League of Nations Intentions and Authority

Collective security articles

Article 8: reduce arms; Article 10: respect territorial bounds - the core intentions of the League

Challenge: aggressive militaristic states

Built on ultranationalism: the Japanese invasion of Manchuria (1931) and Nanking (1937); the Italian invasion of Abyssinia (1935) and Albania (1939); Germany remilitarising the Rhineland

Challenge: consequences of the peace treaties

The 1923 Lausanne Treaty repatriated 0.5 million Turks and 1.2 million Greeks; Article 1 of the NSDAP fuelled Germans wanting reunification in the Sudetenland and Anschluss

Challenge: lack of military mechanism

No commitment to military force, and resolutions were often ignored - e.g. Japan over Manchuria, Poland over Vilna (1920), and Colonel Beck's refusal of the Minority Treaties in 1934

Challenge: British and French hypocrisy

Appeasement conflicted with Article 10; the Hoare-Laval Pact conceded 2/3 of Abyssinia to Italy and contributed to a lack of oil sanctions for self-serving reasons (against Article 16's economic sanctions); the denial of Japan's racial equality clause led to the co-prosperity sphere

Challenge: America's absence

The failure of the US (the largest economy) to join reduced the impact of Article 16's economic sanctions - it refused to join any sanctions against Italy in 1935; Article 10's commitment to protect all members was seen as a violation of sovereignty

Challenge: departures of member states

Germany and Japan left in 1931, Italy in 1937, challenging its legitimacy as a supranational body

Success: early conflict mediator

German-Polish relations were managed with the 1921 plebiscite in Silesia; the Greeks withdrew their invasion of Bulgaria (1925)

Success: humanitarian aid

The Refugee Organisation returned half a million POWs and built refugee camps throughout Turkey (1922); the Health Organisation did critical work preventing malaria and leprosy

Success: economic and minority protections

The ILO offered economic advice to Hungary (1923) and Austria (1922); under the Minority Treaties, Estonia and Latvia granted rights to their minorities