Evening star., 1933-01-29
COMPLICATIONS FEARED
INU. S. TREATIES STAND
Roosevelt Committed to Doctrine of Up.
holding Sanctity Without Use of Force,
and This May Bring Far East Trouble.
of an illegality it has done nothing to

of an illegality it has done nothing to
prevent.
What President Lowell has said, in
effect, is that If international action
is inadequate to prevent aggression,
even when nations act together, the
isolated procedure of the United States
in refusing to recognize the results OF
illegality after the fact will only en-
broil us with the aggressor without
weakening his hold on seized territory
or shaking his resolution to retain this
profit Of violence. And I assume that
fundamentally the president of Har-
ward believes that effective American
action can only come when the United
States acts as member of the League
Of Nations and takes steps to prevent
an aggression.
Both Mr.. Hoover and Mr.. Stimson
have proceeded on the assumption that
the public opinion of the world when
mobilized would suffice to prevent ag-
gression or at the very least to force a
law-breaking nation to resign Its profits.
That was the underlying notion of Mr..
Kellogg and M. BRAND when they un-
dertook to make the Pact of Paris.
which bears their names. 1t was. in
effect rejection of the older French
idea that international force was neces-
sary to protect international law.
Now, it has been clear from the out
set that world opinion has not sufticed
to prevent japanese treaty violation in
Manchuria. 1t Is patent that American
non-recognition or even world nom
recognition of the consequences of
japanese action will not bring Japan
to renounce its policy or restore Man.
chukuo to Chinese sovereignty. Actual
1,, La Nf hal IN
approval has been to encourage Chinese
resistance, exacerbate American-Japa-
neSe relations and protect anarchy and
strife in the Far East.
1t is perfectly true that in the end
the strain placed upon the relatively
slender resources of Japan may bring
about domestic collapse collapse
which can hardly fail to be attended
by revolution and perhaps by Commu-
mist control. But looking solely to the
question Of the restoration Of trade
and commerce and therefore of pros
perity in the world, it can hardly be
imagined that such consequence
would be of great value. True. prin-
ciple. might seem to have been vindi-
Gated, but at costs hardly to be diff
ferentiated from those of war itself.
japanese Danger to United States.
On the other hand. assuming that
Japan will be able to carry on for the
present at least, nothing is more cer-
tain than that ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS re-
lations will become increasingly diff
cult and that the Japanese press and
public, angered by American passive
encouragement of Chinese resistance,
will speak and act in fashion which
can only provoke disagreeable and even
dangerous incidents. Even now it is
hardly to be questioned that for dec
ade at least friendly relations between
Toxic and Washington are out of the
question.
1t is this circumstance which gives
grave Importance to the apparent de-
cision of the new President to take over
the policy of the old in the Far East
and to adhere to the Stimson doctrine,
which obviously can lead to equally Sc
riouS European involvements at any
moment. Actually Mr. Roosevelt seems
to have rejected once for ali the old
WilSonian conception of world peace
insured by the collective will and force
OF all nations, employing the league as
its executive instrument
If Mr.. RooSevelt's statement means
what it has been interpreted to mean
by the general public. we are now to see
international conference whenever a
treaty question is at issue and to stand
firmly against any treaty violation but
to take no positive action to restrain
or coerce the prospective or actual
treaty breaker. We shall thus have our
word to say on the subject of every
treaty dispute in Europe. We shall
necessarily stand with France and her
allies against any attempt forcibly to
revise the status quo of the peace trea-
ties. We shall refuse to recognize the
fruits of any forcible revision But we
shall appear only as the voice of the
moral law-never as one of the forces
to defend or vindicate the law.
AS I see it the issue raised is two
fold. We are undertaking to assert the
doctrine that the sanctity of treaties
must be preserved but refusing to en-
ploy force in their defense. We are
acting on the assumption that in the
end the force of world opinion will
prove adequate to maintain treaties and
that it is possible to continue a moral
offensive against law-breaking nation
without running any risks of becoming
involved in actual conflict. And these
are large assumptions.
Copyright, 1888, by Mcclure Newspaper
Syndicate.)