Logo

American Security Council Foundation

Back to main site

Alan W. Dowd is a Senior Fellow with the American Security Council Foundation, where he writes on the full range of topics relating to national defense, foreign policy and international security. Dowd’s commentaries and essays have appeared in Policy Review, Parameters, Military Officer, The American Legion Magazine, The Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations, The Claremont Review of Books, World Politics Review, The Wall Street Journal Europe, The Jerusalem Post, The Financial Times Deutschland, The Washington Times, The Baltimore Sun, The Washington Examiner, The Detroit News, The Sacramento Bee, The Vancouver Sun, The National Post, The Landing Zone, Current, The World & I, The American Enterprise, Fraser Forum, American Outlook, The American and the online editions of Weekly Standard, National Review and American Interest. Beyond his work in opinion journalism, Dowd has served as an adjunct professor and university lecturer; congressional aide; and administrator, researcher and writer at leading think tanks, including the Hudson Institute, Sagamore Institute and Fraser Institute. An award-winning writer, Dowd has been interviewed by Fox News Channel, Cox News Service, The Washington Times, The National Post, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and numerous radio programs across North America. In addition, his work has been quoted by and/or reprinted in The Guardian, CBS News, BBC News and the Council on Foreign Relations. Dowd holds degrees from Butler University and Indiana University. Follow him at twitter.com/alanwdowd.

ASCF News

Scott Tilley is a Senior Fellow at the American Security Council Foundation, where he writes the “Technical Power” column, focusing on the societal and national security implications of advanced technology in cybersecurity, space, and foreign relations.

He is an emeritus professor at the Florida Institute of Technology. Previously, he was with the University of California, Riverside, Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute, and IBM. His research and teaching were in the areas of computer science, software & systems engineering, educational technology, the design of communication, and business information systems.

He is president and founder of the Center for Technology & Society, president and co-founder of Big Data Florida, past president of INCOSE Space Coast, and a Space Coast Writers’ Guild Fellow.

He has authored over 150 academic papers and has published 28 books (technical and non-technical), most recently Systems Analysis & Design (Cengage, 2020), SPACE (Anthology Alliance, 2019), and Technical Justice (CTS Press, 2019). He wrote the “Technology Today” column for FLORIDA TODAY from 2010 to 2018.

He is a popular public speaker, having delivered numerous keynote presentations and “Tech Talks” for a general audience. Recent examples include the role of big data in the space program, a four-part series on machine learning, and a four-part series on fake news.

He holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Victoria (1995).

Contact him at stilley@cts.today.

China - In the U.N.

Monday, July 31, 2023

Written by Laurence F Sanford, Senior Analyst ASCF

Categories: ASCF News ASCF Articles

Comments: 0

nato-meeting-700x420

China has undue influence on UN agencies despite being only the sixth largest contributor to the UN’s overall budget.

Total UN Contributions 2021:
• U.S $12.5 billion
• Germany $6.1 “
• Sweden $2.8 “
• Japan $2.7 “
• U.K. $2.0 “
• China $2.0 “

Much ado is made of China being the UN’s second largest contributor, after the United States, in UN funding. But like much of China’s “gray zone” deception tactics in conjunction with favorable Marxist media coverage, it is second only in the Member Assessment category. The U.S. contributes $3.2 billion in this category, and China contributes $1.8 billion. The complex formula for Member Assessments is based on gross national product, per capita income, and other criteria.

But in Voluntary Contributions, the U.S. contributes $9.2 billion, while China contributes only $175 million. The United States spends approximately $50 billion annually on foreign aid.

The U.N. agencies where China gets a bigger bang for the buck:

World Health Organization (WHO)
WHO’s Director-General Tedros Adhanom is beholden to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). He previously served in an Ethiopian Marxist government as Health Director and then as Foreign Minister when Ethiopia received millions of dollars in aid from China. Tedros became the Director-General of WHO primarily through the influence of China. Tedros is an example of “elite capture,” where an individual is corrupted by Chinese money, access, or favors. In turn, the recipient will return favors toward China.

