By Steven Mufson and Colum Lynch

Washington - The failure of the United Nations to prevent bloodshed in East Timor, despite clear warnings from officials inside and outside the organization, is reigniting a debate about whether the world body is equipped to deal with urgent humanitarian crises, particularly inside the borders of sovereign states. At the UN General Assembly last week, Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for even greater UN involvement in conflicts within national borders, saying that state sovereignty ''is being redefined.'' President Bill Clinton reaffirmed his own interventionist impulse. ''When we are faced with deliberate, organized campaigns to murder whole peoples or expel them from their land, the care of victims is important, but not enough,'' he said.

Yet many doubt whether the United Nations can adapt, or whether key member countries such as the United States want it to adapt, to meet these new demands and expectations. In responding to the crisis in East Timor - just as in Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Kosovo - the world body was hamstrung by the absence of a standing UN military force, schisms in a Security Council where five nations have veto power, a shortage of funds, and the plodding, insulated and overly deferential dynamics of the 185-member organization. The disaster in East Timor is a case study of the problems of the organization, and it raises tough questions for the ''Clinton doctrine'' of humanitarian-driven interventionism.

On the eve of signing an agreement with Indonesia in May to allow an independence referendum in East Timor, several senior UN officials were full of apprehension rather than joy. True, the vote would let East Timorese decide their fate, 24 years after Indonesia occupied the former Portuguese colony, and Mr. Annan would call the May 5 signing ''an historic moment.'' But the Indonesian government had scratched out sections in the original UN draft that demanded the disarming of anti-independence militias and the confining of Indonesian soldiers to barracks. Indonesia's Foreign Ministry also had rejected an April 30 letter from Mr. Annan that tried to get a personal commitment from President B.J. Habibie on security guarantees during the referendum.

''I cannot hide my apprehensions regarding the course on which we are about to embark,'' a senior UN official wrote in an internal memorandum just before the signing. Citing the possibility of intimidation, vote rigging and violence, he wrote: ''Apart from the moral opprobrium that would be heaped on the UN were we to follow such a course, the consequences for the long-term stability of East Timor would be disastrous. Will any of our 'friends' come to redeem our reputation? I somewhat doubt it.''

Those words seem prophetic now. The capital of East Timor, Dili, lies in ruins, and the reputation of the United Nations is badly bruised. East Timor had been widely ignored since Indonesia invaded in 1975. Although the United Nations condemned the annexation that followed in 1976, few major powers - especially the United States - were ready for a showdown over it. But the issue festered. A small guerrilla group fighting for independence became a persistent nuisance, and the awarding of the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize to two East Timor leaders focused attention on the territory.

The door to independence opened in January, when Mr. Habibie said he would let East Timor choose between independence and autonomy within Indonesia. At the United Nations, Mr. Habibie's offer was seen as a ''window of opportunity'' that could soon slam shut, said a senior diplomat. With Mr. Habibie's term ending in the fall, no one knew who might replace him and what that person's attitude would be toward East Timor. Negotiations between Indonesia and the former colonial ruler of East Timor, Portugal, produced a draft agreement. Because the deal gave Jakarta responsibility for security, the United Nations wanted assurances. On April 30, Mr. Annan sent his letter to Mr. Habibie and it was rejected. On May 4, he sent a memorandum laying out ''necessary security conditions.'' He got no reply, sources said. It was an awkward time. NATO was fighting over Kosovo. The United States had been content to take a supporting role, and Portugal ''feared that if this referendum, didn't happen before Mr. Habibie left office, it would never happen,'' UN diplomats said.

On May 5, the accord was signed. ''There was a great desire to get this issue off the agenda, and the United Nations, saw in Mr. Habibie's proposal a way to do that,'' said Adam Schwarz, an expert on Indonesia at Johns Hopkins University. ''The problem is, they were not asking the hard questions about whether this was workable.'' Officials from the United Nations and five countries - the United States, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Japan - began meeting weekly in May to plan a peacekeeping operation that would keep order after the anticipated withdrawal of Indonesia from the territory in November.

But before the referendum, there was no planning for a multinational intervention force capable of stopping possible militia violence. ''You can't go to the Security Council and say, 'We think Indonesia is going to implement a scorched-earth policy and we need a policy of foreign intervention now,''' said a diplomat familiar with the planning. ''The politics of the council are such that you can't paint a worst-case scenario.'' Instead, diplomacy was wielded to try to persuade Indonesia to keep order. Among others, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Joseph Ralston, spoke to the Indonesian defense minister, General Wiranto, a number of times, stressing the need to maintain order. Nonetheless, by the Aug. 30 vote, around 10,000 militia members, including 2,000 heavily armed irregulars, had flooded East Timor, according to U.S. estimates.

On Sept. 3, the referendum results were announced: 78.5 percent of East Timorese had voted for independence. Militias went on a rampage. In the United States, there were divided views on how to aid the East Timorese. With U.S. forces taxed by Kosovo and other peacekeeping commitments, Pentagon and National Security Council officials resisted yet another foreign military effort. ''People always understood things could go badly,'' a senior Pentagon official said. ''But under the circumstances, we felt it would be much better if there were an Asian face on this.'' After a week of threats from the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, United Nations and Washington, Indonesia agreed to allow an international force to restore order.

Some UN officials have since asked themselves whether Mr. Annan should have postponed the referendum, as he could have under the May 5 agreement. UN diplomats answer that Xanana Gusmao, the East Timorese leader under house arrest; Mr. Ramos-Horta; and Constancio Pinto, a former guerrilla fighter who represents East Timor at the United Nations, all favored proceeding. The senior New York diplomat also said that many people misread the intentions of Indonesia, including Stapleton Roy, the U.S. ambassador to Indonesia. When the military pulled out troops and replaced its East Timor commander, many analysts thought that meant the military was accepting independence. Few believed that Indonesia would risk billions of dollars in foreign investment and IMF loans by launching a scorched-earth policy in plain view of international observers.