Did you know?

How many times has the US sought UN authorization for military action in the 50 some odd year history of the UN?

One.

Two, if you count the Korean War when the UN acted because the USSR was boycotting the Security Council when the vote was taken.

Glenn Reynolds cites an article by David Frum written for the American Enterprise Institute. Here below is the Frum paragraphs:

For most of the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, Americans dismissed the UN as a basically useless institution. Dwight Eisenhower did not ask it for UN authority before his military actions; neither did John F. Kennedy; ditto Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. Neither for that matter did Bill Clinton. The one and only U.S. President of the past 60 years to trouble himself with UN authority for the use of force was George H.W. Bush before the Gulf War of 1991.

The UN's ability to act decisively in 1991 rehabilitated the old talking-shop on the East River in American eyes--and, incidentally, dramatically increased the value of a permanent seat on the Security Council. If the UN fails to act in 2003, its prestige in the United States will plunge back toward its usual level: approximately zero. And the value of a seat on the Security Council will tumble with it.

Why, after all, do French opinions about Iraq matter more than those of, say, Italy or Brazil? If wealth is the measure of national importance, France ranks behind the State of California; if it's military strength, France barely makes it into the top 10, rather behind Israel. Americans are transfixed by French opinions only because the United States submitted its case to a body where, by an accident of history, the French happen to wield disproportionate power. If France wields that power in a hostile manner, no American president will ever return to that body again.