World Organization or Big Power Domination?
World Organization or Big Power Domination? Where Do We Go From Dumbarton Oaks? By William Esslinger MOST liberals acre* that Dumbarton Oaks is "i rood beginning." Bat a beginning implies...
...In collaboration, they could set the pattern of postwar world trade and "remove most of the economic frictions that generate wars...
...The Danes now stop the trains without destroying them...
...Concessions to their prejudices weakened the covenant, and then their opposition kept the United States out of the league after all...
...and that it should therefore be possible st last to achieve their consent to all that is implied...
...development ttep by ttep can be expected...
...The development ef warfare cannot be changed...
...It is suggested that families move into the mountains with all stores snd livestock they csn msnsgs...
...This faith <• the decisive factor...
...The British Commonwealth snd the United States together control more than half of the world's rsw materials and mercantile markets, Batt stated...
...Only by th* enforcement of international law can war be abolished...
...ANGLO-AMERICAN ECONOMIC COOPERATION ESSENTIAL TO PlACI WlLI.IAM L. BATT, vice-chairman of the War Production Board, has declared that the United States mutt aid Britain in her desperate economic plight Britain will be less able to compete in world markets than before this wsr, Unless, be said, Americans realise that ws need Britain's economic cooperation to win the peace as much, as her military cooperation to win the war, the two nations will clash head-on...
...On the other hand, they hold that sines sn organisstion for peace through enforced international law would be premature, no other way remains for them thsn to aspire to s more modest organisation of nations...
...With these deficiencies, the league did not inspire enough confidence in the British and French statesmen to abandon individual power politics for the law of the covenant Thus, when Japan attacked Manchuria, the British thought of their own interests in the Far East, for which they believed they needed Japan's friendship...
...This figure was reached despite the fact that only one-fifth of the country had been freed, that well over 700,000 men had been deported to Germany, and that the pressing need for men in the coal mines sxeluded Isrge numbers of miners from military service...
...Even the incomplete league could have succeeded If it had been trusted...
...The "idealists" agree that a perfect security system cannot be immediately established, that there must be . a period of transition...
...Psychologically, there ie an abyss between the two systems...
...Power rests with the Security Council, especially with its permanent members, and they are supposed to act unanimously...
...Their skepticism originated in the failure of the league...
...My point is simply that people of the world now desire, by whatever means are necessary, peace, reel peace, not a substitute, not armed truce...
...I doubt it The greet powers will, of course, seek to remain united...
...They think that our time is not ripe for unconditional peace...
...But eseh government will seek, at the same time, to increase the power of Its own nation in case another government disagrees with it on a vital problem...
...Underground Europe The Austrian underground has been fighting for 11 years, ever since Dolfuss dissolved the Social Democratic Party and free trade unions...
...Such also is the main aspect of the Dumbarton Oaks plan...
...They think that the league failed because its covenant went too far...
...Moat of the "realists" do not ssy when the time "for real peace will come...
...that this experience is misinterpreted by them...
...Under the Dumbarton Oaks plan tfcj Great Powers are responsible lor maintaining peace // they agree, there will be peers...
...But new, if ever, is the thee te do It for war has taken the souls ef men, they are prepared for new least...
...there it no ether way than to ttep war iteelf forever...
...But that is not what the "realists" mean by their "not now...
...I have said that Dumbarton Oaks is a good beginning...
...And when Mussolini invsded Abyssinia, the French 1 wanted to maintain Italy's friendship at a guarantee against the German menace, and they failed therefore to apply fully the sanctions which would have stopped Mussolini...
...One of the ablest advocates* of such a system described it ss sn organisation built around "a nuclear alliance...
...But I have also stated that no...
...The Czechoslovak Government in London has issued an...
...Earl Sailer, executive member of the Austrian Labor Committee, has come out with a strong plea for the rights of the labor movement in reconstruction when Austria is liberated...
...I cannot examine here whether the realists exaggerate these requirements...
...e ANOTHER argument of the realists is that people are not prepared to accept the conditions necessary for a perfect peace organisation...
...No statesman can act according to both principles, as no man can serve two masters...
...But the agreement exists in theory only...
...Plans to achieve this should be considered immediately because in the international field transitory measures havs a fatal *. tendency to become permanent obstacles...
...Only by the rule of law can nations be equal...
...In this way, distrust may arise end destroy the alliance-organization in exactly the same way as it destroyed mere alliances throughout history...
...In addition, nine minor factories, manufacturing mostly jnachinery and motors, hav* been obliterated...
...Suet security must not rest upon domination by one big nation or s group of great powers over the other nations It must rest en the rule of international law...
...it would be interrupted by s new war caused by power politics...
...Thsy know ss well as anybody that never in history has an alliance lasted for s long time...
...The way of the realists does not lead to international security...
...Only unconditiona peace is enduring pease, i> Real peace does not mesa- an uncertain period without war...
