Mandate from the Self-Deceived

Although the evil done by Dag Hammarskjold conspicuously survives him in the Congo and elsewhere, it would be unfair to describe the late UN Secretary General as a deliberate evildoer, and naive to depict the undermined West as cunningly duped. On the contrary, Hammarskjold earned his eulogies by tirelessly serving the West’s statesmen as custodian of their prized illusions.

Joseph P. Lash’s adoring biography is valuable precisely because of its ultra-Liberal slant. Where another might artfully fuzz up Hammarskjold’s role, the New York Post’s UN correspondent makes explicit the terms of the Swede’s mandate from the self-deceived. Hammarskjold was expected to banish the annoying Cold War, and to maintain the appearance of peace at any price. By whatever means he liked, he was to preserve the appealing concepts of coexistence, neutralism, disarmament and the rest against a contrary reality. In short, his function was to keep open the desperately-sought way out.

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Richard Whalen

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Although the evil done by Dag Hammarskjold conspicuously survives him in the Congo and elsewhere, it would be unfair to describe the late UN Secretary General as a deliberate evildoer, and naive to depict the undermined West as cunningly duped. On the contrary, Hammarskjold earned his eulogies by tirelessly serving the West’s statesmen as custodian of their prized illusions.

Joseph P. Lash’s adoring biography is valuable precisely because of its ultra-Liberal slant. Where another might artfully fuzz up Hammarskjold’s role, the New York Post’s UN correspondent makes explicit the terms of the Swede’s mandate from the self-deceived. Hammarskjold was expected to banish the annoying Cold War, and to maintain the appearance of peace at any price. By whatever means he liked, he was to preserve the appealing concepts of coexistence, neutralism, disarmament and the rest against a contrary reality. In short, his function was to keep open the desperately-sought way out.