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# I. INTRODUCTION

This paper is concerned with the views of certain American statesmen on the sources of war and peace. A particular theme will be the American view of collective security and of its relation to the traditional concepts of balance of power and spheres of influence. The statesmen surveyed are Woodrow Wilson, Charles Evans Hughes, Henry L. Stimson, Cordell Hull, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and John Foster Dulles.

The Wilsonian worldview serves as a point of departure. The paper will set forth some of the main elements of this worldview and then trace the responses of the later statesmen to these themes. We shall see that Hughes and Stimson tend to reject most (but not all) of the Wilsonian premises, and that Hull and Roosevelt tend to speak in Wilsonian terms. Dulles writing in 1939 is reminiscent of Hughes, but Dulles as Secretary of State is found cloaking the American alliance system in the purest Wilsonian mantle.

1. A favorite WILSONIAN theme was that **arbitration and international law** are the keys to the future peace. See WILSON p. 2 & p. 3. Henceforth, nations must be subject to the same code of behavior as individuals. See WILSON p. 4. HUGHES, however, was skeptical about the analogy of individuals and states and about the applicability of law: Outlawing war would be difficult, the distinguished jurist argued, because war was really analogous to the "self-help" which the law *has to allow* even within a society. See HUGHES pp. 10-17. STIMSON was enthusiastic about international law in 1919. See STIMSON p. 15, and appeared so in 1932 as well.

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but was growing skeptical by then [See STIMSON pp. 15-17]. HULL in 1944 treated arbitration and law as two of the bases of American foreign policy for the postwar world [See HULL p. 207]. DULLES in 1939 was skeptical about the efficacy of law and ethics in international relations: Nations were not like individuals, he wrote, but like "bodies corporate;" statesmen were only representatives and had no mandate to sacrifice the specific interests of the group they served [See DULLES p. 247. Force was the only means states had to induce changes from conditions which seemed intolerable to them [See DULLES p. 257. Twenty years later, as Secretary of State rather than corporate lawyer, he saw things differently: He expected that international law would be able to develop, slowly but surely, in a world made peaceful by American collective-security arrangements [See DULLES p. 307].

2. Open diplomacy was another favorite theme of President WILSON. Publicity would ensure a more responsible diplomacy by exposing evil designs and by "cooling off" the participants [See WILSON p. 8, p. 3, p. 2]. HUGHES pointed out, however, that the negotiation process could not function in the glare of publicity [See HUGHES p. 127. HULL also saw the disadvantages of publicized negotiation [See HULL p. 197].

3. The WILSONIAN faith in open diplomacy was a corollary of WILSON'S belief that the people were peace-loving, but governments were not [See WILSON p. 3 & p. 67]. It followed from this that democracies were necessarily peace-loving, but autocratic states were aggressive and untrustworthy [See WILSON p. 5 & p. 97. HUGHES drew a different conclusion from the experience of the First World War: Great wars, he said, are fought by populations aroused by a sense of national injury. [See HUGHES p. 127. Self-

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determination was a source of war, not a remedy for it. See
HUGHES p. 117. STIMSON felt in 1917 that German autocracy was
responsible for the war. See STIMSON p. 15. But the
pacific quality of democracies was not so clear: At the time
of the disarmament negotiations of the 1930's, STIMSON noted
that public sentiment was a limitation on the freedom of action
of democratic statesmen. See STIMSON p. 167. DULLES believed in
1939 that all governments, as corporate bodies, were incapable
of behaving as morally as individuals. See DULLES p. 247.

ROOSEVELT, KEMPE, etc. too, drew a distinction between peoples and
their governments, but for the Wilsonian purpose of identifying
his own policy with the peaceful yearnings of the multitude. See
ROOSEVELT p. 227.

4. WILSON also believed that _the existence of armaments was a cause of war_ and that _disarmament was essential to international security_. See WILSON p. 7 & p. 57. HUGHES believed, on the contrary, that the key to peace was not any "ambitious general scheme to prevent war," but patient diplomacy. See HUGHES p. 117. Whatever the advisability of disarmament in the abstract, a particular agreement, if fair to all sides, could improve the atmosphere. See HUGHES p. 137. STIMSON believed that the "problem of disarmament was secondary to political questions." See STIMSON p. 167. DULLES felt in 1939 that limitation of armaments was conducive to peace, but it was more likely to take place as the result, rather than the cause, of peace. See DULLES p. 257. HULL believed that arms races as a rule resulted in war. See HULL p. 197.

5. One reason for WILSON'S insistence on a "peace without
victory" was that _peace depended on the right state of mind_.
For WILSON this was a "tranquillity of spirit" that came from

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a "sense of ... right" [See WILSON p.4]. This was related to his
belief that "war is a process of heat," which could be "cooled
off" by exposure to public opinion [See WILSON p.8]. HUGHES also
referred to the importance of the right "state of mind" [See
HUGHES p.12]. HUGHES believed that "autosuggestion," or
the psychology of confidence, was an important element of the
peace [See HUGHES pp.12-13]. But HUGHES was more skeptical than
WILSON about the possibility of "cooling off" the national
passions: Outlawry of war would be feasible only if states
achieved mutual confidence and a strong common desire to
abandon war; "the suggested remedy thus implies a state of
mind in which no cure is needed" [See HUGHES p.11]. Thus
HUGHES was somewhat inclined to see peace as a condition imposed
on states, like the Pax Romana, rather than an attitude assumed
by them autonomously [See HUGHES p.11]. His notion of "auto-
suggestion" thus seems to be the only other way he could think
of for nations to break out of the vicious circle of inevitable
conflict, war, and insecurity. Note that DULLES hoped that the
tragic experience of two world wars would finally lead men to the
"intellectual and emotional conviction that the existing system
is so bad that it must be changed" [See DULLES pp.26-27]. A
Wilsonian goal on Hughesian premises?

6. WILSON rejected *balance-of-power politics* as unstable
[See WILSON p.7, p.8] and unjust [p.6, p.8]. The balance of
power was essentially competitive [p.7]; it was a system of
"organized rivalries" [p.4], a "game of power" [p.6], maintained
by "jealous watchfulness and an antagonism of interests" [p.7].
A balance of power favored the strong against the weak [p.8, p.9].
It was a system of force and terror [p.8]. The "new and more

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wholesome diplomacy" would emphasize "acting in concert" [p.4, p.5, p.6], the equality of rights of large and small nations [p.4, p.8], the consent of the governed [p.4, p.5], the end of entangling alliances [p.5, p.6, p.7], and justice [pp.6-7].

HUGHES felt, however, that states saw the balance of power as a means of ensuring national security, and that diplomacy had to operate within this limit [See HUGHES p.13]. The task of statesmanship was patiently to explore the area of accord between the conflicting conceptions of national interests [See HUGHES p.11]. HUGHES was inclined to recommend that the United States continue to avoid entangling alliances, but on the grounds that Europe's "primary interests" were not identical with our own, and that "our influence would not be increased by pooling it" [See HUGHES p.14]. DULLES identified balance-of-power politics with "mere expediency" and force, in contrast to the international legal system he hoped would evolve out of collective-security arrangements [See DULLES p.30].

The balance of power concept is to some extent congruent with that of *spheres of influence*, especially when the balance is a balance of alliance systems. For WILSON, of course, spheres of influence were incompatible with the rights of small nations [See WILSON p.4, p.8], and self-determination [p.4, p.5]. Similarly, ROOSEVELT and HULL tended to lump "balance of power" and "spheres of influence" together as two unfortunate relics of a disreputable bygone era [See ROOSEVELT pp.20-21, HULL p.23]. HULL, like Wilson, felt strongly about the "sovereign equality of nations, large and small" [See HULL p.21]. He seemed to identify "spheres of influence" with the economic imperialism of the early 1900's [See HULL pp.18-19]. ROOSEVELT regarded spheres of influence as

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inherently divisive, in contrast to the close collaboration of
great powers (like the Wilsonian "concert") which he foresaw
for the postwar world [See ROOSEVELT p.22, p.23]. [See also
STATE DEPARTMENT BRIEFING BOOK PAPER pp.23-24]. STIMSON, on
the other hand, believed that the postwar peace depended on a
realistic agreement by the big powers on "their respective
orbits" and their "territorial acquisitions"(which would serve
as "defense posts," or guarantees of security) [See STIMSON pp.17-18].

7. Another theme of President WILSON was the *unique morality of American policy*, or the unique impartiality and benevolence of American intentions. "We threaten none, covet the possessions of none, desire the overthrow of none," said WILSON after war broke out in Europe [See WILSON p.2]. Neutrality was justified as a demonstration of our righteousness, not of our self-interest; thus our *lack* of alliances was conducive to the world's peace [See WILSON p.2, p.3]. Even in 1919, the United States was "the only nation which has proved its disinterestedness [See WILSON p.9].

