An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir June 2018 www.dfmagazine.ie 16 | the League oversaw several other agencies and commissions to dealing with international problems, health and safety is- sues, labour related incidents, slavery, drug trafficking and the protection of refugees. However, some major powers disregarded the organisation and undermined its work. The situation deteriorated in the 1930s when a series of events exposed the League as ineffectual. Its condemnation of the Japanese invasion of China in 1931 prompted Japan to quit the organisation. The Italian invasion of Ethiopia was also condemned but Italy continued its campaign regardless. Ger- many's rearmament programme during this period was also cause for concern, but Hitler ignored the League's calls and continued preparing for war. Ireland, and in particular Eamon de Valera, was to play an important role in the League of Nations. Having become An Taoiseach, de Valera retained for himself the external af- fairs portfolio and as such he represented Ireland at League of Nations' meetings during the 1930s. In September 1932 he became president of the League's council, where his speeches won him worldwide acclaim. In a world dominated by major powers he was particularly vocal on the role of small nations, which he did not want to see dragged into international con- flicts against their will. In a prescient speech given in Geneva in 1936, de Valera high- lighted the failings of the organisation and condemned those countries that sought to invade, occupy and bring war to others. However it may be disguised, it can only be with a feeling of bitter humiliation that each successive speaker has during these days come to this Tribune. Over fifty nations pledged themselves to one another in the most solemn manner each to respect the independence and to preserve the integrity of the territories of the others. One of these nations turned its back on its pledges freely given, and was adjudged almost unanimously by the remainder to have been an aggressor, and now, one by one, we have come here to confess that we can do nothing effective about it. Over fifty nations, we banded ourselves together for collective security. Over fifty nations, we have now to confess publicly that we must abandon the victim to his fate. It is a sad confession, as well as a bitter one. It is the fulfilment of the worst predictions of all who decried the League and said it could not succeed. As has been said already, we are all of us in some measure responsible for this pitiable position, some much more respon- sible than others. Read the speech delivered here by the Emperor of Ethiopia. Does any delegate deny that, so far as it relates to what has happened here, there is to his knowledge truth in every line of it? Perhaps as the representative of a small nation that has itself experience of aggression and dismemberment, the members of the Irish delegation may be more sensitive than others to the plight of Ethiopia. But is there any small nation represented here which does not feel the truth of the warning that what is Ethiopia's fate today may well be its own fate tomorrow, should the greed or the ambition of some powerful neighbour prompt its destruction. Mr President, you had, indeed, very good reason to warn us at the opening of these proceedings against the pitfalls of bitterness, scepticism, and discouragement which the present situation has spread around us. Nothing, surely, would be more disastrous than to abandon ourselves to despair, but is it not equally the height of folly to think that we can go on just as if nothing had happened? Many delegates have stated the circumstances of the present position and given us an analysis of its development. The repre- sentative of Russia has stated in precise terms the kind of League we would all like to see established as a guarantor of peace, but, except to say that the masses must be educated, he has not shown how such a League can be built up. He has not shown how in the present conditions the masses can be led to feel any confidence that obligations, no matter how explicitly they may be undertaken on paper, will in fact be carried out when the testing time comes. How can the plain man be convinced that obligations entered into will not in the future, at the prompting of selfish interest, be ignored, as the existing obligations have been ignored. On 28th June 1919, the Treaty of Versailles was signed during the Paris Peace Conference at the end of World War I. Meetings and events leading to formation of the United Nations Organisation President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill (seated upper left in front of their standing staff members) at divine service aboard the British battleship HMS Prince of Wales, during the Atlantic Charter meeting. 1st August 1941. Photo #83983 UN Photo/(Historical Photo)

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