Evening star., 1933-05-28

z,
less of the Leagues disposition to tenn
porize on the one hand and of the sus-
capabilities of those who make a fetish
of the Monroe Doctrine on the other,
that the line of settlement in the Chaco
will be found through League action.
It is on the League that legal RESPONSE
bility rests and it is to Geneva that this
responsibility must return now that the
mediatory efforts of the United States
have failed to avert first resumption of
hostilities and now formal declaration,
by one of the belligerents, of the exist
ence of state of war.
Return of the dispute to Geneva, as
has been said, is not regarded with dis
taste in Washington. But if weakened
League is to have any real chance of
success in settling the Chaco dispute it
must have something more than benevo-
lent neutrality from the United States.
There must also be active cooperation
in the enforcement of munitions en-
barge, if necessary, and in other positive
steps to force settlement based on
arbitration of the difficulties rather than
on the military superiority of either dis
putant.
To such American intervention, under
League direction and exercised cooper
atively with League members, neither
the Argentine nor any other South
American nation habitually critical of
this country could offer effective objec-
ton. No such objection, it may be noted,
was put forward when the Department.
of State on February 27 approved as
straightforward and helpful" the
Leagues suggestion for the establish
ment of an international police force in
the Leticia territory, in dispute between
Colombia and Peru.
THE policy of the League, as far as
one can judge with relative GER
tainty, will be to send to the Chaco a
commission Of inquiry modelled on the
Lytton Commission to Manchuria. Pend
ing the report Of such q commission,
further efforts will be made to secure
a cessation Of hostihties, perhaps
through the application Of a pressure
which has not yet been deemed prac-
ticable in the Sino-Japanese dispute. The
easiest form Of such pressure would be
an arms embargo In which the United
States would be urged to join, and could
the more readily do 30 since by far the
greater part Of the arms shipments sent
to Bolivia and Paraguay lately has come
from League members and not from this
country. It also would be desirable for
the League as whole to follow the lead
given by the American nations last
August. All members Of the PanAmeri-
can Union except the two disputants
then Endorsed for this dispute the doc
trine of non-recognition Of territorial
arrangements secured by force Of
arms.
1t may be said that steps along these
lines are probable. Less certainty exists
as to the direction which the improve
ment of peace machinery in the West
ern Hemisphere should take, though the
subject will doubtless be much to the
fore at the sessions of the Pan-American
Conference in Montevideo this Fall. A
suggestion now under discussion is that
what is needed is a regional American
peace pact, like the Locarno treaties, to
DC ConCluoeu uuotI League auspices, UuI
with large degree Of responsibility left
to the contracting parties. Such policy,
however, would seem to require a con-
siderable strengthening of cooperation
with the League by the Argentine and
Brazil as well as the United States.
Undeniably clear, however, is the drift
toward developing the old idea that
Latin American peace WAS a urinary re-
sponsibility of the United States salone.
Orderly international relations in the
Americas, as well as in older continents,