HUGHES was cautious, pointing out that we could be as
inflexible as other countries whenever we had a "clear sense of
our own interests" [See HUGHES pp.13-14]. Nevertheless, HUGHES
believed that our "national instinct has been opposed to aggression
and intervention;" the Monroe Doctrine was an example of this
[See HUGHES pp. 13-14]. Both HULL and DULLES, as well, saw no
inconsistency between America's high principles and America's
policy toward the Western Hemisphere; inter-American solidarity
was an example of unity wrought by a common love of liberty
rather than by power [See HULL p.20; DULLES p.27, pp.28-29].
In 1958, DULLES argued that principle, not expediency, was the
motivation behind American policy [See DULLES p.29]. DULLES in

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1939 had warned against national egoism and the deification of
the state [See DULLES p.25], but he also believed then that
federalism in the United States illustrated how chauvinism
could be avoided [See DULLES pp.25-26].

8. The alliance systems created after the Second World War were identified with collective security, that is, with world peace rather than narrow self-interest. According to DULLES, the Manila Pact was directed against aggression as such, and not against any particular countries [See DULLES p.27]. Our Asian alliances were a "mutual security system," to "help others to be free," and an example of the identity of "high principle" and "enlightened self-interest" [See DULLES p.28]. All our alliances were designed for the "common good" [See DULLES p.28]. Our allies, in Latin America and elsewhere, were joined to us solely by community of principle [See DULLES p.27, p.29]. United Nations action in Korea was hailed as the first successful action in history of an international organization against armed aggression [See DULLES p.27].

similarly

Note that HUGHES had regarded our participation in the First World War as consistent with our traditional avoidance of entangling alliances; we had fought because the cause of liberty itself was at stake [See HUGHES p.14]. But DULLES's view is more interesting as an extension of WILSON's formula for the postwar peace: WILSON's solution was a grouping of nations collaborating and serving as "trustee" of world peace, rather than a balance of power [See WILSON P.7]. DULLES even used the same trusteeship language in describing the function of American military power: American resistance to aggression was

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the bulwark of world peace until a more "universal" system could
be developed; in the meantime, the American military establishment
was "a power held in trust for the benefit of many nations" [See
DULLES p.29]. If necessary, the United States could act
unilaterally in the name of the U.N. Charter, as we did in
the Suez and Lebanon crises [See DULLES p.29]. WILSON had
identified world peace with our lack of alliance systems [See
WILSON p.2, p.3]. To DULLES, on the other hand, our alliances
were themselves the foundation of a peaceful world built on
consultation and law [See DULLES p.30].

9. Some final generalizations can be made about the general views of these statesmen on the <u>causes of war and peace.</u>

Many of them inclined toward a simple equation of war with willful aggression against a peaceful status quo. Thus WILSON, in his speech declaring war with Germany, blamed it on the "cunningly contrived plans of deception or aggression" perpetrated by despotic governments [See WILSON pp.5-6]. Similarly, STIMSON in 1917 saw the war as a struggle between "autocratic aggression" and the peace-loving democracies [See STIMSON p.15]. HULL in 1941 warned of "powerful forces" seeking to "displace a system of peaceful and orderly relations among nations by ... wanton violence and brute force" [See HULL p.21]. ROOSEVELT, in his famous "Quarantine Speech" of 1937, saw the world as divided between the 90% who desired peace and the 10% who threatened it [See ROOSEVELT p.21]. In 1958, DULLES explained that the "predatory designs" of international communism made a collective-security system necessary [See DULLES pp.28-29].

In more contemplative moments, however, these statesmen
noted more fundamental causes of war. WILSON, as we have seen,
pointed to the basic instability of the balance-of-power system,

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the tensions of arms races, autocratic ambitions, and the
erresponsibility encouraged by secret diplomacy [See WILSON *passim*].
HULL believed that economic relations lay at the bottom of
international conflict(and concord, too); fair trade relations
brought nations together, and unfair relations drove them apart
[See HULL pp.18-19]. HUGHES saw conflict and war as rooted in
human nature [See HUGHES pp.9-10] and springing from <sup>the</sup> clash of
self-centered states impelled by their conception of national
interests [See HUGHES p.11, p.13]. DULLES in 1939 saw a "dynamic
pressure for change" produced by the "dynamic energies of peoples;"
rigid adherence to the status quo made the process of change
"violent," "irrational and destructive," while flexibility
could accommodate it and guide it "constructively" [See DULLES
p.26]. Peace treaties thus had to allow for peaceful change
[See DULLES pp.24-25]. (By 1958, however, DULLES was warning
against "appeasement" [See DULLES p.29].) DULLES in 1939
shared with HUGHES in 1923 the idea that war was simply a form
of "self-help," which enabled nations to achieve their due if
the international system was too slow or inflexible [See HUGHES
p.10; DULLES pp.24-25]. But Dulles also saw ideology as a
disruptive factor in international relations [See DULLES p.25].

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## II. MATERIALS

**Note:** The materials under the name of each author are presented in roughly chronological order. The order of authors is: WILSON, HUGHES, STIMSON, HULL, ROOSEVELT, and DULLES. There is also included, between ROOSEVELT and DULLES, a Department of State "Briefing Book Paper" on "American Policy toward Spheres of Influence," which I found in the public documents relating to the Yalta Conference. Its authorship is unknown, but it gives a good expression of the Rooseveltian attitude toward spheres of influence.

### A. WOODROW WILSON

**Note:** All the selections from Wilson are taken from *The Messages and Papers of Woodrow Wilson*, in 2 volumes, with editorial notes, an introduction by Albert Shaw, and an analytical index, The Review of Reviews Corp., N.Y. (1924). Each selection which follows is cited to a volume and page number.

The first selection is from Wilson's First Annual Message to Congress on the State of the Union, delivered on December 2, 1913. In it, the President urges the Senate to ratify and renew several treaties of arbitration, and expresses his faith in arbitration and publicity:

> The country, I am thankful to say, is at peace with all the world, and many happy manifestations multiply about us of a growing cordiality and sense of community of interest among the

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nations, foreshadowing an age of settled peace and good will.
More and more readily each decade do the nations manifest their
willingness to bind themselves by solemn treaty to the processes
of peace, the processes of frankness and fair concession. So
far the United States has stood at the front of such negotiations.
She will, I earnestly hope and confidently believe, give fresh
proof of her sincere adherence to the cause of international
friendship by ratifying the several treaties of arbitration
awaiting renewal by the Senate. In addition to these, it has
been the privilege of the Department of State to gain the assent,
in principle, of no less than 31 nations, representing four-fifths
of the population of the world, to the negotiation of treaties by
which it will be agreed that whenever differences of interest or
of policy arise which can not be resolved by the ordinary processes
of diplomacy they shall be publicly analyzed, discussed, and
reported upon by a tribunal chosen by the parties before either
nation determines its course of action.

There is only one possible standard by which to determine
controversies between the United States and other nations, and
that is compounded of these two elements: Our own honor and our
obligations to the peace of the world. A test so compounded
ought easily to be made to govern both the establishment of new
treaty obligations and the interpretation of those already
assumed.
(I, 37-38)

Wilson's Second Annual Message on the State of the Union, delivered
on December 8, 1914, emphasized the complete disinterestedness and

Three days after the sinking of the *Lusitania*, Wilson affirmed that America was "too proud to fight" and was "so right that it does not need to convince others by force that it is right:"

The example of America must be a special example. The example of America must be the example not merely of peace because it will not fight, but of peace because peace is the healing and elevating influence of the world and strife is not. There is such a thing as a man being too proud to fight. There is such a thing as a nation being so right that it does not need to convince others by force that it is right. (Address to Several Thousand Foreign-Born Citizens, after Naturalization Ceremonies, at Philadelphia, May 10, 1915; I, 117)

The basis of neutrality and peace was international law:

> We are not trying to keep out of trouble; we are trying to preserve the foundations upon which peace can be rebuilt. Peace can be rebuilt only upon the ancient and accepted principles of international law .... (Address to the D.A.R., Washington, Oct. 11, 1915; I, 124)

In 1916, Wilson began to expound his views of war and peace.
The peoples of the world are peace-loving, he said, but their governments get into wars:

> I sometimes think that it is true that no people ever went to war with another people. Governments have gone to war with one another. Peoples, so far as I remember, have not, and this is a government of the people, and this people is not going to choose war. But we are not dealing with people; we are dealing with Governments. We are dealing with Governments now engaged in a great struggle, and therefore we do not know what a day or an hour will bring forth. (Address at Milwaukee during Western Preparedness Tour, Jan. 31, 1916; I, 177)

He condemned the secret diplomacy that had led to world war and recommended a "new and more wholesome diplomacy," with the nations all acting in concert and subjecting themselves to the code of honor that we apply to individuals:

> One observation on the causes of the present war we are at liberty to make, and to make it may throw some light forward upon the future, as well as backward upon the past. It is plain that this war could have come only as it did, suddenly and out of secret counsels, without warning to the world, without discussion, without any of the deliberate movements of counsel with which it would seem natural to approach so stupendous a contest. It is probable that if it had been foreseen just what would happen, just what alliances would be formed, just what forces arrayed against one another, those who brought the greatest contest on would have been glad to substitute conference for force. ...

