WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.520 If you, like us, ever look at today's headlines, 00:00:02.799 --> 00:00:05.320 at the gridlock in the UN Security Council maybe, 00:00:05.500 --> 00:00:08.019 or the sheer difficulty of coordinating a global 00:00:08.019 --> 00:00:11.000 health response, you realize that multilateral 00:00:11.000 --> 00:00:16.420 diplomacy is a tightrope walk. But where did 00:00:16.420 --> 00:00:18.760 this whole complicated structure even begin? 00:00:19.289 --> 00:00:21.550 Today, we are deep diving into the organization 00:00:21.550 --> 00:00:23.670 that first tried to solve the world's biggest 00:00:23.670 --> 00:00:26.350 problems. We're talking about the League of Nations. 00:00:26.469 --> 00:00:29.429 It really stands as the original blueprint for 00:00:29.429 --> 00:00:31.969 modern global governance. Yet it's, you know, 00:00:32.009 --> 00:00:35.009 it's famous for one catastrophic failure, its 00:00:35.009 --> 00:00:37.750 inability to stop the war that followed. The 00:00:37.750 --> 00:00:40.189 League was the first worldwide intergovernmental 00:00:40.189 --> 00:00:42.490 organization. And it was explicitly designed 00:00:42.490 --> 00:00:44.869 to maintain global peace. It was officially founded 00:00:44.869 --> 00:00:47.509 on January 10th, 1920, and then dissolved in 00:00:47.509 --> 00:00:50.270 1946. And our mission today is to tackle the 00:00:50.270 --> 00:00:53.109 paradox at its heart. It's a huge one. How could 00:00:53.109 --> 00:00:55.170 this ambitious project, I mean, a project meant 00:00:55.170 --> 00:00:57.270 to end all wars and built on these incredibly 00:00:57.270 --> 00:01:00.850 high ideals, fail so utterly in preventing World 00:01:00.850 --> 00:01:03.590 War II, yet still leave behind such a foundational, 00:01:03.630 --> 00:01:07.090 enduring legacy? A legacy that informs, really, 00:01:07.129 --> 00:01:09.310 almost every modern international body we rely 00:01:09.310 --> 00:01:12.640 on. And to really understand its failure, you 00:01:12.640 --> 00:01:15.739 have to start with the single most critical decision 00:01:15.739 --> 00:01:17.980 that crippled it from the moment the doors opened. 00:01:18.120 --> 00:01:19.700 The absence of the United States. The absence 00:01:19.700 --> 00:01:21.939 of the United States. Exactly. It's the ultimate 00:01:21.939 --> 00:01:24.680 historical irony, isn't it? The leading architect, 00:01:25.040 --> 00:01:27.760 the man who championed the idea across the globe, 00:01:28.299 --> 00:01:30.939 U .S. President Woodrow Wilson. He won the Nobel 00:01:30.939 --> 00:01:33.959 Peace Prize in 1919 for his role in creating 00:01:33.959 --> 00:01:36.959 it. He did. Yet despite all his efforts, all 00:01:36.959 --> 00:01:39.689 his vision, the U .S. Senate. which was driven 00:01:39.689 --> 00:01:43.450 by this wave of isolationist sentiment, refused 00:01:43.450 --> 00:01:46.329 to ratify the Treaty of Versailles. And that 00:01:46.329 --> 00:01:48.870 meant refusing to join the League. And that final 00:01:48.870 --> 00:01:51.769 vote, it was March 19th, 1920. Just think about 00:01:51.769 --> 00:01:53.269 the signal that sent to the rest of the world. 00:01:53.370 --> 00:01:55.569 The league's most important ideological champion 00:01:55.569 --> 00:01:58.530 and one of the world's great economic and military 00:01:58.530 --> 00:02:01.750 powers decides it wants no part of the very future 00:02:01.750 --> 00:02:04.790 it just designed. So as we unpack the league's 00:02:04.790 --> 00:02:07.950 complex origins, its organizational structure, 00:02:08.229 --> 00:02:12.169 its quiet social successes, and its very, very 00:02:12.169 --> 00:02:15.610 public geopolitical failures in the 1930s, you'll 00:02:15.610 --> 00:02:18.729 see how that single absence just eroded the league's 00:02:18.729 --> 00:02:21.800 moral and material authority. day one. Okay so 00:02:21.800 --> 00:02:24.750 let's unpack this. this revolutionary idea of 00:02:24.750 --> 00:02:27.789 collective security. Because the push to systematize 00:02:27.789 --> 00:02:30.469 peace, it wasn't just a spontaneous reaction 00:02:30.469 --> 00:02:33.250 to the horrors of World War I, was it? It had 00:02:33.250 --> 00:02:35.710 these incredibly deep intellectual roots stretching 00:02:35.710 --> 00:02:38.430 back centuries. Absolutely. The philosophical 00:02:38.430 --> 00:02:41.750 desire for a permanent, peaceful community of 00:02:41.750 --> 00:02:43.569 nations. I mean, that's been around since the 00:02:43.569 --> 00:02:45.610 Enlightenment. If you want to trace the most 00:02:45.610 --> 00:02:47.770 direct philosophical predecessor, you've got 00:02:47.770 --> 00:02:50.949 to go back to Immanuel Kant's 1795 vision in 00:02:50.949 --> 00:02:54.210 perpetual peace. A philosophical sketch. In Kant's 00:02:54.210 --> 00:02:56.129 work, it wasn't just abstract theory. It's more 00:02:56.129 --> 00:02:58.349 like a blueprint. He argued that peace could 00:02:58.349 --> 00:03:00.370 only be secured through a league of free states, 00:03:00.530 --> 00:03:02.610 all of them functioning as republics, respecting 00:03:02.610 --> 00:03:05.310 their citizens, and welcoming visitors as, you 00:03:05.310 --> 00:03:07.370 know, fellow rational beings. Right. He wasn't 00:03:07.370 --> 00:03:09.509 advocating for a global super state. No, not 00:03:09.509 --> 00:03:11.750 at all. But a peaceful society built on mutual 00:03:11.750 --> 00:03:15.080 respect and shared rights. And that's... Well, 00:03:15.139 --> 00:03:18.120 it's a beautiful, if maybe a little impossibly 00:03:18.120 --> 00:03:21.219 idealistic starting point for what the League 00:03:21.219 --> 00:03:23.379 became. It really did provide that essential 00:03:23.379 --> 00:03:26.219 intellectual foundation. And then as we move 00:03:26.219 --> 00:03:28.139 into the 19th century, we start to see these 00:03:28.139 --> 00:03:31.039 more practical diplomatic models emerge. The 00:03:31.039 --> 00:03:33.139 most significant one being the Concert of Europe, 00:03:33.300 --> 00:03:35.240 which developed after the defeat of Napoleon 00:03:35.240 --> 00:03:37.860 in 1815. That was essentially the great powers. 00:03:38.590 --> 00:03:41.729 Britain, Austria, Prussia, Russia, agreeing to 00:03:41.729 --> 00:03:44.949 consult each other and to intervene when necessary 00:03:44.949 --> 00:03:47.289 just to maintain the geopolitical status quo. 00:03:47.449 --> 00:03:49.669 So it was designed to avoid a massive European 00:03:49.669 --> 00:03:52.629 war by managing spheres of influence. Precisely. 00:03:52.629 --> 00:03:55.009 It was informal. It was driven by mutual self 00:03:55.009 --> 00:03:56.789 -interest. And it was all about managing power 00:03:56.789 --> 00:03:59.500 imbalances. But, and this is the key, it was 00:03:59.500 --> 00:04:02.120 not codified or institutionalized. It was simply 00:04:02.120 --> 00:04:04.759 a tool of the powerful. The real shift toward 00:04:04.759 --> 00:04:07.120 formal international mechanisms began later in 00:04:07.120 --> 00:04:08.879 the 19th century. With things like the Geneva 00:04:08.879 --> 00:04:11.400 Conventions, right? Defining humanitarian relief 00:04:11.400 --> 00:04:13.800 during wartime. And the Hague Conventions of 00:04:13.800 --> 00:04:17.720 1899 and 1907. These were huge steps toward creating 00:04:17.720 --> 00:04:20.259 universal rules for conflict and, crucially, 00:04:20.459 --> 00:04:22.620 offering methods for the peaceful settlement 00:04:22.620 --> 00:04:25.879 of disputes. This was the legal and intellectual 00:04:25.879 --> 00:04:27.839 scaffolding that the League would eventually 00:04:27.839 --> 00:04:30.300 be built on. And then came the Great War. Which 00:04:30.300 --> 00:04:32.959 didn't just test the system, it shattered it 00:04:32.959 --> 00:04:35.199 completely. The sheer devastation, the scale 00:04:35.199 --> 00:04:37.180 of the mechanized slaughter, it just completely 00:04:37.180 --> 00:04:39.339 shifted the diplomatic and public landscape. 00:04:39.740 --> 00:04:42.170 World War I was devastating in a way. that no 00:04:42.170 --> 00:04:44.829 previous conflict had been. Affecting every social, 00:04:44.910 --> 00:04:47.230 political, economic system across Europe. And 00:04:47.230 --> 00:04:49.810 it was immediately universally described as the 00:04:49.810 --> 00:04:52.970 war to end all wars. So the desire for systemic, 00:04:53.069 --> 00:04:56.350 profound change was just massive. People weren't 00:04:56.350 --> 00:04:58.470 looking for another temporary fix like the Concert 00:04:58.470 --> 00:05:00.430 of Europe. They wanted to address the fundamental 00:05:00.430 --> 00:05:03.550 flaws that led to, well, to the abyss. The question 00:05:03.550 --> 00:05:06.660 became, why did this happen? And the analysis 00:05:06.660 --> 00:05:09.779 was surprisingly uniform across the allied capitals. 00:05:09.959 --> 00:05:13.620 The causes were identified as these reckless 00:05:13.620 --> 00:05:16.879 arms races fueled by fear and nationalism, the 00:05:16.879 --> 00:05:19.620 rigid system of secret diplomacy and alliances 00:05:19.620 --> 00:05:22.079 that just pulled everyone into conflict. And 00:05:22.079 --> 00:05:24.420 the sovereign right of states to just go to war 00:05:24.420 --> 00:05:26.259 whenever they felt their interests were threatened. 00:05:26.459 --> 00:05:28.540 Right. So the remedy had to be just as systemic. 00:05:28.699 --> 00:05:31.180 Yeah. And that remedy, the very philosophical 00:05:31.180 --> 00:05:34.379 mission of the League, was incredibly ambitious. 00:05:34.939 --> 00:05:37.500 an international organization that would prevent 00:05:37.500 --> 00:05:42.009 future war through three core mechanisms. Open 00:05:42.009 --> 00:05:44.149 diplomacy. And a system of collective security 00:05:44.149 --> 00:05:46.470 that would impose penalties, whether economic 00:05:46.470 --> 00:05:49.430 or military, to make conflict just too costly 00:05:49.430 --> 00:05:51.629 and unattractive. And this brings us to the key 00:05:51.629 --> 00:05:53.930 architects who turned these theoretical ideas 00:05:53.930 --> 00:05:56.029 into the concrete framework of the covenant. 00:05:56.230 --> 00:05:58.829 So beyond Wilson, you had Lord Robert Cecil from 00:05:58.829 --> 00:06:01.029 the UK, a tireless advocate for international 00:06:01.029 --> 00:06:04.110 law, and Jan Smuts, the influential South African 00:06:04.110 --> 00:06:07.089 statesman. And the momentum wasn't just top down. 00:06:07.500 --> 00:06:09.879 The intellectual push in the U .S. came from 00:06:09.879 --> 00:06:12.699 these really powerful domestic groups like the 00:06:12.699 --> 00:06:15.800 League to enforce peace, which was led by former 00:06:15.800 --> 00:06:18.319 President William Howard Taft. They were advocating 00:06:18.319 --> 00:06:20.879 for arbitration and sanctions. It was a genuine 00:06:20.879 --> 00:06:23.540 international movement. What's particularly fascinating 00:06:23.540 --> 00:06:26.759 is the range of ideas that were ultimately rejected. 