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Disarmament Conference 1926

The main aim of the 1926 disarmament conference, was to prepare for a bigger one. The preparation commission for the disarmament conference. By this point, the sizes of the military of countries was: France: 733,707; Russia: 562,967; Great Britain: 520,948; Italy: 308,000; Japan: 235,056; the USA: 136,560; and Germany: 99,086. It was from this, that French foreign minister Aristide Briand and American secretary of state Frank B Kellogg went out to consult 65 different countries on the subject of disarmament, from this the Kellogg-Briand pact was formed.

International attitudes towards disarmament

The attitudes in Britain towards disarmament were largely ones of support. The main body of support came from the left who saw little point in spending money on arms. The belief was that they would be more likely to cause a conflict than prevent one.

This is demonstrated by various anti war groups which sprung up in the 1920s such as the Peace Pledge Union.

Disarmament

Washington Naval Conference (1922)

British Foreign Policy Conclusion

This conference saw Great Britain, France, the USA, Italy, and Japan agree on limiting their navies.

This was seen in both positive and negative lights, as this was an instance of peaceful negotiation, however Britain's desire to dominate with the British navy was abolished as terms were set to have navies split in the following ratios.

  • Britain - 5
  • USA - 5
  • Japan - 3
  • Italy - 1.75
  • France - 1.75

This meant that Britain no longer had Naval superiority- the size of it's fleet would now be determined by the treaty, not by an assessment of Britain's strategic needs. The agreement also left Britain and Japanese relations damaged, however Britain at least remained on good terms with the USA (and avoided an unnecessary naval race with them).

It could be argued that Disarmament in this time period led to much dispute and international paranoia of more conflict after the first "Great War", the disarmament conferences (1926 and 32) could be seen as a result of this public need for peace, as well as the Washington Naval conference which limited Navies- although loopholes were found in later years (the idea of producing smaller ships weren't specified in the original terms).

Political Cartoons

Countries that had rearmed- fascist/communist states

"The Next Step" - David Low (British Cartoonist)

Published in the Daily Express - 10th May 1933

A few countries experienced wide spread political change after World War One. The first of which was Russia, during the first world war the Bolsheviks had started and completed a revolution in Russia, lead by Lenin against the white rebels. The Bolsheviks won and installed a major communist regime into the Russian life, which effectively soared the Russian economy in the years following. Although Russia seemed to not cause harm with it's foreign policy during the 1920s, it did refuse to acknowledge it's war debts to Britain and the USA, stirring up discontent.

The second country was Italy; due to discontent with the terms of the treaty of St Germain and their lack of land gain, Italian ex socialist Benito Mussolini seized power in Rome during October of 1922, and became the Italian Prime Minister, throughout his early years he installed many different policies to solidify his power, many of which involved aggression and a can do attitude to mainly his foreign policy, which proved to have a major effect in Britain, such as during the 1935 Abyssinian crisis.

The third important power player was Germany, still bitter about the first World War, their government began to see corruption and extremism take hold, mainly when Adolf Hitler took control as Chancellor in 1932, making one of his first policies to leave the peace aiming League of Nations during a World Changing disarmament conference, that may have solved conflict issues.

Japan too became more militant however not to the major extent and severe changing that the other countries did, the military became more of a force in Japan and took to an aggressive foreign policy, as is evident by their take over of Manchuria.

Disarmament Conference (1932)

Aftermath of the Disarmament Conference (1932)

Met in Geneva, it involved 31 nations, this included the USA, USSR and Germany.

The conference discussed reductions in both naval and land forces.

The conference was a failure however due to the fact that Germany was pushing for equality in disarmament while France were too concerned about security to reduce the size of their armed forces. It proved too great a task to find compromise between these two countries demands. Following Hitler's assent to power in 1933, Germany let the conference.

The conference was chaired by ex British foreign secretary, Arthur Henderson.

The aftermath of the conference left many leaders worried. Germany (under Hitler's leadership) leaving the League of Nations meant that there was now a "Rogue state" in the middle of Europe, not only that but an extreme right wing rogue state with the aim of expanding their territory (Lebensraum).

This is in addition to the fascist states of Italy (led by Benito Mussolini), and the fascism forming in Spain under leader Franco- causing worry that they could form a fascist alliance resulting in another great war.

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