All the of the permanent members had the power of VETO, this meant that if the member disliked or disagreed with the decision being made it had the chance to say so and the dispute would have to be stopped, even if all the other members agreed. The main idea of the council was that if any of its members came to a dispute the council would discuss the situation without the issue leading to war. it this failed the council could use a range of powers: moral condemnation, economic and financial sanctions and military force.
Both the assembly and council experienced some troubles and tough decisions. The power of VETO prevented many good decisions being made and the implementation of collective security.
The collective security system worked such that any member that was attacked would have sanctions and military force applied against them by all members. This was a good idea in theory however; the most powerful members didn’t want to have conflict so soon after the bloodshed of World War One and had other conflicts of interest. They wanted Italy as an ally against Germany therefore they didn’t take the actions necessary against Italy when she invaded Abyssinia. The Japanese invasion of Manchuria was also played downs insignificant, as it was too far away to be of concern. This gave the wrong impression to any other country planning to break the league i.e. Germany. If, however, the members had stuck to the procedure necessary perhaps the Nazi’s would have never came to power therefore Germany would have not invaded and broken the league.
The league wasn’t truly a world organisation because many countries were absent from it. Even despite the fact that it was president Wilson of USA that initiated the concept, America was one of the absentees. This was because the new American government became insular and didn’t want to get involved with Europe’s and the worlds problems. As America was the world’s most powerful nation, this was a serious blow to the prestige of the League. Germany was not allowed to join the League in 1919. As Germany had started the war, according to Versailles, one of her punishments was that she was not considered to be a member of the international community and, therefore, she was not invited to join. This was a great blow to Germany but it also meant that the League could not use whatever strength Germany had to support its campaign against aggressor nations. Russia was also not allowed to join as in 1917; she had a communist government that generated fear in Western Europe. Such a country could not be allowed to take its place in the League. Three of the strongest nations were not present in the league. The absence of the USA was hard on the rest of the league because it did not have access to the prestige, influence, wealth or military power of the United States. It was forced to rely on Britain and France, who had both been weakened by the First World War. The main countries in the league were France and Britain. France wanted to completely dissolve Germany therefore it was quiet dangerous having France a main member. France also wasn’t prepared to be strong and wasn’t prepared to uphold the agreements of the League of Nations. Britain’s govement was pacifist meaning it was downscaling its own military.
During the 1920’s many nations were exhausted after world war one and in the process of reconstruction. It took a while for new dictators and systems to establish themselves, in Italy, Japan and Germany. Ten years after the Treaty, and after the economic depression key members of the league had new political systems (fascist Mussolini in Italy) and the desire for access to mineral wealth (Japan in Manchuria) and therefore key members of the league took on an aggressive policy against the spirit of the league.
In the late 1920’s the American economy was booming and the USA was the richest country in the world. The success of America benefited many countries that loaned or traded with it. As countries co-operated with each to trade and grew richer the world became more peaceful and the leagues job became easier. At the beginning American economy boomed millions of Americans gambled on the New York stock exchange on Wall Street. Between 1927 and 1929 the average share rose 300 per cent. This meant that $10 invested in 1927 was worth was worth $30 in 1929.by this time many American investors believed their shares would not rise any further and were forced to sell them, this caused a general panic and soon all the share holders were trying to sell and the value of the shares collapsed. Many American banks owned shares and lost huge amounts of money in the Wall Street crash. They now wanted their money back from Germany. The greatest financial crisis in US history, the collapse of the stock market ended a period of prosperity and ushered in the Great Depression. The fact that America was suffering economically had an affect on the rest of the world. There was a huge degrease in trade mainly because countries put up taxes on any foreign goods. This resulted in mass unemployment in Britain, Germany, France and Japan. In both Japan and Germany aggressive dictators came to power, who promised to put their countries first, they were unaware of the plans their dictators had. In Germany unemployment and poverty led people to elect the Nazis. However Adolf Hitler and the Nazis made no secret of their plan to overrun the Treaty of Versailles. The German people were aware of the Nazis plans but they were prepared to do anything if it meant it would get them out of depression and poverty. The same situation was mirrored in Japan. In Japan the depression threatened a complete collapse of the country’s industry. In Italy economic problems encouraged Mussolini to try to build an overseas empire to distract peoples attention from the difficulties the government faced. Britain suffered high unemployment. It was not willing to get involved sorting out international disputes while its economy was suffering.