00:06:26.920 --> 00:06:32.079 Many of the initial proposals were far more radical 00:06:32.079 --> 00:06:34.180 than what ended up in the covenant. Like the 00:06:34.180 --> 00:06:36.560 French position in 1918. I think that's a crucial. 00:06:36.779 --> 00:06:38.300 detail that really tells you where the system 00:06:38.300 --> 00:06:41.100 broke down later on. It is. The French drafted 00:06:41.100 --> 00:06:44.120 this very far -reaching proposal that called 00:06:44.120 --> 00:06:46.639 for annual meetings of a council to settle all 00:06:46.639 --> 00:06:49.240 disputes. But crucially, they wanted a standing 00:06:49.240 --> 00:06:52.160 international army to enforce those decisions. 00:06:52.439 --> 00:06:54.480 They recognized that without teeth, the League 00:06:54.480 --> 00:06:57.019 would just be a talking shop. And that concept, 00:06:57.259 --> 00:06:59.920 the international army, was definitively rejected 00:06:59.920 --> 00:07:02.399 by the British and Americans. They were willing 00:07:02.399 --> 00:07:04.860 to have a forum for discussion, absolutely, but 00:07:04.860 --> 00:07:07.480 not a permanent supranational military command 00:07:07.480 --> 00:07:09.350 that could override their national... sovereignty. 00:07:09.629 --> 00:07:12.290 And that rejection, right there at the drafting 00:07:12.290 --> 00:07:15.230 table, it fatally undermined the enforcement 00:07:15.230 --> 00:07:18.189 capability of the League before it even existed. 00:07:18.509 --> 00:07:21.170 The covenant was finalized and signed on June 00:07:21.170 --> 00:07:24.730 28, 1919, as part one of the Treaty of Versailles. 00:07:25.050 --> 00:07:27.509 The machinery was put in motion pretty quickly. 00:07:27.709 --> 00:07:30.189 The first council meeting was on January 16, 00:07:30.589 --> 00:07:33.889 1920, in Paris, and the first assembly met in 00:07:33.889 --> 00:07:36.589 Geneva that November. But even in those founding 00:07:36.589 --> 00:07:38.350 meetings, there was this deep -seated tension 00:07:38.350 --> 00:07:40.430 about what the league was actually supposed to 00:07:40.430 --> 00:07:43.050 be. Did everyone really agree on Wilson's grand 00:07:43.050 --> 00:07:45.870 vision? Not at all. There was a critical mismatch. 00:07:45.970 --> 00:07:48.569 On one side, you had Wilson's revolutionary conception 00:07:48.569 --> 00:07:51.129 of the league as the solid replacement for the 00:07:51.129 --> 00:07:53.790 corrupt secret alliance system. He saw it as 00:07:53.790 --> 00:07:56.329 a true guardian of international order, a protector 00:07:56.329 --> 00:07:58.850 of small states. He wanted a complete overhaul. 00:07:59.110 --> 00:08:01.509 And on the other side, the British and others 00:08:01.509 --> 00:08:03.829 seemed far more pragmatic or, I don't know, maybe 00:08:03.829 --> 00:08:06.279 cynical. Certainly more pragmatic. David Lloyd 00:08:06.279 --> 00:08:08.220 George, the British prime minister, he primarily 00:08:08.220 --> 00:08:11.300 wanted a cheap, self -enforcing peace. Which 00:08:11.300 --> 00:08:13.939 basically meant updating the old fluid concert 00:08:13.939 --> 00:08:17.160 of Europe model. Exactly. He wanted a low cost 00:08:17.160 --> 00:08:20.360 mechanism to manage the status quo without requiring 00:08:20.360 --> 00:08:23.399 constant British military commitment. So Wilson 00:08:23.399 --> 00:08:27.019 saw a total idealistic overhaul while the major 00:08:27.019 --> 00:08:30.980 European powers saw a manageable, low risk forum 00:08:30.980 --> 00:08:34.429 for diplomacy. That inherent tension meant the 00:08:34.429 --> 00:08:36.610 league was immediately compromised on sensitive 00:08:36.610 --> 00:08:39.269 issues. And while the U .S. never joined the 00:08:39.269 --> 00:08:42.149 formal structure, we shouldn't overlook the indirect 00:08:42.149 --> 00:08:44.769 American influence that came later. American 00:08:44.769 --> 00:08:47.690 philanthropies, particularly the massive Rockefeller 00:08:47.690 --> 00:08:50.610 Foundation, stepped in, especially in the 1930s. 00:08:50.610 --> 00:08:53.190 Right. They provided major grants to build up 00:08:53.190 --> 00:08:55.789 the league's technical expertise, transforming 00:08:55.789 --> 00:08:58.450 its permanent staff from mere bureaucrats into 00:08:58.450 --> 00:09:01.009 a real international civil service focused on 00:09:01.009 --> 00:09:03.899 impartial analysis. This helped make the League 00:09:03.899 --> 00:09:06.080 in some ways less a parliament of nations and 00:09:06.080 --> 00:09:08.440 more a precursor to a modern international think 00:09:08.440 --> 00:09:10.360 tank. Yeah, it's a great nuance. So even as the 00:09:10.360 --> 00:09:12.360 political structure was failing, the professional 00:09:12.360 --> 00:09:14.340 technical foundation was being quietly built 00:09:14.340 --> 00:09:17.220 with American money. OK, let's move now from 00:09:17.220 --> 00:09:19.639 the big ideas to the functional architecture. 00:09:20.120 --> 00:09:22.779 How is this revolutionary organization actually 00:09:22.779 --> 00:09:25.779 structured in Geneva? And, you know, what were 00:09:25.779 --> 00:09:28.220 the key details of that structure that ultimately 00:09:28.220 --> 00:09:30.620 became its downfall? Well, the League was built 00:09:30.620 --> 00:09:33.379 around three main constitutional organs, the 00:09:33.379 --> 00:09:36.159 Assembly, the Council, and the Permanent Secretariat. 00:09:36.419 --> 00:09:38.639 These were the political and administrative heart, 00:09:38.740 --> 00:09:41.879 all located in Geneva. And then, critically, 00:09:42.080 --> 00:09:45.360 it had two autonomous wings essential for international 00:09:45.360 --> 00:09:48.389 law and labor rights. The Permanent Court of 00:09:48.389 --> 00:09:50.490 International Justice in The Hague. And the International 00:09:50.490 --> 00:09:53.690 Labor Organization, or IOLO. So, starting with 00:09:53.690 --> 00:09:56.149 the Assembly, that was the grand forum where 00:09:56.149 --> 00:09:58.610 everyone, big or small, got a voice, correct? 00:09:58.710 --> 00:10:00.789 That's right. The Assembly was made up of representatives 00:10:00.789 --> 00:10:03.629 of all member states. Each state was allowed 00:10:03.629 --> 00:10:06.289 up to three representatives, but, and this is 00:10:06.289 --> 00:10:08.470 the key democratic element, each state received 00:10:08.470 --> 00:10:11.289 only one vote. And it met once a year in September. 00:10:11.720 --> 00:10:14.039 It did. And while it was huge, its functions 00:10:14.039 --> 00:10:16.620 were largely supervisory, controlling the budget, 00:10:16.820 --> 00:10:18.679 electing the non -permanent council members, 00:10:18.899 --> 00:10:21.440 and acting as a directing force for all the league's 00:10:21.440 --> 00:10:23.600 technical activities. Then you had the council, 00:10:23.779 --> 00:10:26.340 which was clearly the executive body, designed 00:10:26.340 --> 00:10:28.480 to handle crises and high -stakes decisions. 00:10:28.840 --> 00:10:31.220 The council was designed as the smaller, more 00:10:31.220 --> 00:10:33.980 action -oriented chamber. It started with four 00:10:33.980 --> 00:10:36.779 permanent members, the victorious Allied powers, 00:10:37.039 --> 00:10:41.440 the UK, France, Italy, and Japan. and four non 00:10:41.440 --> 00:10:43.700 -permanent members elected by the Assembly for 00:10:43.700 --> 00:10:46.220 three -year terms. And it met far more frequently. 00:10:46.539 --> 00:10:48.899 Oh yeah, sometimes five times a year in Geneva 00:10:48.899 --> 00:10:51.340 and sometimes in other capitals. So the great 00:10:51.340 --> 00:10:53.639 powers made sure they had permanent seats and 00:10:53.639 --> 00:10:55.679 therefore permanent control over the League's 00:10:55.679 --> 00:10:57.779 most crucial decisions right from the start. 00:10:57.980 --> 00:11:00.519 That looks a lot like the structure the UN adopted 00:11:00.519 --> 00:11:03.259 later. It does, but with one crucial difference 00:11:03.259 --> 00:11:05.580 we'll get to. The composition of the Council 00:11:05.580 --> 00:11:09.039 was dynamic. Germany was admitted as a gesture 00:11:09.039 --> 00:11:11.580 of reconciliation and became the fifth permanent 00:11:11.580 --> 00:11:15.159 member in 1926. Under the Weimar Republic. Right. 00:11:15.240 --> 00:11:18.059 And as the League grew, the number of non -permanent 00:11:18.059 --> 00:11:20.740 seats was also increased, peaking at 11 by the 00:11:20.740 --> 00:11:23.200 end, meaning the Council had a total maximum 00:11:23.200 --> 00:11:26.360 membership of 15 before the major powers began 00:11:26.360 --> 00:11:29.059 their dramatic exits. And finally, the Permanent 00:11:29.059 --> 00:11:32.720 Secretariat, the League's unsung engine. We often 00:11:32.720 --> 00:11:34.700 forget the importance of the bureaucracy itself. 00:11:34.960 --> 00:11:37.019 The Secretariat was essential. It was the first 00:11:37.019 --> 00:11:40.000 truly international civil service, located permanently 00:11:40.000 --> 00:11:44.759 in Geneva. By 1931, it housed 707 staff members, 00:11:45.039 --> 00:11:48.139 experts recruited internationally, not just delegated 00:11:48.139 --> 00:11:49.980 by their home governments. They were responsible 00:11:49.980 --> 00:11:52.279 for preparing agendas, publishing the critical 00:11:52.279 --> 00:11:54.899 reports that often framed disputes, and handling 00:11:54.899 --> 00:11:57.860 all the complex routine administration. And these 00:11:57.860 --> 00:11:59.740 staff were divided into sections that really 00:11:59.740 --> 00:12:02.100 reveal the scope of the League's ambitions beyond 00:12:02.100 --> 00:12:05.179 just preventing war. Indeed. They had sections 00:12:05.179 --> 00:12:07.399 dedicated to political issues, financial and 00:12:07.399 --> 00:12:10.019 economics, mandates, disarmament, and the humanitarian 00:12:10.019 --> 00:12:12.919 side. Health, social issues like the notorious 00:12:12.919 --> 00:12:15.240 opium and traffic in women and children's sections, 00:12:15.360 --> 00:12:17.940 and transit. This internationalized expertise 00:12:17.940 --> 00:12:20.500 laid the foundation for virtually every specialized 00:12:20.500 --> 00:12:23.830 agency we know today. Now we arrive at the catastrophic 00:12:23.830 --> 00:12:26.850 structural weakness, the fatal flaw embedded 00:12:26.850 --> 00:12:29.750 right there in the covenant, the veto problem. 00:12:30.029 --> 00:12:32.350 This is where the idealistic philosophy clashed 00:12:32.350 --> 00:12:34.350 fatally with the practical mechanics of power. 00:12:34.809 --> 00:12:37.629 The rule was that unanimity was required for 00:12:37.629 --> 00:12:40.129 almost all major decisions of both the assembly 00:12:40.129 --> 00:12:44.110 and the council. Unanimity? Yes. Only procedural 00:12:44.110 --> 00:12:46.269 matters and things like admitting new members 00:12:46.269 --> 00:12:49.049 could be decided by a majority. So any single 00:12:49.049 --> 00:12:52.940 major member? could essentially veto any decisive 00:12:52.940 --> 00:12:56.799 action, any serious sanction, or any military 00:12:56.799 --> 00:12:59.399 intervention against an aggressor. Precisely. 