PRACTICE QUESTION 1

‘The League failed in Manchuria because of the attitudes of its leading

members’ How far do you agree with this statement?
Explain your answer

The League of Nations; a post-war organization established in the year

1920 was solely dedicated to promoting international cooperation. Ironically
the league failed at its only task, causing more harm than it did good in a
troubled world.

A prime example of the failure of the league was the Manchurian Crisis of
1931, involving the Japanese Empire invading Manchuria (or Manchukuo),
a region belonging to the Republic of China. Whose fault this crisis was can
be seen differently based on the viewpoints of different countries and
historical sources. Some may say that it was the fault of the leading
members of the League, due to its reluctance to confront the aggressive
nation that was Japan, while others may place blame on the global
economic depression that spanned the 1930s.

Either way, the Manchurian Crisis was a major failure for the League,
contributing to its long list of failures that far outweighed its successes. The
Manchurian Crisis had begun when the Japanese Empire had accused
China of blowing up one of the Empire’s railroads in the province of
Mukden, also known as the Mukden incident. Many historians argue that
this was a False Flag Incident, as it was too close of a coincidence, since
Japan had already been planning to invade Manchuria. The Japanese
Empire then proceeded to invade the region of Manchuria, following the
invasion of the town of Mukden. The citizens of Manchuria continued to
demand independence, and thus, Japan installed a puppet leader, which
still gave the Empire control over the region.
This crisis alerted the League of Nations, and thus, the League decided to
take action. Sending the Lytton Commission, led by Lord Lytton, the
commission would investigate the invasion of Manchuria, and submit a
report to the League. This report took around 7 months to complete and
submit to the League, the contents of the report stating that Japan was the
aggressor and should take the blame for the invasion of Manchuria. The
League did not take any action on the Lytton Commision until 1933, when
Japan refused to accept the report, walking out of the League, and thus,
avoiding any sanctions that would have been imposed on the Empire.

Leading members of the League, such as Britain and France were still
reluctant to take action against Japan due to its immense power and
aggression. They did not want to start another war, as the memory of world
war I was still fresh in these countries’ minds. This attitude of appeasement
would hinder the league’s ability to place proper punishment on Japan.

The League’s failure to impose sanctions on Japan exposed a structural

weakness in the functioning of the League. It was contingent on its
members' willingness to act collectively. The League was ill equipped to
handle a crisis of this magnitude, and the absence of a united front among
its members further weakened its effectiveness.

Proposing a view contrasting the said source would be quite difficult but
one might form an argument based on an extract from Alan Farmer’s
Britain Foreign Affairs, 1919 – 39, (1996).

If action was to be taken, US support was vital, but that support was not forthcoming.
Japanese imperialism, although a potential threat to British interests in the Far East,
was not an immediate danger. Indeed Japanese expansion in northern China could be
seen as reducing the risk of Japanese expansion, in other, more sensitive, areas (for
example, Southeast Asia).

Economic sanctions were unlikely to achieve much. The Royal Navy was not strong
enough to enforce a trade embargo, and the USA, Japan’s biggest trading partner,
made it clear it would not support any League action. The best policy therefore seemed
to be to accept Japan’s takeover of Manchuria and to hope that the Japanese threat did
not develop.
The League of Nations did not take action in Manchuria because it simply
could not do so as it was concerned with European affairs which were quite
pressing at the time, however on the other hand, the League did take some
action showing their competency, like sending Lord Lytton, because it knew
it had to take some action in order to maintain world peace which was one
of the League’s aims. This was the best that could be done at the time
considering the circumstances and it is inferred that the attitudes of the
leagues members simply were not considered, the decision was simply
beneficial for the League, its member countries, and world peace which
was the main agenda of the league and the world at the time.

According to Alan, the principal reason why the League of Nations did not
take any action was because it believed that without the support of the US,
any actions it took would be ineffective. Farmer notes “that support was not
forthcoming” from the USA. Furthermore the source stated amongst many
also noted that economic sanctions would be unlikely to achieve too much
‘logically speaking’ since Britain was not prepared to get involved. Sources
and historians have come to a consensus that the League simply needed
to concentrate on European affairs before concerning itself with affairs in
other parts of the world as they were far more tense and dangerous at the
time. As a result the League of Nations was concerned with economic
matters to get involved with war like affairs as they should have been.

Another reason why the League of Nations did not get involved in the
Manchurian crisis was because it did not have an effective army in place.
Both China and Japan were members of the League. According to the
League covenant, any country which was a member of the League and
which was being attacked, all countries should then offer support. However
this did not happen, since the two countries in that region involved with the
league with an army were at war with each other, there was simply no way
of getting an army to intervene with the war. This further points out that
attitudes were not a factor in the failure of the manchurian crisis, it may be
more fitting to describe it as a logistical failure of no members direct fault.
Therefore looking through another lens we can conclude that the League
did not get involved in the Manchurian crisis simply because it did not have
the logistics to deal with the crisis and that attitudes were not considered in
the leagues decisions.

After weighing both arguments, the only sensible conclusion to be made on

this matter is one that agrees with the statement with the farthest level of
dedication. It is indicated by analysis that the league let the members'
attitudes influence a technical decision that would crumble the leagues
influence outside europe and the leagues influence overall making the
league ‘the laughing stock’ that we refer to today.

Zidaan - P

Dhruv - CV