Basic Trope: Exactly What It Says: The UN has a standing military the size of a superpower’s (e.g. the United States, China).
- Straight: The UN has a superpower-sized military capable of sustaining full-scale war with other nations.
- Exaggerated:
- The UN military is ten-times the size of the United States’, reducing other nations’ power drastically.
- The UN creates its own space fleet by 2020 and rules the significant part of the galaxy while singular countries are not much stronger than today.
- Downplayed: The UN has a military force, but it is not superpower-sized, and is run by Bomb-Throwing Anarchists.
- Justified:
- With all the conflict in the world, the UN has to have a military in order to keep the peace.
- The nations of the world needed to provide a united front in order to fight extraterrestrial threats and the already existing UN serves as the most practical way to transition to a One World Government capable of leveraging all resources.
- The UN's Super Registration Act is less stiffling than the ones in the individual countries of the world. As a result, most Bomb-Throwing Anarchists flock to serving the UN.
- Inverted:
- The UN has no military, but the Taliban, Greenpeace and Apple does.
- The League of Nations Is A Superpower.
- Subverted: The UN simply commands other nations’ militaries during wartime…
- Double Subverted: …But is later revealed to be commanding them in peacetime too, in secret.
- Parodied: The UN’s military consists of thousands of men armed with flowers in an attempt to calm the enemy to death. It doesn't work.
- Zig Zagged: The UN does have a military, but they don’t use it in warfare and simply protects their own interests, but the military is later revealed to be controlled by the Illuminati, who are subsequently defeated by military mutineers and the UN gains superpower-status thanks to that.
- Averted: The UN has no standing military other than peacekeeping volunteers.
- Enforced: “The UN is just a bunch of boring bureaucrats; we’ve got to give them a proper army to make them cooler!”
- Lampshaded: “How come the United Nations has the military power of the United States? I thought they were a peacekeeping organization?”
- Invoked: Terrorist bomb the UN headquarters, forcing the organization to strengthen their military power…
- Exploited: …The United States then uses said military to aid in a war they started…
- Defied: …But the Hero tries to stop the UN’s military buildup, knowing it will bring more destruction.
- Discussed: “The UN needs more military power if they want to become a real superpower NGO.” “Yeah, but that’ll create a lot of tension between actual superpowers, right?” “True, but it is a risk we’ve got to take in order to secure the world.”
- Deconstructed: The UN's rise to power results in it becoming effective at everything except its actual job - facilitating communication between other countries to try to reduce the prevalence of needless wars. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure is an apt description as even their 'successes' are massively more expensive in money and lives.
- Conversed: “The UN sure looks a lot more badass with their army of elites.”
- Played For Laughs: The UN builds an army, but they have no idea how to do it and arm all their men with kitchen knives and uses catapults as artillery support.
- Played For Drama: The UN builds an army in order to subvert other nations' power and take over the world, finally achieving world peace through fear and submission.
- Played For Horror: When the UN decides to Take over the world, they really don't hold back with their atrocities.
- Implied: A news report mentions talks about the UN like it's a country, but the extent is not revealed.
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