How would a League of Nations/UN founded before WW1 look like? What changes could it bring?

[wiltedpleasure]

Basically, I’m thinking of a scenario where, faced with growing tensions, territorial and colonial disputes and arms races, the Great powers of the early 20th century come together at around the turn of the century or a little later but not after 1914 to found an international organisation, in the fashion of the Concert of Europe but permanent, formalised and worldwide like the LoN or the UN to prevent further conflict, perhaps giving veto power or more influence to a set of empires (like the countries that participated in the Eight Nation Alliance, for instance). What would it look like? What nations would be part of it? Does it really prevents further conflict and perhaps WW1 or it inevitably fails? Tell me what you think about it.

 

[Dorknought]

The current state of affairs could be summed up by the Bryan Treaties (They are named after William Jennings Bryan, the US Secretary of State at the time) where the US had signed over 20 bi-lateral treaties of arbitration in 1913-14. There were designed to set up permanent commissions of inquiry. Such inquiries were designed to resolve differences between the United States of America and a large number of foreign states.

The treaties were not all identical, but had the following key feature in common:
The high contracting parties agreed:
(1) to refer all disputes that diplomatic methods had failed to resolve to a Permanent International Commission for investigation and report, and
(2) not to begin hostilities before the report was submitted.

All the Great Powers signed except two. Guess which two.

 

[Beatriz]

A formal world council exists in Randy McDonald’s Empires Earth with nonvoting membership extended recently to nations like China, Ukraine, Gran Colombia etc. as clients of the imperial powers

 

[wiltedpleasure]

The current state of affairs could be summed up by the Bryan Treaties (They are named after William Jennings Bryan, the US Secretary of State at the time) where the US had signed over 20 bi-lateral treaties of arbitration in 1913-14. There were designed to set up permanent commissions of inquiry. Such inquiries were designed to resolve differences between the United States of America and a large number of foreign states.

The treaties were not all identical, but had the following key feature in common:
The high contracting parties agreed:
(1) to refer all disputes that diplomatic methods had failed to resolve to a Permanent International Commission for investigation and report, and
(2) not to begin hostilities before the report was submitted.

All the Great Powers signed except two. Guess which two.

That’s interesting. Should Germany and A-H sign the treaties for whatever reason, would it eventually turn into a formal organisation? And would other smaller nations, aside from Latin American countries, join the treaties? I’m thinking of the likes of Arab states, Bhutan, Nepal, etc.

 

[Dorknought]

Should Germany and A-H sign the treaties for whatever reason

Probably never, after all it was German resistance to A-H being forced to sit down with Serbia to just such arbitration that ultimately caused WW1.

Arms were too tied up with security and Germany as more a military with a state with it ingrained in culture. People whine that Germany was more 'democratic' because more people had the vote but FFS, kids vote in school but it doesn't mean the teachers or head should worry about their jobs.

The next Hague Peace conference was due 1915 and then another 1923 (every 7 years but the 1914 one had been delayed). The problems were understood at the time, the Director of Naval Intelligence, Admiral Sir Lewis Anthony Beaumont in preparing for the first Hague Conference in 1899 listed the practical difficulties of disarmament proposals:

(a) Disarmament is impossible without the assurance of a durable peace.
(b) A durable peace cannot be assured without adjustment of all differences such as Alsace, China, Egypt etc etc
(c) The adjustment of differences is impossible without a force to enforces the decrees of Congress.
(d) No such force exists.
The fact is that after a long peace each Power is prepared to fight for what it considers its legitimate aspirations. It will only yield when exhausted by war.

Churchill was working on a proposal in mid 1914 (he was invited to Kiel Week but didn't attend, the berth allocated to Enchantress remained empty) and he worked up a four-point arms- control agenda.

1. at the top of his list was a discussion of the building holiday proposal that had been on the table since 1912.
2. room for agreement might exist with regard to limitations in the size of capital ships
3. explore ways to reduce the danger of surprise attack - “the unwholesome concentration of fleets in Home Waters ” With a reduction in the readiness of the main British and German fleets to launch concentrated offensive strikes, both sides would have less to fear from the hair-trigger danger of surprise attack.
4. development of confidence-building measures—that is, formal procedures for mutual inspections—which “would go a long way to stopping the espionage on both sides which is the continued cause of suspicion and ill-feeling ”

No genuine willingness existed on the part of the Kaiser or Tirpitz to reduce the naval program. Quite the reverse was actually the case; both wanted to make additions to German naval strength during the spring of 1914. The Kaiser, for instance, pressed for the construction of an extra battleship. Meanwhile, Tirpitz’s staff wanted to increase the readiness of the fleet, so that it could carry out a “lightning-fast offensive . To increase both the combat power of ships and the fleet’s readiness, Tirpitz asked for an extra 150–200 million marks over and above the budget already allotted.

