With what the Taoiseach has said, I am substantially in agreement. I admit that at present the League is little more than a flyblow, but I am very much of the opinion voiced by the Taoiseach that we should not contribute in the slightest to its further collapse. It would be a very easy thing for a person to point out that the proper thing would be to desert the League. What good is it? What good was it ever? That is easy to say at the present time. Yet I feel that it would be unjust so far as the activities of the League in the past are concerned, and that it would be unwise to identify ourselves with a policy of that kind. True, the League has to bow its head at the present moment. Its voice is certainly not heard in the major international affairs that interest the world. That is clear to everybody. But I should be long sorry to think that we would ally ourselves with those who have left the League for different motives, and I feel that, especially now, to take the step of leaving the League would only be read in one way—here is another nation throwing in its lot definitely on one side. Staying in the League does not commit us to any such thing. Leaving the League would.
As regards those cynical people who, as I have said more than once in this House, have by their wise cynicism been throwing cold water on any effort to save mankind from the catastrophe which now faces it, they might ask themselves if what has followed the League has succeeded much better. The Taoiseach pointed out that at present you have international conferences. They have taken the place of the League. Is anybody in this House, or even the most cynical person in the country, satisfied with that particular method of settling international disputes?
It is not, therefore, on a question of the advantages, which are no doubt considerable, that we might get out of the technical operations of the League that I am glad the Government is not deserting the League at present. It is because at times in the past the League did step in and possibly save Europe from facing a situation such as it is facing to-day. It is easy to forget that the years after 1918 and 1920 were not such easy years to get over. There was many a dispute which might have led to a major quarrel in Europe that was overcome by the efforts of the League.
One thing that always impressed me —possibly to some minds it was a weakness of the League—was the influence wielded there by the small nations. Perhaps there was an element of unreality about that which might not appeal to the modern-wise, realist statesmen, but it was a reality during a number of years. I have seen representatives of the greatest Powers not merely using their strength to get support from the smaller Powers, but being genuinely anxious to convince the representatives of the small Powers that their point of view was right. The League did represent in its best years a kind of solid European public opinion that the different Powers of Europe were quite anxious to court and that they did obviously court. When I see the position of the small nations to-day, every one of them, as I said on the last debate, trembling, anxious to save their skins, and not sure whether they will have any skins to save in a year or two, when I see the situation everywhere in Europe at present; and when I compare that situation with the situation that I knew 13 or 14 years ago when the League was a reality, I should be the last, with any sense of European responsibility, to cast any stone at the League. It had its weaknesses undoubtedly. One of them was mentioned by the Taoiseach. I do not know how such a thing will be avoidable in the future. Supposing you have conferences with the big Powers to-day and they settle on the basis of the present territorial distribution in Europe, can anybody regard that as satisfactory? Even if there were not further conquests by the big central Power of which I spoke on the last Vote, can anybody regard even the Munich settlement as a satisfactory one on which to base any future settlement of the world? It is a pity that these definite treaties settling boundaries were made a portion of a covenant like the League of Nations Covenant. It is very hard to know whether it is avoidable or not.
But there was another fault, and I think it did help to some extent to explain the gradual eclipse of the League—I think it was inclined to go too fast. I am sure the same charge has been made against governments in various countries, that they would run ahead of the views of their constituents. I think the body of men who met at Geneva, and perhaps especially the civil servants at Geneva, were inclined to run ahead of European public opinion, and to attempt more than the public of Europe was educated up to. I do not say that they attempted to do what was unjust. I say that it was unwise to go so quickly, because Europe was not sufficiently prepared, and that no State, great or small, was prepared to make the necessary sacrifices. There were some States that I might preeminently call good League States, generally the Northern States that had no reason to do otherwise, that might be relied on always to take a definite and an impartial League view. At one time or another there was the danger —and I do not see how it will be overcome as long as human nature is what it is—of different States trying to use the League for their own purposes. At one time it was France, and at another time England. At one time England had no use for the League, if I might use that expression. Then she determined to use it. At one time Russia scoffed at the League and everything connected with it as being the embodiment of the bourgeoisie, and standing for everything that was discreditable and hypocritical, but that view changed in a couple of years. That, I am afraid, is an evil that cannot be got rid of. What is being done at the moment? What is the hope of Europe, or, at least, what was the hope? Is "hope" too strong a word? When President Roosevelt sent out his message the basis of it was the setting up of a new League. That proposition, remember, came from a statesman removed to some extent from European affairs. It came from the head of a nation that itself had stood apart from the original League, and had stood apart, possibly, for good reasons of its own. By standing apart from the original League it, to some extent, undermined its authority, yet that nation now comes forward with a suggestion for a new League, or something like it. If you want to get any reasonable settlement or, apart from an institution like the League, to get any method of preventing things coming to the edge of war, because once they come to the edge of war I am afraid the League will be no use, it is hard to know how to do it. What is the position with the breakdown of the League?