00:12:59.399 --> 00:13:01.940 The core philosophical belief was that the League 00:13:01.940 --> 00:13:04.759 sought a solution by consent, not by dictation. 00:13:04.940 --> 00:13:07.200 This respected national sovereignty absolutely, 00:13:07.480 --> 00:13:09.799 which was a core demand of the time, but the 00:13:09.799 --> 00:13:11.700 resulting mechanism was guaranteed to produce 00:13:11.700 --> 00:13:14.379 indecision or fatally slow action. It sounds 00:13:14.379 --> 00:13:16.159 like the League was designed to work only when 00:13:16.159 --> 00:13:18.629 the great powers already agreed. which sort of 00:13:18.629 --> 00:13:21.110 renders the system unnecessary for managing conflicts 00:13:21.110 --> 00:13:23.549 between those same great powers. That's a very 00:13:23.549 --> 00:13:26.049 sharp observation. When the Eagles fell out, 00:13:26.090 --> 00:13:28.649 as Mussolini so cynically put it, the League 00:13:28.649 --> 00:13:30.990 had no legal mechanism to override the national 00:13:30.990 --> 00:13:33.570 interests of even one powerful member. Did the 00:13:33.570 --> 00:13:36.350 League have any unifying symbols? Common languages? 00:13:36.610 --> 00:13:38.470 The official working languages were French and 00:13:38.470 --> 00:13:41.009 English, reflecting the two dominant post -war 00:13:41.009 --> 00:13:43.730 powers, though Spanish was also accepted. And, 00:13:43.730 --> 00:13:46.250 you know, interestingly, unlike the U .N., The 00:13:46.250 --> 00:13:48.789 league never adopted a permanent, universally 00:13:48.789 --> 00:13:51.990 recognized official flag for most of its existence. 00:13:52.029 --> 00:13:55.200 That kind of highlights it. tentative, experimental 00:13:55.200 --> 00:13:57.759 nature. It does. A semi -official emblem did 00:13:57.759 --> 00:14:00.700 appear later, two five -pointed stars within 00:14:00.700 --> 00:14:04.240 a blue pentagon used at the 1939 New York World's 00:14:04.240 --> 00:14:06.539 Fair, symbolizing the Earth's five continents 00:14:06.539 --> 00:14:09.200 and five races. Let's talk about the volatility 00:14:09.200 --> 00:14:11.460 of its membership, the coming and going that 00:14:11.460 --> 00:14:13.539 really defined its political relevance. Well, 00:14:13.620 --> 00:14:15.919 the League began with 42 founding members in 00:14:15.919 --> 00:14:18.779 1920 and reached its peak with 58 members between 00:14:18.779 --> 00:14:23.019 1934 and 1935. But the high -profile exits, particularly 00:14:23.179 --> 00:14:25.919 during the critical decade of the 1930s, told 00:14:25.919 --> 00:14:29.080 the real story of its decline. The major aggressor 00:14:29.080 --> 00:14:31.460 states simply rejected the system when it demanded 00:14:31.460 --> 00:14:34.100 accountability. That's the key takeaway. When 00:14:34.100 --> 00:14:36.279 the League began to actually function as a moral 00:14:36.279 --> 00:14:38.980 and legal check on aggression, the states committing 00:14:38.980 --> 00:14:42.080 those aggressive acts simply walked away. Japan 00:14:42.080 --> 00:14:45.409 and Germany left in 1933. Italy, a permanent 00:14:45.409 --> 00:14:49.009 council member, withdrew in 1937 and Spain followed 00:14:49.009 --> 00:14:52.070 in 1939. The Soviet Union is a unique case here, 00:14:52.169 --> 00:14:54.649 joining late and then leaving under duress. Yes. 00:14:54.850 --> 00:14:58.990 The USSR only joined in September 1934, primarily 00:14:58.990 --> 00:15:01.549 because it saw the League as a potential tool 00:15:01.549 --> 00:15:04.870 to resist the rising power of Nazi Germany. But 00:15:04.870 --> 00:15:06.970 its membership was short lived. The Soviet Union 00:15:06.970 --> 00:15:09.350 was formally expelled after its invasion of Finland 00:15:09.350 --> 00:15:12.470 on December 14th, 1939. And that expulsion is 00:15:12.470 --> 00:15:16.480 a historically significant It's the final dramatic 00:15:16.480 --> 00:15:19.120 flourish. The Soviet Union was the only member 00:15:19.120 --> 00:15:21.440 ever formally expelled from the League of Nations, 00:15:21.679 --> 00:15:24.360 marking one of its very last acts before the 00:15:24.360 --> 00:15:26.460 World War consumed its administrative functions. 00:15:26.820 --> 00:15:29.240 This constant flux just showed that the League 00:15:29.240 --> 00:15:31.200 could hold power over the weak, but it could 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:33.240 not hold the loyalty or compliance of the strong. 00:15:33.690 --> 00:15:35.629 When you look back at the League, the failures 00:15:35.629 --> 00:15:38.629 of the 1930s just dominate the narrative. But 00:15:38.629 --> 00:15:41.470 that focus obscures this massive area where the 00:15:41.470 --> 00:15:44.230 League was surprisingly effective, establishing... 00:15:44.230 --> 00:15:50.690 This is the critical correction history provides. 00:15:50.870 --> 00:15:53.899 The League... catastrophically failed at high 00:15:53.899 --> 00:15:56.820 politics preventing war, but it excelled at technical, 00:15:56.980 --> 00:16:00.179 social, and administrative cooperation. These 00:16:00.179 --> 00:16:02.700 overlooked successes, they are the true enduring 00:16:02.700 --> 00:16:04.759 legacy. Let's start with the mandate system. 00:16:05.100 --> 00:16:07.700 This was the controversial compromise for dividing 00:16:07.700 --> 00:16:09.919 up the colonies of the defeated central powers 00:16:09.919 --> 00:16:13.080 after WWI. It was a fascinating concept under 00:16:13.080 --> 00:16:16.019 Article 22 of the Covenant. It applied to former 00:16:16.019 --> 00:16:18.220 German colonies and the Arabic -speaking provinces 00:16:18.220 --> 00:16:21.269 of the Ottoman Empire. The idea, championed by 00:16:21.269 --> 00:16:24.169 Wilson, was revolutionary on paper. Rather than 00:16:24.169 --> 00:16:26.210 letting the Allies just annex these lands as 00:16:26.210 --> 00:16:28.710 war booty, the territories were placed under 00:16:28.710 --> 00:16:30.950 a system designed to assist them toward eventual 00:16:30.950 --> 00:16:33.129 self -governance, all subject to international 00:16:33.129 --> 00:16:36.250 observation. It sounds like an attempt to supervise 00:16:36.250 --> 00:16:38.950 empire, to put colonial powers under some degree 00:16:38.950 --> 00:16:40.850 of international scrutiny for the very first 00:16:40.850 --> 00:16:44.389 time. But wasn't it often just a fig leaf for 00:16:44.389 --> 00:16:47.190 continued control? That is the essential contradiction. 00:16:47.529 --> 00:16:50.110 The system was managed by the Permanent Mandates 00:16:50.110 --> 00:16:52.549 Commission, which reviewed annual reports from 00:16:52.549 --> 00:16:55.009 the administering powers. So yes, it introduced 00:16:55.009 --> 00:16:57.769 scrutiny, but it ultimately enshrined colonial 00:16:57.769 --> 00:17:01.289 control under a new name. The territories were 00:17:01.289 --> 00:17:04.150 divided into three classifications, A, B, and 00:17:04.150 --> 00:17:06.670 C, based on their perceived ability to stand 00:17:06.670 --> 00:17:08.710 alone. Can you break those down for us? What 00:17:08.710 --> 00:17:10.609 do they mean for the people living there? Certainly. 00:17:10.809 --> 00:17:13.049 A mandate's applied to parts of the old Ottoman 00:17:13.049 --> 00:17:15.470 Empire, like Mesopotamia, which is modern Iraq, 00:17:15.710 --> 00:17:17.910 and Palestine. These were deemed to have reached 00:17:17.910 --> 00:17:20.569 a stage where their independence could be provisionally 00:17:20.569 --> 00:17:23.470 recognized, subject only to administrative assistance 00:17:23.470 --> 00:17:26.430 from the mandatory power, usually Britain or 00:17:26.430 --> 00:17:29.549 France. So the path to independence was theoretically 00:17:29.549 --> 00:17:33.099 shortest for them. Exactly. Then you have B mandates, 00:17:33.460 --> 00:17:35.819 which were applied to former German colonies 00:17:35.819 --> 00:17:38.140 in Central and East Africa, like Tanganyika. 00:17:38.380 --> 00:17:41.059 These were considered less developed and the 00:17:41.059 --> 00:17:43.759 mandatory power had broader administrative responsibility. 00:17:44.339 --> 00:17:47.299 But the covenant explicitly prohibited them from 00:17:47.299 --> 00:17:49.940 building fortifications or military bases. And 00:17:49.940 --> 00:17:52.579 C mandates sound like the closest thing to outright 00:17:52.579 --> 00:17:55.940 annexation. They were. Sea mandates covered territories 00:17:55.940 --> 00:17:58.279 like southwest Africa and some Pacific islands. 00:17:58.519 --> 00:18:01.539 Due to their small size, sparse population, or 00:18:01.539 --> 00:18:03.940 closeness to the mandatory power, they could 00:18:03.940 --> 00:18:06.519 be administered as integral portions of that 00:18:06.519 --> 00:18:08.660 power's territory. The success rate for immediate 00:18:08.660 --> 00:18:12.039 independence was mixed too. Iraq, and an A mandate, 00:18:12.400 --> 00:18:14.720 gained independence in 1932 and actually joined 00:18:14.720 --> 00:18:17.539 the League. But why did nearly all mandates stay 00:18:17.539 --> 00:18:19.819 under control until after World War II if the 00:18:19.819 --> 00:18:21.960 goal was self -governance? Because the mandatory 00:18:21.960 --> 00:18:24.579 powers, like France and Britain, had very little 00:18:24.579 --> 00:18:27.079 incentive to speed up the process, the system 00:18:27.079 --> 00:18:29.160 gave them an international justification for 00:18:29.160 --> 00:18:31.259 holding the territory. And while the Mandates 00:18:31.259 --> 00:18:33.859 Commission was persistent, it just lacked the 00:18:33.859 --> 00:18:36.859 power to enforce immediate independence. Still, 00:18:37.019 --> 00:18:38.720 the system set a precedent for international 00:18:38.720 --> 00:18:41.559 trusteeship that the UN later adopted. And the 00:18:41.559 --> 00:18:43.579 League itself had direct administrative roles 00:18:43.579 --> 00:18:45.819 in Europe, too, which is an overlooked aspect 00:18:45.819 --> 00:18:48.539 of its governance legacy. It did. The League 00:18:48.539 --> 00:18:50.799 governed the territory of the Saar Basin. for 00:18:50.799 --> 00:18:54.440 15 years until a 1935 plebiscite returned it 00:18:54.440 --> 00:18:57.180 to Germany. It also governed the free city of 00:18:57.180 --> 00:18:59.680 Danzig -Now -Gasisch, navigating extreme political 00:18:59.680 --> 00:19:02.980 tensions between Poland and Germany. Okay, let's 00:19:02.980 --> 00:19:05.759 shift to the true surprising wins, the global 00:19:05.759 --> 00:19:08.660 social and technical work. This is the foundation 00:19:08.660 --> 00:19:11.440 on which so much of the modern UN system is built, 00:19:11.519 --> 00:19:13.759 and it's where the League truly succeeded day 00:19:13.759 --> 00:19:15.779 to day. You have to start with the International 00:19:15.779 --> 00:19:19.390 Labour Organization. ILO. It was established 00:19:19.390 --> 00:19:21.490 by the Treaty of Versailles and was deliberately 00:19:21.490 --> 00:19:23.630 made autonomous, though its budget was controlled 00:19:23.630 --> 00:19:26.410 by the Assembly. This autonomy helped it survive 00:19:26.410 --> 00:19:29.450 the League's political death. And the ILO was 00:19:29.450 --> 00:19:31.670 securing fundamental worker rights worldwide 00:19:31.670 --> 00:19:35.670 well before World War II. That's a massive achievement 00:19:35.670 --> 00:19:38.880 in social justice. Its impact was profound and 00:19:38.880 --> 00:19:41.759 immediate. The ILO secured the adoption of the 00:19:41.759 --> 00:19:44.019 eight -hour workday and the 48 -hour working 00:19:44.019 --> 00:19:47.279 week in numerous countries. It campaigned successfully 00:19:47.279 --> 00:19:50.079 against child labor, restricted the use of lead 00:19:50.079 --> 00:19:53.440 in paint, a major health hazard, and advocated 00:19:53.440 --> 00:19:55.440 for women's rights in the workplace. It wasn't 00:19:55.440 --> 00:19:57.480 just about labor, though. The League tackled 00:19:57.480 --> 00:20:00.599 issues that defined human survival. And nothing 00:20:00.599 --> 00:20:03.160 was more critical in that era than global health. 