To bring real change you would perhaps have to have the Entente expanded to all Europe + US before Germany and A-H may start to see reason.

In 1914, the South American countries arbitrated between the US and Mexico so any nations would be in favor and could work with a permanent system.

 

[wiltedpleasure]

No genuine willingness existed on the part of the Kaiser or Tirpitz to reduce the naval program.

To bring real change you would perhaps have to have the Entente expanded to all Europe + US before Germany and A-H may start to see reason.

I see, I’m guessing a change in leadership in both countries wouldn’t do the trick, would it?
Would getting the recently independent Balkan countries and the Ottomans on board favor the Entente and eventually get Germany and A-H to sign? And if they did, would it prevent WW1?

Something else: Assuming the treaties do evolve into something global, which colonies and protectorates would become individual members? Aside from the obvious like the British dominions.

 

[wiltedpleasure]

Something else I though is that the Inter-Parliamentary Union could be integrated in some way, maybe by becoming a sort of General Assembly for this organisation.

 

[Dorknought]

I see, I’m guessing a change in leadership in both countries wouldn’t do the trick, would it?

Tirpitz certainly had some cognitive barriers to cooperation.

Would getting the recently independent Balkan countries and the Ottomans on board favor the Entente and eventually get Germany and A-H to sign? And if they did, would it prevent WW1?

No, it was regarding Serbia as beneath Austria's dignity and not an equal that meant that no arbitration was possible. None of this will change for Germany/Austria. Only something like GB unambiguously siding with France-Russia very early in the July crisis would Germany change track. As it was Germany gambled on GB being too involved in an Irish civil war to intervene in Europe.

Something else: Assuming the treaties do evolve into something global, which colonies and protectorates would become individual members? Aside from the obvious like the British dominions.

None, not even the Dominions. They could only consider independent courses once they had proven themselves on the battlefield. Any global system would cement the European Great Powers at the top of the pile. The most likely outcome, and to ensure a peace, is for a European grouping, excluding GB. This would have to replace the CP vs Franco-Russian alliance arrangement.

 

[Colonel Grubb]

I recall reading years ago a timeline where there was a gradual creation and set up of a permanent international council in Geneva in the aftermath of the Eight Nation alliance in the boxer rebellion that cemented the international Edwardian era status quo.

 

[extraterrestris]

The League of Nations and the United Nations were/are both paper tigers. So would be any earlier equivalent.

Probably never, after all it was German resistance to A-H being forced to sit down with Serbia to just such arbitration that ultimately caused WW1.

The blank check was not given in a vacuum.

 

[wiltedpleasure]

Ok, so, assuming for some reason both Germany and A-H are on board with this World Council under the mentioned circumstances, I’d think that a prospective list of members would be as follows:

• The US.
• All of Latin America minus the European colonies.
• All of Europe, maybe minus the micro states.
• Liberia and Ethiopia in Africa.
• China, Japan, Persia, Siam in Asia.

The ones I’m still not sure about their possible participation regarding their status are the Arab monarchies (like the Trucial states or Saudi Arabia), the British Dominions, the Philippines, Mongolia, and states that didn’t join the League of Nations in OTL like Nepal or Bhutan.

Also, what shape would the organisation take? I’m thinking that, in line with the precedent of the Bryan treaties and the Inter Parliamentary Union, a host city would be somewhere like The Hague or Geneva, and some other agencies aside from a Security Council-like organ would eventually be founded.

 

[Jonah Carter]

The League of Nations and the United Nations were/are both paper tigers. So would be any earlier equivalent.

You often see the United Nations described as toothless, impotent, etc., but I think the people saying that fundamentally misunderstand it. The UN isn't meant to make anybody do anything--the Security Council is explicitly the only body whose resolutions can be binding, and its veto system ensures that that power is used very rarely. Instead, the main value of the UN is as a forum for international discussion. When the UN is able to score a victory on an issue, as it often does in a wide range of policy areas, it does so because its structure enables member states to collectively agree on and implement a set of policies. The UN is bad at stopping genocides, yes, but its structure is such that no reasonable person would expect it to be good at that.

