MIA > Archive > Arthur Rosenberg
From International Press Correspondence, Vol. 2 No. 18, 8 March 1922, pp. 131–132.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Marxists’ Internet Archive.
Public Domain: Marxists Internet Archive (2019). You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.
Anybody wanting to learn the truth about the Washington Conference, now fortunately adjourned, must needs peruse French papers. Both the American and the English press have all reason to laud the Conference and what it has accomplished. For American and British diplomats staged the Washington Conference, sought for a superficial solution of the world’s problems, and are now, through their press, telling the public that everything sought for had been obtained. The French Government was looked upon in Washington as undesirable and treated accordingly, which, of course, did not favorable impress the French who are now retaliating by telling the truth. The Temps, the semi-official Paris daily, recently published very interesting disclosures as to what was meant in Washington by “disarmament”. These revelations are proof of the scandalous manner in which capitalist diplomats and the kept press hoodwink the public.
The limitation of naval armaments is generally held to be Washington’s biggest achievement. The four great naval powers, Great Britain, the United States, Japan and France have reached an agreement not to build any new warships for a period of ten years. The easily fooled pacifists and reformists of all countries wept with joy ... everything they had so ardently hoped for and which always had to be delayed owing to the resistance offered by Imperial Germany, was now to become an accomplished fact. The Temps, however, points out that there are a number of serious flaws in the widely-heralded agreement. Paragraph 2 provides for exceptions in case one of the contracting parties should be involved in warlike operations. It would not be difficult for either the United States of Great Britain to conform to that preliminary. If, for instance, the American capitalists, should once more think fit to enter Mexico, an American fleet would steam into Mexican ports. Thus as entirely new situation would arise and automatically nullify the disarmament agreement.
But worse is yet to come. Paragraph 21 states expressly that “if during this period one of the undersigned powers should come to the conclusion that its provisions for safeguarding national security are, as concerns naval defense no longer sufficient, owing to new factors having come to the forefront, the contracting parties will meet at the instance of said power, reconsider the causes of this agreement and come to an understanding regarding the necessary alterations”. Put into practice this would, for instance, mean that if in the midst of peace Japan should suddenly discover that political developments render necessary an increase of her fleet, she would invite the other three powers who, having heard Japan’s arguments, would promptly accede to her request for a number of new capital ships. But what if the United States, Great Britain and France should decline to do so? For obvious reasons the agreement is silent on that question. This silence can be interpreted to mean that the power concerned would then no longer be bound by the agreement and would simply build as many ships as it deemed necessary.
There can be no doubt that this agreement is nothing but a fake, as was maintained by the Communists from the very beginning. No capitalist power, determined to increase its fleet, would ever allow a scrap of paper to be a barrier in its way. But the agreements signed in Washington have been so carefully worded that it appears as if the signatory powers were exhorting each other not to pay any attention to them. Both in peace and in war every great power will build as many warships as it thinks fit and can pay for. This is commonly called “disarmament”.
The Temps has overlooked a very important point. Supposing for a minute that Great Britain abides by the agreement and does not construct capital ships for a period of ten years (subject to the exceptions dealt with previously!) what will happen if Siam or Portugal orders a warship at an English yard? Do the Washington agreements interfere with the right of British industry to accept large orders such as that? Hardly. Provided they can procure the necessary faked orders from the smaller states the four powers can continue to construct as many ships as they desire. All that remains to be done is to haul down the flag of the smaller state and run up the Union Jack instead, or the Star Spangled Banner, etc., and the ships will be ready for battle, whenever the time arrives. This, too, is commonly called disarmament.
Another agreement signed at in Washington was drawn up with the purpose of regulating submarine warfare. Under the clauses of this agreement no cargo or passenger ships may be sunk without warning. Every ship must first be searched and her crew placed in safety. Any submarine commander offending against these rules will be treated as a pirate. That sounds uncompromising enough, and the Temps has nothing to say with regard to this agreement, because in this respect France sits in a glasshouse and cannot afford to throw stones. Some months ago, a French naval officer, Castex, was so ill-advised as to publish an article advocating the methods of submarine warfare that are closely bound up with the name Tirpitz. The French militarists’ indignation at these methods has evaporated since they themselves hope that some day they will “force Great Britain to her knees” by means of ruthless submarine warfare. As the British naturally took exception to the rash Mr. Castex, the French government played the innocent and assured its late allies that its officer had been totally misunderstood and that civilized France would never tolerate such “Boche methods”. The submarine agreement apparently admits of no misinterpretation; like a code hewn into stone, it threatens all submarine commanders offending the laws of humanity. Very strict and precise regulations protect cargo-carriers against unjustified torpedoing by submarines, but not one single word is devoted to a definition of what constitutes a cargo-carrier. It is very probable that in wartime a ship with a cargo of hand grenades will not be designated as a cargo-carrier but as an auxiliary cruiser, especially so if it carries a number of armed soldiers or a gun, as was very often the case during the last war. If in a future war France blockades Great Britain, will she permit the passage of a ship carrying foodstuffs, for instance, or cotton? Would she not say that the food was destined for the army and the cotton for soldiers’ coats, and torpedo the ships, claiming that they were no cargo-carriers in the sense of the Washington agreement, but auxiliary cruisers in the service of the British War Office. The Washington submarine agreement has as many loopholes as that on disarmament.
The contracting parties at Washington furthermore undertook not to use any poison gas in future wars. Here again it is the Temps which calls attention to a flaw in the agreement, viz., the term “civilized peoples”, which is used throughout the agreement. This allows of the inference that no objections will be raised against that the use of gas bombs against the uncivilized nations, so-called. France can set up as many poison gas factories as she thinks essential, provided she declares that the gas will be used exclusively against savages. Who will define the term “civilized nation”? The Council of the League of Nations?
All parties, however, seem to be agreed on the fact that proletarians are not to be counted among “civilized nations”; proof of this is furnished by the fact that after this agreement had been signed the New York City administration armed its police with gas bombs. The French, English and American capitalists will continue to employ against the exploited masses both at home and in the colonies, the poison of their press and, if necessary, the poison of their gas bombs. The objects of so much devotion, however, will defeat all such attempts the more they lose faith in their governments.
The Temps suggests that the deficiencies of the various agreements would be rectified by leaving the administration of them to the League of Nations. The United States, in the opinion of the Temps, did wrong in holding aloof from that laudable institution. The League of Nations as it is today is the instrument of French imperialism, as was shown in the case of the Saar region and in Upper Silesia. ‘To leave the realization of the Washington decisions to the League of Nations would be equivalent to allowing France to interpret the agreements for her own ends, which the British and the Americans could and would not admit. The working-class is not over-interested in the domestic conflicts of capitalist diplomacy. The workers know that conferences such as Washington are only staged in order to hoodwink them. The intrigues of international profiteers must be brought to nought by international labor policy.
Last updated on 27 December 2018