THE SMALL STATES' CASE
By EMILE CAMMAERTS
ONE of the most difficult problems with which the peacemakers will have to deal, after victory is won, is to reconcile the promise given in the Atlantic Charter to restore the oppressed nations to their full independence with the necessity of subor- dinating national sovereignty to some international control. It is too early even to attempt to solve this problem, but if we cannot yet visualise the practical steps which should be taken in the right direction, we can at least point out the decisions which should not be taken in the wrong direction.
h has frequently been said that the system of the Covenant failed because it jealously preserved the principle of national sovereignty, while trying to enforce the decisions of the League through economic and military sanctions. But this is not the only reason. Most students of international affairs agree that, in spite of this defect, the League might have succeeded in maintaining order and in nipping aggression in the bud, if the peoples belonging to the prin- cipal States which controlled it had been prepared to shoulder their responsibilities. Instead of subjecting themselves to an international economic discipline which might have borne fruit after a lapse of years, they returned to a system of national competition which gave them a temporary and artificial prosperity. Instead of preserving a wide margin of military strength against the would-be aggressor, they sacrificed their security and that of the smaller countries depending upon their support on the altar of disarmament. It is now the fashion to denounce the governments which adopted this policy, but these governments would never have succeeded in main- taining themselves in power if they had departed from it. Their electors were ready to pay lip service to an international idea ; they were not prepared to think or to act internationally. The League was not for them a reality which they had experienced or were ready to experience, but an illusion which flattered their false sense of security, and incidentally favoured their immediate interests.
No institution can be lasting and fruitful in a democratic State unless it springs from a stern conviction shared by the majority. No plant can grow in the social soil unless it is deeply rooted. In spite of the enthusiasm aroused in intellectual circles, the League never struck root in the masses because the masses were not pre- pared for it. On the Continent, especially in France, it appeared as an artificial structure superimposed on the Peace Treaty in order to comply with President Wilson's wishes. It has been said that the Covenant was betrayed by the politicians, but the politicians would never have dared to 'betray it if it had been wedded to the people's will, like their parliamentary syitem or their constitutional guarantees.
Peace came as a surprise in 1918. No harmony had been realised in the public mind between its negative and its positive aspect. We knew what we wished to destroy, e.g., German imperialism, but we only had a vague idea of what we wished to construct, and many of us did not even wish to be constructive. We may be grateful that, this time, some leading principles are beginning to emerge from the chaos in which we are struggling. /Ale see far more clearly than during the last war that no legal guarantee, however wisely con- ceived, can replace the guarantee of armed strength, and that no Peace can be maintained in the political sphere if war is still waged in the economic sphere. We realise that international inter- dependence must be substituted for a narrow national independence. We understand also that such military and economic interdepend- ence must rest on the solid foundation of a solidarity willingly accepted by free men and free peoples.
On such broad principles an agreement has already been reached between the Allies, since the Atlantic Charter has been endorsed by the smaller States. There is, however, a difference of opinion among English critics between those who accept its third point—maintain- ing national sovereignty—and rely on free co-operation, and those who wish to eliminate this sovereignty and to introduce, if necessary, compulsory co-operation. A number of articles and books have appeared recently insisting on the necessity of revising the Atlantic Charter in that light—notably G. D. H. Cole's Europe, Russia and the Future and Gollancz's Shall Our Children Live or Die ? It is significant that these critics seem to entertain a poor opinion of the " emigre " or " discredited " Governments of the smaller European States, now in London, " capitalists, militarists, men who, if not fascists, are certainly of fascist mind," and to place their hope in a social revolution which will rid Europe not only of Nazi tyranny but of any independent regime which might prove an obstacle to the establishment of their New Order.
It is scarcely necessary to point out that if these Governments had been " fascist in mind " they would have had no difficulty in joining the Axis instead of pursuing the fight and placing all their resources at the service of the Allied cause. The main reason which determines their policy is the conviction that the people they repre- sent will never submit to foreign oppression. In spite of serious obstacles, they are well informed on the state of public opinion in their respective countries, and they know that the idea which inspires moral and material resistance, irrespective of class and party, is the preservation of national independence. It is the same idea which is emphasised and exalted in every message which reaches the occupied countries through the B.B.C. As far as the voice of the oppressed who sacrifice every day their freedom and their life in the struggle is heard in this country, it tells us that they pin their faith to the promises made to them, on several occasions, by the British Govern- ment and which are confirmed and strengthened by the Atlantic Charter. This does not mean that the Norwegians, the Dutch and the Belgians, for instance, who are subjected to Nazi rule, will not be ready to join in some economic and military organisation when the conflict is over. But it means that, at present, national freedom stands uppermost in their mind and that some time will be needed to bring them to realise that they should, in their own interest, accept the limitation of this freedom, and to help them to reconcile their beliefs based on cherished traditions with our own beliefs founded on experience.
Those who attack the exiled Governments in London or mis- represent the true state of public opinion in occupied countries play into the hands of their worst enemies. If the efforts they are making to eliminate from the Charter the recognition of the national inde- pendence of small States were ever to succeed, they would provoke inevitable reactions in the occupied countries which Nazi propa- gandists would not fail to exploit to the full.
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