If such a system were to be implemented around 1900, I imagine its membership would be limited to major European powers, the US, maybe a few Latin American countries, probably Japan, and maybe China. The mindset of these major powers is essentially that their opinions are the only ones that matter--and in a practical sense, that's mostly true--so why should Montenegro, Honduras, or Afghanistan get a seat at the table? If its primary intention is to resolve global conflict, as I imagine it would be since most of the UN's major policy areas were things most people didn't care about at the time, it may prevent a few minor conflicts mostly through the threat of great power intervention. It would not prevent WWI or an equivalent (because again, assuming a LoN/UN style system, expecting it to do so is totally unreasonable).

I think you hit the nail on the head with your two proposed host cities (The Hague and Geneva). Both are in neutral, wealthy European states with all the necessary infrastructure. Geneva is also already the headquarters of the Red Cross, which probably affiliates itself as closely with this UN as it has with the real one.

 

[extraterrestris]

You often see the United Nations described as toothless, impotent, etc., but I think the people saying that fundamentally misunderstand it. The UN isn't meant to make anybody do anything--the Security Council is explicitly the only body whose resolutions can be binding, and its veto system ensures that that power is used very rarely. Instead, the main value of the UN is as a forum for international discussion. When the UN is able to score a victory on an issue, as it often does in a wide range of policy areas, it does so because its structure enables member states to collectively agree on and implement a set of policies. The UN is bad at stopping genocides, yes, but its structure is such that no reasonable person would expect it to be good at that.

That the UN security council can pass legally binding resolutions in principle indicates that the UN was/is not just meant to be a forum.

 

[Beatriz]

You often see the United Nations described as toothless, impotent, etc., but I think the people saying that fundamentally misunderstand it. The UN isn't meant to make anybody do anything--the Security Council is explicitly the only body whose resolutions can be binding, and its veto system ensures that that power is used very rarely. Instead, the main value of the UN is as a forum for international discussion. When the UN is able to score a victory on an issue, as it often does in a wide range of policy areas, it does so because its structure enables member states to collectively agree on and implement a set of policies. The UN is bad at stopping genocides, yes, but its structure is such that no reasonable person would expect it to be good at that.

If such a system were to be implemented around 1900, I imagine its membership would be limited to major European powers, the US, maybe a few Latin American countries, probably Japan, and maybe China. The mindset of these major powers is essentially that their opinions are the only ones that matter--and in a practical sense, that's mostly true--so why should Montenegro, Honduras, or Afghanistan get a seat at the table? If its primary intention is to resolve global conflict, as I imagine it would be since most of the UN's major policy areas were things most people didn't care about at the time, it may prevent a few minor conflicts mostly through the threat of great power intervention. It would not prevent WWI or an equivalent (because again, assuming a LoN/UN style system, expecting it to do so is totally unreasonable).

I think you hit the nail on the head with your two proposed host cities (The Hague and Geneva). Both are in neutral, wealthy European states with all the necessary infrastructure. Geneva is also already the headquarters of the Red Cross, which probably affiliates itself as closely with this UN as it has with the real one.

Would it be dissolved after *WW1 Or would some of its members continue under new governments. Also do the Ottomans fit?

 

[Jonah Carter]

That the UN security council can pass legally binding resolutions in principle indicates that the UN was/is not just meant to be a forum.

I never said it was. What I actually said was that "the main (i.e. not the only) value of the UN is as a forum for international discussion". The UNSC is able to pass binding resolutions, but this isn't the intended path for conflict resolution, and is generally only done at the point that all other options have failed. What that means is that the cases where Security Council resolutions are passed are generally the most intractable conflicts, where a peaceful resolution is almost impossible to begin with (see Rwanda, Bosnia, Somalia).

Would it be dissolved after *WW1 Or would some of its members continue under new governments. Also do the Ottomans fit?

I imagine that in the same way the League of Nations couldn't survive WW2, this alt-UN couldn't survive WW1. Even if it's not really fair, I think such a major conflict fatally discredits it.

I could go either way on the Ottoman Empire but it makes sense intuitively to include them, if only because so many of the pre-WW1 conflicts took place within the Ottoman sphere.

 

[wiltedpleasure]

If such a system were to be implemented around 1900, I imagine its membership would be limited to major European powers, the US, maybe a few Latin American countries, probably Japan, and maybe China. The mindset of these major powers is essentially that their opinions are the only ones that matter--and in a practical sense, that's mostly true--so why should Montenegro, Honduras, or Afghanistan get a seat at the table?

