of the League of Nations, yet managed to keep some of its good points. For instance, unlike the League of Nations, a two-thirds majority would be required to approve a resolution. That way, the UN would not be paralysed by the lack of agreement between contrasting policies of different countries, as the League of Nations had been. As well, in order to keep the world’s most powerful nations in the UN, the USA due to its military and economic strength, the USSR due to its military might, China due to its large population, and Britain due to its vast colonial interests, were given veto power and were made permanent members of the Security Council; in other words, the United Nations could not make any decision without their unanimous consent. At this time, France was under German occupation, so it was not made a permanent member of the Security Council, even though it also had a vast colonial empire in Africa, Asia, the Pacific and the Caribbean. However, after the war and once France had been freed, it gained equal status with the other powerful nations.