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- The undertaking to give the United Nations every assistance in any action which takes place in accordance with the Charter, and to refrain from giving assistance to any State against which the United Nations is taking preventive or enforcement action.
These principles include a respect for the sovereign equality of States, and the territorial integrity and political independence of States. They also include a pledge to serve the aims of justice and the cause of peace.
Our fellow Members of the United Nations have placed in our hands the primary, but not the sole responsibility, for the maintenance of international peace and security. They have given to us authority to act on their behalf, and they will expect us to remember these principles at all times. I am sure that so long as we do so the Security Council will be a great power for good in the world, bringing that freedom from fear which is necessary before we can hope for progress and welfare in all lands.
The first task before the Security Council will necessarily be of an organizational kind, so that it may establish itself and complete all the arrangements necessary for its smooth working and continuous functioning. I trust that this essential business will be completed expeditiously, so that we may give immediate attention to the completion of the system of security described in the Charter.
In addition to the preliminary organization, I feel that I should call attention to the need, in accordance with Article 43 of the Charter, for the negotiation of special agreements amongst states, so that the Security Council may have available at its call as soon as possible the armed forces, assistance and facilities necessary to maintain peace. For the conclusion of these agreements, the advice and assistance of the Military Staff Committee will be necessary; one of the first acts of the Security Council will be to call this Committee into being and to direct it in the task that it is to perform. When this process is complete, the Security Council will be fully equipped to perform a function which is unique in the history of international organization—the direction of collective action for the maintenance of peace, justice, and the rule of law.
I would stress, therefore, that the calling together of the Security Council will not by itself establish peace. The maintenance of peace requires the co-operation of all Members of the United Nations. That co-operation rests, in the ultimate issue, on the will of the peoples of the world to work for peace. A real will to peace must spring, not from fear, but from positive faith in the brotherhood of men.
The more speedily and smoothly we can complete this preliminary work, the sooner will the Security Council be capable of exercising its full powers for the good of all-nations, so that we may find the means of living together in peace with one another as good neighbours. Conscious of the urgent nature of the responsi
