The League of Nations was a product of Woodrow Wilson’s 14 points and was therefore born out of the Versailles Peace Settlement of 1919 after World War I. He suggested the creation of an international organization to maintain peace which was accepted and therefore on 10th January 1920 the League of Nations was officially launched in Geneva. The objectives of the League of Nations included;
- To maintain peace and security through collective security or responsibility
- To promote international co-operation in order to solve the economic problems
- To stop external aggression on the member states
- To provide economic aid to the member states
- To improve the social welfare of the masses
- To stop drug trafficking
- To address the refugee problem
- To administer the mandated territories
The League of Nations was bound to fail and indeed it failed to achieve the above objectives due to the following reasons;
The isolation of USA undermined the League of Nations. Although it was President Woodrow Wilson of USA who initiated the League of Nations in 1920, the people of USA especially the Republicans opposed the inclusion of USA into the League of Nations because President Woodrow Wilson who was a democrat did not take their views to the Paris Conference which gave birth to the League of Nations. They therefore refused to approve USA’s membership and this was a major setback to the organization because it meant that the League of Nations had lost a huge source of military and economic support and therefore it was bound to fail.
The League of Nations failed because lacked enough funds to finance its activities. The League of Nations as an organization entirely depended on the financial contributions from the member states. However, between 1920 and 1939 many member states were not willing to contribute money because they were still recovering from the adverse economic effects of World War I. Without enough financial resources therefore, the League of Nations could not successfully implement its resolutions, thus leading to its failure.
The League of Nations also failed because it lacked an independent army or joint force and navy to enforce its resolutions. The League of Nations depended on the forces from individual member states for its military operations and peace keeping missions. Unfortunately, in the 1920s and 1930s the member countries failed to contribute forces to form a joint force that could be used fight against European aggressors like Italy and Germany. For example, in 1935 Benito Mussolini of Italy attacked Ethiopia but nothing was done force him out of Ethiopia since the League of Nations had no standing army to perform that function. This was a clear indication that the League of Nations was weak.
The absence of a number of big states in the League of Nations also greatly undermined its operation. At the start, the League of Nations excluded some big powers. For example, USSR was not a member until 1934, Germany was not a member between 1926 and 1933 while Italy became a member of the League between 1926 and 1935. These were great powers and therefore their exclusion meant that the resolutions of the League of Nations were not binding on them. As a result, they called it a British – French league, which made it hard for the League of Nations to achieve its objectives.
The principle of free entry and exit undermined the operation of the League of Nations. According to the structure of the League of Nations, the member states were free to enter and get out of the League without any restrictions. This weakness was therefore exploited by some member states to pull out of the league. For example in 1933, the League of Nations asked Germany to observe its principle of disarmament and in October 1933, Adolf Hitler refused and he instead withdrew Germany from the League of Nations. Russia also withdrew from the League of Nations in 1936 when she refused to observe the principles and decisions of the League of Nations. But the League of Nations took no action to keep these countries in the league. This affected the League of Nations because the absence of such members undermined co-operation which was vital in maintaining peace.
The association of the League of Nations with the harsh and unpopular Versailles Peace Treaty of 1919 undermined its operation. The League of Nations was set up in 1920 in the aftermath of the Versailles Peace Treaty that had been signed in 1919 at the end of World War I between victorious powers and the defeated Germany. The terms of this treaty were considered too harsh and unfair by the Germans and therefore they rejected them. As a result, when the League of Nations was formed in 1920, the defeated powers especially Germany associated the League of Nations with this unfair Versailles Peace Treaty of 1919. This therefore made the League of Nations unpopular among the defeated powers which undermined its efforts to achieve the objectives of its founders like international co-operation.
The League of Nations failed because it neglected of the independent states. The League of Nations was set up to protect the member states from external aggression but it greatly failed in this area. For example, Italy invaded Ethiopia in 1935 while Germany invaded Austria, Poland and Czechoslovakia. These were independent states which the League of Nations was supposed to protect but it failed to use its system of collective security or responsibility against the aggressive powers. This therefore made the League of Nations unable to achieve its objectives like maintaining peace in the world.
The failure of the disarmament policy was a major blow to the League of Nations. The League of Nations failed to disarm the big powers yet this was one of its major objectives. For example, Adolf Hitler of Germany publically denounced the Versailles Peace Treaty of 1919 and he introduced military conscription. He also started programmes to manufacture deadly weapons so as to re-arm Germany but the League of Nations did nothing to stop him. This gave Germany confidence to destabilize world peace which undermined the operation of the League of Nations.
The rise of dictators in the world created a difficult environment for the League of Nations to operate, hence making it unable to achieve the objectives of its founders. During the 1920s and 1930s a number of dictatorial rulers captured power in several states in the world. For example, there was Adolf Hitler of Germany, Tojo Hirohito of Japan, Benito Mussolini of Italy and General Franco of Spain. The above were dictators were very much determined to fight against the democratic states like Britain, France and USA which were trying to defend the spread of democracy in the world. Indeed, in 1935 Hitler and Mussolini invaded Spain to install General Franco, a fascist to power. This created instability in Europe which undermined the operation of the League of Nations, thus leading to its failure.
The revival of the alliance system weakened the League of Nations. After World War I, a number of hostile alliances were created in Europe which revived the alliance system. For example, in 1939 Britain, France and Turkey concluded an alliance to resist German aggression. Also in 1939, the three aggressors that included Japan, Italy and Germany signed an alliance known as the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis to work together as dictators in their foreign policies and to fight against the democratic states of France, USA and Britain. This divided the world, hence weakening the League of Nations as it failed to control the activities of these hostile alliances.
The League of Nations lacked mass support which made it unable to achieve its objectives. The League of Nations neglected the small and weak member states because the major decisions and resolutions were made by the World War I victorious powers or nations of Britain and France without considering the interests of the small states. The smaller states like Ethiopia and Liberia therefore refused to associate themselves with the League of Nations and therefore refused to support its resolutions.
The weaknesses in the structure of the League of Nations also made it unable to achieve the objectives of its founders. For example, the League of Nations was based on the principle of equality in representation yet the members were not equal, for example Britain was not equal to Liberia. Also, in the voting procedure, voting was done on the Unanimous principle where by all the member states in the council had to first agree over some thing before it could be implemented which was difficult. This made it difficult for the League of Nations to achieve its objectives.
The League of Nations also failed to achieve its objectives because it was very slow in decision making. Although the League of Nations had clear objectives and methods to use in the implementation of the objectives, with its headquarters in Geneva, it never immediately put them into practice. This was partly due to the fact that the League of Nations met few times in its life time. As a result, all its resolutions ending up remaining of paper without being put into action and that is why it was referred to as a “backing dog that could not bite”, which eventually led to its failure.
The selfish national interests at the expense of international interests undermined the work of the League of Nations, thus making it unable to achieve its objectives. When the League of Nations was in its operation, some states of the world promoted their selfish national rather than international interests. For example, USA refused to join the League of Nations at the very start for fear of the American soldiers who, in an attempt to create peace, would get involved in wars on the European continent that would led to their death. This partly explains why USA refused to become a member of the League of Nations at the start and yet she was a very powerful country with huge financial and military resources that would have greatly helped the League of Nations to achieve its objectives.
The League of Nations also failed to achieve its objectives because it used ineffective or weak punishments against the offenders. The League of Nations had clear mechanisms of punishing any member states that violated its principles and objectives but it never had the military and economic machinery to apply them to the maximum. For example, in 1935 Benito Mussolini occupied Ethiopia and Italy was declared the aggressor by the League. The League of Nations then imposed economic sanctions on Italy hoping that it was to withdraw from Ethiopia. However, Italy did not feel these sanctions because oil and coal, the two major energy sources were not included on the list. The Suez Canal also remained open to the Italian ships and Italy continued to import oil and other items from Asia through the Suez Canal.
There was disunity among the members of the League of Nations which also made it unable to achieve its objectives. The principle of collective responsibility where every member of the League of Nations had to share the responsibility of defending the other members from external aggression failed to work on some occasions. This is illustrated by the incident of the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. Countries like Austria, Albania and Switzerland refused to impose economic sanctions on Italy so as to force her out of Ethiopia yet they were members of the League of Nations. Mussolini therefore went ahead and consolidated the Italian control over Ethiopia which was an independent state.
The League of Nations worked on false assumptions which also made it unable to achieve its objectives. During it existence, the League of Nations used on work on some assumptions in order to achieve its objectives but unfortunately some these assumptions were false. For example, it worked on a false assumption that all powers were interested in peace. This was a miscalculation because countries like Germany and Italy which were led by aggressive dictators were more than ready to go against the objectives of the League of Nations and create instability in Europe. They wanted to annex territories and also increase on their armament among other desire. Therefore, they could not be loyal to the League of Nations.
The outbreak of the Great Economic Depression in 1929 further weakened the League of Nations, thus contributing to its failure. From 1929, Europe was faced with a depression because there were many goods but less money to purchase them. This economic depression undermined the work of the League of Nations of promoting international relations because countries imposed very high taxes on the imports from other countries and abolished free trade. This increased enemity among the European powers which any hopes for lasting peace in Europe.
The ideological differences even among the victorious powers themselves which were members of the League of Nations affected the operation of the League of Nations. For example, there was little co-operation between communist Russia and the Western capitalist countries of Europe like France and Britain. That’s why Russia was not a member of the League of Nations until 1934. Above, all some states were dictatorial while others were democratic. For example, France and Britain supported the policies of democracy yet Italy, Japan, Germany and Spain were despotic or dictatorial countries.
The magnitude of the problems of Europe made the League of Nations unable to succeed. Between 1920 and 1939, Europe witnessed several social, economic problems which largely a result of World War I and yet the League of Nations was supposed to address all of them. For example, there was inflation, unemployment as well as a refugee crisis. These problems overwhelmed the League of Nations thus making it unable to maintain peace in Europe up to 1939.
The appeasement policy of Britain and France created difficulties for the League of Nations to operate. In the 1920s and 1930s, Britain and France pursued or practiced a policy of appeasement which was based on the wrong assumption of satisfying the two European dictators of Hitler and Mussolini so as to prevent them from engaging in acts of aggression and prevent the outbreak of another world war in Europe. For example, it was because of this policy that Britain and France allowed Benito Mussolini to take over Ethiopia in 1935. Unfortunately, this policy undermined the operation of the League of Nations because it just encouraged aggression by Mussolini of Italy and Hitler of Germany which undermined peace in Europe.
The outbreak of World War II in 1939 was the final blow to the League of Nations. Due to the failure of the League of Nations to protect the independent states, Adolf Hitler of Germany invaded Poland in 1939. Then, Britain and France declared war on Germany and this was the beginning of World War II. The League of Nations which had failed to avert the outbreak of this war was disbanded and replaced by United Nations Organization (UNO) in 1945.
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