The Depression hit Japan badly. Both china and USA put up tariffs against Japanese goods. The collapse of the American market put the Japanese economy at crisis. Without this trade Japan couldn’t feed its people. The Japanese leaders had a solution to this problem-they wanted to build up Japans Empire. In September 1931 Japanese army claimed that the Chinese had sabotaged their railway and used this as the perfect excuse to invade. They threw out all the Chinese forces. The League at China’s request immediately ordered the Japanese army to withdraw. Japan’s delegates at the League’s headquarters in Geneva, agreed to this demand and blamed the event on army "hot-heads". The Japanese government in Tokyo also agreed to this demand. However, the army did not listen and it launched a full-scale invasion of Manchuria and by the end of 1931, it had occupied the whole of the province. The civilian government had clearly lost control of the army, and the League’s position was that it would deal with the government of the aggressor nation. The league refused to help China, even after they pleaded for help. They believed the problem was too far away and it didn’t concern them. Also, the French and British army were short on men and therefore refused the aid China. China was left to help herself. The reason why the league didn’t act tougher was because many countries had important trading links with Japan. The League could not agree on sanctions or even a ban on weapons sales. Britain and France did not want a war, so nothing was done.
The next big failure of the league was over disarmament in 1930’s there was pressure on the league to do something about disarmament. The Germans had long been furious about having to disarm after the First World War whilst the other nations didn’t. Many countries were actually spending more money on arms that before the First World War. After the Manchurian crisis the league realised the urgency of the problem. In February 1932 the long-promised Disarmament Conference finally got under way. By July 1932 it had produced a resolutions to limit the size of artillery, limit the tonnage of tanks, prohibit chemical warfare and prohibit bombing of civilian. They knew what was needed to be done, however they didn’t know how to go about doing so. It was not a promising start. There was a bigger, more important problem facing the Conference-what to do about Germany. The Germans had been in the Conference for 6 years now. The majority of people believed that Germany should be treated more equally than under the Treaty of Versailles. Germany was still somewhat weaker militarily. The question was whether Germany was to rearm to the size of other powers or other powers were to disarm to the degree of Germany. In 1933 Hitler withdrew from the Conference and soon after took Germany out of the league altogether. By this time all the powers were aware that Germany was secretly Germany already. So they also started to rebuild its own armaments. Despite all the disputes the conference carried on for another year, finally ending in 1934. The conference failed due to a number of reasons, some believe it was doomed fro the start. No one was taking the disarmament anyway, however nothing else was proposed. Britain and France were divided on the issue, which didn’t help. By 1933 many British believed the Treaty of Versailles. In fact, the British singed an agreement to allow the Germans to ream if the navy stayed under 35 per cent of the British. This was to dismay of the French. Britain did not consult its allies not the League about this decision, however Britain wasn’t actually breaking the Treaty of Versailles. It seems that each country was looking after its own and ignoring the league.
The fatal blow came when the Italian dictator, Mussolini, invaded Abyssinia in 1935. In some ways it was similar to the invasion on Manchuria. The origin of this invasion lead back to 1896. In 1896 Italian troops had tried to invade Abyssinia but had been terribly defeated due to poor equipment and tribesmen. Mussolini wanted revenge on his humiliating defeat. Also in Abyssinia there was fertile soil and mineral wealth, which Mussolini had his eye on. He mostly wanted glory and a larger empire. In December 1934 Benito Mussolini accused the Abyssinians of aggression at an oasis called Wal Wal. He ordered Italian troops, already situated in Somaliland and Eritrea to attack Abyssinia. He had thoughtfully planned this as the had stockpiled there large quantities of ammunition and supplies had been. In October of 1935, the Italian army invaded Abyssinia. The Abyssinians stood no chance against the modern Italian army. After the invasion Haile Selassie appealed to the league for help. The league did two things: condemned the attack and imposed economic sanctions against Italy. However, it took 6 weeks for the sanctions to be organised and they still did not include oil sanctions. Britain and France secretly gave a part of Abyssinia to Italy as part of their plan to keep Italy on their side against Germany. They didn’t consult the league and though about themselves other than the rest of the nation. This was really the last straw for the league. It had struggled to stay together for far too long and even the main powers weren’t obeying the rules. It is also possible that both Britain and France considered the war too far away to be of any importance to them. They were not prepared to risk their naval power in the Mediterranean for the sake of a country barely anybody had heard of in either France or Britain.
