Brian Urquhart

Major Sir Brian Edward Urquhart (28 February 1919 – 2 January 2021) was a British Army officer, politician and writer. He played a significant role in the founding of the United Nations.

After a time at Badminton School in Bristol, where his mother taught, Urquhart won a scholarship to Westminster School and went on to Christ Church, Oxford, before leaving university on the outbreak of war.

Military service When World War II broke out, Urquhart joined the British Army and, after a brief training period, was commissioned as an officer in the Dorsetshire Regiment on 14 January 1940. His service number was 113613. He was warned that his loss of mobility could be permanent, and spent months in the hospital recovering and regaining his strength.

The episode was described by Cornelius Ryan in his book on "Market Garden", A Bridge Too Far. In the film version, directed by Richard Attenborough, Urquhart's character (portrayed by Irish actor Frank Grimes) was renamed "Major Fuller", to avoid confusion with the British general Roy Urquhart, the commander of the 1st Airborne Division at Arnhem. The subsequent failure of the operation and the heavy casualties that resulted vindicated Urquhart's judgment. He became deeply depressed by his failure to persuade his superiors to halt the operation, and requested a transfer out of the airborne forces.

Urquhart was one of the first allied personnel to enter the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in April 1945. His experience there partly spurred him on to be involved in peacemaking at the United Nations. He loyally served by Hammarskjöld's side until the latter's death in 1961, admiring him greatly in spite of admittedly never getting to know him very well on a personal level.

During the Suez Crisis of 1956 Urquhart played a critical role in creating what turned out to be the first major U.N. effort towards conflict resolution and peacekeeping. As Hammarskjöld's only major adviser with military experience Urquhart took the lead in organising the first U.N. peacekeeping force, which was designed to separate the Egyptian and Israeli forces then fighting each other in the Sinai Peninsula. To differentiate the peacekeepers from other soldiers, the U.N. wanted the soldiers to wear blue berets. When it turned out that those would take six weeks to make, Urquhart proposed the characteristic blue helmets, which could be converted in a day by painting over normal ones.

In the early 1960s Urquhart served as the main U.N. representative in the Congo, succeeding his friend Ralph Bunche. His efforts to stabilise the war-torn country were hampered by the chaos created by innumerable warring factions. At one point Urquhart was abducted, brutally beaten and threatened with death by undisciplined Katangese troops. He survived only by persuading his captors that his death would bring retribution by U.N. Gurkha troops, whom the Katangans greatly feared.

He served as the U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Special Political Affairs from 1972 until his retirement in 1986. As Under-Secretary-General, Urquhart's main functions were the direction of peacekeeping forces in the Middle East and Cyprus, and negotiations in these two areas; amongst others, his contributions also included work on the negotiations relating to a Namibia peace settlement, negotiations in Kashmir, Lebanon and work on peaceful uses for nuclear energy. His book Decolonization and World Peace is based on his 1988 Tom Slick world peace lectures that he gave at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin. The appendices offer further insight into his views on the peacekeeping potential of the United Nations. Included are his remarks at the Nobel Prize banquet in Norway on the occasion of the award of the 1988 Nobel Peace Prize to the United Nations Peace-Keeping Forces. He also wrote biographies of Hammarskjöld and Bunche. He was also a member of the Order of the British Empire. He received the Freedom from Fear Award (part of the Four Freedoms Award) in 1984, as well as the Distinguished Peacekeeper Award by the International Peace Academy.

To celebrate Urquhart’s work on behalf of the United Nations, the Sir Brian Urquhart Award is given annually by the United Nations Association – UK for distinguished service to the United Nations.

His biographical book Ralph Bunche: An American Odyssey (1993), was used to create a William Greaves documentary film of the same name in 2001.

Personal life

Urquhart was described as Non-religious. He married Alfreda Huntington, daughter of the writer Gladys Huntington, but the couple later divorced.

Selected works

Books

Lectures

Reflections on the United Nations: Interviews of Sir Brian Urquhart by Ms. Virginia Morris, Principal Legal Officer Codification Division, United Nations Office of Legal Affairs in the Lecture Series of the United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law