You’re right, if any smaller nations are included in these treaties they’d probably be given representation akin to observer seats at the UN with no votes.

If its primary intention is to resolve global conflict, as I imagine it would be since most of the UN's major policy areas were things most people didn't care about at the time, it may prevent a few minor conflicts mostly through the threat of great power intervention. It would not prevent WWI or an equivalent (because again, assuming a LoN/UN style system, expecting it to do so is totally unreasonable).

That’s interesting, because although a wider war in Europe probably can’t be avoided completely, the existence of such organisation could change the way the war develops by maybe making it a more localised conflict with less consequences or delaying it a few years. If it did prevented total war I’d see it surviving in some way.

 

[extraterrestris]

I never said it was.

It sounded as if

You often see the United Nations described as toothless, impotent, etc., but I think the people saying that fundamentally misunderstand it. The UN isn't meant to make anybody do anything--the Security Council is explicitly the only body whose resolutions can be binding, and its veto system ensures that that power is used very rarely. Instead, the main value of the UN is as a forum for international discussion. When the UN is able to score a victory on an issue, as it often does in a wide range of policy areas, it does so because its structure enables member states to collectively agree on and implement a set of policies. The UN is bad at stopping genocides, yes, but its structure is such that no reasonable person would expect it to be good at that.

 

[extraterrestris]

Purposes of the UN

1. To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace;

It is difficult to argue that the UN is very good at this.

 

[Dorknought]

The blank check was not given in a vacuum.

Pardon me while I decline to fork out €30 for some German negationism that I could add to shelf right next to 'The Clean Wehrmacht'.

 

[Dorknought]

The problem with the League of Nations was that the USA, Russia and Germany were not in it. The USA had a tendency to not participate in forums/arrangements that it did not control ie. it would opt out of joint banking that involved Europeans. The Kaiser thought that he was the balance of power in Europe, that didn't work. Pre 1913 Europeans thought of a pan-European war as we think of Nuclear War today, its very unlikely as it would be too horrific to think about.
Here is a 1913 estimate

COST OF WAR.​

IF EUROPE SHOULD FIGHT.​

What would a European war cost?​

Professor Charles Richer, of University of Paris, and a . prominent member of the Peace Society, has worked out an eleborate estimate of the vast amount of money which would have to bo spent daily to maintain the armies and navies of Great Britain, Russia, Franco, Germany, Austria, and Italy in the field. A conflict between those, nations is still not unlikely to happen as an outcome of the Balkan war.​

In the event of such a-war Professor Richer declares 10.000,000 would be led immediately on to the fields of battle, and 20,000,000 would be placed​

under arms.​

• Germany 3,600,000 Men
• England 1,500,000 Men
• Austria 2,500,000 Men
• France 3,400,000 Men
• Italy 2,800,000 Men
• Roumania , 300,000 Men
• Russia 7,000.000 Men
• Total - 21,100,000 Men

​

The daily expense of maintaining these men in food and ammunition. &c. is made up by the professor as follows:-​

• Food for men £ 2,400,000
• Food for horses £200,000
• Pay £840,000
• Pay for non-combatants £200,000
• Mobilisation expenses £800,000
• Transport of food £400,000
• Infantry,ammunition £840,000
• Artillery ammunition £??0,000
• Naval ammunition .... ?
• Equipments ........ £840,000
• Ambulances £100,000
• Warship expenses (coal, &.. £100.000
• Decrease in ? £2.000,000
• Releif of ? £1,360,000
• Indemnities £400.000
• Total: £11,260,000 per day

Professor. Richer has estimated this daily cost on present market prices. He points out, however that prices would be enormously increased as soon as war was declared. Factories would be closed, farms would be deserted, commerce would be paralyzed banks would fail, and the nations themselves would soon become bankrupt. A war to decide whether Durrazzo should be Austrian or Serbian would bring famine and epidemics to Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Moscow, Milan, and Rome, and it would take half a century to repair the ruin and wipe out the hate aroused.​

They did think that arms and arms control were worthwhile and that the Hague Peace conferences brought regulation to warfare. It took 2 World Wars to come up with the UN, that's a lot of blood and treasure for the lessons learned. For WW1 to be avoided, Germany would have to be actually encircled - not them just thinking so. Even if Albert Balin had come back from his informal sounding out GB's position with an unequivocal 'GB will support France' then an Ambassadors conference would have ensued and the war avoided without having a global body.