100 years of Chatham House: Top ten articles from the 1930s
Editorial Team
Following on from our earlier ‘Top 10’ list for the 1920s, in March we look at the 1930s. By then Chatham House had received its royal charter and become a key place in London to discuss the international issues of the day. A regular flow of visitors spoke at the Institute, on or off the record, and in the case of the former their talks were published in International Affairs for the benefit of those who were unable to attend. As with the 1920s, the speakers, their subject-matter and their language is a reflection of the time and is not indicative the thinking of the journal or Chatham House today.
1) Mohandas K. Gandhi on the future of India
Who was he?
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869–1948), of course, needs little introduction. He was a lawyer who successfully led the movement for Indian independence from the British Empire. Trained as a barrister in London, Gandhi spent his early career in South Africa where he was involved with the fight to obtain civil rights for the Indian diaspora community. He then returned to India and became a key actor in the Indian National Congress party, through which he pursued a non-violent campaign calling for the end of British rule. He was assassinated soon after India became independent in 1947, but continues to inspire movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.
In October 1931, Gandhi gave a speech at Chatham House, which was then transcribed in the journal. The meeting was chaired by the Marquess of Lothian (aka Philip Kerr, who featured in a previous blogpost), who became Under-Secretary of State for India the month after this speech. So it is interesting that he introduced Gandhi by noting that: ‘he thought Mr. Gandhi had accepted the invitation to speak at Chatham House because it was one of his convictions that the best way of arriving at the solution of any problem, political or social, was for the protagonists of rival views to meet one another and talk things out with sincerity and candour.’
From the article:
I have noticed that the greatest stumbling-block in my way is the hopeless ignorance of the true facts of the situation, through no fault of yours; you belong to one of the busiest nations in the world, you have your own problems, and at the present moment this great island of yours is going through a crisis such as you have never had to face within living memory. My whole heart goes out to you in your troubles.
2) Basil Liddell Hart on an international military
Who was he?
Basil Liddell Hart (1895–1970) was a British soldier, historian and military theorist. At the outset of the First World War he joined the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry and served on the Western Front. His battalion was virtually annihilated on the first day of the Battle of the Somme, and soon after he was removed from the frontlines as a result of suffering a severe gas attack. From the 1920s onwards, he published a series of military histories that proved highly influential among strategists and politicians. His ideas, including the concept of the ‘indirect approach’, underpinned much military thinking throughout the rest of the twentieth century.
In November 1932 Liddell Hart read a paper at Chatham House in November 1932, which was later republished in the journal. In it, he considers (the still very relevant) question of whether it is possible to set up a truly international military force.
From the article:
This new kind of international force would be the agent of an international body, an incorporated society of nations, for the preservation of peace and the peaceful settlement of disputes. The force would have a general but not a particular object, and it would have no certain objective to govern its organisation.
3) Victor Bulwer-Lytton on Manchuria
Who was he?
Victor Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton (1876–1947) was a British politician and colonial administrator. He served as Governor of Bengal between 1922 and 1927 and was briefly Acting Viceroy of India in 1926. Between 1931 and 1932 he headed the Lytton Commission, a League of Nations investigation into the war in Manchuria between Japan and China. The conclusion of his report, that Japanese aggression was to blame for the conflict, was a factor in Japan’s decision to withdraw from the League in 1933.
This article is based on a speech he gave at Chatham House in November 1932, his first public engagement after producing the report.
From the article:
It has been a bad year for the League. The Disarmament Conference has hung fire, and certainly the prospects of peace in the Far East have not improved since September of last year. But it is in just such circumstances that it is incumbent on the friends of the League to maintain cool heads and stout hearts, to have faith in the organization which they have reared.
4) Count Stephen (István) Bethlen on minorities in Transylvania
Who was he?
István Bethlen (1874–1946) was Prime Minister of Hungary from 1921 to 1931. He had previously served as the representative of the new Hungarian government at the Paris peace conference. After his time in office he remained engaged with affairs of state, opposing an alliance with Nazi Germany in the lead up to the Second World War. He was one of a number of political leaders who spoke at Chatham House during the 1930s on the issue of borders and minorities.
In November 1933, Bethlen was invited to read a paper at Chatham House on ‘The Transylvanian problem’. He argued that the case of Transylvania is reflective of wider problems in central Europe and called for an international conference of the Great Powers to address them.
From the article:
If this problem is not solved speedily and well, both peoples have to look forward to a dark and stormy future, since all the small peoples of Central Europe will be engulfed either by the Slav ogre or by the German ‘drang nach Osten’, if not perhaps — in mutual understanding — by both. None of these fatal issues is desirable to any of these small nations, and even less to Europe itself.
5) Philip J. Noel-Baker on disarmament and the League of Nations
Who was he?
Philip Noel-Baker (1889–1982) was a British politician, amateur athlete, and renowned campaigner for disarmament. Noel-Baker is the only person to have won an Olympic medal and received a Nobel Prize. He represented Great Britain at three Summer Olympic Games, winning a silver medal in the 1500 metres at Antwerp in 1920. He attended the Paris peace conference in 1919 and served as an assistant to the first Secretary-General of the League of Nations. A Labour Party politician during the interwar years, Noel-Baker later served as Minister for the Commonwealth in the Atlee government. His leading advocacy on disarmament issues saw him awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1959.
In November 1934, Noel-Baker gave a speech at Chatham House on the role of the League of Nations in providing international security, within the context of international efforts towards disarmament.
