300            FOREIGN RELATIONS, 1946, VOLUME I

the requirement of unanimity tends to iiicrease the difficulties of adopt-
ing a clearcut decision by forcing the great powers to endeavor to find
a solution acceptable to all of them, it probably produces better results
than would a voting formula that permitted an important decision
unacceptable to any one of them. In any event, it prevents any tendency
for the Security Council on issues of major importance to the Great
Powers to become progressively committed to a course of action in-
consistent with the continued collaboration of one or more of those
Powers in the Security Council.

  Therefore, the United States should seek to direct the Assemblv
debate on the veto toward carefully considered and feasible objectives
which will strengthen the United Nations as much as present circum-
stances permit. Four general factors serve as guile posts in deternilln-
ing the objectives which are feasible:
  1. The highest possible degree of unanimity among the permanent
members is not only a desirable objective, but is considered essential
to the effective operation of the Security Council. Therefore, even if
all the other great powers were ready and willing to consent to a voting
formula in the Security Council which would permit substantive de-
cisionsk where the great powers were not unanimous, it is not at all
certain that the United States should favor such a formula, since it
would be likely to retard the achievement of unanimity. In situatiolns
where the principle of unaninity should be mnaintained. the voting
formula itself should be changed to permit decisions which are not
arrived at unanimously only if extended experience shows that such
change is necessary for the successful operation of the Council.
  It is pointed out in the Four Power Statement (Part I, Paragraphs
6 and 7) 71 that the, voting formula in the Security Council is in itself
a relaxation of the stricter conception of unaniimity contailned in the
Covenant of the League of Nations.

  §Certain decisions of the Council under Chapter VI, now requiring
the con-
currence of all the Permanent Members might well be adopted by an unqualified
majority of any seven members without affecting the objectives set forth
herein.
See C, 2 infra. [Footnote in the original.]
  n These paragraphs read: "6. In appraising the significance of the
vote required
to take such decisions or actions, it is useful to make comparison with the
require-
ments of the League Covenant with reference to decisions of the League Council.
Substantive decisions of the League of Nations Council could be taken only
by
-the unanimous vote of all its members, whether permanent or not, with the
exception of parties to a dispute under Article XV of the League Covenant.
Under
Article XI, under which most of the disputes brought before the Leautie were
dealt with and decisions to make investigations taken, the unanimity rule
was
invariably interpreted to include even the votes of the parties to a dispute.
  "7. The Yalta voting formula substitutes for the rule of complete
unanimity
of the League Council a system of qualified majority voting in the Security
Council. Under this system, non-permanent members of the Security Council
individually would have no 'veto'. As regards the permanent members, there
is
no question under the Yalta formula of investing them with a new right, namely,
-the right to veto, a right which the permanent members -of the League Council
always had. The formula proposed for the taking of action in the Security
Coun-
cil by a majority of seven would make the operation of the Council less subject
to obstruction than was the case under the League of Nations rule of complete
-unanimity."