The Geneva Protocol Part 6

There is another phase of this general question of the _status {39} quo_ which is sometimes discussed by those who seem to have a natural antipathy to the words and that is what I may call the "raw materials"

phase. There is, let us say, no coal in Switzerland, and yet Switzerland must have coal for her people to exist. There are no oil wells in Norway, and yet in Norway there must be, if civilization is to continue, automotive engines. It is obvious that there can be no physical change in such a _status quo_. People who live in the territory that is now Switzerland must get their coal somewhere else, and motor transport in Norway must get its gasoline from other lands.

What is the international phase of such situations as this? There are perhaps three possibilities. One is a war of conquest commenced by a country in the situation of Norway in order to obtain dominion over foreign oil lands; the second is some kind of agreement such as has been suggested in a vague way by the Italians and others for some sort of an international supervision in such matters; and the third is that the situation shall continue as it is now--a matter of bargain and sale, of supply and demand.

There is not the slightest doubt in my mind that, among these three, the first would be as impossible as it would be wicked; the second is wholly outside the realm of practical politics for centuries to come; the third is the _status quo_, which has not in any case of world peace resulted in any serious injustice.

Of course, if we go beyond such cases as Norway and Switzerland and take countries much less favored, it is always a mystery as to why people live in them. It is very difficult to understand, for example, why there are settlers in Labrador, or why people are fond of Greenland as a home; none the less these things are so. And under the existing system of exchange of commodities there has perhaps never been a time when even the people who live in these countries without certain particular natural resources have not generally been able to obtain sufficient of them as a result of their own efforts in the occupations which the character of those lands permits.

Of course some countries are naturally richer than others and {40} must remain so. In the Delta of the Nile, the land produces as many as four crops a year and sells for something like $3,000 an acre. Such a condition cannot be duplicated in a climate where only one crop is possible.

But the notion that _any_ State or any combination of States, less than world-wide, _could_ be substantially self-sufficient in respect of _all_ raw materials is untenable. Even the United States lacks (mentioning minerals only) nickel, cobalt, platinum, tin, diamonds.

Its supplies of the following are inadequate: antimony, asbestos, kaolin, chromate, corundum, garnet, manganese, emery, nitrates, potash, pumice, tungsten, vanadium, zirconium. Outside of minerals we lack jute, copra, flax fiber, raw silk, tea, coffee, spices, etc. This mere enumeration suggests the absurdity of the "raw materials" argument against the _status quo_.[13]

Without going into it in detail, the mere fact that there are no copper mines in Germany[14] or in England has never prevented either country from obtaining all the copper that it needed by means of the exchange of its own commodities and its own labor for the copper, say, of Spain, or of the United States, or of Chili; and from any possible point of view that is now conceivable it is only by the continuance of such a system that the deficiency of particular articles in particular countries can be supplied.

All that we can say is, in other words, that so long as the people in a particular country are able to produce enough of something that the rest of the world needs, so long will they be able to supply their own necessities. And if in any country, in Labrador, for example, the people are unable, because of the situation of the country, to produce a sufficiency of consumable and exchangeable commodities, the inevitable result will be the evacuation of that country by civilized human beings. If such a result could be changed by conquest, the change would be only temporary. To attempt to change it by agreement would be to attempt a sort of international charity by means of which {41} people would be able to live in Labrador by the use of part of the surplus production, say, of Kentucky, given to them for nothing.

There is a very exaggerated notion in the minds of some as to the effect of what is called "control of raw materials."

Of course, in time of war, control of raw materials _has_ importance.

But this does not mean "control" in the sense of _owners.h.i.+p_ of foreign supplies, as, _e. g._, British owners.h.i.+p of Persian oil fields or American owners.h.i.+p of Bolivian tin mines. It means merely either (1) the possession of adequate domestic supplies, or (2) safe and unimpeded _access_ to foreign sources of supply, as, _e. g._, German access, during the war, to Swedish iron ore. The military significance of raw materials, aside from purely domestic supplies, is related to such things as naval power, blockade, "freedom of the seas," "free transit,"

etc., rather than to national _owners.h.i.+p_ of sources of supplies.

_Access to the market_ is the important thing, although the question of finance may be more difficult in respect of foreign supplies than of domestic.

But in time of peace, the "control of raw materials" in the last a.n.a.lysis means that the owners of those materials can do only two things with them, use them or to sell them. This is perhaps most obvious in the case of such raw materials as are perishable, but it is true of all.

Take such a product as copper, for example. Some countries have copper mines, others have none. But the owners.h.i.+p of a copper mine is of no possible advantage unless the copper produced from that mine is manufactured into something else or is sold. Of course temporarily a mine owner may leave his ore in the ground or may store a supply of copper above ground; but these are expedients to be resorted to only in some time of over-production and impossible of continuance. If the product of the mine is not either used or sold, its advantage is purely a theoretical possibility of the future. It has no more value in present reality than a bank note on a desert island.

The really important factor, as to raw materials, is _access to the market_ on an _equal footing_.

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In practice there are only two ways in which a State or its citizens can be discriminated against, in time of peace, so far as the State's access to supplies of raw materials is concerned. They are as follows:

(1) By discriminatory export duties, or similar duties. In practice these are _not_ important.

(2) By discrimination in respect of prices, or similar matters, by _monopolistic_ producers. To achieve this result it is necessary not merely that one _State_ should have a "monopoly" of the supply of some raw materials, but also that _within_ that State, the production and sales of the raw materials should be in the hands of monopoly.