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And the lesson which the shock of being taken by surprise in a matter so deeply vital to all the nations of the world has made poignantly clear is, that the peace of the world must henceforth depend upon a new and more wholesome diplomacy. Only when the great nations of the world have reached some sort of agreement as to what they hold to be fundamental to their common interest, and as to some feasible method of acting in concert when any nation or group of nations seeks to disturb those fundamental things, can we feel that civilization is at last in a way of justifying its existence and claiming to be finally established. It is clear that nations must in the future be governed by the same high code of honor that we demand of individuals. (Address before the League to Enforce Peace, Washington, May 27, 1916; I, 272-73)

In his famous speech to the Senate on the "Essential Terms of Peace in Europe," on January 22, 1917, Wilson pointed to the instability of the balance-of-power system which had preceded the war:

> He recommended a "peace without victory" because of the psychological importance of a fair settlement in creating the "right state of mind" for a stable peace; he rejected "equipoises of power:"

> First of all, ... it must be a peace without victory. ... Victory would mean peace forced upon the loser, a victor's terms imposed upon the vanquished. It would be accepted in humiliation, under duress, at an intolerable sacrifice, and would leave a sting, a resentment, a bitter memory upon which the terms of peace would rest, not permanently, but only as upon quicksand. Only a peace between equals can last. Only a peace the very principle of which is equality and a common participation in a common benefit. The right state of mind, the right feeling between nations, is as necessary for a lasting peace as is the just settlement of territory or of racial and national allegiance.

The equality of nations upon which peace must be founded if it is to last must be an equality of rights; the guarantees exchanged must neither recognize nor imply a difference between big nations and small, between those that are powerful and those that are weak. Right must be based upon the common strength, not upon the individual strength, of the nations upon whose concert peace will depend. Equality of territory or of resources there of course cannot be; nor any other sort of equality not gained in the ordinary peaceful and legitimate development of the peoples themselves. But no one asks or expects anything more than an equality of rights. Mankind is looking now for freedom of life, not for equipoises of power. (Ibid.; I, 352)

Self-determination was essential to peace because without it there
would be a "ferment of spirit" and no "sense ... of right:"

And there is a deeper thing involved than even equality / of right among organized nations. No peace can last, or ought to last, which does not recognize the principle that governments derive all their just powers from the consent of the governed, and that no right anywhere exists to hand peoples about from sovereignty to sovereignty as if they were property. ...

... Any peace which does not recognize and accept this principle will inevitably be upset. It will not rest upon the affections or the convictions of mankind. The ferment of spirit of whole populations will fight subtly and constantly against it, and all the world will sympathize. The world can be at peace only if its life is stable, and there can be no stability where the will is in rebellion, where there is not tranquillity of spirit and a sense of justice, of freedom, and of right. (Ibid.; I, 352-53)

"Preponderating" armaments were a menace to the "sense of safety and
equality:"

Peace cannot be had without concession and sacrifice. There can be no sense of safety and equality among the nations if great preponderating armaments are henceforth to continue here and there to be built up and maintained. The statesmen of the world must plan for peace and nations must adjust and accommodate their policy to it as they have planned for war and made ready for pitiless contest and rivalry. (Ibid.; I, 354)

The "concert of power" upon which the postwar peace depended was
inconsistent with a system of special alliances:

When the United States went to war against Germany, Wilson emphasized that we had no quarrel with the German people. It was the German *Government* -- autocratic, selfish, deceitful, and anachronistic -- which was responsible for the war:

> We have no quarrel with the German people. ... It was not upon their impulse that their government acted in entering this war. It was not with their previous knowledge or approval. It was a war determined upon as wars used to be determined upon in the old, unhappy days when peoples were nowhere consulted by their

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rulers and wars were provoked and waged in the interest of dynasties or of little groups of ambitious men who were accustomed to use their fellow men as pawns and tools. Self-governed nations do not fill their neighbor states with spies or set the course of intrigue to bring about some critical posture of affairs which will give them an opportunity to strike and make conquest. Such designs can be worked out only under cover and where no one has the right to ask questions. Cunningly contrived plans of deception or aggression, carried, it may be, from generation to generation, can be worked out and kept from the light only within the privacy of courts or behind the carefully guarded confidences of a narrow and privileged class. They are happily impossible where public opinion commands and insists upon full information concerning all the nation's affairs.

A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic government could be trusted to keep the faith within it or observe its covenants. It must be a league of honor, a partnership of opinion. Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honor steady to a common end and prefer the interests of mankind to any narrow interest of their own. (Address to Congress Advising That Germany's Course Be Declared War against the United States, April 2, 1917; I, 378-79)

Impartial justice, cemented by a League of Nations, would be the guarantee of peace:

> That price /the price of a secure and lasting peace/ is impartial justice in every item of the settlement, no matter whose interest is crossed; and not only impartial justice but also the satisfaction of the several peoples whose fortunes are dealt with. That indispensable instrumentality /which can guarantee the fulfilment of the peace agreements/ is a League of Nations formed under covenants that will be efficacious. Without such an instrumentality, by which the peace of the world can be guaranteed, peace will rest in part upon the word of outlaws and only upon that word. (Address Opening the New York Campaign for the Fourth Liberty Loan, September 27, 1918; I, 523)

Alliances and rivalries were a cause of wars:

> Special alliances and economic rivalries and hostilities have been the prolific source in the modern world of the plans and passions that produce war. It would be an insincere as well as insecure peace that did not exclude them in definite and binding terms. (Ibid.; I, 525)

The ordinary people of the world wanted something more hopeful than the power arrangements preferred by statesmen:

> The counsels of plain men have become on all hands more simple and straightforward and more unified than the counsels of sophisticated men of affairs, who still retain the impression that they are playing a game of power and playing for high stakes. That is why I have said that this is a people's war, not a statesmen's. Statesmen must follow the clarified common thought or be broken. ... They /the people/ are not yet satisfied with what they

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have been told. They still seem to fear that they are getting what they ask for only in statesmen's terms, -- only in the terms of territorial arrangements and divisions of power, and not in terms of broad-visioned justice and mercy and peace and the satisfaction of those deep-seated longings of oppressed and distracted men and women and enslaved peoples that seem to them the only things worth fighting a war for that engulfs the world. Perhaps statesmen have not always recognized this changed aspect of the whole world of policy and action. (Ibid.; I, 526-27)

In London after the Armistice, Wilson condemned the balance of power again as an unstable system of antagonism and force. He urged that it be replaced by a single grouping of nations who would act as the "trustee" of peace:

> They [the soldiers] fought to do away with an old order and to establish a new one, and the center and characteristic of the old order was that unstable thing which we used to call the "balance of power" — a thing in which the balance was determined by the sword which was thrown in the one side or the other; a balance which was determined by the unstable equilibrium of competitive interests; a balance which was maintained by jealous watchfulness and an antagonism of interests which, though it was generally latent, was always deep-seated. The men who have fought in this war have been the men from free nations, who were determined that that sort of thing should end now and forever.

> It is very interesting to me to observe how from every quarter, from every sort of mind, from every concert of counsel, there comes the suggestion that there must now be, not a balance of power, not one powerful group of nations set off against another, but a single overwhelming, powerful group of nations who shall be the trustee of the peace of the world. (Address at a Reception by the Officials of London in the Guildhall, Dec. 28, 1918; I, 584)

The great advantage of the League Covenant was that it undid all the entangling alliances and "selfish combinations:"

> Nothing entangles, nothing enmeshes a man except a selfish combination with somebody else. Nothing entangles a nation, hampers it, binds it, except to enter into a combination with some other nations against the other nations of the world. And this great disentanglement of all alliances is now to be accomplished by this covenant, because one of the covenants is that no nation shall enter into any relationship with another nation inconsistent with the covenants of the League nations. Nations promise not to have alliances. Nations promise not to make combinations against each other. Nations agree there shall be but one combination, and that is the combination of all against the wrongdoer. (Address at New York City, March 4, 1919; II, 656)

The old system was a system of war and terror:

> It [the great sacrifice] had been exacted because one nation desired dominion and other nations had known no means of defence except armaments and alliances. War had lain at the heart of every

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arrangement of the Europe, -- of every arrangement of the world, -- that preceded the war. Restive peoples had been told that fleets and armies, which they toiled to sustain, meant peace; and they now knew that they had been lied to: that fleets and armies had been maintained to promote national ambitions and meant war. They knew that no old policy meant anything else but force, force, -- always force. And they knew that it was intolerable. ... A war in which they had been bled white to beat the terror that lay concealed in every Balance of Power must not end in a mere victory of arms and a new balance. (Address to the U.S. Senate, Presenting the Peace Treaty, July, 10, 1919; II, 708)

