T V R Shenoy has a good defence of India’s strategic ambivalence on the Iraq issue. He is particularly scathing towards the UN:
One might argue that individual affiliates of the United Nations — UNICEF, WHO, or the World Food Programme have done a decent job on the whole. But they can, and should, be spun off to become independent bodies (like the International Red Cross). Because the United Nations on the whole is nothing but a collection of lazy, unimaginative bureaucrats, selected without any regard for merit. As for the General Assembly, it deserves nothing but our contempt.

Let me take you back to December 7, 1971, when the General Assembly voted on the infamous ‘Uniting for Peace’ resolution. Pakistan had attacked India three days earlier, and India had recognised Bangladesh as an independent nation on December 6. But while Islamabad’s treatment of the Bengalis had long been a global scandal, it was India that was at the receiving end in the General Assembly. We lost that vote by 104 to 11, with only the Soviet bloc standing by us.

I have had little respect for the United Nations’ moral posturing ever since. That body celebrates its 58th birthday later this year, the age when Indian bureaucrats retire. Perhaps a similar fate is indicated for the United Nations…