00:20:03.299 --> 00:20:05.539 The League's health organization was revolutionary. 00:20:06.250 --> 00:20:08.589 Its structure directly influenced the later World 00:20:08.589 --> 00:20:11.630 Health Organization, the WHO. It had a massive 00:20:11.630 --> 00:20:14.190 job focusing on controlling epidemics like leprosy, 00:20:14.190 --> 00:20:16.650 malaria and yellow fever, including launching 00:20:16.650 --> 00:20:18.789 international mosquito extermination campaigns. 00:20:19.130 --> 00:20:21.349 And they even worked across political boundaries 00:20:21.349 --> 00:20:23.849 that were hostile to the League itself, right? 00:20:23.930 --> 00:20:26.150 That's a key detail. They worked successfully 00:20:26.150 --> 00:20:28.309 with the Soviet government to combat devastating 00:20:28.309 --> 00:20:31.589 typhus epidemics. The work of the League's health 00:20:31.589 --> 00:20:34.289 experts proved that technical cooperation could 00:20:34.289 --> 00:20:36.450 transcend the ideal. ideological and political 00:20:36.450 --> 00:20:38.690 barriers that constantly stalled the council. 00:20:39.069 --> 00:20:41.750 The League also tackled profound moral issues 00:20:41.750 --> 00:20:45.210 like slavery and forced labor. This must have 00:20:45.210 --> 00:20:47.349 created incredible political friction. It did. 00:20:47.589 --> 00:20:50.329 The Slavery Commission worked globally to eradicate 00:20:50.329 --> 00:20:53.250 slavery. When Ethiopia applied for membership 00:20:53.250 --> 00:20:55.930 in 1923, for instance, a condition was securing 00:20:55.930 --> 00:20:58.410 a firm commitment to end slavery domestically. 00:20:58.589 --> 00:21:01.150 They also worked extensively with Liberia to 00:21:01.150 --> 00:21:03.829 abolish forced labor. Were there measurable successes 00:21:03.829 --> 00:21:06.609 in this difficult area? Absolutely. Or a powerful 00:21:06.609 --> 00:21:08.630 example is that the Tanganyika Railway project, 00:21:08.730 --> 00:21:10.950 where the death rate for forced laborers was 00:21:10.950 --> 00:21:13.930 reduced from a horrific 55 percent to just 4 00:21:13.930 --> 00:21:16.190 percent after the League intervened and enforced 00:21:16.190 --> 00:21:19.210 better labor practices. Wow. States like Afghanistan, 00:21:19.509 --> 00:21:22.710 Iraq and Nepal all abolished slavery or severely 00:21:22.710 --> 00:21:25.390 restricted forced labor, partly due to diplomatic 00:21:25.390 --> 00:21:28.430 pressure from the League. And the refugee crisis 00:21:28.430 --> 00:21:31.519 after World War One was immense. The League had 00:21:31.519 --> 00:21:34.880 to literally invent mechanisms to deal with stateless 00:21:34.880 --> 00:21:37.500 people. The Commission for Refugees, led by the 00:21:37.500 --> 00:21:40.240 renowned Norwegian explorer and diplomat Fridtjof 00:21:40.240 --> 00:21:43.460 Nansen, was instrumental. Immediately after the 00:21:43.460 --> 00:21:45.380 war, there were millions of ex -prisoners of 00:21:45.380 --> 00:21:47.579 war scattered across Russia, often forgotten. 00:21:47.900 --> 00:21:49.980 Within just two years, the Commission helped 00:21:49.980 --> 00:21:54.220 425 ,000 of them return home. And here is a truly 00:21:54.220 --> 00:21:57.779 surprising high -impact takeaway. The Nansen 00:21:57.779 --> 00:22:00.440 passport. This is a piece of foundational legal 00:22:00.440 --> 00:22:02.839 history. The Nansen passport was a stroke of 00:22:02.839 --> 00:22:05.880 genius, a landmark in international law. It was 00:22:05.880 --> 00:22:07.940 the first internationally recognized identity 00:22:07.940 --> 00:22:10.400 document for stateless people who couldn't return 00:22:10.400 --> 00:22:13.220 home. It helped thousands of Russian, Armenian 00:22:13.220 --> 00:22:15.700 and Turkish refugees move legally across borders 00:22:15.700 --> 00:22:18.200 and settle safely. Manson won the Nobel Peace 00:22:18.200 --> 00:22:20.240 Prize for his work, and that passport concept 00:22:20.240 --> 00:22:22.640 is the intellectual ancestor of modern refugee 00:22:22.640 --> 00:22:25.420 conventions. And beyond the practical and humanitarian, 00:22:25.900 --> 00:22:27.700 the League supported intellectual endeavors, 00:22:28.079 --> 00:22:31.200 establishing the precursor to UNESCO. They established 00:22:31.200 --> 00:22:33.299 the International Commission on Intellectual 00:22:33.299 --> 00:22:36.579 Cooperation. This aimed at standardizing everything 00:22:36.579 --> 00:22:39.259 from bibliographical work to protecting intellectual 00:22:39.259 --> 00:22:42.220 property. Figures like Henri Bergson and Albert 00:22:42.220 --> 00:22:44.359 Einstein were involved, cementing the League's 00:22:44.359 --> 00:22:46.779 role in promoting scientific and cultural exchange, 00:22:47.200 --> 00:22:49.799 again laying the direct groundwork for UNESCO. 00:22:50.059 --> 00:22:52.599 Finally, we need to address the economic legacy, 00:22:52.779 --> 00:22:55.640 because this is where the League directly influences 00:22:55.640 --> 00:22:58.599 modern finance and, well, potentially even our 00:22:58.599 --> 00:23:01.450 tax bills today. This is truly a deep dive moment. 00:23:01.609 --> 00:23:04.329 The Economic and Financial Organization, established 00:23:04.329 --> 00:23:08.529 in 1923, did fundamental technical work. It codified 00:23:08.529 --> 00:23:10.589 the most favored nation norm in international 00:23:10.589 --> 00:23:13.329 trade. Okay, hold on. Most favored nation norm 00:23:13.329 --> 00:23:16.009 sounds a bit like academic jargon. For a listener 00:23:16.009 --> 00:23:17.849 who isn't a trade expert, what are we talking 00:23:17.849 --> 00:23:19.849 about here? We're talking about fairness and 00:23:19.849 --> 00:23:23.160 global trade. a radical idea at the time. The 00:23:23.160 --> 00:23:25.180 norm meant that if you granted a special tariff 00:23:25.180 --> 00:23:27.240 reduction or trade advantage to one country, 00:23:27.460 --> 00:23:29.640 you were obligated to grant that same advantage 00:23:29.640 --> 00:23:32.289 to all other members of the agreement. It standardized 00:23:32.289 --> 00:23:35.170 trade and prevented the kind of exclusionary 00:23:35.170 --> 00:23:37.990 secret economic deals that had fueled pre -war 00:23:37.990 --> 00:23:40.329 tensions. That makes perfect sense. Standardizing 00:23:40.329 --> 00:23:43.089 global trade to avoid creating hostile economic 00:23:43.089 --> 00:23:45.970 blocks. Absolutely. And the biggest, most surprising 00:23:45.970 --> 00:23:48.829 takeaway is that its 1923 report provided the 00:23:48.829 --> 00:23:51.130 intellectual foundation for the modern international 00:23:51.130 --> 00:23:54.430 taxation regime. It established guidelines for 00:23:54.430 --> 00:23:56.869 allocating taxable profits across borders to 00:23:56.869 --> 00:23:59.230 avoid double taxation and encourage global capital 00:23:59.230 --> 00:24:02.759 flow. This detailed complex contribution shapes 00:24:02.759 --> 00:24:05.640 global financial treaties and laws today. So 00:24:05.640 --> 00:24:07.900 we've established that the League was this powerhouse 00:24:07.900 --> 00:24:11.220 of technical and humanitarian achievement. Yet, 00:24:11.279 --> 00:24:13.859 when faced with great power aggression, the machinery 00:24:13.859 --> 00:24:16.660 just seized up. Let's confront the geopolitical 00:24:16.660 --> 00:24:19.579 failures, which started early, long before Hitler. 00:24:19.920 --> 00:24:22.000 The first test arrived with the Corfu incident 00:24:22.000 --> 00:24:25.680 of 1923, and it immediately exposed the League's 00:24:25.680 --> 00:24:28.220 fundamental weakness when facing a determined, 00:24:28.420 --> 00:24:31.519 cynical major power like fascist Italy. This 00:24:31.519 --> 00:24:34.500 involved Italy and Greece and Mussolini making 00:24:34.500 --> 00:24:37.940 a very aggressive power play. Exactly. An Italian 00:24:37.940 --> 00:24:40.460 general, Enrico Tellini, who was heading a commission 00:24:40.460 --> 00:24:42.859 to mark the border between Albania and Greece, 00:24:43.099 --> 00:24:46.869 was assassinated on Greek soil. Benito Mussolini, 00:24:46.990 --> 00:24:49.269 the new Italian leader, seized the opportunity. 00:24:49.569 --> 00:24:52.269 He demanded immediate massive reparations from 00:24:52.269 --> 00:24:54.849 Greece and then, crucially, occupied the Greek 00:24:54.849 --> 00:24:58.990 island of Corfu on August 31st, 1923. Occupying 00:24:58.990 --> 00:25:01.549 the island was a clear, blatant violation of 00:25:01.549 --> 00:25:03.960 the League's covenant. It was, and Greece immediately 00:25:03.960 --> 00:25:06.359 appealed to the League for intervention. The 00:25:06.359 --> 00:25:08.359 League Council started examining the dispute, 00:25:08.559 --> 00:25:10.880 which was the correct protocol, but Mussolini 00:25:10.880 --> 00:25:13.039 just refused to accept the League's jurisdiction. 00:25:13.380 --> 00:25:15.720 He insisted the decision be handled by the Allied 00:25:15.720 --> 00:25:18.259 Conference of Ambassadors, a pre -war body where 00:25:18.259 --> 00:25:20.859 Italy had more sway effectively bypassing the 00:25:20.859 --> 00:25:23.039 League entirely. And the League tried to stand 00:25:23.039 --> 00:25:25.920 firm, but Mussolini's military leverage proved 00:25:25.920 --> 00:25:28.430 stronger than its moral authority. Well, the 00:25:28.430 --> 00:25:30.630 Conference of Ambassadors eventually accepted 00:25:30.630 --> 00:25:32.910 the League's finding that Greece should pay an 00:25:32.910 --> 00:25:35.650 indemnity, but they drastically increased the 00:25:35.650 --> 00:25:38.170 amount, forcing Greece to pay the 50 million 00:25:38.170 --> 00:25:41.009 lire Mussolini had originally demanded, even 00:25:41.009 --> 00:25:43.049 though the perpetrators were never found. And 00:25:43.049 --> 00:25:45.710 that leads directly to Mussolini's famous cynical 00:25:45.710 --> 00:25:49.349 quote, which is almost the epitaph of the League's 00:25:49.349 --> 00:25:51.789 political life. It is brutal, but incredibly 00:25:51.789 --> 00:25:54.559 insightful. Mussolini stated that The League 00:25:54.559 --> 00:25:57.099 is very well when sparrows shout, but no good 00:25:57.099 --> 00:26:00.099 at all when eagles fall out. It proved that when 00:26:00.099 --> 00:26:02.799 facing a determined major power willing to use 00:26:02.799 --> 00:26:05.920 force and defy international opinion, the League 00:26:05.920 --> 00:26:08.140 was utterly powerless because its great power 00:26:08.140 --> 00:26:10.940 members, Britain and France, just weren't willing 00:26:10.940 --> 00:26:14.039 to risk a military confrontation. So if Corfu 00:26:14.039 --> 00:26:17.119 was a warning, the Manchuria crisis was the definitive 00:26:17.119 --> 00:26:19.119 death blow to the core concept of collective 00:26:19.119 --> 00:26:21.480 security. This happened almost a decade later 00:26:21.480 --> 00:26:23.880 in the Far East. The Mukden incident in September 00:26:23.880 --> 00:26:26.799 1931 was the crisis from which the League never 00:26:26.799 --> 00:26:29.839 recovered. The Japanese Kwantung Army, which 00:26:29.839 --> 00:26:31.619 was guarding Japanese interests in the South 00:26:31.619 --> 00:26:34.559 Manchurian Railway, fabricated an incident. They 00:26:34.559 --> 00:26:37.240 lightly damaged a railway section and used this 00:26:37.240 --> 00:26:39.940 as a pretext to launch a massive invasion and 00:26:39.940 --> 00:26:42.839 occupation of the entire Chinese region of Manchuria. 