The balance of power was unjust because it served the interests of the strong at the expense of the rights of the weak:

> This treaty is unique in the history of mankind, because the center of its redemption of weak nations. There never was a congress of nations before that considered the rights of those who could not enforce their rights. There never was a congress of nations before that did not seek to effect some balance of power brought about by means of serving the strength and interest of the strongest powers concerned ... (Address at Columbus, Ohio, on Western Tour, Sept. 4, 1919; II, 731)

Publicity and open diplomacy could prevent war by exposing a nation's belligerent policy to the "cooling air of the opinion of the world:"

> ... I want to call you to witness that in almost every international controversy which has been submitted to thorough canvass by the opinion of the world it has become impossible for the result to be an war. War is a process of heat. Exposure is a process of cooling; and what is proposed in this is that every hot thing shall be spread out in the cooling air of the opinion of the world, and after it is thoroughly cooled off, then let the nations concerned determine whether they are going to fight about it or not. (Address at Luncheon at the Hotel Statler, St. Louis, Mo., on Western Tour, Sept. 5, 1919; II, 761)

> There is a period of nine months of cooling off, and Germany did not dare cool off for nine days! If Germany had dreamed that anything like the greater part of the world would combine against her, she never would have begun the war, and she did not dare to let the opinion of mankind crystallize against her by the discussion of the purposes which she had in mind. (Address at Coliseum, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on Western Tour, Sept. 8, 1919; II, 817)

He returned to the balance-of-power theme, attacking it as essentially a system of force and selfishness:

> Notice the phrase. Not the balance that you try to maintain in a court of justice, not the scales of justice, but the scales of force; one great force balanced against another force. Every bit of the policy of the world, internationally speaking, was made in the interest of some national advantage on the part of the stronger nations of the world. (Address at Minneapolis, Minn.,

--9

on Western Tour, Sept. 9, 1919; II, 836)

Are we satisfied now what the balance of power means? It means
that the stronger force will sometimes be exercised or an attempt
be made to exercise it to crush the other powers. (Ibid.; II, 837)

Finally, Wilson emphasized in the strongest terms that America
was uniquely disinterested and trustworthy, and that America's
example confirmed the pacific nature of democratic nations:

America is evidence of the fact that no great democracy ever
entered upon an aggressive international policy. (Address
at St. Paul, Minn., on Western Tour, Sept, 9, 1919; II, 852)

The point is that the United States is the only nation of
the world that has sufficient moral force with the rest of
the world. It is the only nation which has proved its
disinterestedness. It is the only nation which is not suspected
by the other nations of the world of ulterior purposes.
(Address at Cheyenne, Wyoming, on Western Tour, Sept. 24, 1919;
II, 1093)

B. CHARLES EVANS HUGHES

Note: The Hughes materials come from The Pathway of Peace: Representative Addresses Delivered During His Term as Secretary of State (1921-1925), Harper & Bros., 1925. Most of the following materials come from a single speech, entitled "The Pathway of Peace," delivered in Montreal in 1923, which sets forth his views on war and peace at great length.

Hughes believed that war was not an aberration or a gratuitous
unleashing of violence; rather its causes lay deep in human nature
and in the inability of civilization to maintain a just peace:

We may gain something in our quest for peace if we recognize
at once that war is not an abnormality. In the truest sense, it
is not the mere play of brute force. It is the expression of the
insistent human will, inflexible in its purpose. The culture of

--10

civilization has strengthened, not enfeebled it. It is the old human spirit with the latest equipment. . . .

When we consider that the inability to maintain a just peace attests the failure of civilization itself, we may be less confident of the success of any artificial contrivances to prevent war. We must recognize that we are dealing with the very woof and warp of human nature. The war to end war has left its curse of hate, its lasting injuries, its breeding grounds of strife, and to secure an abiding peace appears to be more difficult than ever. ("The Pathway to Peace," an address delivered before the Canadian Bar Association at Montreal, Sept. 4, 1923; pp. 3-4)

The difficulty of abolishing war was that war was "self-help," that is, the only way by which independent states could preserve their rights and their security. Nations would never give up their right of self-defense. If there ever were enough of an international consensus to allow for the rule of law, no cure would be needed. Peace has always been something imposed on people and peoples by superior power:

> It is not surprising that many should be captivated by the proposal, with its delusive simplicity and adequacy, for the outlawry of war. War should be made a crime, and those who instigate it should be punished as criminals. The suggestion, however futile in itself, has at least the merit of bringing us to the core of the problem. Even among its sponsors appear at once the qualifications which reflect the old distinction, so elaborately argued by Grotius, between just and unjust wars. "The grounds of war," said he, "are as numerous as those of judicial actions. For where the power of law ceases, there war begins." He found the justifiable causes generally assigned for war to be three -- defense, indemnity, and punishment. War is self-help, and the right to make war has been recognized as the corollary of independence, the permitted means by which injured nations protect their territory and maintain their rights. International law leaves aggrieved states who cannot obtain redress for their wrongs by peaceful means to exact it by force. If war is outlawed, other means of redress of injuries must be provided. Moreover, few, if any, intend to outlaw self-defense, a right still accorded to individuals under all systems of law. To meet this difficulty, the usual formula is limited to wars of aggression. But justification for war, as recently demonstrated, is ready at hand for those who desire to make war, and there is rarely a case of admitted aggression, or where on each side the cause is not believed to be just by the peoples who support the war.

> There is a further difficulty that lies deeper. There is no lawgiver for independent states. There is no legislature to impose its will by majority vote, no executive to give effect even to accepted rules. The outlawry of war necessarily implies a self-imposed restraint, and free peoples, jealous of their national safety, of their freedom of opportunity, of the rights and privileges they deem essential to their well-being, will not forego

--11(10)

the only sanction at their command in extreme exigencies. The restraints they may be willing to place upon themselves will always be subject to such conditions as will leave them able to afford self-protection by force, and in this freedom there is abundant room for strife sought to be justified by deep-seated convictions of national interests, by long-standing grievances, by the apprehension of aggression to be forestalled. The outlawry of war, by appropriate rule of law making war a crime, requires the common accord needed to establish and maintain a rule of international law, the common consent to abandon war; and the suggested remedy thus implies a state of mind in which no cure is needed. As the restraint is self-imposed, it will prove to avail only while there is a will to peace.

It is this difficulty which constantly suggests recourse to force to maintain peace. Peoples who would engage in war, it is said, must be compelled to be peaceful; there should be an international force adequate to prevent aggression and to redress wrongs. The analogy of domestic peace is pressed; the force of the state -- that is, of all the people -- maintains the authority of the municipal law and compels public order. The analogy has held good in the case of great empires and within the range of their imperial power. The earliest empires, established through conquest and the greed of dominion, doubtless diminished wars among the subject peoples while the imperial authority continued, and the centuries of the *pax Romana* were made possible by the unchallengeable sway of Rome. It is unfortunately true that it is self-determination which makes for war and places obstacles in the way of all plans for keeping the peace. (Ibid.; pp. 4+5-6)

Conflicting national interests, and mutual fears for the national security, lead to the outbreak of wars:

In the field of conflicting national policies, and what are deemed to be essential interests, when the smoldering fires of old grievances have been fanned into a flame by the passionate sense of immediate injury, or the imagination of peoples is dominated by apprehension of present danger to national safety, or by what is believed to be an assault upon national honor, what force is to control the outbreak? Great powers agreeing among themselves may indeed hold small powers in check. But who will hold great powers in check when great powers disagree? (Ibid.; p.7)

The highest task of statemanship is the patient effort to explore the area of agreement and to restrain the belligerence of the populace:

> There is no path to peace except as the will of peoples may open it. The way to peace is through agreement, not through force. The question then is not of any ambitious general scheme to prevent war, but simply of the constant effort, which is the highest task of statesmanship in relation to every possible cause of strife, to diminish among peoples the disposition to resort to force and to find a just and reasonable basis for accord. (Ibid.; pp. 7-8)

--12

Democracies are not necessarily peace-loving:

> We have to take into account of both the advantages and disadvantages of democratization. It is generally thought that democracies are disposed to peace, but this is yet to be demonstrated where there is deep feeling and a national sense of injury. Great wars, involving vast populations, cannot be fought without public support, but the most serious causes of war are precisely those which carry popular appeal. The peoples of the warring nations were never so united as during the last war, and this was equally true of both sides. (Ibid.; p. 11)

Open diplomacy could not work if it meant complete publicity at every stage of the negotiating process:

> It is suggested that all would be easy if negotiators would simply tell the public everything that they are doing. But the trouble is that in every negotiation, as all business men know, there are preliminary positions to be taken, tentative plans to be discussed, arguments to be presented and demolished and nothing can be accomplished if every suggestion, every advance and every retreat must be publicly made. Negotiators under such restriction would inevitably take their positions not to promote a settlement, but to win public approval by the firmness and vigor of their partisanship. . . . Open diplomacy is openness of results; the absence of secret agreements and understandings, not the immediate publication of all intermediate steps. (Ibid.; p. 14)

