The Criticism of League of Nations and Why it Failed

The League of Nations was an organization established in 1919-1920 after the Treaty of Versailles. It contained up to 58 members at its greatest extend in year 1934-1935. The organizations intentions were discouraging aggression from any nation, encouraging business and trade cooperation, disarmament, improving the living and working conditions in all parts of the world. Although the League of Nations was determined to successfully fulfill its intentions, it failed miserably as it could not maintain peace and nation cooperation as it promised. Throughout its existence there were multiple conflicts and disputes which the League could not resolve successfully and eventually led to a new World War. It was heavily criticized during the interwar period and at the time it seemed that the whole criticism was fairly relevant and reasonable.

Firstly, the Leagues inner structure was the break in dealing with important matters. The council was a group of people which met at least once a year and its main purpose was to resolve disputes between nations worldwide through discussion. Obviously the number of the meetings was too low and each member in the council had a veto which meant that it had a rough time in gaining an agreement in the matter they were solving, because one member could terminate the Leagues decision although the rest of the council voted otherwise. Secondly, certain members of the League of Nations were self centered and looked mostly for their own intentions, safety and wellbeing. This led the League to failures because every single member disagreed and wanted the solution that suited it the best or didn't involve it in particular (possible) conflict.

For example, in 1920 the league was authorized to solve a conflict between Lithuania and Poland. Vilna (now Vilnius) was made the capital of the state of Lithuania, but its population was largely Polish. So a private Polish army took the capital of Lithuania by force. Lithuanians appealed for help to the League. According to the Covenant (grand authority, rights) it could have sent British and French troops to force the Poles out of the region. But France rejected this idea mainly because it saw Poland as potential defense partner in case of a German assault. This shows that the League could not make reasonable decisions because every member was trying to solve its own personal needs. All in all, the Leagues inner structure was a genuine and theoretically correct idea but it failed because of these circumstances.

One of the League of Nations main purpose was to maintain peace and security throughout the world. Many people found it rather impossible for the League to accomplish this aim. A lot of criticism was proclaimed for the League about this matter. For example, a rabbit facing a huge snake¹ (rabbit representing the League of Nations, snake - an international struggle the League was fighting against). This shows us that people doubted the idea of the Leagues capability to face these matters in a confident way. Their criticism was precise indeed as in 1931 a Japanese invasion into Manchuria began. Japan had a very powerful army and navy and because the Depression hit Japan badly, it decided to invade Manchuria and expand the Japanese empire. China appealed to the League for help but the process that it took for the League to start taking this matter in their hands was too slow. Although eventually it was stated that Japan invaded Manchuria illegally, the League was powerless to overpower Japan. It tried discussing economical sanctions but it would have been inefficient because USA, the main trade center between Japan, never joined the League. This clearly reflects the idea of the cartoon, that the League has never had a strong and dominant position in dealing with military situations and because of the arrogance and weak stand for its own policies, it looked simply as a puny rabbit facing the impossible.

Disarmament was also a major point in the Leagues intentions: "The Members of the League recognize

that the maintenance of peace requires the reduction of national armaments to the lowest point consistent with national safety and the enforcement by common action of international

obligations.²" This is an extract from the Covenant of the League. Reduction of arms was never achieved because no country was interested in it. This shows the Leagues lack of persuasion in defending its own laws. Many people though it was doomed in the first place and it was indeed.

All in all, the League of Nations was a failure and the criticism it received was justified by its actions. Assuming its genuine idea of maintaining peace in the world and economic cooperation, the League of Nations was needed in the world at that particular time but the world wasn't ready due to the previous horrors it suffered in the World War I. League of Nations was ended in 1946.