Testing 'no army' as the explanation for League failure in Manchuria
A mock Paper 2 question asks: 'The League of Nations failed in Manchuria because it had no army.' You have four items. Item A is the Lytton Report (October 1932), which condemned Japan's actions but proposed autonomy for Manchuria under Chinese sovereignty. Item B is a Japanese government statement of March 1933 rejecting the League's report and announcing withdrawal. Item C is a British Foreign Office memorandum from January 1932 warning that economic sanctions might damage British trade and that public opinion would not support military action. Item D is a table of League members' defence spending in 1931–32, showing Japan spending far more on its army than the League Secretariat's entire budget. You have 45 minutes and a 900-word limit. Your opening sentence is: 'The League failed because it lacked an army.' Your teacher says this is true but not sufficient, and that Item D may be a trap because budgets do not measure political will.
1. Explain why 'lack of an army' is a necessary but insufficient explanation. Use at least three items.
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Lack of an army was necessary because the Covenant's ultimate sanction was collective force, and without it Japan could ignore condemnation. But it is insufficient: Item C shows Britain would not accept sanctions that harmed trade, so the problem was political will and priorities, not only capability. Item B shows Japan calculated that defiance was affordable. Item A shows the League could produce a legal compromise but not enforcement. Item D shows a power asymmetry, yet budgets do not prove the League could not act-member states had armies but chose not to use them. The deeper causes include unanimity, great-power veto, US and USSR non-membership, and the priority of imperial interests. 'No army' is a shorthand for a collective-security system that depended on the very great powers whose interests were at stake.
2. How should Item D be used, and what are its limitations?
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Use D as an indicator of the disparity between Japan's national military effort and the League's tiny secretariat, not as proof that the League was militarily weaker in principle. Its limitation is that it compares a state war budget with an international administrative budget; League members had armed forces, so the relevant question is whether they were willing to deploy them. The table also says nothing about distance, domestic opinion, alliance commitments or the risk of war with Japan. It can support a claim about asymmetry of commitment, but it cannot by itself explain the outcome.
3. Write a revised thesis for the essay.
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Revised thesis: 'The League failed in Manchuria because its collective-security mechanism depended on great-power unanimity and will that did not exist; the absence of a League army was a symptom of that dependence, not the whole cause. The Lytton Report established aggression in law, but Britain's trade priorities, Japan's willingness to withdraw, and the non-membership of the USA and USSR made enforcement impossible.'