The best hope for peace is national self-restraint based on an enlightened self-interest:

> The principle, each nation for itself to the full extent of its power, is the principle of war, not of peace. Let it be recognized that force is the inevitable resort of unrestrained selfishness; that peace is to be reconciled with national aims only as an enlightened self-interest permits the reasonable restraint that is consistent with the fair opportunity of others -- in a world where we must either fight or "live and let live" in a decent regard for the welfare of others as well as our own. (Ibid.; p. 15)

In a speech in New Haven in 1922, Hughes commented on the results of the recent Washington Conference. He hoped that it would help to create a new state of mind in the participants, a common determination and mutual confidence (by "autosuggestion"):

> The most important results are those which are unwritten and imponderable; those that relate to sentiment and purpose, to good will and to a better understanding. Where there is friendship and confidence, treaties to maintain peace are of least importance, and where suspicion and hatred dominate the thought of peoples it may be wise to interpose the mechanism of conciliation but the best assurance of peace is lacking. . . . Quite apart from specific engagements, it was worth all the efforts of the Conference to produce a new state of mind with respect to our relations with

--13 (W)

the Far East. It will be the part of wisdom for our peoples to maintain this attitude and to frown upon those who seek to change it. Autosuggestion has an important place in national, as well as in individual, life, and nations intent on peace will find the ways of peace. ("Some Aspects of Our Foreign Policy," address read at Annual Meeting of the American Historical Association, at New Haven, Conn., Dec. 29, 1922; pp. 39-40)

A nation must learn somehow to protect itself without being threatening to others:

> If you wish peace, you must pursue the paths of peace. Reasonable precaution in a prudent preparation for contingencies is one thing; a bellicose disposition and threatening gestures and preparation are quite different. (Ibid.; p.44)

Speaking again of disarmament agreements, he emphasized the concrete function that such an agreement could perform (if it is a "fair" adjustment), rather than the abstract desirability of disarmament:

> The question really comes, not to the advisability of such an agreement in the abstract, but to the fairness of a particular agreement. (Ibid.; p. 45)

National interests and ambitions are the overriding determinants of national policies, he explained in another speech. A balance of power was a mechanism resorted to in order to preserve a nation's security. Hughes warned Americans against imagining themselves less self-centered than other peoples, but also paid tribute to the Monroe Doctrine as an example of American opposition to aggression:

> Foreign policies are not built upon abstractions. They are the result of practical conceptions of national interest arising from some immediate exigency ... standing out vividly in historical perspective. When long maintained, they express the hopes and fears, the aims of security or aggrandizement, which have become dominant in the national consciousness and thus transcend party divisions and make negligible such opposition as may come from particular groups. They inevitably control the machinery of international accord which works only within the narrow field not closed by divergent national ambitions or as interest yields to apprehension or obtains compensation through give and take. Statesmen who carry the burdens of empire do not for a moment lose sight of imperial purposes and requirements. When a balance of power is deemed essential to national security you can not conjure it away by any form of words. The best of diplomatic instruments, the conference, has no magical potency to dispose of these strongly held national convictions.

We are fortunate in our detachment from many difficulties and

--14

dangers which oppress the imagination of other peoples, but we
should resist the tendency to indulge in self-praise. When we have
a clear sense of our own interests, we are just as inflexible as
others. The great advantage we have had is that, coming to
independence in a world afflicted with the long rivalries of
military powers, the traditions of conquest, and the dreams of
empire, we sought simply the assurance of freedom, and our
national instinct has been opposed to aggression and intervention.
The Monroe doctrine was the embodiment of this sentiment. ("The
Monroe Doctrine -- A Review: Its Relation to American Foreign
Policy in the Twentieth Century," address read at a meeting held
under the auspices of the American Academy of Political and Social
Science and the Philadelphia Forum, at Philadelphia, November 30,
1923, to celebrate the centenary of the Monroe Doctrine; pp.142-443)

Avoidance of entangling alliances was still a good idea for American
policy; our entry into the Great War was not a violation of this
policy, because the cause of liberty had been at stake:

> With respect to Europe, our policy has continued to be in the
> phrase of Jefferson: "Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with
> all nations, entangling alliances with none." We entered the
> Great War, not violating our tradition, for the cause of liberty
> itself was at stake. We have emerged from the war with the same
> general aims that we had before we went in. (Ibid.; p. 150)

> But Europe still has "a set of primary interests" which are not
> ours. . . . We still hold to that view. The preponderant thought
> among us undoubtedly is that our influence would not be increased
> by pooling it. The influence that is due to our detachment and
> impartiality could not long be maintained if we should substitute
> the rôle of a partisan in European quarrels . . . . (Ibid.; pp.
> 151+52)

C. HENRY L. STIMSON

**Note:** Most of these materials are taken from Stimson & Bundy, *On Active Service in Peace and War*, Harper & Bros., N.Y., 1947. The book is written in the third person, but with occasional direct quotation from Stimson's speeches or letters. I have also included a Memorandum written by Stimson and sent to the Secretary of State in January 1945, and have tracked down certain Stimson quotations given by Arthur Schlesinger in his October 1967 *Foreign Affairs* article.

--15

In 1917, Stimson spoke on a Midwestern tour and portrayed the Great War as a contest between autocracy -- which was aggressive by nature -- and democracy:

"America is not going to war with Germany merely because, as one of the accidents of a great struggle raging across the water, we have suffered an accidental injury, gross and unbearable as that injury may be. . . . It is because we realize that upon the battlefields of Europe there is at stake the future of the free institutions of the world." The German violations of neutrality were merely the inevitable result of the German theory that all rights belonged to the state. The world was a house divided between those who believed in the individual and democracy and those who believed in the state and autocracy. (On Active Service, p. 89)

Nations which respected the dignity of the citizen, holding that the rights of man precede the rights of government, seemed not to be disposed toward aggression, whether they were have or have-not nations. But where the state was the object of highest honor and its advantage the only test of justice, war and threats of war seemed to be the normal condition. If the world was to have either freedom or peace, it must destroy autocratic aggression.

This was the issue that Stimson saw in 1917, and he believed that "Into such a struggle a man or nation may well go with lofty faith and burning ardor." (Ibid.; p. 90)

In February 1919, Stimson wrote an open letter to Will Hays, the Republican National Chairman, urging the acceptance of the League of Nations as a step toward the rule of law among nations:

"The time is surely coming when in international law an act of aggression by one nation upon another will be regarded as an offense against the community of nations; just as in the development of municipal law a homicide has become an offense against the state instead of merely a matter of redress by the victim's family. So I feel that one country should take advantage of this time to help move the world along towards that condition of development." (Ibid.; p. 103)

In August 1932, he spoke to the Council on Foreign Relations on the subject of "The Pact of Paris -- Three Years of Development." At the time, he had great hope in the efficacy of public opinion as the mainstay of peace, but the book's comment after quoting from this speech suggests later disillusionment:

"The Kellogg-Briand Pact provides for no sanctions of force. . . . Instead it relies upon the sanction of public opinion which can be made one of the most potent sanctions of the world. . . . Public opinion is the sanction which lies behind all international intercourse in time of peace. Its efficacy depends upon the will of

--16

the people of the world to make it effective. If they desire to
make it effective, it will be irresistible. Those critics who
scoff at it have not accurately appraised the evolution in world
opinion since the Great War."

Though this statement was extreme, it was one which a man
might fairly make in trying to give life to the only force
available to him. (Ibid.; p.259)

At the time of the 1932 Geneva Disarmament Conference, Stimson felt
that armaments were the result, rather than the cause, of world
insecurity; nor were the democracies entirely eager to disarm:

Is own conviction was that armaments were less a cause than a
result of international insecurity, and he was not optimistic about
the prospects for disarmament unless and until the major political
difficulties of Europe should have been materially eased. The crux
of the Disarmament Conference would be land armaments . . . . Land
armaments were almost wholly a European problem -- a problem
affecting the relations of France and Italy, Italy and Yugoslavia,
central Europe and Russia, and, most important of all, Germany and
France. (Ibid.; p.266)

Thus in Stimson's view the problem of disarmament was secondary
to political questions. The limiting factors on all his work for
naval restrictions had been political; either the responsible states-
men themselves feared further limitations because they feared other
nations, or, as so often in the case of Americans, they were limited
by what they thought -- or knew -- their people would not accept.