00:26:43.079 --> 00:26:45.700 So Japan, one of the permanent members of the 00:26:45.700 --> 00:26:47.960 council, was aggressively invading another member 00:26:47.960 --> 00:26:51.140 state. What was the League's response? It was 00:26:51.140 --> 00:26:53.640 catastrophically slow. The League immediately 00:26:53.640 --> 00:26:56.000 sent observers, but the subsequent investigation, 00:26:56.339 --> 00:26:58.920 led by Lord Lytton, took over a year to complete. 00:26:59.180 --> 00:27:01.779 The resulting Lytton Report, published in October 00:27:01.779 --> 00:27:05.500 1932, condemned Japan's actions, refused to recognize 00:27:05.500 --> 00:27:08.019 the new puppet state of Manchukuo, and demanded 00:27:08.019 --> 00:27:10.319 the territory be returned to China. That sounds 00:27:10.319 --> 00:27:12.720 like a strong moral stand, at least. It was a 00:27:12.720 --> 00:27:15.359 strong moral and diplomatic stand. The Assembly 00:27:15.359 --> 00:27:18.720 voted 42 to 1 to condemn Japan, a clear international 00:27:18.720 --> 00:27:21.460 mandate. But Japan's response was just to reject 00:27:21.460 --> 00:27:23.440 the report and announce its withdrawal from the 00:27:23.440 --> 00:27:26.619 League in 1933. And this is the moment where 00:27:26.619 --> 00:27:29.160 the weakness of the veto and the lack of an enforcement 00:27:29.160 --> 00:27:31.900 army become completely obvious. They condemn 00:27:31.900 --> 00:27:35.299 Japan. But what military action did the League 00:27:35.299 --> 00:27:38.839 powers take? None. The powers, particularly Britain 00:27:38.839 --> 00:27:40.980 and France, refused to commit military forces 00:27:40.980 --> 00:27:44.160 or enact significant economic sanctions. Japan 00:27:44.160 --> 00:27:46.480 was far away, and they were concerned with the 00:27:46.480 --> 00:27:49.359 rise of Hitler closer to home. As one historian 00:27:49.359 --> 00:27:51.839 observed, this was the definitive moment that 00:27:51.839 --> 00:27:55.240 showed collective security was dead. The world 00:27:55.240 --> 00:27:57.720 had condemned aggression, but no country was 00:27:57.720 --> 00:28:00.019 willing to fight to reverse it. If Manchuria 00:28:00.019 --> 00:28:02.859 showed the League's paralysis in the East, the 00:28:02.859 --> 00:28:05.660 Abyssinian crisis, starting in 1935, exposed 00:28:05.660 --> 00:28:08.079 its fatal contradictions right on Europe's doorstep. 00:28:08.220 --> 00:28:10.220 It proved the system was entirely negotiable. 00:28:10.430 --> 00:28:12.349 This crisis was devastating because it pitted 00:28:12.349 --> 00:28:14.390 Italy, another permanent member of the Council 00:28:14.390 --> 00:28:16.690 Against Abyssinia, modern Ethiopia, a fellow 00:28:16.690 --> 00:28:19.109 member and the only uncolonized African state 00:28:19.109 --> 00:28:22.190 at the time. Mussolini, seeking glory and resources, 00:28:22.609 --> 00:28:26.250 invaded Abyssinia in October 1935 using a massive 00:28:26.250 --> 00:28:29.529 force of 400 ,000 troops. And Italy was using 00:28:29.529 --> 00:28:32.069 horrific modern weapons against Abyssinian forces 00:28:32.069 --> 00:28:35.210 and civilians. Precisely. They employed widespread 00:28:35.210 --> 00:28:39.390 chemical weapons, specifically mustard gas and 00:28:39.390 --> 00:28:41.740 poison. and water supplies, in clear violation 00:28:41.740 --> 00:28:44.700 of international law. At Bissinia's Emperor Hail 00:28:44.700 --> 00:28:47.240 Selassie, I appealed directly to the League for 00:28:47.240 --> 00:28:50.500 help. And this time, the League did act. It imposed 00:28:50.500 --> 00:28:53.380 economic sanctions, but they were famously limited. 00:28:53.599 --> 00:28:56.200 Fatally limited. Sanctions were imposed in November 00:28:56.200 --> 00:28:59.380 1935, covering weapons, loans, and certain raw 00:28:59.380 --> 00:29:02.160 materials. But the crucial resources that Italy 00:29:02.160 --> 00:29:04.579 needed to continue the war, namely oil, coal, 00:29:04.779 --> 00:29:08.039 and steel, were not restricted why were oil and 00:29:08.039 --> 00:29:10.700 coal excluded that seems like an enormous deliberate 00:29:10.700 --> 00:29:13.940 loophole it was a calculated political loophole 00:29:13.940 --> 00:29:16.920 britain and france the two most powerful members 00:29:16.920 --> 00:29:19.480 enforcing the sanctions feared that restricting 00:29:19.480 --> 00:29:22.079 oil might provoke italy into declaring war on 00:29:22.079 --> 00:29:24.839 them furthermore britain refused to close the 00:29:24.839 --> 00:29:27.019 suez canal which was the main route for italian 00:29:27.019 --> 00:29:29.619 troops and supplies because they feared escalating 00:29:29.619 --> 00:29:31.619 the situation so britain and france who were 00:29:31.619 --> 00:29:33.619 obligated by the covenant to protect abyssinia 00:29:33.619 --> 00:29:36.369 were prioritizing balance Mussolini against the 00:29:36.369 --> 00:29:38.230 rising, far more dangerous threat of Hitler. 00:29:38.430 --> 00:29:41.200 This leads to the infamous Horleval Pact. The 00:29:41.200 --> 00:29:43.700 Hoare -Laval Pact, drafted in secret in December 00:29:43.700 --> 00:29:46.859 1935, was a massive public relations disaster 00:29:46.859 --> 00:29:49.599 and the clearest possible betrayal of the League's 00:29:49.599 --> 00:29:52.599 ideals. Britain's Foreign Secretary Samuel Hoare 00:29:52.599 --> 00:29:55.059 and French Prime Minister Pierre Laval secretly 00:29:55.059 --> 00:29:58.039 agreed to partition Abyssinia, effectively handing 00:29:58.039 --> 00:30:00.740 Mussolini the largest and most valuable two -thirds 00:30:00.740 --> 00:30:02.700 of the country. And when news of this secret 00:30:02.700 --> 00:30:05.720 deal leaked, the public outrage in Britain and 00:30:05.720 --> 00:30:08.460 France was so massive that both officials were 00:30:08.460 --> 00:30:11.680 forced to resign. The pact exposed the hypocrisy 00:30:11.680 --> 00:30:14.180 at the heart of collective security. The major 00:30:14.180 --> 00:30:16.319 powers were willing to condemn aggression publicly, 00:30:16.579 --> 00:30:19.180 impose half -hearted sanctions, but were simultaneously 00:30:19.180 --> 00:30:21.819 willing to sell out a fellow member state behind 00:30:21.819 --> 00:30:24.319 closed doors to achieve their own national strategic 00:30:24.319 --> 00:30:27.200 goals. And we also have that incredible, almost 00:30:27.200 --> 00:30:31.019 tragic detail of Emperor Haile Selassie, and 00:30:31.019 --> 00:30:32.940 I'm personally addressing the assembly in Geneva. 00:30:33.299 --> 00:30:35.660 It was an unprecedented and heart -wrenching 00:30:35.660 --> 00:30:39.839 moment in June 1936. Selassie stood before the 00:30:39.839 --> 00:30:42.599 assembly, appealing for protection, urging them 00:30:42.599 --> 00:30:45.240 to remember their treaty obligations, and declaring 00:30:45.240 --> 00:30:47.720 that if the League failed to help Avicenna, it 00:30:47.720 --> 00:30:50.380 would surely fail to help others later. Tragically, 00:30:50.420 --> 00:30:52.799 the sanctions were lifted just weeks later, confirming 00:30:52.799 --> 00:30:55.640 Italy's conquest. Beyond the reaction to external 00:30:55.640 --> 00:30:58.319 aggression, the League's other foundational goal, 00:30:58.440 --> 00:31:00.880 universal disarmament, also failed completely, 00:31:01.259 --> 00:31:03.980 demonstrating its inability to create a lasting 00:31:03.980 --> 00:31:07.279 peace based on trust. Article 8 mandated armament 00:31:07.279 --> 00:31:09.500 reduction as essential for peace, but the effort 00:31:09.500 --> 00:31:12.460 was just doomed by mutual suspicion. The World 00:31:12.460 --> 00:31:14.960 Disarmament Conference ran for two years, from 00:31:14.960 --> 00:31:18.519 1932 to 1934, and achieved absolutely nothing 00:31:18.519 --> 00:31:21.140 of substance. Why the paralysis? I mean, everyone 00:31:21.140 --> 00:31:23.140 was ruined by World War I. Surely they wanted 00:31:23.140 --> 00:31:26.650 to spend less on arms. In theory, yes. In practice, 00:31:26.910 --> 00:31:29.430 states like France, Poland and Czechoslovakia, 00:31:29.529 --> 00:31:32.289 which sat on the border of a potentially resurgent 00:31:32.289 --> 00:31:35.390 Germany, adamantly refused to reduce their own 00:31:35.390 --> 00:31:38.289 armaments without ironclad security guarantees 00:31:38.289 --> 00:31:40.809 from the League, guarantees the League could 00:31:40.809 --> 00:31:44.089 not legally or militarily provide. This fear 00:31:44.089 --> 00:31:46.650 only intensified exponentially when Adolf Hitler 00:31:46.650 --> 00:31:50.549 gained power in January 1933 and Germany withdrew 00:31:50.549 --> 00:31:52.799 from the League almost immediately. So the League 00:31:52.799 --> 00:31:55.220 was faced with this tragic contradiction. Yeah. 00:31:55.400 --> 00:31:58.279 It needed the ability to enforce its guarantees 00:31:58.279 --> 00:32:00.859 to achieve disarmament, but it needed disarmament 00:32:00.859 --> 00:32:03.039 to reduce the need for enforcement. It was a 00:32:03.039 --> 00:32:05.359 vicious cycle. The League was then completely 00:32:05.359 --> 00:32:07.740 powerless during the major events that defined 00:32:07.740 --> 00:32:09.740 the final march toward the Second World War. 00:32:10.119 --> 00:32:12.819 It was silent in the face of Hitler's remilitarization 00:32:12.819 --> 00:32:16.519 of the Rhineland in 1936, the Anschluss of Austria 00:32:16.519 --> 00:32:19.079 in 1938, and the occupation of the Sudetenland 00:32:19.079 --> 00:32:21.460 later that year, all clear violations of the 00:32:21.460 --> 00:32:23.299 Treaty of Versailles. By the time the League 00:32:23.299 --> 00:32:26.500 expelled the Soviet Union in late 1939, the three 00:32:26.500 --> 00:32:29.160 major aggressors, Japan, Germany, and Italy, 00:32:29.259 --> 00:32:31.160 had already withdrawn, leaving the organization 00:32:31.160 --> 00:32:33.440 hollowed out and completely irrelevant. It was 00:32:33.440 --> 00:32:35.519 a ghost. So it's clear that the league suffered 00:32:35.519 --> 00:32:39.200 a spectacular failure in its primary goal. Let's 00:32:39.200 --> 00:32:42.099 synthesize the root causes and structure them 00:32:42.099 --> 00:32:44.940 into the big three takeaways regarding why the 00:32:44.940 --> 00:32:46.660 league ultimately collapsed when it mattered 00:32:46.660 --> 00:32:50.240 most. First, the inescapable issue of its origins. 