A shameful display from the WHO demonstrating its subservience to the CCP occurred in 2020 when Taiwan was raising red flags about a mysterious disease in Wuhan. The World Health Assembly (WHA), the forum through which the World Health Organization is governed by its 194 member states, kept Taiwan at arm’s length and refused to allow Taiwan to participate in the global response to the Wuhan Virus (Covid-19).

Tedros was also responsible for the WHO report that absolved China’s Wuhan Lab from spreading the virus. WHO followed the CCP line on the pandemic in stating that bats, not the Wuhan lab, were the source of the pandemic. The report was shallow at best since the CCP did not allow WHO full access to the Wuhan Lab. Furthermore, WHO promoted the CCP policies of facemasks and lockdowns, which have been proven ineffective and have cost millions of lives and billions of dollars in world economies. Lives were shattered, education suffered, suicides increased, and the social fabric was sundered due to the lockdowns.

Peacekeeping Operations
China provides more personnel for peacekeeping operations than any other permanent member of the Security Council. These contributions enable China to exert diplomatic and political influence globally. China was the tenth-largest overall contributor of peacekeeping personnel, with approximately 2200 as of December 2022. Nonpermanent members Bangladesh, India, and Nepal each had contributed nearly triple the number of peacekeepers.

International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)
Led by Secretary General Fang Liu, the ICAO advanced policies dictated by the CCP, including new air routes in violation of ICAO procedures. Liu also concealed for months a hack on its computers believed to have been launched by a Chinese hacker group and allowed the malware to spread throughout the airline industry. An independent investigation in 2017 would conclude that the malicious software used in the attack had been identified by ICAO antivirus software a year earlier. However, the computers still had not been disinfected. The ICAO information technology team contacted a New York-based IT agency affiliated with the UN to analyze the attack but ultimately rejected its expertise.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
The IPCC is the UN body for assessing climate change science. It is also in the hip pocket of the CCP. The Epoch Times (July 26-August 1, 2023) reports that independent Environmental Progress found that solar panels made in China produce at least 3X more carbon emissions than the IPCC claims. National and international studies have yet to be conducted to verify the basis of the IPCC claim. Could it be just made-up data from the Chinese solar panel manufacturers? Ninety-seven percent of the global supply of solar wafers is made in China. The IPCC has not responded to the report.

Solar panel waste is an issue that the IPCC is not addressing. Solar panels contain heavy metals, which can be released in a cloud if the panels are shattered during disposal. Solar panels often contain lead, cadmium, antimony, and other toxic chemicals that cannot be removed without breaking apart the entire panel. To recycle a panel is $20 to $30 more expensive than burying it in a landfill.

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) in 2016 estimated that there were about 250,000 metric tons of solar panel waste worldwide at the end of that year. IRENA projected that this amount could reach 78 million tons by 2050.

Summary

The CCP has manipulated the UN to promote its national agenda against the world's common good. When Chinese nationals are elected to lead UN organizations, the CCP uses these opportunities to promote national interests. The CCP is not above intimidation or bribery to achieve its goals.

How the CCP can get away with genocide against its Muslim Uighur citizens and not get a peep from the outside Muslim world or condemnation in the UN is an excellent example of CCP influence. Meanwhile, just one person in Sweden burning a Quran generates worldwide Muslim outrage.

The CCP’s Climate Change hoax is multi-faceted and will be the subject of another paper. China is the world’s biggest polluter and emitter of carbon dioxide. It continues by building two coal power plants weekly versus the U.S. building none. Yet there is NO UN condemnation of China’s pollution.

The CCP ignores the UN's finding that China’s claims to the South China Sea are bogus. China continues to harass and intimidate air and sea traffic.

The United States must step up its actions by exerting its strengths in promoting the American creed of democracy, free markets, fair trade, and freedom of speech and religion. Stop funding nations that side with China and America’s enemies. Reduce Voluntary Contributions to the UN.

Peace Through Strength!

Laurence F. Sanford
Senior Analyst
American Security Council Foundation
www.ascf.us

Please donate to ASCF! We need support to continue our mission of educating Americans on issues of national security, economic security, and moral leadership.

Comments RSS feed for comments on this page

There are no comments yet. Be the first to add a comment by using the form below.