Just imagine for a moment if the world halved its military spending and channeled the monies into areas contributing to the development of human kind and not the destruction of it. How can this be done you say? Wouldn't currently well defended countries, be then open to attack from other nations?

Not if every military in the world joined forces under one banner - The United Nations. The United Nations (U.N.) is the only one truly global organisation that is capable of holding such power. It is truly representative of its 191 member states and is the one global governing body that has committed itself to real peace and security, economic and social development, human rights, international law and the advancement of civil society everywhere.

It is true that the U.N. has it problems. Most of which are caused by lack of money and resources. Another issue is the, dead lock that the veto has at the security council. But some could say necessary if they were to control the worlds military. But the framework is in place at the United Nations for it to take on a larger role in the world. It just needs to resources and the rest will happen.

Some people would ask, by having a single global defence force under the control of the U.N. and therefore creating peace between nations, then why have a military or defence force at all? Unfortunately, it isn't a perfect world that we live in and nor will it ever be. There will always be external forces that attempt to disrupt and harm our global village, whether it is terrorism, human rights violators or even the very unlikely but remotely possible chance of alien attack. We should always be prepared for the unexpected.

Think of any conflict in the world. Then imagine the existence of a fully resourced United Nations Defense Force acting as the only military in that region. With such a force, backed up by a fully working International Criminal Court for violators of human rights, I can't see how new conflicts could arise.

Yes, it would be far more difficult to reign in the current conflicts than to prevent new ones. With one U.N. defence force and many of the courses of the conflicts eliminated with a better sharing of resources. It would happen with time. If you disagree, I hope to hear from you so we can discuss.

But is it even possible? Would countries like the U.S. and China ever half their military spending and hand control of the remaining forces to another body? This is of course the biggest obstacle to a proposal like this ever happening. I'm sure you would find no opposition from smaller countries that feel pressured by countries with large military powers, but convincing super powers to lessen their grip on their major bargaining tools is a big ask.

We are at a crossroads and the worlds governments know it. We either come together or the current model of competing nation states will rip us apart. Resources are limited, but if better shared we can all co-exist.

This especially rings true when you start to think what good could be done with the half a Trillion US Dollars that would be saved by the global community if military spending was cut in half. There are many examples of how such as massive redirection of resources could be spent to bring about human rights, which sets the scene for the natural upward mobility of people everywhere

For example the approximately 2 Trillion US Dollars(2) of foreign debt that the “developing” countries owe, could be wiped out in approximately 4 years. As the amount of interest payments as a percentage of government spending is getting out of control, wiping out this debt would alone be a massive step going towards eradicating world poverty. In addition to wiping out 3rd world debt, if spending the savings of a reduced defence force went into the creation of self sustainable communities around the globe, then within 10 years we would see such a different world that many would say is impossible right now.

Halving the world military spend and putting the worlds military under one banner would bring about a peace that many think is impossible right now. Ideas like these need to be discussed, scrutinised and put forward. It is only with the people demanding such changes, instead of the very dangerous status quo, that something will happen. History proves to us that if the people demand something, then it will happen.

Although possible and so beneficial, if this doesn't happen anytime soon, there should still be a concerted effort to better share the worlds resources. Please think about this, The GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the poorest 48 nations (i.e. a quarter of the world's countries) is less than the wealth of the world's three richest people combined(3). There is something wrong here and everybody will pay the consequences if it isn't addressed.

The human race has everything needed to create a better world for all. A fairer allocation of resources will go a long way to making that a reality. Some more imaginative approaches could take us to heights currently only imagined by a few.

(1) Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

(2) New Internationalist

(3) Ignacio Ramonet, The politics of hunger, Le Monde Diplomatique, November 1998

Revised: 28th November 2006