The most relevant steps of WWII.

In 1939, the major countries involved at the beginning were Germany, France, the UK; then in 1940
Italy, in 1941 Soviet Union after the German invasion in Barbarossa operation. In the end, with the
Japanese attack on Pearl harbour and the consequent involvement of US, it turned to a world-spread
conflict.
What happens to the League of Nations and the ILO?
These bodies faced a total crisis, giving that the main aim, the maintenance of peace, was already
compromised. At that time, a lot of countries were not really part of the League anymore, even
though the League was still formally existing. With the German invasion, a lot of members of the
League of Nations didn’t exist anymore (dissolution of Czechoslovakia, Poland, Balkan states
cancelled as political entities, Denmark, Norway etc.).
A second reason was related to the geographical allocation. The bodies were located in Geneva, but
Switzerland was totally surrounded by hostile countries against the League of Nations (Germany,
Italy, France that collaborated with Germany). The headquarters had been relocated in the
American continent. ILO in Montreal, while the economic and financial section of the League (the
only survived) was transferred in Princeton. The work of the League, after the outbreak of the war,
was limited to the study and research on economic and financial matters (studies that will be used in
the futures in 1945 in order to reconstruct the international economic system, in Bretton-woods).
League of Nations failed in 1930s and now is replaced by the UN.
Even though much reduced in the size, ILO gave a stronger idea of continuity of the work, even
during the war. With the support of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1941, an International Labour
Conference was held in New York: it was one of the very first occasions in which the countries
against the Axis (so against Nazism, Fascism) met and declared all together that they would have
worked for a more democratic international system at the end of the war. The majority of the
countries represented at that conference were occupied in that moment, and the representatives were
in exile in London.
After the WWII, the concerns about how to rebuild the situation became popular among countries,
involved or not. In the UK a section of the British foreign office created a department for
international organization and treaties, something that already existed and became more important.
Of course at that time 1940-1941 these are not priorities.
In the US, not the US administration but a lot of private / semi-private associations created in 1939-
40-41, before the involvement of the US, aimed to organize international peace: one of the most
important was the Carnegie endowment for international peace, created before the WWI. Another
quite relevant body close to Roosevelt administration was the Commission for study the
organization of peace. In general, all those private bodies created at that time had sometimes
different visions about how to reorganize the world after war. The most important and influent of all
these bodies was and is still the Council of Foreign Relations, which is formally private, but it’s
also very close to the administration because it aimed to prepare the political personnel for the
international affairs. A lot of secretaries of State, foreign ministers or even presidents have been
formed within this body. The issue of how to reconstruct the world and reorganizing peace after
war, was something really spread in the intellectual and political circles of the US.
Most relevant steps that led the US toward the involvement in WWII
(The involvement happened in a quite similar way of WWI)
A first step taken by Roosevelt administration towards the involvement can be identified in the
approval, in 1941, of the Lend-lease Act. This law, approved by the American congress, gave to the
president the power to lend to friendly nations all the material they needed, if it was considered
necessary by the President for national security. This Act represents the means by which UK
obtained the material for fighting the Axis powers during the world. The Slogan was that “US play
a role of Arsenal of democracy”. This act needed to be formalized by a bilateral agreement, with the
UK, one of the basis on which the UN system would have been created later, was very long in
negotiations and it has been signed in 1942. The reason was that the UN administration, in return,
wanted the commitment by the UK administration, represented by Winston Churchill, to promote
an open world economy after war. A progressive liberalization of world economy would have
implied a progressive abolishment of colonial power. From 1941 to 1945, around 50 billion dollars
have been given by the US as a consequence of the act, not in money but raw material and
armaments.
The second step was the signature, in 1941, of the Atlantic Charter, another manifesto very similar
to Wilson’s 14 points. Since it was signed by the two allies (UK and US), before of the entry in the
war of the US, and it was considered binding. The aim was the reorganization of the world after the
war and it contained a list of conditions for the involvement of the US beside UK. It was composed
of 8 small chapters:
1. US and UK stated that they wouldn’t not seek territorial conquests;
2. Self-determination as a principle that, concretely, meant:
- the need of popular approval for all territorial changes (prohibition of military conquest as
Germany in Europe and Japan in Asia were doing);
- the need of popular approval for the form of government in every single country;
3. Free trade and free access to raw material for all the economic actors in the world, that was
possible only with the removal of protectionist barriers imposed by colonial empires after
the economic crisis of 1929;
4. Right of free navigation in all the seas of the world, with no preferential zones for this or
that country.
5. Principle of collective security, called in this case the “establishment of a wider and
permanent system of general security”;
6. Principle of abandonment of the use of force; for solving international disputes, connected to
the principle of disarmament, even though here the latter idea was smoothed. They agreed
on the formula of disarmament of aggressive nations representing a threat.
So in general the principles were very similar to Wilson’s 14 points, such as the promotion of
international democracy, abolishment of colonialism, collective security etc but there was a
difference contained specifically in the 5th point:
A new principle coming from the experience of the more recent years, of the 1930s and the
economic crisis, a principle of international economic cooperation and collaboration that didn’t
exist in the Wilson’s points and in the framework of the League of Nations. This collaboration had
the specific aim of securing for all the countries:
- Improve labour standards;
- Social security;
- Economic advancement;
The first two points were immediate consequences of the economic crisis of 30s. These kind of
social concerns have been inserted in an international document for a specific reason:
1) in order to respond to the authoritarian regimes. In Germany, Hitler had promised to its
citizens conditions of wealth, social security, protection in terms of income, house,
unemployment etc.; and he maintained his promises and this is how he maintained the
consensus. So somehow through the inclusion of these principles, liberal democracies
wanted to show that what happened during the 30s wouldn’t happen again, and that they
could have given protection to their citizens too.
2) But these principles were not just a rhetorical reference, also because the US had already
done something to ensure protection through the New Deal, that involved the intervention of
the state in the economy in order to fill the gaps that the market had created, and to offer a
stronger system of social security. The main reason for including these principles in an
international charter is related to the fact that the implementation of these social reforms has
a cost for the state; and for ensuring the implementation of social reforms, the government
uses needs more money through the increase taxes for industries, firms: as a consequence,
the cost of the products increase, also in the international market. The idea was, through the
Charter, to promote an international commitment for improving the social security system
and the labour standards all over the world, and in so doing they could remove the costs by
equalizing the situation in all countries, that would have risen the prices as well. The US
wanted to maintain its competitive advantage in the international trade, and this was the only
way to convince all countries, starting from UK, to promote the liberalization of the world
trade. Atlantic Charter was signed by a lot of countries and became the basic reference
document for the elaboration of the UN system.
After the entrance of the US in the WWII, A first step towards the creation of the UN system, was
the declaration of the UN in 1942, in which several countries (with the participation of URSS)
reaffirmed those principles that were in the Atlantic charter and that they will to continue to fight
until the defeat of the axis. This idea of fighting all together was the precondition for the
participation of all those countries to the creation of the UN.