This week, the independent report on the oil-for-food scandal was finally released, criticizing the United Nations from top to bottom. The language of the report was crystal clear: “The inescapable conclusion from the committee’s work” is that the UN “needs thorough reform—and it needs it urgently.”

The oil-for-food program was conceived to trade food, medicine and other supplies needed by the impoverished people of Iraq for oil around the world. While it did accomplish those goals to some degree, the program also resulted in billions of dollars of graft and was subject to corruption in businesses, governments, and at every level of the UN.

Thus, the most vaunted international institution in history enacted the largest financial scandal in history.

The independent report spoke about the UN’s reputation and the connection between its reputation and its ability to function effectively: “At stake is the UN’s ability to respond promptly and effectively to the responsibilities thrust upon it by the realities of a turbulent, and often violent, world. In the last analysis, that ability rests upon the organization’s credibility—on maintaining a widely held perception among member states and their populations of its competence, honesty and accountability.

“It is precisely those qualities that too often were absent in the administration of the oil-for-food program.”

That report comes as the UN is about to meet on the subject of reform; thus far, divisions run deep, and it appears the assembly will make little progress on the most important issues of UN management. Secretary General Kofi Annan’s chief of staff said his “deepest fear is that we’ll end up with a summit of empty words and broken promises.”

Secretary Annan was at the top of the list of those subject to criticism. “The report is critical of me personally, and I accept the criticism,” Annan said. He accepted that criticism, however, in typical UN fashion: “I don’t anticipate anyone to resign. We are carrying on with our work.” In the middle of what needs to be sweeping UN reform, that is the wrong response.

As Minnesota senator Norm Coleman said, “If the guy leading the charge is stained with a record of incompetence, of mismanagement, of fraud, it’s going to make it very hard for him to do the very heavy lifting required.”

The interesting thing is, Annan has reformed the UN before, and the institution we see today is the result. The reforms currently under proposal—“a culture of greater openness, coherence, innovation and confidence … more stringent standards for judging the performance of peacekeepers, in the field and at headquarters”—were taken straight from a UN dossier released in June 2002. Anyone can see how much good those reforms did the first time around.

Since the last time reform revolutionized UN headquarters, the oil-for-food scandal has cost billions of dollars—some of which may have ended up in the hands of terrorist organizations; in terms of dollars, this was quite possibly the biggest con job in the history of mankind. Even more sickening, the Congo sex scandal continued for over a year even after UN officials had knowledge of allegations that their peacekeepers had raped children as young as 12 and committed numerous other sex crimes.

Yes, it is time for reform. Perhaps the ineptitude of the UN in solving such problems would be less glaring if this vaunted institution had actually proved itself capable of preventing war. Instead, its 60-year history stands as a testament of failure.

Recognized and respected by leaders around the world, Herbert W. Armstrong attended the San Francisco Conference in 1945 at which the UN was formed. Mr. Armstrong wrote that at this conference, he heard chiefs of state “ring out the warning that this was the world’s last chance.” He went on to write, in his booklet The Wonderful World Tomorrow—What It Will Be Like, “But it has failed. The United Nations has no power over the nations. It has no power to settle disputes, stop wars or prevent wars. … Man has failed his last chance! Now God must step in—or we perish!”

By now, the problem should be obvious: Mankind simply cannot rule itself. The choices that even the highest leaders make are generally based on greed and a way of life that cannot bring peace or happiness.

The UN, built on a mandate of peace, is still at its core deceitful, greedy, and crippled by the evil influence of human nature. The UN may have been designed to keep peace between national governments as an international authority, but how sickening its failure is! What a powerful demonstration of the complete inability of man to rule successfully over man—and of the absolute need, if we are to survive in peace as a race—for the Creator God to intervene.

As Mr. Armstrong said, “God must step in—or we perish!”