At present there are diplomatic negotiations amongst the Powers. What is the result? The situation we were discussing this afternoon. Is that a condemnation of the League? The worldly-wise people have now triumphed. They have won victory over the idealists, and won a victory from the League. See the magnificent mess they have made of the world. What is the system that prevails at present? What are the western Powers trying to do? According to themselves they are now forming a League of Peace. If you take their professions at their face value, that is what is happening. Is it possible for these Powers to restore confidence in Northern and Eastern Europe? Look at the efforts of the past 12 months. What prospect is there of a restoration of confidence? What Power in east Europe, that is not an immense Power like Russia, can have any confidence in anything that is done in the way of international negotiation of any kind? I think it was in the month of October that a meeting of the French Radical Party was held. I am not sure of the designation of the different French political parties, but there was a meeting in Marseilles, just when the fire occurred there, and one speaker after another, including M. Heriot and M. Bonnet, got up and said that collective security was at an end; that the fate of Czecho-Slovakia destroyed collective security. It destroyed something which was more fundamental than collective security. It destroyed not collective security, because it did not come into play, but the ordinary method of trying to bring about international understanding between one State and another. That is what was killed. It was buried last March. That was already done by the very people and by various countries that are now trying to resuscitate either peace through the sword, or else a new League of Peace without aggression.
I should be very sorry if this country, particularly at the present moment, whatever may happen in the future, would take the step of resigning from the League. It would be symbolic. It would be another useful weapon of propaganda for those who have always thrown scorn, not merely on collective security, but also on peace as something that was good in itself. I spoke of small nations and mentioned their position to-day, and I meant to go on to point out what was the position before. Everyone of them had a feeling of absolute security 12 years ago. There was no fear of aggression from a neighbour, and no fear of being overrun by a big Power.
We were one of the smallest nations and, as the Taoiseach knows, we were not afraid to get up to give our view, no matter how opposed it was to that of Great Britain, France or Germany, and sometimes we were listened to effectively. Is that the position at the present day? The result of the ordinary return to common sense? That is what we have at the present day. We are now facing up to a new League and to a return to common sense. Small nations were particularly powerful there in the old League days. I admit that they were powerful beyond their real strength. That was the great thing to be said in favour of the League. That sense of security for them was there for a number of years notwithstanding the intrigues of this or that Power. There was a feeling of European solidarity. For reasons that we need not go into that has been undermined. Everyone knows that if we are not to have a continuance of the present crisis after crisis, and if it does not end in a great war, that even after a great war some machinery must be set up. Of course, there were difficulties. Every Power was anxious for the application of justice to every other Power but they made mental reservations where their own interests, great or small, were concerned. Every nation was anxious that every other Power should observe not only international but also the moral law.
There was not enough, perhaps, of flexibility in the arrangements. When I look back to September last year I wonder whether people think of some of the things involved in the defence made for the Munich Agreement. I have heard defenders of the Munich Agreement say: "After all, is it not only quite fair that the Germans got what they were entitled to?" If that were so, and if they only got what they were entitled to, why was there a danger of a war? Who was responsible for bringing Europe to the pitch of a war of such a nature if one State only got what it was entitled to? The people who were making that defence on these grounds apparently forgot that they implied that the Western Powers were not quick enough to see the justice of their neighbours' cause. Apart from that, however, if you call that an example—and I should be sorry indeed to hint that that defence was seriously meant—there was a slowness, and there was no proper machinery for bringing about a peaceful change. If there is any machinery in the future to be set up, somehow or other, that will have to be provided for. It is a pity that all nations, great and small, never give way except to the threat of force, and never give way to the decent demands of justice, but always to the threat of force.
That is what has happened with regard to certain Powers in Europe—that when there were decent demands for ordinary justice, the great Powers ignored them. The great Powers adopted the bad political method of teaching, of giving way only to threats. Undoubtedly, the League of Nations did good work, and that it failed to do its full work is largely due to the selfishness of these Powers, none of which was concerned about the demands of justice or its neighbours, and also to the cheap cynicism that a lot of people poured on the League itself—merely because it was symbolical of collective security. But we can still cherish a belief in its return. For that reason I am glad that the Government is not leaving the League at the present time.