Further, the domestic monopolistic organization, must, in order that discrimination should be an outcome of the situation, find it _profitable_ (not merely "patriotic") to discriminate in favor of the domestic market. There is _no_ important instance of such discrimination.

Such conjunction of circ.u.mstances is one which is exceedingly unlikely to occur. There is more chance that there will be discrimination _in favor of_ the foreign buyer. In short, the matter is not one of great practical importance, for

(1) a raw material supplied only by one State and (2) controlled, _within_ the State, by a monopoly, which also (3) finds it profitable to discriminate against foreign buyers

is something to be found only in imagination.

I venture to say that there has never been a time in modern civilization when the people of any country have been prevented by the international situation from obtaining any raw material whatever for which they had the capacity to pay. The only possible exception to this statement has been in time of war[15]; and the only possible change in the situation in time of peace would, as I have suggested, amount to some form of compulsory international charity.

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If we look generally at this question of the _status quo_ from the international point of view during the past two centuries, we find two divergent and irreconcilable lines of treatment.

The jurists and the writers have generally considered that the _status quo_ is or ought to be sacred from the point of view of outside attack.[16] In most of the books the question is treated under the heading of "Intervention" and, perhaps with some qualifications, the writers do not admit the legality of intervention. They make exceptions on the ground of self preservation of the intervening State, sometimes on the ground of protection of human life and so on. But, at least with these exceptions, they generally maintain that the State against which the intervention is directed may legally object to it--that is, may legally insist upon the maintenance of the _status quo_ (or of its right, in a proper case, to change the _status quo_[17]) and furthermore that such a State might justly, if able (as it usually is not), resort to war against the intervention.

On the other hand, the history of international affairs during this period is quite to the contrary.[18] Over and over again States, sometimes individually, sometimes some of them collectively, have interfered with the affairs of another State with which they Had strictly no legal concern, on many different occasions and on all sorts of pretexts. They have defended such intervention at times on the vague grounds of the rights of humanity, the interests of commerce, the restoration of order and so on.

Any one who is familiar, even in a cursory way, with the history of Europe will be able to recall numerous such instances; and it must in fairness be admitted that in some of them the result has seemed beneficent.[19]

And it must not be forgotten that it is not only the wicked powers of Europe that have acted along these lines. In reference {44} to the affairs of other countries, though not its own, the United States has maintained this privilege of paternal intervention by force. We maintained it, for example, in Cuba in 1898, chiefly on the ground of the sake of humanity.[20] In connection with the Panama Ca.n.a.l, Mr.

Root set up the famous proposition[21] that the sovereignty of Columbia over the Isthmus was limited and qualified by the general right of mankind to have a ca.n.a.l between the Atlantic and the Pacific, and to have that ca.n.a.l kept open for the commerce of all.

Many other instances might be cited. It is, however, worth while to recall in connection with this alleged limited right of sovereignty of Columbia over part of its territory that the United States subsequently paid $25,000,000 to the owner of the qualified fee.

It is perhaps unnecessary to add that this alleged right of intervention, as between great powers, was recognized by another name as a method of changing the _status quo_, namely, the method of war.

The effect of the Protocol is unquestionably to consecrate the international _status quo_ with a definite position of legality, not to be disturbed by force.[22] The views of the writers, as opposed to the practice of Great Powers, have been adopted.

Article 2 of the Protocol forbids a resort to war[23] as against any {45} other State, a party to the Protocol, "except in case of resistance to acts of aggression."[24]

Under Article 8, every Signatory agrees to abstain from any act which might const.i.tute a threat of aggression.

Under these provisions and the provisions of the Protocol for the settlement of international disputes, intervention to upset the _status quo_ (or to prevent a state from changing it where it legally may) becomes aggression and is an international crime.

[1] Such as discovery, occupation of _terra nullius_, etc. See the Treaty of Spitzbergen, A. J. I. L., Vol. XVIII, p. 109.

[2] A. J. I. L., Vol. XI, at p. 626.

[3] A.J. I. L, Vol. XI, Supp. 1917, p. 53.

[4] Some regions of Asia may be exceptions.

[5] See the Franco-Swiss Free Zones, by Louis Schulthess, in Foreign Affairs, Vol. 3, No. 2, p. 331, with map.

[6] "Et il faut bien remarquer, que la Guerre ne decide pas la question; la Victoire contraint seulement le vaincu a donner les mains au Traite qui termine le differend. C'est une erreur non moins absurde que funeste, de dire, que la Guerre doit decider les Controverses entre ceux qui, comme les Nations, ne reconnoissent point de Juge." Vattel, Book III, Section 38.

[7] In general, this is the theory of Article Ten of the Covenant.

[8] See the Genesis of the War, Asquith, pp. 97, 98.

[9] Article 15.

[10] President Wilson's so-called first draft of the Covenant contained a provision along these lines in Article III. See Woodrow Wilson and World Settlement, Baker, Vol. III, p. 89.

[11] The statistics of language, etc., even when accurate, do not always forecast the popular wish. Upper Silesia is an instance of this fact. The statistics, as stated in the note of Clemenceau of June 16, 1919, showed 1,250,000 Poles and 650,000 Germans. The vote was 717,122 for Germany and 483,514 for Poland.

[12] The Convention between Germany and Poland relating to the regime of Upper Silesia is a doc.u.ment of some 300 pages.