Evening star., 1937-02-21
BY THE RIGHT HONORABLE LORD
STRAROLGI

STRABOLGI,.
Formerly Of the Admiralty War Stan OF
Great Britain.
TINE Spanish civil war, which has
ragged for half year, presents
many lessons From this ter
u rible and bitter struggle the
strategists and students of naval and
military affairs, the politicians and,
above all, the ordinary citizens can
learn much.
I suggest that the people of Amer
lea in particular can read valuable
lessons from that troubled country.
and diplomacy are less trustworthy
than at any time for three centuries.
The painfully and gradually built-up
law of nations is no lohger observed
in practices. Not only have the diplo-
mats and politicians of Europe lied to
each other with regard to the question
Of Intervention in Spain, but every
one knew they were lying.
For example, from the beginning Of
the outbreak and even before it. the
Italians, Germans and Portuguese
gave substantial help to the rebels.
This was a fragrant breach of inter-
national law itself. An established
and recognized government of any
country has certain rights 1t is an
act of illegality under international
law and custom for friendly state
and in this sense friendly" means any
etc IN ,n$ af re y,ninhbOr- n
give assistance to a rebellious move
ment.
The position was stated very clearly
as recently as 1880 by the then United
States Secretary of State in an almost
precisely similar case arising out of
the attempted revolution in Brazil.
At that time certain citizens of the
United States were sympathetic to
the rebels in Brazil and desired to
send them arms. They were stopped
by the United States Government
which, at the same time, declined to
interfere with the right of the recog-
nized Brazilian government to buy
arms in the United States market for
the purpose of suppressing the revolu-
ton and restoring order.
Not New Principle.
I cannot do better than quote the
words of the Secretary of State, speak
ing with the full authority of the
American Government, on that occa-
sion.
There is nothing unprecedented in
the principle which we now apply.
which we have applied many times
before. It is very important that
people should not misunderstood it
as a new principle. 1t is important
for the reason that the revolutionists,
who may be hurt by our action in
placing an embargo, may assert that
we are taking sides for some Interior
reason with one or other of the COM
batants.
Instead of that, we are acting ac-
cording to general principles Of inter-
national law. Those principles declare
that where we are in friendly relations
through diplomatic channels with q
government which has been recog-
nized as the legitimate government OF
a country, that government is en-
titled to the ordinary rights Of any
government to buy arms in this
country, while the people who are
opposing and trying to overthrow that
government and are not yet recog-
nized as belligerents are not entitled
to that right. It is not a matter OF
choice on our part, but is a practice
of mankind known as international
law. We have no personal bias, and
are doing nothing but attempting to
carry out the law Of mankind"
AS was then stated, this is no new
principle To depart from it in this
present Spanish case even the United
States Congress had to pass a special
act. It is accepted that any govern
ment can prevent the export Of arms
as an act of domestic legislation, and
the neutrality acts passed by Congress
have somewhat altered the principle
laid down in 1880. But the neutrality
acts were intended to apply to war
between sovereign states, not to civil
war within state.
The British had powers to prevent
the export of arms by an administra-
tive act. No arms can be exported
from Great Britain except under
special license In the case of the
Spanish civil war, all these special