00:32:50.960 --> 00:32:53.240 The League was just inextricably linked to the 00:32:53.240 --> 00:32:55.660 Treaty of Versailles. It was seen across the 00:32:55.660 --> 00:32:57.839 globe, especially by the defeated powers and 00:32:57.839 --> 00:33:00.720 later by the Soviet Union as a League of Victors, 00:33:00.839 --> 00:33:03.720 created by the Allied powers as part of a punitive 00:33:03.720 --> 00:33:06.839 peace settlement. This limited its impartiality 00:33:06.839 --> 00:33:09.640 from the start. Second, the structural flaw we 00:33:09.640 --> 00:33:13.099 spend time on, the unanimous veto. The requirement 00:33:13.099 --> 00:33:15.200 for unanimity among council members guaranteed 00:33:15.200 --> 00:33:18.400 institutional paralysis and slow action. It was 00:33:18.400 --> 00:33:20.559 a structural choice that reflected the fact that 00:33:20.559 --> 00:33:23.180 primary members were utterly unwilling to cede 00:33:23.180 --> 00:33:24.920 even a fraction of their national sovereignty. 00:33:25.240 --> 00:33:27.380 They essentially gave themselves a veto over 00:33:27.380 --> 00:33:30.359 any decisive action. And third, the devastating 00:33:30.359 --> 00:33:33.240 impact of the U .S. absence. How significant 00:33:33.240 --> 00:33:35.500 was the missing American political will, money, 00:33:35.619 --> 00:33:38.019 and military potential? It was critically damaging, 00:33:38.279 --> 00:33:41.309 though it's complex. As historian Ruth Hainick 00:33:41.309 --> 00:33:43.950 suggests, had the U .S. joined, it would have 00:33:43.950 --> 00:33:46.589 provided necessary political and economic support 00:33:46.589 --> 00:33:49.190 to France and Britain, potentially stabilizing 00:33:49.190 --> 00:33:52.089 Europe earlier. The U .S. economy alone could 00:33:52.089 --> 00:33:54.210 have backed far more robust sanctions during 00:33:54.210 --> 00:33:57.089 the Manchuria or Abyssinia crises. But even if 00:33:57.089 --> 00:33:59.410 the U .S. had joined, there's an argument that 00:33:59.410 --> 00:34:01.890 its deep -seated reluctance to engage in European 00:34:01.890 --> 00:34:05.490 wars, that policy of isolationism, might still 00:34:05.490 --> 00:34:07.769 have hampered enforcement, given the veto structure. 00:34:08.380 --> 00:34:11.059 That's the subtlety. The U .S. joining might 00:34:11.059 --> 00:34:13.300 have stabilized the system politically, but it 00:34:13.300 --> 00:34:16.400 doesn't change that fatal unanimity rule. If 00:34:16.400 --> 00:34:18.800 the U .S. Senate had ratified the covenant, the 00:34:18.800 --> 00:34:20.679 U .S. military still would have been extremely 00:34:20.679 --> 00:34:22.880 hesitant to intervene in the Far East or Africa. 00:34:23.219 --> 00:34:25.420 Without the U .S., though, Britain and France 00:34:25.420 --> 00:34:27.619 were left alone to carry the burden of enforcement, 00:34:28.039 --> 00:34:30.699 a burden they swiftly decided was too costly. 00:34:31.019 --> 00:34:33.199 Ultimately, all these weaknesses boil down to 00:34:33.199 --> 00:34:35.860 the failure of the League's core concept, collective 00:34:35.860 --> 00:34:38.960 security. That is the deepest weakness. Collected 00:34:38.960 --> 00:34:41.159 security demanded that nations act against states 00:34:41.159 --> 00:34:43.260 they might consider friendly or in ways that 00:34:43.260 --> 00:34:45.599 genuinely endangered their own immediate national 00:34:45.599 --> 00:34:48.400 interests, potentially risking war to defend 00:34:48.400 --> 00:34:50.639 states for which they had no natural affinity. 00:34:50.880 --> 00:34:53.500 Like Britain fighting Japan over Manchuria. Exactly. 00:34:53.920 --> 00:34:56.280 Nations were unwilling to make this enormous 00:34:56.280 --> 00:34:58.940 political sacrifice. And Prime Minister Stanley 00:34:58.940 --> 00:35:01.800 Baldwin summarized this reality brutally in the 00:35:01.800 --> 00:35:04.940 British House of Commons in 1936 in the devastating 00:35:04.940 --> 00:35:08.139 wake of the Abyssinia crisis. His statement perfectly 00:35:08.139 --> 00:35:10.960 captured the lesson learned. He noted that collective 00:35:10.960 --> 00:35:13.980 security failed ultimately because of the reluctance 00:35:13.980 --> 00:35:16.260 of nearly all the nations in Europe to proceed 00:35:16.260 --> 00:35:19.739 to what I might call military sanctions. He concluded 00:35:19.739 --> 00:35:21.800 that if collective action is to be a reality 00:35:21.800 --> 00:35:24.659 every country must be ready to go to war at once. 00:35:24.880 --> 00:35:27.360 That is a terrible thing but it is an essential 00:35:27.360 --> 00:35:30.119 part of collective security. The League demanded 00:35:30.119 --> 00:35:33.059 instantaneous self -sacrifice and governments, 00:35:33.300 --> 00:35:35.599 prioritizing their own domestic interests, just 00:35:35.599 --> 00:35:38.579 refused to pay that price. This also meant that 00:35:38.579 --> 00:35:40.980 the two most important members, Britain and France, 00:35:41.199 --> 00:35:44.340 ultimately abandoned collective security entirely 00:35:44.340 --> 00:35:47.599 for the strategy of appeasement. They needed 00:35:47.599 --> 00:35:49.840 teeth, but they were legally and morally bound 00:35:49.840 --> 00:35:53.139 to pull those teeth out. So when did the League 00:35:53.139 --> 00:35:55.579 actually die? Was it just allowed to fade into 00:35:55.579 --> 00:35:57.800 the background? It was largely inactive after 00:35:57.800 --> 00:36:00.860 the outbreak of World War II in 1939. The Allied 00:36:00.860 --> 00:36:03.559 powers, recognizing its critical political failure, 00:36:03.900 --> 00:36:06.679 formally agreed at the 1943 Tehran Conference 00:36:06.679 --> 00:36:09.360 to replace it with a new body one that they hoped 00:36:09.360 --> 00:36:11.460 would have stronger mechanisms and the permanent 00:36:11.460 --> 00:36:13.699 involvement of the U .S. The formal dissolution 00:36:13.699 --> 00:36:16.300 was a purely bureaucratic affair on April 18, 00:36:16.559 --> 00:36:20.119 1946, in Geneva. No dramatic speeches, just a 00:36:20.119 --> 00:36:22.059 transfer of property. A quiet administrative 00:36:22.059 --> 00:36:24.900 end. The final session concerned itself with 00:36:24.900 --> 00:36:26.860 liquidating the League's assets, worth about 00:36:26.860 --> 00:36:29.679 $22 million, and transferring them, including 00:36:29.679 --> 00:36:31.940 its extensive archives and its grand headquarters, 00:36:32.239 --> 00:36:34.739 the Palais des Nations, to the new United Nations. 00:36:35.119 --> 00:36:37.059 Lord Robert Cecil, one of the original architects, 00:36:37.340 --> 00:36:40.139 gave a poignant closing address. He did, urging 00:36:40.139 --> 00:36:42.239 the delegates to be bold against aggression, 00:36:42.599 --> 00:36:45.289 concluding with the famous line, The League is 00:36:45.289 --> 00:36:49.269 dead. Long live the United Nations. But the scholarly 00:36:49.269 --> 00:36:52.110 consensus today paints a much more complex picture 00:36:52.110 --> 00:36:54.469 than simply calling it a failed organization. 00:36:54.789 --> 00:36:58.039 Yeah. What is the enduring positive legacy? The 00:36:58.039 --> 00:36:59.880 consensus is that while the League failed in 00:36:59.880 --> 00:37:02.079 preventing World War, a failure that cost 60 00:37:02.079 --> 00:37:05.519 million lives, it was wildly successful in building 00:37:05.519 --> 00:37:08.179 new roads toward expanding the rule of law globally. 00:37:08.420 --> 00:37:10.519 It took the idea of international cooperation 00:37:10.519 --> 00:37:12.880 and moved it from high -level secret diplomacy 00:37:12.880 --> 00:37:16.179 to an institutionalized, permanent set of procedures. 00:37:16.519 --> 00:37:19.139 And the designers of the UN clearly learned from 00:37:19.139 --> 00:37:21.280 the League's crippling structural flaws while 00:37:21.280 --> 00:37:23.750 inheriting its successes directly. Most of the 00:37:23.750 --> 00:37:26.550 DNA of the modern multilateral system came from 00:37:26.550 --> 00:37:29.449 the League. Key organizations that survived and 00:37:29.449 --> 00:37:33.329 transitioned directly included the ILO, the Permanent 00:37:33.329 --> 00:37:35.449 Court of International Justice, which became 00:37:35.449 --> 00:37:37.570 the International Court of Justice, and the Health 00:37:37.570 --> 00:37:39.769 Organization, which was restructured into the 00:37:39.769 --> 00:37:42.730 World Health Organization. The technical foundations 00:37:42.730 --> 00:37:45.510 were invaluable. And the single most important 00:37:45.510 --> 00:37:48.550 structural improvement the UN made was modifying 00:37:48.550 --> 00:37:50.650 the voting rules in the Security Council, right? 00:37:50.940 --> 00:37:53.260 Absolutely. The UN learned from the League's 00:37:53.260 --> 00:37:56.000 rigidity. Decisions in the UN Security Council 00:37:56.000 --> 00:37:59.159 are binding and, unlike the League Council, do 00:37:59.159 --> 00:38:02.380 not require the unanimity of all members. However, 00:38:02.639 --> 00:38:04.860 the five permanent members retained the crucial 00:38:04.860 --> 00:38:07.760 power of the veto, protecting their vital interests, 00:38:08.099 --> 00:38:10.599 a compromise that acknowledged the League's lesson 00:38:10.599 --> 00:38:12.940 that great powers will not submit to collective 00:38:12.940 --> 00:38:15.000 will if their core sovereignty is threatened. 00:38:15.179 --> 00:38:17.219 It was a pragmatic step back from the impossible 00:38:17.219 --> 00:38:20.789 idealism of the League. So. The League of Nations' 00:38:21.010 --> 00:38:24.130 failure to prevent the Second World War solidified 00:38:24.130 --> 00:38:27.670 a terrible necessary lesson for the world. That 00:38:27.670 --> 00:38:30.730 ambitious international cooperation without credible 00:38:30.730 --> 00:38:33.610 enforcement power, which requires national sacrifice, 00:38:33.969 --> 00:38:36.639 is ultimately brittle. It collapses the moment 00:38:36.639 --> 00:38:39.059 a major power decides to act purely selfishly. 00:38:39.079 --> 00:38:41.619 At its foundational humanitarian, social, and 00:38:41.619 --> 00:38:44.340 technical work, from establishing the ILO to 00:38:44.340 --> 00:38:46.699 creating the Nansen passport and laying the groundwork 00:38:46.699 --> 00:38:48.840 for modern taxation and public health structures, 00:38:49.039 --> 00:38:51.460 lay the unavoidable groundwork for nearly every 00:38:51.460 --> 00:38:53.659 multilateral organization that exists today. 00:38:53.840 --> 00:38:55.940 It taught the world how to cooperate, even if 00:38:55.940 --> 00:38:57.579 it couldn't ultimately force it to cooperate. 