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The League of Nations, established after World War I as part of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, was designed to maintain world peace and prevent future conflicts. When dealing with offending nations—that is, nations that were perceived as threats to peace or that were in violation of international agreements—the League employed a few strategies.
1. Diplomatic Pressure: The League would try to persuade the offending nation to comply with international laws and norms through negotiations and discussions. The aim was to resolve conflicts through diplomacy and dialogue without resorting to force.
2. Economic Sanctions: If diplomacy didn't work, the League could impose economic sanctions. This meant that member countries would stop trading with the offending nation, aiming to hurt its economy and force it to comply with the League's rules or decisions.
3. Military Intervention: As a last resort, the League could authorize military interventions. However, the League had no standing army of its own and relied on the member states to contribute forces. This was a weakness, as member countries were often reluctant to commit troops, and hence, such actions were rarely taken.
Despite these mechanisms, the League of Nations often found it difficult to enforce its decisions. Several factors contributed to this:
- The absence of major powers: The United States never joined, and the Soviet Union only became a member in 1934. Germany wasn't a member until 1926 and left in 1933. These absences weakened the League's influence.
- Lack of an armed force: Without its own military power, the League relied on the commitment of its members to enforce sanctions or military responses, which was not always forthcoming.
- The principle of unanimous agreement: Decisions in the League had to be unanimous, making it difficult to approve strong actions against offending nations, particularly if those nations had alliances within the League.
Ineffective Responses: The League's ineffective responses in some high-profile conflicts, such as the invasion of Manchuria by Japan (1931) and the Second Italo-Ethiopian War (1935–36), displayed its limitations and contributed to its decline and eventual replacement by the United Nations after World War II.