From the article:
The whole history of the League has proved that Geneva works when Great Britain leads and Geneva languishes when she fails to lead. We sometimes complain of this; we speak of it as if it were unfair of the foreigners not to be able to get on without us. Such complaints are both useless and foolish. It is the nature of things that power involves responsibility.
6) General Jan C. Smuts on international relations in the early 1930s
Who was he?
Jan Smuts (1870–1950) is remembered for his outsized role in South African politics in the first half of the 20th century. He was a Boer commander during the Second Boer War and lead the South African forces that captured German south–west Africa during the First World War. He served as Prime Minister of South Africa between 1939 and 1948, and laid much of the legislative groundwork for apartheid throughout his political career. He was also the only person to sign the peace treaties ending both world wars.
Smuts gave a speech to Chatham House members at the Savoy Hotel in November 1934. He addressed the ‘grave’ international outlook in Europe and the rest of the world, although he is not wholly pessimistic.
From the article:
To tell me that the German people really desire war and are deliberately preparing for it is asking me to believe that they are madder than any people to-day could possibly be. Let us stop this senseless war-talk, the mischievous tendency of which is to translate itself into fact sooner or later. I do not mean to deny that the times are full of dangers and full of anxieties, but they do not justify this loose and dangerous war-talk and war propaganda
7) Leo S. Amery MP on the mandate system
Who was he?
Leo Amery (1873–1955) was a Conservative politician and government minister. A journalist by training, in the First World War he served as an intelligence officer in the Balkans. Amery later held several government roles including Secretary of State for India and Burma between 1940 and 1945. He was a staunch critic of Neville Chamberlain’s policy of appeasement towards Nazi Germany in the run-up to the Second World War.
Amery spoke at Chatham House in October 1936 on the secession of mandated territories, the former colonial possessions of Turkey and Germany which were removed from their control by the League of Nations.
From the article:
Germany’s surrender was outright. The division amongst the Allies was also outright and intended to be permanent. The idea which is vaguely held in many quarters that these territories in some sense belong to the League of Nations, are held subject to good behaviour on a kind of tenancy, were only abstracted for the time being from Germany, and that there is some kind of residual claim to them on Germany’s part, has no foundation whatever in fact.
8) Lilo Linke on social change in Turkey
Who was she?
Lilo Linke (1906–1963) was a German–Ecuadorian writer and reporter. She was a prominent figure in left-leaning politics in interwar Germany. She first joined the German Democratic Party in the 1920 and was a founding member of the Radical Democratic Party in 1930. In 1932, when the failure of an independent left-liberal party was evident, she joined the Social Democratic Party. Two years later, in mid-1933, Linke went into exile in England, before moving to South America in 1939. The books she published while in England made her an important figure of the contemporary political and literary scene.
In 1937, Linke addressed Chatham House members on the state of Turkish politics. Her reflections were drawn from her travels in the country in 1935.
From the article:
Full of good intentions, Turkey has set to work. Wherever you go, you find positive results of the Government’s efforts. For the sake of these results, I am even prepared to condone two major sins — dictatorship and nationalism.
9) Arnold J. Toynbee on world politics after the Munich agreement
Who was he?
Arnold Toynbee (1889–1975) was synonymous with the Royal Institute of International Affairs for the first half of its history. He held the post of Director of Studies from 1925 to 1954, and thereafter retained an office in Chatham House until his death. Throughout that half century, he combined the roles of scholar and public intellectual, using International Affairs — along with many other outlets — to communicate the fruits and findings of his research to policy-makers and the wider community.
In November 1938, he spoke to Chatham House members about the impact of the Munich agreement on international relations. Interestingly, as his introduction suggests, although Toynbee thought that ‘Munich was a disaster’, proponents of both sided disagreed with him.
From the article:
Perhaps I had better begin by saying a word as to how this paper took shape … When I was asked to write this paper … I said Munich was a disaster. I said it a great many timesover, and when that draft was submitted to a group of members of Chatham House, they all disliked it, because those who wanted still to fight Germany said: ‘If things are really as bad as this, we cannot fight Germany,” and those who wished now to pursue a policy of appeasement said: ‘If things are really as bad as this, it is no use pursuing a policy of appeasement.”
10) General Maxime Weygand on the defence of France
Who was he?
Maxime Weygand (1867–1965) was a French military leader in both world wars. A year into the Second World War he was promoted to Supreme Commander of the French armed forces, in response to his predecessor’s failure to halt the German advance. Soon after, as Italy joined the war, Weygand became convinced of France’s inevitable defeat and argued fervently for an armistice. He subsequently served in the Vichy government.
General Weygand presented his plan for the defence of France to Chatham House members on 16 May 1939. In his speech, he argued that any German offensive would have to be met with ‘an invincible resistance from the beginning’.
From the article:
The process of strengthening existing fortifications was, however, not enough, since Germany alternatively threatened the violation of Belgium, Holland, and Switzerland. Belgium’s declaration of neutrality, by putting a stop to Franco-Belgian collaboration for the combined defence of the frontier, caused us to extend our fortifications up to the floodable districts in Flanders, which the British Army knows so well.
We hope you enjoyed this second post in our series, ‘100 years of Chatham House’. Every month throughout 2020, the editorial team of International Affairs will be publishing some of the highlights from each decade since the founding of the Royal Institute of International Affairs.
Read more from the series here.
Find out more about the Chatham House Centenary here.