Land armament was surrounded by similar difficulties, European
in origin. (Ibid.; p.267)

Stimson believed that more courageous statesmanship could have led these
nations out of their nationalistic prejudices:

... Stimson never wondered that no nation stepped out boldly to cut by a single stroke the Gordian knot of disarmament. Such strokes are rare. What did seem to him disappointing was that he and his colleagues had been unable to perform the ordinary task of statesmanship; they had not found a way to untie the knot. What could have been done in one big stroke by one nation could also have been done in a large number of little steps, all four powers contributing in reasonable proportion. The goal of statesmanship in 1931 was stable peace. To reach that goal the statesmen were required to make some inroads on the territory held by nationalism. But they were not without weapons; the peoples who were so full of national pride were also full of a deep yearning for peace. Surely it was the function of statesmanship to show these peoples that peace depended in some part upon the doing of things that nationalism denounced. Surely it was the duty of the democratic leaders to fight and educate, and not to surrender to the simple formula of "political impossibility."

Some of the responsible statesmen were as narrow as any of
their nations; some were embittered by real or fancied hurts from
other lands. But taken together, especially when their expert

--17

advisers are included, they knew what should be done.

Stimson could not avoid the conclusion that the tragedy of 1932 in the politics of Europe was a tragedy not of Greek inevitability, nor even of the vast human error of nationalistic pride. It was a tragedy of the timidity of statesmanship. (Ibid.; pp.280-81)

In January of 1945, in a Memorandum to the Secretary of State, Stimson set forth his view that a stable postwar peace would depend on big-power agreement on "territorial acquisitions" which the powers would deem essential to their security. (This was relevant to the "spheres-of-influence" controversy that developed during 1945):

3. The job of the four big nations is principally to establish a guarantee of peace in the atmosphere of which the world organization can be set going.

This will necessarily include the settlement of all territorial acquisitions in the shape of defense posts which each of these four powers may deem to be necessary for their own safety in carrying out such a guarantee of world peace.

4. For substantially this purpose, at the end of the last war President Wilson proposed a joint covenant of guarantee by Britain and America of the security of France as the pillar of western Europe. But the mistake was made of not securing that guarantee before the second step of creating the League of Nations whose safety was in large part to be dependent upon such a guarantee. As a result the League of Nations lacked a foundation of security which ultimately proved fatal to it.

5. I think we are in danger of making a similar mistake by attempting to formulate the Dumbarton organization before we have discussed and ironed out the realities which may exist to enable the four powers to carry out their mission. . . .

6. Any attempt to finally organize a Dumbarton organization will necessarily take place in an atmosphere of unreality until these preliminary foundations are established. (Memorandum for the Secretary of State, January 23, 1945, in *Foreign Relations of the United States: The Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945*, at p. 79; also in *On Active Service*, pp. 603-04)

Finally, in April of 1945, Stimson made certain comments which reveal his view of spheres of influence. President Truman records the following in his memoirs:

> Mr. Stimson then said he would like to know how far the Russian reaction to a strong [U.S.] position on Poland would go. He said he thought that the Russians perhaps were being more realistic than we were in regard to their own security. (Meeting of April 23, 1945, Harry S Truman, *Memoirs*, Vol. I: *Year of Decisions*, p. 78)

An entry in Stimson's Diary, dated April 16, 1945, refers to "our respective orbits" (cited in Gar Alperovitz, *Atomic Diplomacy: Hiro-

--18

shima and Potsdam, p. 50 note 41). Another entry in Stimson's Diary, this one dated April 26, 1945, was critical of those who were "anxious to hang on to exaggerated views of the Monroe Doctrine and at the same time butt into every question that comes up in Central Europe" (cited in Alperovitz, op. cit., p. 51, note 43). (N.B.: These Stimson quotes from April 1945 are those mentioned in Schlesinger, "Origins of the Cold War," *Foreign Affairs*, vol. 46, no. 1, Oct. 1967, at p. 28, but Schlesinger gives no sources. As indicated, one comes from Truman's memoirs and the others come from Stimson's Diary. This Diary is unpublished, but I found references to them in Alperovitz. I was unable to find references to them in *On Active Service in Peace and War*.)

D. CORDELL HULL

Representative Cordell Hull made a speech in the House on February 21, 1919, which expressed his strong conviction that economic relations held the key to war and peace:

> If a real economic peace can now be effected it will afford the greatest possible assurance of permanent world peace. (67 CONG. REC. 3956, (1919))

Innumerable instances might be cited in which commercial nations in the past have striven to reach the goal of commercial supremacy, either by fair means or foul. Commercial power means political power, and, as a rule, military power as well. Commercial control over one nation by another means political control.

Since the wars of earlier periods, when racial or tribal antagonisms, religious controversies, and personal rivalries of ambitions among kings and other autocratic rulers constituted their chief origin and underlying causes, it is a historic fact that most wars of recent generations owe their origin in at least substantial measure to the irritation, bitterness, jealousy, and strife arising from economic controversies. (Ibid.)

It is undoubtedly true that trade relations will bring nations closer together or drive them further apart than any other, accordingly as those trade relations are fair or unfair. (Ibid.)

It still causes one to shudder to recall how commercial nations, bantering, jockeying, and threatening each other in the course of strenuous trade conquests, have so often approached the very verge

--19(w)

of a general war. Different terms have been used to define the
various degrees or steps pursued by the strong nation in its
efforts to secure new territory. The terms "controlling influence,"
"spheres of influence," "protectorate," and "colonies" mark the
successive steps from the beginning of the encroachment until the
designing country secures its prey. . . . The verdict of history,
in my judgment, will be that Germany finally did go to war to gain
greater control over markets for her home products and over larger
sources of raw materials she needed for manufacture at home. (Ibid.,
at 3959)

Hull believed that open diplomacy, in the sense of wide-open publicity, would make it impossible to conduct foreign relations:

> The State Department is the only department not required to
> make annual reports to Congress. There is the best of reasons for
> this policy, adopted at the outset of our Government. It is
> impossible to conduct foreign relations in many important res-
> pects with wide-open publicity. Were we to do so, foreign nations
> would promptly refuse to discuss matters of a delicate or serious
> nature with us. As an inevitable result, it would be impossible
> to carry on diplomatic conversations any portion of which the other
> interested countries would desire to be kept secret. We would soon
> cease to be on speaking terms with other nations if we should
> make public, at the time, the confidential details of the conversa-
> tions taking place between us. (Hull, *Memoirs*, vol. I, 1948, at
> p. 213)

Hull also believed that disarmament was an essential element of peace:

> To my mind disarmament was both a terrific undertaking and an
> essential element of peace. To me there were three main points to
> disarmament. In the first place, it would prevent races in
> armaments and the exhaustion of nations' material resources.
> In the second place, unlimited races in armaments as a rule resulted
> in war. In the third place, it had to be by all nations. You
> could not have some disarming, others not. (Ibid., p. 222)

In early 1941, Hull saw the shadow of war approaching. His
explanation was that evil forces were at work to disturb the system of
peaceful relations between states:

> There are at work in the world today powerful forces the
> significance of which no individual and no nation can ignore
> without falling into a position of the gravest danger and of the
> utmost jeopardy. These forces are not new in the experience of
> mankind. They rose on many occasions in the past and, for varying
> periods and with varying intensity, held sway over human affairs.
> They spring today from the same source from which they have always
> sprung in the past -- from godless and soulless lust for power
> which seeks to hold men in physical slavery and spiritual degrada-
> tion and to displace a system of peaceful and orderly relations
> among nations by the anarchy of wanton violence and brute force.
> ("The Need for Spiritual Rebirth," Statement of March 22, 1941,
> *Documents on American Foreign Relations*, vol. III, S.S. Jones &
> D.P. Myers, eds., 1941, Ch. 1 (8), p. 41)

--20 (ll)

During the war, in a Pan American Day address, he explained that the unity of the Western Hemisphere was due to a common love of liberty among the American nations:

> Inter-American unity was not brought about by force and is not based upon the conception of a master race whose mission is to rule. It was not produced by nations with a homogeneous racial origin. It does not depend upon the bonds of a common language or a culture based on a common literature or common customs and habits.

Were these the only sources of international unity and common action, the future for the world would be dark indeed. But inter-American unity proves that there are other sources more subtle and even stronger -- sources which offer hope to a world which can find no hope in the factors which I have mentioned. Our unity comes from a passionate devotion to human liberty and national independence which is so strong that it does not stop with the effort of each people to secure liberty for itself but goes on to respect as no less valid the desire of other peoples to achieve the same liberty in accordance with their own traditions and historic / institutions. (Pan American Day Address before the Pan American Union, April 14, 1944, *Documents on American Foreign Relations*, vol. VI, L.M. Goodrich & M.J. Carroll, eds., Ch. XIII (2), pp. 494-95)

It is the common pride of the American Republics and the good fortune of all mankind that the torch of international cooperation has burned at its brightest in the affairs of this hemisphere precisely at a time when it was being blacked out elsewhere. (Ibid., p. 495)

In March 1944, Hull gave to the press a Memorandum on the Bases of the Foreign Policy of the United States. The Memorandum listed among these bases our policies toward spheres of influence, international cooperation, the equality of nations, and the International Court:

## INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION

Cooperation between nations in the spirit of good neighbors, founded on the principles of liberty, equality, justice, morality, and law, is the most effective method of safeguarding and promoting the political, the economic, the social, and the cultural well-being of our nation and of all nations.

## POLITICAL DIFFERENCES

Political differences which present a threat to the peace of the world should be submitted to agencies which would use the remedies of discussion, negotiation, conciliation, and good offices.

## INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE

Disputes of a legal character which present a threat to the peace of the world should be adjudicated by an international court of justice whose decisions would be based upon application of principles of law.

## SPHERES OF INFLUENCE AND ALLIANCES

As the provisions of the four-nation declaration [of the October 30, 1943, Moscow Conference] are carried into effect, there will no longer be need for spheres of influence, for alliances, for balance

--21 (4)

of power, or any other of the special arrangements through which,
in the unhappy past, the nations strove to safeguard their security
or to promote their interests.

## SOVEREIGN EQUALITY OF NATIONS

Each sovereign nation, large or small, is in law and under
law the equal of every other nation.

The principle of sovereign equality of all peace-loving
states, irrespective of size and strength, as partners in a
future system of general security, will be the foundation-stone
upon which the future international organization will be con-
structed. (Memorandum on the Bases of the Foreign Policy
of the United States, given to the press on March 21, 1944,
Documents on American Foreign Relations, vol. VI, L.M. Goodrich &
M.J. Carroll, eds., 1945, Ch. 1 (7), pp. 22-23)

E: FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT

Roosevelt's famous "Quarantine Speech" at Chicago, on October 5,
1937, warned that the 90% of the world that was peace-loving was
being threatened by the 10% that was spreading the disease of war:

> The peace, the freedom and the security of ninety percent of the
> population of the world is being jeopardized by the remaining
> ten percent who are threatening a breakdown of all international
> order and law. Surely the ninety percent who want to live in
> peace under law and in accordance with moral standards that have
> received almost universal acceptance through the centuries, can
> and must find some way to make their will prevail.

> It seems to be unfortunately true that the epidemic of world
> lawlessness is spreading.

> When an epidemic of physical disease starts to spread, the
> community approves and joins in a quarantine of the patients in
> order to protect the health of the community against the spread
> of the disease." (Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D.
> Roosevelt: 1937, Item 128, 406 ff 410)

In June, 1944, Roosevelt cabled to Churchill the American objection
to the creation of spheres of influence. Roosevelt regarded spheres of
influence as inherently divisive, and preferred cooperative action:

> ". . . Briefly, we acknowledge that the military responsible
> Government in any given territory will inevitably make decisions
> required by military developments, but we are convinced that the
> natural tendency for such decisions to extend to other than
> military fields would be strengthened by an agreement of the type
> suggested. In our opinion, this would certainly result in the
> persistence of differences between you and the Soviets and in
> the division of the Balkan region into spheres of influence
> despite the declared intention to limit the arrangement to

--22

military matters.

We believe efforts should preferably be made to establish
consultative machinery to dispel misunderstandings and restrain
the tendency toward the development of exclusive spheres."
(Cable, June 11, 1944; *Triumph and Tragedy*, p. 75)

In his January, 1945, State of the Union Message, President
Roosevelt described the Grand Alliance as an association of peoples,
rather than of governments:

It is not only a common danger which unites us but a common
hope. Ours is an association not of Governments but of peoples--
and the peoples' hope is peace. (State of the Union Message,
Jan. 6, 1945; *Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt*
*1944-45*, Samuel I. Rosenman, ed., 1950, Item 126, 483, at 497)

Roosevelt hoped that the postwar world would not be governed by "power politics:"

In the future world the misuse of power, as implied in the
term "power politics," must not be a controlling factor in
international relations. That is the heart of the principles
to which we have subscribed. We cannot deny that power is a
factor in world politics any more than we can deny its existence
as a factor in national politics. But in a democratic world, as
in a democratic Nation, power must be linked with responsibility,
and obliged to defend and justify itself within the framework of
the general good. (Ibid., at 498)

Speaking of Greece and Poland, he emphasized the ultimate importance
of self-determination and warned against letting spheres of influence
develop and block that self-determination. Allied cooperation would
ensure a "democratic and fully integrated world security system:"

We and our allies have declared that it is our purpose to
respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government
under which they will live and to see sovereign rights and self-
government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of
them. But with internal dissension, with many citizens of liberated
countries still prisoners of war or forced to labor in Germany,
it is difficult to guess the kind of self-government the people
really want.

During the interim period, until conditions permit a genuine
expression of the people's will, we and our allies have a duty,
which we cannot ignore, to use our influence to the end that no
temporary or provisional authorities in the liberated countries
block the eventual exercise of the people's right freely to choose
the government and institutions under which, as free men, they are
to live. (Ibid., at 500)

The atmosphere of friendship and mutual understanding and
determination to find a common ground of common understanding,

--23 (c)

which surrounded the conversations at Dumbarton Oaks, gives us
reason to hope that future discussions will succeed in developing
the democratic and fully integrated world security system toward
which these preparatory conversations were directed. (Ibid., at 501)

After his return from the Yalta Conference, he again warned against
the development of spheres of influence:

There have been instances of political confusion and unrest
in these liberated areas -- that is not unexpected -- as in Greece
or in Poland or in Yugoslavia, and there may be more. Worse than
that, there actually began to grow up in some of these places
queer ideas of, for instance, "spheres of influence" that were
incompatible with the basic principles of international collabora-
tion. If allowed to go on unchecked, these developments might
have had tragic results in time. (Address to Congress on the
Yalta (Crimea) Conference, March 1, 1945; Public Papers and Addresses
of Franklin D. Roosevelt: 1944-45 (Samuel I. Rosenman, ed., 1950),
Item 738, 570, at 579)

Spheres of influence and balances of power had always failed to preserve
the peace; a universal organization must take the place of all these
vain expedients:

The Crimean Conference was a successful effort by the three
leading Nations to find a common ground for peace. It ought to
spell the end of the system of unilateral action, the exclusive
alliances, the spheres of influence, the balances of power, and
all the other expedients that have been tried for centuries --
and have always failed.

We propose to substitute for all these, a universal organization
in which all peace-loving Nations will finally have a chance to
join. (Ibid., at 586)

F. DEPARTMENT OF STATE BRIEFING BOOK PAPER ON AMERICAN POLICY
TOWARD SPHERES OF INFLUENCE

**Note:** This is an anonymous document, identified only by the above
title, appearing in the official *Foreign Relations of the United States:*
*Diplomatic Papers: The Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945*, at pp. 102ff.

The paper refers to the Churchill-Stalin proposed agreement on the
distribution of influence in the Balkans:

The American position ... is briefly as follows:

Our assent to the trial period of three-months was given in
consideration of the present war strategy. Except for this over-
riding consideration, this Government would wish to make known its
apprehension lest the proposed agreement might, by the natural

--24 (L)

tendency of such arrangements, lead to the division in fact of the
Balkan region into spheres of influence.

It would be unfortunate, in view of the decisions of the Moscow
Conference, if any temporary arrangement should be so conceived as
to appear to be a departure from the principle adopted by the three
Governments at Moscow, in definite rejection of the spheres of
influence idea. Consequently this Government hopes that no
projected measures will be allowed to prejudice the efforts toward
directing the policies of the Allied Governments along lines of
collaboration rather than independent action, since any arrangement
suggestive of spheres of influence cannot but militate against
the establishment and effective functioning of a broader system of
general security in which all countries will have their part.

G. JOHN FOSTER DULLES

In 1939, Dulles set forth his political worldview in a book entitled
*War, Peace and Change* (Harper & Bros. 1939). Nations were basically
egoistic bodies, he felt. They were "bodies corporate," and were led
by men who, as representatives, did not have a mandate to sacrifice the
specific interests of the group:

To the extent that human beings are disposed to subordinate
their desires to those of others, it is in favor of others with
whom they are in personal association. Religions have not served,
to any large extent, to overcome this geographical limitation.
Often they have operated to precipitate conflict, by enlisting
"unselfishness" to coerce others.

Further, economic relations between national groups are
primarily conducted by bodies corporate, which, through the
nature of their being, ignore "ethical" considerations.

Finally, the political affairs of the nations and their
relations with each other are administered by persons acting
in a representative capacity and who, in such capacity, are not
deemed to have any specific mandate to sacrifice for the general
welfare the specific interests of the group which has placed them
in a position of authority. (*War, Peace and Change*, p.26)

The weakness of international law was that it froze the status quo
and left no means of effecting change except through force:

If we do not realize that treaties, as such, are neither "law"
nor "sacred," we will fall into the common error of thinking that
treaties provide a mechanism whereby international peace can be
assured. If treaties are "sacred law" why can we not at a single
stroke abolish war by a multilateral treaty to this effect? That
was the conception -- and the error -- which underlay the Pact of
Paris. By it the governments of the world bound their nations
forever to renounce force as an instrument of national policy.

--25

But neither the Pact of Paris nor any other international arrange-
ment provided any peaceful mechanism for changing the existing
order. Force or the threat of force remained, as it always had
been, the only positive method of inducing change from conditions
which, to some nations, might seem intolerable or unjust. Force
remained the sole means of outlet to dynamic forces which, under
existing or future conditions, might become repressed to the point
of explosion. (Ibid., pp. 47-48)

As for disarmament, it was more likely to occur, if at all, as a result
of new political conditions, rather than as cause of them:

If ... the creation of vast military establishments is provocative
of war, then limitation of armaments is conducive to peace.
However, it is highly doubtful that limitation of armament can
serve as a means of obtaining peace. If limitation of armament
comes, it will be a result rather than a cause of peace. So long
as the force system prevails, then armament has a utility. ...

There have, to be sure, been arrangements for the limitation
of armament. These, however, have not served primarily as a
means to peace. Rather they have emerged when the armament in
question was not likely to be used. (Ibid., p. 93)

Ideology added a new and disruptive element to international affairs:

This new ideology -- coupled with undeclared war -- provides
a new technique whereby the dynamic nations effect changes in the
status quo. Through ideology, national boundary lines are first
peacefully penetrated. ./. Through such ideological penetration
the way is opened to effect change without the formal declaration
of war. The change may, indeed, be of a character which, nominally,
leaves national boundaries intact, but which in substance gives
greater scope of opportunity to the dynamic forces within a nation
which demand an outlet. The foregoing trend may evidence the
beginning of a new era, akin to that of the religious wars, when
force will be employed internationally without formal declaration
of war and under the banner of governmental philosophies. (Ibid., 103-0

Peoples tend to deify their states:

[W]e must recognize that the qualities attributed by a people
to their own state are reasonably lofty. The personified nation
is endowed with qualities deemed to be virtuous and heroic. We
have not, as individuals, reached a point where self-abnegation
and non-resistance are qualities which are imputed by those seeking
to create a heroic image. (Ibid.; p. 107)

It [the group authority] has become increasingly deified throughout
the world largely because religion has left a vacuum which the group
authority is eager, and apparently able, to fill. (Ibid., p. 118)

Federalism in the United States illustrated how chauvinism could be
avoided (although it is not clear whether Dulles meant the chauvinism
of the separate states, or of the U.S. as a whole, or both):

--26

The United States of America constitutes a significant illustration of the extent to which exaggerated nationalistic conceptions can be shrunk through the opening up of boundaries. (Ibid., p. 124)

The principal cause of world conflicts was the "dynamic of change," which had to be channeled and moderated; rigid resistance to change would only build up dangerous and explosive pressures:

> Generally speaking, we have a choice between a condition of change which is fairly constant and which, because it is constant, can be moderated and constructively guided, or a condition of rigidity, interspersed with violent change which is irrational and destructive.

> We have seen that in international affairs the dynamic energies of peoples rise and fall. So long as this occurs and/ or so long as the nation ideology prevails and national domains are a matter of practical and sentimental importance, then national domains must of themselves be subject to change. From our consideration of change in the abstract we can draw the conclusion that changes in international domains, if they are to be moderate and rational, must be timely. If they are to be timely, the influences working for change must be detected at an incipient stage and before they become conspicuous. The fact of conspicuousness is in itself evidence that dynamic pressure for change has already accumulated to a degree such that violent and emotional characteristics are likely. Further, if we are to have change which is timely, those who desire the *status quo* must abandon the position that no change should be made until the necessity therefor is demonstrated by the growth of overwhelming pressure. They must abandon this position even at the risk of acquiescing in some changes which in retrospect may seem to have been avoidable. (Ibid., pp. 139-40)

Five years later, in an address to Princeton seminarians, Dulles saw the world as in a state of anarchy, but hoped that, by an act of will, the nations of the world could replace power with principle:

> One reality we need to see is that the society of nations is in a most primitive stage of development. We have, in essence, a society of some sixty members who have never even established a common meeting place. There is little community sentiment. Each member goes his own way, and power, whether or not actually used, primarily determines whether one or another nation gets what it wants or keeps what it wants. As Lord Lothian constantly emphasized, the society of nations is in a state of anarchy.

> No society moves at a single bound from the primitive stage of anarchy to a highly developed order. That comes through gradual stages.

> The first stage is psychological. There must be an intellectual and emotional conviction that the existing system is so bad that it must be changed, even though that means, for some, forgoing [sic] advantages that they have the power to grasp. It takes hard and

--27(lt)

cruel experience to get a primitive group into that frame of mind. Those who think they have the power, or can get the power, to do what they want, usually prefer a power system.

Two world wars may have brought the nations really to want to organize their society so that principles, rather than relative power, settle conflicts of desire. ("The Churches and World Order," address to the graduating class of Princeton Theological Seminary, May 16, 1944, in *The Spiritual Legacy of John Foster Dulles: Selections from His Articles and Addresses*, Henry P. Van Dusen, ed., 1960, pp. 29-30)

Ten years later, as Secretary of State, Dulles hailed the "harmony of the spirit" which united the nations of the Western Hemisphere:

The unity which generally prevails between us at international gatherings is nothing that is artificial. It is not, indeed, primarily geographic. It is a unity which exists because of a harmony of the spirit.

It has been my experience that the Governments of the American Republics usually act alike internationally because their peoples believe in the same fundamentals.

We believe in a spiritual world.

We believe that man has his origin and destiny in God.

We believe that this fact requires human brotherhood.

We believe that, just as every human being has dignity and worth, so every nation great or small has dignity and worth and that international relations should be on the basis of mutual respect and equal dignity. ("The Spirit of Inter-American Unity," address to the Tenth Inter-American Conference, Caracas, Venezuela, March 4, 1954; Press release No. 109)

In September 1954, Dulles affirmed that the Manila Pact was directed against aggression, and not directed against any particular countries:

Now, the Soviet Foreign Office has just issued a lengthy statement denouncing the Manila Pact. It particularly complains of article 4, which provides for united resistance to armed attack and political subversion. The Soviet statement says that the Chinese Communists also do not like the pact.

The Manila Pact is directed against no government, against no nation, and against no people. It is directed only against aggression. The fact that the Communists find that objectionable is tragically revealing of their ambitions. ("The Manila Pact and the Pacific Charter," radio and TV address, Sept. 15, 1954; Press Release No. 509)

The U.N. action in Korea was hailed as the first successful military action by an international organization:

[T]he Korean action of the United Nations [was proudly hailed] as the first example in all history of an international organization which had in fact acted effectively against armed aggression. ("Partnership for Peace," address to U.N. General Assembly, Sept. 23, 1954; Press release No. 525)

--28 (c)

Dulles emphasized again that the American alliance system was really a
system of world-wide collective security against aggression:

We believe that the greatest contribution we can make to peace is
to be ready to fight, if need be, and to have the resources and
the allies to assure that an aggressor would surely be defeated.
("The Goal of Our Foreign Policy," address before the Annual
National 4-H Club Congress, Chicago, carried over radio and TV,
Nov. 29, 1954; Press release No. 674)

A vital part of our foreign policy is to have friendly
relations with many other countries so that we can work together
for our common defense.

Of course, we could not have that relationship if we thought
only of ourselves. The relationship must be for the common good.
So, the common defense includes many areas outside the United Sta

It is particularly important that the great oceans should be
dominated by free and friendly nations. We have made this clear
by a series of security treaties. (Ibid.)

and high principle

"Enlightened self-interest" led us to create a mutual security system
in the Far East:

The broad goal of our foreign policy is to enable the people
of the United States to enjoy in peace the blessings of liberty.
Under present world conditions we cannot achieve that goal by
thinking just of ourselves. We must help other peoples to be
free. Thus, enlightened self-interest combines with high principle
to lead us to do for others what, if conditions were reversed, we
would want them to do for us. ("Our Foreign Policies in Asia,"
address before the Foreign Policy Association, New York, Feb. 16,
1955; Press release No. 86)

In the Far East the United States has responded to the desire
of others that we join with them to assure their security. During
the last 4 years, the United States has become party to security
treaties with Korea, Japan, the Republic of China on Formosa, the
Philippines, Australia and New Zealand. Also we have joined the
eight-power Manila Pact for the security of Southeast Asia.

The total of these treaties is a mutual security system which,
starting from the Aleutian Islands in the North, runs in a great
arc to the South Pacific. This constitutes a defensive bulwark
for freedom in that part of the world. (Ibid.)

The predatory designs of international Communism warranted the preserva-
tion of the collective-defense structure:

Despite victory in World War II, the need for maintaining our
collective-defense structure is as great as ever. A new menace
grew as international communism pursued its goal of world conquest.
It manifestly has predatory designs against this hemisphere and it
views the existence of inter-American solidarity as an insuperable
barrier to its aggressive plans. Through agents, overt and secret,