UN General Assembly
1966

We have consistently held that, sooner or later, the use of some force will be necessary in this case, in spite of our national preference for peaceful means for the settlement of disputes, because we are dealing here with people who have shown themselves to be quite impervious to reason, because voluntary sanctions cannot be effective if some people are determined to ignore them, and mandatory sanctions necessarily imply the threat of force. We say that the sanctions should be made mandatory, and we are told that this would bring us into conflict with South Africa, which is known to be determined to flout the sanctions order in any event. As one eminent Journal pointed out recently, this case reminds one of the criticism by Mr. — as he then was — Winston Churchill of the similarly ambivalent position of the then United Kingdom Prime Minister on the occasion of the half-hearted decision of the League of Nations to impose economic sanctions against one of its members. Mr. Churchill spoke as follows: