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CHAPTER I

Initial Effort Toward Preparation

December 1939

HE OUTBREAK of war in Europe on September 3, 1939, had been foreshadowed by a succession of crises, each more acute than the one before. It was met by the United States Government with measures of neutrality instituted swiftly, and almost automatically. These measures flowed from the laws then in force. Despite the evident fact that neutrality of thought could not be asked again as in Woodrow Wilson's day, these measures were supported by the determination, alike of officials and private citizens, that our country should remain a neutral nation—and, however uneasily, at peace.

There were no solutions ready to hand, however, for the basic problems of future United States foreign policy raised by a major European war. Serious dislocations in established prewar international relationships would be the outcome in any event. Responsible officials of our Government, looking back over the eight years of mounting tensions that culminated in the invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, and looking ahead to the war's consequences, were undecided on the course to pursue.

American preparation for the postwar period grew out of the history and foreign relations of the American people; it also grew directly out of the experiences of the interwar years and out of the experiences of the war itself. A largely new and evolving policy was required, not a set of fixed dogmas or a hurried improvisation of plans at the close of the war. Continuous re-evaluation of the issues and revision of thought as events unfolded became essential.

AMERICAN EFFORTS TOWARD PEACE

UNDERLYING the German aggression upon Poland, to which the British and French responded with declarations of war, was a grave deterioration in international relations. This extended even to deception in the making of formal treaties on vital matters and a disregard of these

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treaties after they were made, thus destroying confidence and challenging the very bases of international order.

The twenty-one years between the Armistice signed at Compiègne in 1918 and the invasion of Poland in 1939 can be divided roughly into halves, the first seemingly hopeful for the cause of peace, the second increasingly hopeless.

In the first eleven years, the apparent trend toward the realization of mankind's quest for peace had been signalized by various constructive developments. Economic improvement seemed in process. The Washington Conference on the Limitation of Armament, November 12, 1921-February 6, 1922, appeared to constitute a successful prelude to general disarmament. The Locarno Pact, initialed October 16, 1925, appeared to bulwark peace in Western Europe. The obligation of the Kellogg-Briand Pact, signed August 27, 1928, to settle disputes by none but pacific means had been accepted almost universally. Further efforts toward disarmament were underway: A Preparatory Commission for Reduction and Limitation of Armaments to formulate proposals for a future general conference began work, with United States participation, in 1926. A naval conference was held by the United States, Great Britain, and Japan during the summer of 1927. Then the London Naval Conference of the same three powers, France, and Italy convened in January 1930, and a treaty among the first three was successfully negotiated. These in large measure constituted direct efforts among states to strengthen the bases of peace.

The principal international effort to establish peace and to maintain it after World War I was centered in the League of Nations, and the League in the twenties appeared strong enough to survive the difficulties it might confront, though it had been designed to function with the United States as a member and that membership had been declined. Nevertheless, the United States gradually undertook to cooperate with the League in the economic and social fields of its work, and increasingly also in the disarmament field.

To an extent not yet fully calculable, however, the outworking of counter influences also marked this first period. The war itself had had revolutionary implications both within and among nations—manifested not alone in the tendencies toward violence that cropped up in various parts of the world and not alone in communism with its disruptive methods and its revolutionary outlook. A growing cynicism toward the accepted order in many states manifested itself in questioning, denial, or contempt of the precepts of Christianity and democracy. Certainty, loyalty, and unity in regard to moral principles applicable in relations among states and between the state and the individual were widely shaken. Insecurity had grown in the presence of increasing economic and political nationalism, of critical

problems left by the war, and of underlying stresses produced over decades by the lag between national and international economic, social, and political policy on one hand and swift technological development and desires for a higher standard of living on the other. No program of constructive economic and social action agreed upon among all the victor powers of 1918 had come into being. Fascism had emerged and dictatorships had come into power in a number of states. Suicidal national economic policies were widely practiced. Tariffs and some of the international loans of the period, particularly those of large powers including the United States, worked away from, rather than toward, stabilization of international conditions. The policies of isolation pursued, for different reasons, by the Soviet Union and by the United States of America were among the other counter influences that prevailed.

These counter influences became dominant late in the decade, and the apparently hopeful trend of the twenties was reversed. The change came as the great economic depression and its consequences settled down over the lives of men and of states, as the militant resurgence of Germany and militarist expansionism in Japan gathered momentum, and as tensions sharply mounted from the revolt launched against the established international order by powers restricted by it. The decade of the thirties was destined to see in the weakness of many peaceful countries the expression of their fear of war. The forces of aggression with their erosive ideology pitted their growing military strength, move by move, against the weakly armed and disunited forces seeking to keep the peace.

Japan attacked Manchuria September 18, 1931, and, though not decisively checked by the League of Nations, gave notice on March 27, 1933, of its intention to withdraw from that organization. Germany's resignation from the League over the question of armaments followed (October 14, 1933). Italy conquered Ethiopia between October 3, 1935, and May 5, 1936. Germany occupied the demilitarized Rhineland March 7, 1936. The Spanish Civil War, which opened July 17, was to provide a three-year battle-training course for the aggressor powers. Germany joined with Italy to form the Rome-Berlin Axis on October 25, 1936. One month later Germany joined with Japan in an Anti-Comintern Pact.

The intervals between aggressions thereafter shortened. Japan intensified its undeclared war on China with the incident of the Marco Polo Bridge near Peiping July 7, 1937. Italy signed the AntiComintern Pact November 6 and left the League December 11. Germany occupied Austria on March 11-13, 1938. The Munich Pact between France, Germany, Italy, and Great Britain and the consequent cession of the Sudetenland by Czechoslovakia to Germany came on

September 29. Full German occupation of Czechoslovakia was effected March 14-16, 1939. Albania was invaded by Italy April 7. Germany made public demands affecting Danzig and the Polish Corridor, April 28, and sought assurance of conditions for a safe move on Poland by a treaty of nonaggression with the Soviet Union August 23, 1939.

In this span of eight years from 1931-1939 the American Government attempted to strengthen peace in every feasible way short of involvements that might prejudice United States detachment. Apart from specific efforts directed toward individual countries such as those made by Secretary of State Henry L. Stimson in the case of Japan in 1931-32, repeated approaches were made to the basic problems involved in the maintenance of peace.

The first was in the field of disarmament and took the form of proposals presented to the General Disarmament Conference at Geneva which convened several times during the years February 2, 1932-April 13, 1935. When the Geneva Conference failed in 1933 to produce a general disarmament agreement, this Government in 1934 proposed a separate treaty dealing with the manufacture of and international traffic in arms. When that failed and when failure to reach any general agreement continued at the London Naval Conference December 9, 1935-March 25, 1936, this Government concluded with Britain and France on the latter date a conditional treaty of qualitative limitation of armaments. This treaty, however, was futile from the standpoint of general disarmament. It had become clear during the course of these efforts, when forms of aggression were multiplying and becoming more complex and insidious, that general limitation of armament would be possible only if political and economic conditions essential to international peace existed.

American participation in the economic activities of the League of Nations was increased during this period, and the United States became an active member of the International Labor Organization. The Export-Import Bank was established in this country to facilitate foreign trade, and a particular effort was made in these years toward the elimination of discriminatory trading practices, which acted as a barrier to world trade. At the International Monetary and Economic Conference in London June 12-July 27, 1933, the economic disintegration wrought by the depression in the United States and abroad operated to preclude any substantial progress toward this end. There was fundamental disagreement on certain basic issues involved; for example, on whether or not exchange stabilization should precede efforts to reverse the downward trend of prices. Yet in the Trade Agreements Act of 1934, the United States took a step that gave promise of improving economic conditions and therefore of contributing toward peace. That promise began to be realized as numerous

reciprocal trade agreements were made, involving acceptance of the principle of nondiscrimination as the basis of trading relations and reducing the effects of discriminatory bilateral trade arrangements, which were increasing in number and scope on a scale hitherto unknown. Fundamental as this program was, however, the most important of the trade agreements, that with the United Kingdom, was not concluded until November 17, 1938. The critical state of international relations by that time, with the outbreak of war less than a year distant, gave little opportunity to test the effects of this agreement, or the impact of the program as a whole on the state trading systems of Germany, the Soviet Union, and Italy.

These efforts were paralleled by attempts on the part of the United States to exert its influence toward preventing hostilities through the example of its peace program in the Western Hemisphere, through its V neutrality legislation, and through diplomatic approaches and official statements as threatening situations emerged.

The United States peace program for the Western Hemisphere was initiated at the Seventh International Conference of American States at Montevideo, December 3-26, 1933, and was further developed at the Inter-American Conference for the Maintenance of Peace, Buenos Aires, December 1-23, 1936. It was designed to implement the Good Neighbor Policy enunciated by President Roosevelt, and consisted of a series of agreements and arrangements for political and economic collaboration among the twenty-one American republics on the basis of accepted principles of peaceful conduct. The elaboration and implementation of this program was carried out at subsequent interAmerican conferences as the world situation grew more threatening to the peace of this Hemisphere.

The Neutrality Acts of 1935, 1936, and 1937 were concrete expressions of American determination to remain at peace in a world where assurance of peace was declining. It was, moreover, the hope of the proponents of this legislation that it might act as a deterrent to war by serving notice on the rest of the world that the resources of the United States would not be readily available to foreign nations should they resort to armed force. Though the President signed these successive acts, disagreement in judgment existed between the executive and legislative branches of the Government on the methods embodied in this legislation to avoid involvement in war.

The neutrality legislation as developed by 1937 sought to preserve this country from war through such measures as an embargo on arms and on loans to belligerents, "cash-and-carry" provisions in the case of trade with belligerents, and other restrictions relative to travel on belligerent vessels, arming of American merchant ships, and belligerent use of American ports. The legislation was applicable impartially to victim and aggressor alike and had both mandatory and permissive