...Any delay in the restoration of the labor .movement would induce bitterness in men who feel that they have paid with their blood for the right to speak in a free Austria...
...TSlP'actual aim of the realists is not a mere alliance of the great powers...
...An international organisation for peace mutt have real strength and have faith in the enforcement of law...
...Four major plants have been blown up within the last month, including a V-2 plant, and a submarine . detector factory...
...In what sense, then, is the Dumbarton Oaks plsn a good beginning ? It is necessary for the transitional period after the war, but it should be transformed into "a more perfect union," an organisstion to secure poses by law...
...he assumes, in BOO years...
...The success of these attacks it reflected in the nearly complete absence todsy of modern switching devices...
...order to the Chechoslovakian population to resist in every possible way deportation by the retreating German army...
...All this is, to a large degree at least, common ground...
...Danish state railway haa been nearly used up, and the Germans are unable to provide any of their own...
...The Odin Tower at Qdense, Denmark, next to the Eiffel Tower the highest in Europe, has been destroyed by saboteurs...
...Free Slovakia, a secret radio station recently established, has been brosdessting details of Partisan successes...
...Will such a combination of the systems of alliance and international organisation have a better chance of stability than an alliance proper...
...One cannot get over O brood chatm by a serif* of ekort jump...
...Other "realists" have a shorter period of waiting in mind...
...To the first question the so-called "realists" answer, "Not now," to the second, "Only slowly, step by step...
...But for all practical purposes their object cannot be real peace,' in the sense as defined, because they believe that its conditions will not be achieved in our time...
...Bat a beginning implies that progress is nssdsd toward a mors perfeei organisation...
...If their objections to the realisation in our time of peace through law are correct, we must despair of peace at all...
...Behind the first car come s few empties, snd then the cars carrying German soldiers and supplies...
...When it was pointed out to him thst Denmark should be capitalised, hs replied: "Better leave it ss it is, otherwise the Germans will demand that 'best' also should be capitalised...
...The teak le te tasks the ceaditieas ef real peace clear eaeagh...
...The main argument of the realists is the experience of the League of Nations...
...New techniques ef destruction and the disappearance *f all metal limitation, of warfare combine te make the ides of a third world war completely intolerable...
...They were the only big political group in Austria actively to enter the fight against Fascism...
...This description is quits correct In sny combination of elements of alliance and real organisation those of alliance are likely to form Aha center...
...Actually, the league did not succeed because Wilson's correct idea of an organisstion to enforce lew snd secure peace was crippled from the very beginning by the realists of his time...
...Such acts, however, which tend te increase the power and "security" ef one nation, sre liable to decrease the security of another...
...As long as the international organisation is not complete enough to guarantee full security to all nations, each government will feel obliged to increase the individual security .of its nation...
...We cannot have any thing better for the present, but we should realise that what we want is unconditional peace...
...not equal as U power or wealth, but equal under law...
...To combat frequent Daniah underground attacks on trains, the German now load the first cars of all trains with Danish hostages...
...The repair materia) of...
...At that time, in 1934, the Social Democratic Party represented close to so percent of the voters, and almost all industrial workers were union members...
...When can it be done/ And how...
...Gradual development over a long time is therefore impossible...
...At least it must be tried...
...The psychology of individual security through power politics sad that ef collective security through law are incompatible in the long run...
...I believe, however...
...9 Eing Christian recently gave a magnificent prize for marksmanship, inscribed: "To him who shoots beat in denmark...
...for the ultimate cause of war is international lawlessness...
...Forty-two Psrtitsn attacks on German garrisons and communications during December have been reported in London, Announced score is 6,200 Germans dead, 140 prisoners, 20 railroad bridges, 30 tanks, snd 110 motor cars destroyed...
...Their ranks have suffered much...
...Railroad sabotage delayed for a week the transport of a German division to the Normandy front at th* time of the invasion...
...The Red Army has also set up a station on liberated territory, which regularly broadcasts instructions to Partisans and the civilian population on how best to ssbotaa-a the anamv...
...It means lasting security for all nations...
...Professor Mortimer Adler risks s guess which he calls optimistic...
...When it comes to applying the principles, we And grave dissension on the question...
...For the same reason the idea of gradual development towards a more perfect international organisstion is wrong...
...The prisoners, cap tured members of the resistance groups, are chained together and left in the first car for as many as 14 days at a time...
...The Germans had been using it is a radio finder...
...I knew test it is difficult to fight cartela prejudices, such as the cherished notion of ab solute national sovereignty...
...that people are not prepared to accept its implications...
...A social organism ef any sort whatever, large or small," says William James, "is what it is because each member proceeds te his own duty with the trust that the other members will simultaneously do theirs...
...There were 6,000 volunteers for the reorganized Dutch army within eight weeks after the Allied invasion of Holland...
...The Czech partisans are actively engaged in attacks on German communications, working in conjunction with Red Army advances...
Vol. 28 • February 1945 • No. 7
