This past year the United States rejoined UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, after a 19-year hiatus. The United States had been a founding member of the organization, established in 1945 in the wake of World War II. UNESCO's raison d'être is summed up in the words of American poet Archibald MacLeish included in its constitution: "Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be constructed." Though active in UNESCO for almost four decades, the United States withdrew in 1984, claiming that the body was overly bureaucratic, biased against the United ...