World War I was called the "war to end all wars," leading to the creation of the League of Nations in January 1920, an international body championed by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson to prevent future conflicts. But despite the American president's efforts, the United States never joined.

When the League's Assembly first met, it had just over 40 founding members. Over time, a total of 63 nations joined, though no more than 60 were members at any given time. But with a system requiring unanimity and other structural weaknesses, the League ultimately proved ineffective, collapsing when Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union invaded Poland in 1939.

Like many idealistic efforts throughout history, the League of Nations teetered for years before its final collapse at the end of World War II. Ironically, two of its most powerful members, Great Britain and France, undermined it by bypassing the League for self-serving actions, setting the stage for its failure.

Before that global conflict ended, efforts began to establish a new international rules-based structure to ensure lasting world peace — one where rules would take precedence over the power of individual states. This vision took shape in June 1945 when 50 countries signed the United Nations Charter, with Poland later joining as the 51st original member.

Since its founding, the U.N. has expanded into a vast network of about 30 specialized organizations, each focused on global issues ranging from health to trade. Together, these organizations spend over $50 billion annually and employ more than 133,000 staff worldwide.

Of these, a majority of the agencies — such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Trade Organization — are funded through mandatory contributions from member states. The rest, including the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and U.N. Women, primarily rely on voluntary donations.

More member states are cutting or withdrawing funding from U.N. organizations in response to growing concerns over their direction and actions. Much of the frustration centers on the U.N. Security Council, often described as a relic of the world as it was in 1944. It has failed in its most fundamental role — maintaining global peace.

A socialist-leaning idealist, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt crafted a U.N. Charter that cemented the perpetual power of five nations — those he designated as the "victors" of World War II: the United States, the United Kingdom, France, the Republic of China and the Soviet Union. In reality, none of the other four could have survived, let alone been seen as victors, without massive U.S. support. But perhaps Roosevelt felt awkward declaring America the world's sole superpower.

France was still recovering from over four years of German occupation, with Paris liberated less than a year before; the U.K. was economically exhausted; Chiang Kai-shek's government was on the brink of a full-blown civil war with Mao Zedong's Chinese Communist Party; Japan’s surrender was imminent; and Josef Stalin's USSR had quickly emerged as the newest threat to Europe, condemned by Winston Churchill in his famous "Iron Curtain" speech.

And despite all of that, the U.S. gave a permanent veto in the new U.N. to those four countries that could never be revoked or altered unless all five agreed. The U.N. Charter was intentionally designed like a locked bank vault where the key and combination were to be thrown away.

With the U.N.'s 80th anniversary approaching, we remain stuck with this structure — though in reality, there were two chances to fix it, and the U.S. squandered both.

The first came in October 1971, when U.S. President Richard Nixon allowed the Republic of China to be replaced by the People's Republic of China on the U.N. Security Council, handing a permanent, veto-wielding seat to Beijing. And now we have Xi Jinping.

The second came in 1991 — when the Soviet Union collapsed — and rather than reevaluating its Security Council seat, the world, including the U.S. under President George H.W. Bush, simply let the Russian Federation inherit it without a vote or formal process. And now we have Vladimir Putin.

Still, there have been attempts to reform the UNSC by adding new members — Japan among them — but they have repeatedly failed. Despite being the U.N.'s second-largest financial contributor for decades and still ranking third after the U.S. and China, Japan, along with India, Germany, the African Union and more recently the "Global South," has faced opposition. Any proposal that threatens the privileged status of the five permanent members has been blocked by at least one of them.

In fact, in 1963, the U.N. Charter was amended to increase the number of nonpermanent members in the UNSC from six to 10, while retaining the five veto-wielding permanent members.

Beyond the UNSC, troubling issues have emerged over the decades in various U.N. organizations and other international bodies not formally part of the United Nations system. One example is the alleged politicized prosecutorial decisions and blatant bias of the International Criminal Court, which has raised concerns by some about whether these organizations are exacerbating problems rather than solving them.

Here is a short list:

UNRWA is arguably the most notorious of the organizations today, with some of its staff being accused of involvement in the massacre of 1,200 Israelis and the abduction of over 250 hostages during the Oct. 7, 2023 attack. Other employees are alleged to have held hostages in UNRWA facilities and in homes. In response, the U.S. and several European countries are moving to defund and disband the agency.

The WHO is accused of being co-opted by China and failing to fulfill its core responsibilities to promote health, keep the world safe and serve the vulnerable — one of which was to confirm the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic, which many believe began in China, led to millions of deaths and caused trillions of dollars in global economic damage.

U.N. Women is accused of significant bias and of succumbing to pressure from Beijing and other governments to avoid investigating the systematic murder, torture, rape and abuse of women in countries such as Israel (both during the invasion and while women were hostages in Gaza), Iran and in China's Uyghur and Tibetan regions, as well as elsewhere.

Many of these organizations are now facing defunding or disbandment due to their failure to achieve their objectives. Aside from technical and standards-setting groups, like those for intellectual property, civil aviation and international telecommunications, few U.N. organizations effectively fulfill their mission.

And so, we come to the tough questions: Is the world nearing a League of Nations-like moment, where the international system collapses?

The unprovoked invasion of Ukraine by one of the permanent members of the Security Council, Russia; the body’s failure to stop another permanent member, China, from illegally occupying its neighbors’ territories in the South China Sea; and Iran’s sponsorship of terrorist proxies across the Middle East all suggest that the UNSC is unable to fulfill its core mission of ensuring peace. And like with the League, two of the most powerful countries of the current era are acting to overturn the world order.

Has faith in this postwar system eroded to the point where it’s on the verge of being dismantled or discarded? Which parts of the U.N. system can still be salvaged? Can a new international rules-based system, suited to the needs of the 21st century, be implemented alongside the existing U.N. framework as it appears headed for the same fate as the League of Nations?

The most perplexing question remains: Can we transition to a new system without plunging the planet into World War III?

[bio]Edo Naito is a commentator on Japanese politics, law and history. He is a retired international business attorney and has held board of director and executive positions at several U.S. and Japanese multinational companies.[bio]