00:38:57.940 --> 00:38:59.780 So here's the final thought for you to chew on. 00:39:00.679 --> 00:39:02.780 The League struggled because its members were 00:39:02.780 --> 00:39:05.000 constantly asked to sacrifice immediate national 00:39:05.000 --> 00:39:07.780 interest like keeping the Suez Canal open for 00:39:07.780 --> 00:39:10.699 oil or fighting Japan over a far -flung region 00:39:10.699 --> 00:39:13.920 for the greater long -term goal of global collective 00:39:13.920 --> 00:39:16.840 stability. Considering that modern bodies like 00:39:16.840 --> 00:39:19.559 the UN Security Council still face gridlock and 00:39:19.559 --> 00:39:21.960 vetoes when permanent members' interests conflict, 00:39:22.199 --> 00:39:25.400 how fundamentally solvable is this tension? Is 00:39:25.400 --> 00:39:27.460 it possible for a system built on national self 00:39:27.460 --> 00:39:29.699 -interest to truly uphold global collective security? 00:39:30.219 --> 00:39:32.860 Or is perpetual gridlock, in the face of major 00:39:32.860 --> 00:39:34.940 conflict, simply a feature of the modern world 00:39:34.940 --> 00:39:37.860 order? Welcome to the debate. Today, we're digging 00:39:37.860 --> 00:39:41.599 into one of the most ambitious and, well, maybe 00:39:41.599 --> 00:39:43.599 one of the most tragic political experiments 00:39:43.599 --> 00:39:47.219 of the 20th century, the League of Nations. It 00:39:47.219 --> 00:39:49.460 was founded in 1920, right after the hoarders 00:39:49.460 --> 00:39:52.239 of the Great War, with this single overriding 00:39:52.239 --> 00:39:54.900 mission. to establish a system of collective 00:39:54.900 --> 00:39:58.159 security that would maintain world peace permanently. 00:39:58.639 --> 00:40:02.159 And yet, by 1946, it was dissolved, completely 00:40:02.159 --> 00:40:05.099 sidelined by the Second World War. And that history 00:40:05.099 --> 00:40:07.719 presents us with a really profound disagreement. 00:40:07.900 --> 00:40:10.699 Should the League be judged as fundamentally 00:40:10.699 --> 00:40:13.699 a catastrophic failure because it didn't prevent 00:40:13.699 --> 00:40:17.679 the aggression of the 1930s? Or was it actually 00:40:17.679 --> 00:40:21.599 a consequential success? that forged the vital 00:40:21.599 --> 00:40:24.480 institutional foundations that modern global 00:40:24.480 --> 00:40:27.619 governance is now built on. Exactly. And I'll 00:40:27.619 --> 00:40:30.019 be arguing that the League's structural paralysis, 00:40:30.400 --> 00:40:33.559 compounded by its total inability to halt great 00:40:33.559 --> 00:40:36.360 power regression, means its history really has 00:40:36.360 --> 00:40:38.900 to be written as a fundamental political failure. 00:40:39.360 --> 00:40:41.519 And I'll present the necessary counterpoint. 00:40:41.659 --> 00:40:44.840 Because while its political failures in the 1930s 00:40:44.840 --> 00:40:47.340 are of course undeniable, their most prominent 00:40:47.340 --> 00:40:49.860 part of the narrative, the League's true historical 00:40:49.860 --> 00:40:52.599 legacy, I think, resides in the profound institutional 00:40:52.599 --> 00:40:56.119 innovations it pioneered. It built a scaffolding, 00:40:56.119 --> 00:40:58.519 if you will, that the United Nations would later 00:40:58.519 --> 00:41:01.599 refine and adopt. We just can't judge a decades 00:41:01.599 --> 00:41:04.000 -long endeavor solely by the outbreak of the 00:41:04.000 --> 00:41:07.059 one war it was designed to prevent. But the outbreak 00:41:07.059 --> 00:41:11.269 of that war. is it's the only metric that truly 00:41:11.269 --> 00:41:13.670 matters when you're assessing the League's mandate. 00:41:13.929 --> 00:41:16.949 The Covenant's central purpose was non -negotiable. 00:41:17.090 --> 00:41:20.469 Prevent another world war. The fact that a global 00:41:20.469 --> 00:41:23.369 conflict began just two decades after its founding, 00:41:23.550 --> 00:41:27.369 a conflict with unprecedented devastation, that 00:41:27.369 --> 00:41:30.630 defines its historical legacy. And the reason 00:41:30.630 --> 00:41:33.349 it failed is because the very system it championed, 00:41:33.349 --> 00:41:36.889 collective security, was fatally flawed. It was 00:41:36.889 --> 00:41:39.760 theoretically unsound. Tell me how. Well, the 00:41:39.760 --> 00:41:42.400 concept itself, asking nations to view an attack 00:41:42.400 --> 00:41:45.639 on any member as an attack on themselves, that 00:41:45.639 --> 00:41:48.500 required a radical sacrifice of immediate national 00:41:48.500 --> 00:41:52.500 self -interest for a theoretical, long -term 00:41:52.500 --> 00:41:55.119 global stability. And that demand was just too 00:41:55.119 --> 00:41:58.539 radical for the post -World War I era. Institutionally, 00:41:58.559 --> 00:42:00.760 the League was, I would argue, doomed by two 00:42:00.760 --> 00:42:03.500 crippling weaknesses. First, it lacked its own 00:42:03.500 --> 00:42:06.039 armed force. It could only recommend sanctions, 00:42:06.360 --> 00:42:08.860 relying entirely on major powers like Britain 00:42:08.860 --> 00:42:11.239 and France to enforce anything. But even more 00:42:11.239 --> 00:42:13.320 critically, its decision -making structure was 00:42:13.320 --> 00:42:16.000 paralyzed. The requirement for unanimity among 00:42:16.000 --> 00:42:18.400 council members meant that any primary member 00:42:18.400 --> 00:42:20.940 could veto decisive action against an aggressor. 00:42:21.019 --> 00:42:23.280 I mean, imagine a police force where every single 00:42:23.280 --> 00:42:25.880 officer has to unanimously agree before arresting 00:42:25.880 --> 00:42:28.460 a thief. That was the League's counsel. It was 00:42:28.460 --> 00:42:31.769 just designed to fail. Okay. I'm willing to grant 00:42:31.769 --> 00:42:34.570 you the profound political difficulty of achieving 00:42:34.570 --> 00:42:37.409 that, but I think you're confusing the institutional 00:42:37.409 --> 00:42:40.329 tool with the political will of the nations using 00:42:40.329 --> 00:42:43.809 it. Current scholarly consensus really confirms 00:42:43.809 --> 00:42:46.969 that even as it struggled politically, the League 00:42:46.969 --> 00:42:50.230 built new roads for global governments. And this 00:42:50.230 --> 00:42:52.829 work was critical. The high -profile political 00:42:52.829 --> 00:42:56.869 failures completely overshadowed its very substantial, 00:42:57.210 --> 00:43:00.900 often ignored, successes in technical, economic, 00:43:00.980 --> 00:43:04.440 and humanitarian areas. These weren't secondary 00:43:04.440 --> 00:43:08.139 achievements. They were foundational. For instance, 00:43:08.300 --> 00:43:10.579 we see its competence shine in disputes that 00:43:10.579 --> 00:43:13.239 didn't involve the great powers. The League successfully 00:43:13.239 --> 00:43:16.460 resolved the Åland Islands dispute in 1921 between 00:43:16.460 --> 00:43:19.659 Sweden and Finland. Later, in 1926, it settled 00:43:19.659 --> 00:43:22.440 the highly sensitive Musil question, successfully 00:43:22.440 --> 00:43:24.780 brokering a border between Turkey and British 00:43:24.780 --> 00:43:27.460 -mandated Iraq. So the League showed its arbitration 00:43:27.460 --> 00:43:29.719 mechanisms could work. And more than that, the 00:43:29.719 --> 00:43:31.760 institutional structure itself proved enduring. 00:43:32.019 --> 00:43:34.500 I mean, just look at the UN. It inherited several 00:43:34.500 --> 00:43:37.039 key agencies directly, including the International 00:43:37.039 --> 00:43:39.619 Labor Organization, the Permanent Court of International 00:43:39.619 --> 00:43:42.519 Justice, and the Health Organization. Its structure 00:43:42.519 --> 00:43:44.300 was the blueprint for everything that followed. 00:43:44.559 --> 00:43:47.079 You speak of early successes, but those were 00:43:47.079 --> 00:43:50.079 what Mussolini famously dismissed as sparrow 00:43:50.079 --> 00:43:52.760 fights. He argued the league was, and I quote, 00:43:52.960 --> 00:43:56.139 very well when sparrows shout, but no good at 00:43:56.139 --> 00:43:59.150 all when eagles fall out. The structural weakness 00:43:59.150 --> 00:44:01.550 meant that when a great power truly defied the 00:44:01.550 --> 00:44:04.130 League, the entire diplomatic mechanism just 00:44:04.130 --> 00:44:09.090 dissolved. Take the Corfu incident in 1923. Italian 00:44:09.090 --> 00:44:12.090 forces occupied the Greek island and Greece appealed 00:44:12.090 --> 00:44:15.230 to the League. But Mussolini, applying pure coercion, 00:44:15.250 --> 00:44:17.710 immediately threatened to withdraw. And under 00:44:17.710 --> 00:44:20.030 that threat, the Allied powers stepped in and 00:44:20.030 --> 00:44:22.190 transferred the matter to the Conference of Ambassadors. 00:44:22.409 --> 00:44:24.769 Right, which was outside the League's direct 00:44:24.769 --> 00:44:27.829 authority. Exactly. And the conference, under 00:44:27.829 --> 00:44:30.929 direct Italian pressure, forced Greece to pay 00:44:30.929 --> 00:44:33.690 Italy reparations, even though the perpetrators 00:44:33.690 --> 00:44:36.389 of the initial crime were never found. This wasn't 00:44:36.389 --> 00:44:39.110 just a procedural failure. It was a profound 00:44:39.110 --> 00:44:42.210 declaration that if a major power refused to 00:44:42.210 --> 00:44:45.090 respect the covenant, the League machinery was 00:44:45.090 --> 00:44:48.010 useless. The aggressor, Italy, was effectively 00:44:48.010 --> 00:44:52.050 rewarded. It proved that high diplomacy was subservient 00:44:52.050 --> 00:44:54.650 to great power self -interest from the very start. 00:44:55.099 --> 00:44:57.159 I just don't think that's the right framing. 00:44:57.639 --> 00:45:00.420 Corfu demonstrates the political cowardice of 00:45:00.420 --> 00:45:03.619 the Allies, not an intrinsic flaw in the League's 00:45:03.619 --> 00:45:06.760 mechanism itself. The institutions existed to 00:45:06.760 --> 00:45:09.380 solve the problem, but the Allied powers chose 00:45:09.380 --> 00:45:12.159 to undermine the body to appease a rogue state. 00:45:12.440 --> 00:45:15.119 We can't let those moments of great power betrayal 00:45:15.119 --> 00:45:18.039 erase the efficacy the League showed where commitment 00:45:18.039 --> 00:45:21.440 actually existed. Let's consider the Upper Silesia 00:45:21.440 --> 00:45:25.150 dispute in 1921. Now, this was a critical flashpoint 00:45:25.150 --> 00:45:27.949 between Germany and Poland. When the Allies failed 00:45:27.949 --> 00:45:30.670 to resolve it, the League stepped in. Its commission 00:45:30.670 --> 00:45:32.969 brokered a settlement that divided the territory, 00:45:33.150 --> 00:45:36.489 but, and this is key, it simultaneously established 00:45:36.489 --> 00:45:39.550 a convention ensuring economic interaction and 00:45:39.550 --> 00:45:42.690 minority rights. The League provided the legitimate 00:45:42.690 --> 00:45:45.190 infrastructure needed for sovereign nations to 00:45:45.190 --> 00:45:48.630 de -escalate. That was a profound political success. 00:45:49.420 --> 00:45:52.019 But those successes were just minor skirmishes 00:45:52.019 --> 00:45:55.119 compared to the defining challenges of the 1930s. 00:45:55.139 --> 00:45:58.019 The League's credibility collapsed irreversibly 00:45:58.019 --> 00:46:01.119 when that great power willingness vanished. We 00:46:01.119 --> 00:46:03.539 have to discuss the failures in Manchuria and 00:46:03.539 --> 00:46:06.679 Abyssinia. They destroyed any remaining faith 00:46:06.679 --> 00:46:09.300 in collective security and signaled to every 00:46:09.300 --> 00:46:11.400 aspiring dictator that the system was hollow. 00:46:11.639 --> 00:46:15.880 In 1931, Japan manufactures a crisis, the Mukden 00:46:15.880 --> 00:46:19.030 Incident, occupies Manchuria and sets up the 00:46:19.030 --> 00:46:21.650 puppet state of Manchukuo. The League took an 00:46:21.650 --> 00:46:23.829 entire year to dispatch the Lytton Commission, 00:46:24.130 --> 00:46:26.989 which finally condemned Japan's aggression. And 00:46:26.989 --> 00:46:30.690 what happened next? Japan simply slammed the 00:46:30.690 --> 00:46:32.949 door on the report and walked away from the League 00:46:32.949 --> 00:46:36.409 in 1933. It exposed the ultimate vulnerability. 00:46:36.969 --> 00:46:39.769 The League had zero enforcement mechanism against 00:46:39.769 --> 00:46:42.769 a major power choosing to leave. The covenant 00:46:42.769 --> 00:46:45.710 just dissolved into an academic exercise. What 00:46:45.710 --> 00:46:47.889 good is a rulebook if the most powerful players 00:46:47.889 --> 00:46:49.909 can simply tear out the pages they don't like? 00:46:50.190 --> 00:46:52.070 You're right that Manchuria was devastating. 00:46:52.329 --> 00:46:55.489 But the Abyssinia crisis is, I think, an even 00:46:55.489 --> 00:46:58.010 more tragic illustration of how external political 00:46:58.010 --> 00:47:01.070 calculation actively destroyed the system, rather 00:47:01.070 --> 00:47:03.230 than the institution failing on its own terms. 00:47:03.550 --> 00:47:07.409 In 1935, when Italy invaded Abyssinia, the League 00:47:07.409 --> 00:47:10.480 did respond swiftly. It condemned Italy and imposed 00:47:10.480 --> 00:47:12.980 sanctions, the most robust action it had ever 00:47:12.980 --> 00:47:15.340 taken against a major power. But they were ineffective 00:47:15.340 --> 00:47:18.099 sanctions. They were deliberately ineffective. 00:47:18.519 --> 00:47:22.380 They were neutered. Coal and oil, Italy's key 00:47:22.380 --> 00:47:25.880 strategic needs, were explicitly left off the 00:47:25.880 --> 00:47:28.960 list. This wasn't a flaw in the covenant. It 00:47:28.960 --> 00:47:31.460 was a cynical political choice by Britain and 00:47:31.460 --> 00:47:34.039 France, who were terrified that effective sanctions 00:47:34.039 --> 00:47:36.940 would drive Mussolini right into an alliance 00:47:36.940 --> 00:47:41.199 with Hitler. It was a tragic pantomime. It signaled 00:47:41.199 --> 00:47:43.739 to every dictator watching that the covenant 00:47:43.739 --> 00:47:47.000 was negotiable if the interests of London and 00:47:47.000 --> 00:47:49.800 Paris were on the line. But the result is what 00:47:49.800 --> 00:47:53.079 matters. The sanctions failed. They were lifted 00:47:53.079 --> 00:47:56.820 in 1936. Italy annexed Abyssinia and withdrew 00:47:56.820 --> 00:48:00.460 in 1937. The system was exposed as theoretical, 00:48:00.780 --> 00:48:04.300 unable to survive reality. And let's not overlook 00:48:04.300 --> 00:48:07.230 the giant hole in the room. The permanent absence 00:48:07.230 --> 00:48:10.130 of the United States. Its non -participation 00:48:10.130 --> 00:48:12.190 just crippled the organization's credibility 00:48:12.190 --> 00:48:15.269 from the very beginning. That is certainly a 00:48:15.269 --> 00:48:17.610 heavy weight around the league's neck. I'll grant 00:48:17.610 --> 00:48:21.130 you that. However, even as it was dying, the 00:48:21.130 --> 00:48:23.630 league maintained its commitment to principle 00:48:23.630 --> 00:48:27.260 over appeasement. Consider one of its last significant 00:48:27.260 --> 00:48:31.119 acts in December 1939, the expulsion of the Soviet 00:48:31.119 --> 00:48:34.300 Union for invading Finland. At that point, the 00:48:34.300 --> 00:48:37.119 leak was practically irrelevant, yet it was still 00:48:37.119 --> 00:48:39.699 willing to enforce its covenant against the permanent 00:48:39.699 --> 00:48:43.159 council member. This underscores that the framework 00:48:43.159 --> 00:48:46.719 held its moral authority. It was the geopolitical 00:48:46.719 --> 00:48:49.760 calculus of the great powers that failed. As 00:48:49.760 --> 00:48:52.719 Stanley Baldwin said in 1936, the failure of 00:48:52.719 --> 00:48:55.159 collective security lay not in the structure, 00:48:55.260 --> 00:48:57.820 but in the nation's reluctance to commit the 00:48:57.820 --> 00:49:00.300 military force required to back the covenant. 00:49:00.679 --> 00:49:03.780 That's a failure of statecraft, not of design. 00:49:04.139 --> 00:49:07.239 But can we really separate the two? Well, let's 00:49:07.239 --> 00:49:11.570 shift our gaze entirely away. from military deterrence 00:49:11.570 --> 00:49:13.909 and focus on the institutional work, because 00:49:13.909 --> 00:49:16.130 that's where the long term success story really 00:49:16.130 --> 00:49:19.289 is. The foundational work of the League's commissions 00:49:19.289 --> 00:49:21.710 was extraordinary. Take the Slavery Commission. 00:49:22.030 --> 00:49:25.650 It achieved measurable, concrete victories. It 00:49:25.650 --> 00:49:28.050 secured Ethiopia's commitment to end slavery 00:49:28.050 --> 00:49:31.090 in 1923, and it worked to curb forced labor in 00:49:31.090 --> 00:49:34.480 Liberia. More strikingly, the commission's efforts 00:49:34.480 --> 00:49:37.079 dramatically reduced the death rate on the Tanganyika 00:49:37.079 --> 00:49:40.579 Railway from 55 percent down to 4 percent by 00:49:40.579 --> 00:49:42.960 combating forced labor. I mean, this isn't just 00:49:42.960 --> 00:49:45.360 a historical footnote. This shows the league's 00:49:45.360 --> 00:49:47.559 commissions had a concrete, practical reach. 00:49:48.079 --> 00:49:50.900 I acknowledge the positive influence of bodies 00:49:50.900 --> 00:49:53.380 like the ILO, which push for things like the 00:49:53.380 --> 00:49:55.739 eight -hour workday, but we have to question 00:49:55.739 --> 00:49:58.219 the deep impact of these decentralized reforms 00:49:58.219 --> 00:50:00.980 when they're in the shadow of a total political 00:50:00.980 --> 00:50:04.019 catastrophe. Humanitarian achievements, while 00:50:04.019 --> 00:50:07.239 laudable, were ultimately marginalized. If the 00:50:07.239 --> 00:50:09.679 purpose of the whole mechanism was stability 00:50:09.679 --> 00:50:13.300 and the high political function failed, can we 00:50:13.300 --> 00:50:16.119 truly elevate the technical function above that 00:50:16.119 --> 00:50:19.239 existential failure? Furthermore, the whole structure 00:50:19.239 --> 00:50:22.039 suffered from a permanent bias. It was widely 00:50:22.039 --> 00:50:25.119 seen as a league of victors, designed by the 00:50:25.119 --> 00:50:27.880 Allies. The initial exclusion of Germany in the 00:50:27.880 --> 00:50:30.940 Soviet Union and the absence of the U .S. severely 00:50:30.940 --> 00:50:33.519 curtailed its legitimacy from the outset. The 00:50:33.519 --> 00:50:37.059 representation issue is a valid historical constraint, 00:50:37.340 --> 00:50:40.239 but the organizational innovations it introduced 00:50:40.239 --> 00:50:44.079 transcended that initial bias. I mean, consider 00:50:44.079 --> 00:50:47.340 the mandate system under Article 22. While it 00:50:47.340 --> 00:50:50.300 was rooted in partitioning former empires, it 00:50:50.300 --> 00:50:53.019 created a radical new concept, the principle 00:50:53.019 --> 00:50:56.139 of international observation. Colonial powers 00:50:56.139 --> 00:50:58.880 were placed under the supervision of the Permanent 00:50:58.880 --> 00:51:01.179 Mandates Commission. They had to submit annual 00:51:01.179 --> 00:51:04.199 reports and administer territories as a sacred 00:51:04.199 --> 00:51:07.659 trust of civilization. Now, this was a profound 00:51:07.659 --> 00:51:10.699 revolutionary shift from outright annexation 00:51:10.699 --> 00:51:13.380 to national responsibility under international 00:51:13.380 --> 00:51:16.539 scrutiny. It created a critical new standard 00:51:16.539 --> 00:51:19.360 of accountability and acted as a catalyst for 00:51:19.360 --> 00:51:22.500 future decolonization movements. But even the 00:51:22.500 --> 00:51:25.639 mandates often served as thinly -veiled instruments 00:51:25.639 --> 00:51:28.360 for the Allies to advance their own interests. 00:51:28.760 --> 00:51:32.239 The fundamental problem remains. The structure 00:51:32.239 --> 00:51:34.860 that allowed the League to function was the same 00:51:34.860 --> 00:51:37.260 structure that permitted those great powers to 00:51:37.260 --> 00:51:40.519 ignore resolutions when it mattered most. The 00:51:40.519 --> 00:51:43.139 entire architecture was dependent on a goodwill 00:51:43.139 --> 00:51:46.199 that just evaporated when it was tested. At the 00:51:46.199 --> 00:51:48.719 end of the day, the League of Nations was designed 00:51:48.719 --> 00:51:52.119 with one overriding mission, to prevent global 00:51:52.119 --> 00:51:56.039 war. Its structural flaws, its failure to enforce 00:51:56.039 --> 00:51:59.019 disarmament, its inability to retain universal 00:51:59.019 --> 00:52:02.360 membership, and, most critically, its failure 00:52:02.360 --> 00:52:05.519 to halt aggression in the 1930s meant it failed 00:52:05.519 --> 00:52:08.579 in its primary purpose. History cannot classify 00:52:08.579 --> 00:52:11.500 a mechanism created for peace that results in 00:52:11.500 --> 00:52:14.380 a world war as anything other than a political 00:52:14.380 --> 00:52:17.599 failure of the First Order. I will concede that 00:52:17.599 --> 00:52:20.760 the League failed to prevent the war, but I would 00:52:20.760 --> 00:52:23.519 ask that we define success not solely by what 00:52:23.519 --> 00:52:26.179 it failed to deter, but by what it successfully 00:52:26.179 --> 00:52:29.679 created. The League institutionalized international 00:52:29.679 --> 00:52:32.820 affairs. It pioneered technical and humanitarian 00:52:32.820 --> 00:52:36.300 work. It codified international law in ways that 00:52:36.300 --> 00:52:39.099 persist today. It provided the exact blueprint, 00:52:39.320 --> 00:52:41.780 the structure, and the intellectual foundations, 00:52:42.019 --> 00:52:44.940 like collective security, that the United Nations 00:52:44.940 --> 00:52:48.119 would later adopt and refine. As Robert Cecil 00:52:48.119 --> 00:52:51.239 noted at its dissolution in 1946, the machinery 00:52:51.239 --> 00:52:54.409 was sufficient. The enduring challenge then and 00:52:54.409 --> 00:52:56.650 now is the willingness of states to actually 00:52:56.650 --> 00:52:59.949 use that machinery. Its legacy isn't just the 00:52:59.949 --> 00:53:03.150 tragedy of 1939, but the entire architecture 00:53:03.150 --> 00:53:05.389 of global cooperation we rely on today.