Successful Attempt For The League Of Nations example essay topic

This essay will be looking at whether or not the 1920's was a Golden Age for the League of Nations. Also it will look at some of the problems which the League got involved in and discuss whether or not the League was successful in solving these disputes. Some of the problems which are going to be discussed are areas like Corfu and the Aaland islands to see how the League of Nations handled them. Collective Security was an idea for preserving peace after the First World War which president Woodrow Wilson of the United States was mainly responsible for. Wilson said. ".. it is our duty to maintain the safeguards which will see to it that the mothers of America and the mothers of France and England and Italy and Belgium and all other nations should never be called upon for this sacrifice again". The Nations agreed that they would all maintain peace together by joining the League of Nations, which forty-two nations joined, but Russia did not join until 1934, this was the year that Germany left the League and it was weakened further by America not joining either.

Nations felt that the League would be unstable without America, they also felt that America should join as it was Woodrow Wilson who was mainly responsible for the League of Nations. The League of Nations was to maintain peace by dealing with disputes between countries within the League by negotiation, not by war. They were to defend the independence of countries and their borders and encourage disarmament. They were to improve living conditions of all people by tackling problems such as slavery and poor health. The Covenant of the League of Nations was a series of solemn promises not to go to war again which all members agreed to and signed, if not there would be penalties.

In this Covenant the League's aims, rules and methods of working were laid down. The League of Nations had many successes in settling disputes in the period of 1920 to 1931, but these disputes were between only minor powers. The League also distinguished itself in humanitarian work and sponsored valuable work to repatriate refugees of the First World War. However, there were also disputes in which greater powers deliberately ignored the terms of the league of nations and fought among themselves to sort out a compromise which suited them, but which was not the result of the principled, judicial and court - like procedure that the League had hoped to have. I began to get clearer that the League of Nations was not strong enough to take on even second - rate powers which committed acts of aggression.

Many problems were faced by the League of Nations, such as in Corfu in 1923, the Italian General, Tellin i was murdered and Mussolini demanded that the killers had to be punished and that Greece should pay compensation to Italy, but Greece refused. Italian troops who had occupied Corfu, tried to make Greece pay this compensation. The league of Nations intervened and the plan was for possible compensation of 50 million lire which had to be deposited into a Swiss bank. The Italians would not accept it.

The Conference of Ambassadors then took over the problem and changed the plan to make it more favourable to Italy. Greece lost the 50 million lire and the Italian marines withdrew from Corfu. The League of Nations seemed to be unsuccessful with this as it did not solve the problem, the Conference of Ambassadors did. In 1923, the Ruhr was invaded by French and Belgian troops when Germany had defaulted reparations. Britain did not get involved. Germany retaliated with passive resistance.

By invading the Ruhr, the French were breaking the Covenant of the League. The Swedes thought that this was wrong and they threatened to take France to the League of nations, but did not because France was more powerful than them. This is another example of the League of Nations being unsuccessful as it was not able to stand up to an aggressor and a member of the League had broken the Covenant. Another example of the League of Nations failing to solve a problem was the dispute between Lithuania and Poland over Vilna which was populated by a large majority of Polish people. The league of nations got involved again and this time the plan was for force in the area which was not supported by members.

Polish troops simply took over the city and kept possession. Yet again the Conference of Ambassadors got involved and awarded Vilna to Poland because it simply recognised that the Poles already had possession of the city. The reason for the league failing this time was that the plan for force was rejected and it was also thought that the League had favoured Poland. Although the League of Nations had several unsuccessful attempts at solving disputes, it also had some successful attempts, such as the problem of the Aaland islands in 1920/21. This was a dispute between Sweden and Finland over the Baltic islands ownership. The League of Nations got totally involved in this problem and awarded the islands to Finland, although the islanders preferred to be Swedish.

This was a success for the League of Nations as it was dealing with a smaller country and Sweden wanted the League to succeed. The League of Nations also got involved in a dispute over Leticia, a Columbian outpost in the Amazon. This dispute was between Columbia and Peru, the Peruvians captured Leticia and war was imminent. The league had a Commission to govern the area for a year to calm things down. As a result of this Leticia returned to Columbia and war was averted. This was another successful attempt for the League of nations, it was between two weak countries, but war was prevented.

In 1921 the League of Nations got involved in a problem with Upper Silesia. Upper Silesia had been taken from Germany and given to Poland in 1919 by the Treaty of Versailles. Later, 60% of people wished to be German and 40% wanted to remain with Poland. The League decided to separate Upper Silesia.

Poland only ended up with one-third of the original area, but that part had great mineral wealth. The League of nations was successful yet again with this dispute as they carried out wishes of people as far as possible and they managed to defuse an awkward situation. Overall the League of Nations had examples of success such as when it addressed non-controversial areas and when it was dealing with minor powers or weaker countries such as when it was dealing with the Aaland islands. It was also successful in situations like Sweden when they wanted the League to be successful. However the League of nations also had basic weaknesses, such as not being able to stand up to aggressors and the fact that the USA and Russia were not members. Its basic weaknesses were shown in situations like the invasion of the Ruhr and Corfu.