In English we have an odd expression: “to have a good war”. The phrase was originally used to describe someone who was decorated or otherwise distinguished themselves, usually during WW II. Allan Massie, for example, wrote that author William Golding “had a good war, first as an ordinary seaman, then as an officer in command of a Landing Craft Tank (Rocket) on D-Day”. Today, newspapers and blogs have been quick to use the phrase for politicians. So David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy are said to have had a “good war” over Libya, so far at least, with Barack Obama faring differently.
Organisations also have good and bad wars – with their experience either confirming their stature or predicting their demise. So the UN Security Council has had a surprisingly decent war. Gridlocked for most of the Cold War and active in the immediate post-Cold War period, the council had begun to revert.
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