published
he wrote: "I fervently believe that the happiness and welfare of the human race is more
closely concerned in the evolution of English democracy and of our Imperial
Commonwealth than in the growth of any international League." On 7 December 1919, in
another letter to Hankey, he wrote: "You say that my letter was critical and not
constructive. So it was. But the ground must be cleared of debris first. I assume that this
is done. We will forget the high ideals and the fourteen points for the moment. We will
be eminently practical. So here goes. Do not let us bother about a League of Nations. It
may come slowly or not at all. What step forward, if any, can we take? We can get a
League of Empire." Shortly afterwards, writing to his heir, the present Viscount Esher, he
called the League "a paper hoop." The importance of this can be seen if we realize that
Lord Esher was the most important factor on the Committee of Imperial Defence, and
this committee was one of the chief forces determining British foreign policy in this
period. In fact, no less an authority than Lord Robert Cecil has said that the Geneva
Protocol was rejected on the advice of the Committee of Imperial Defence and that he
accepted that decision only when he was promised a new project which subsequently
became the Locarno Pacts.(8)
The rejection of the Protocol by Britain was regarded subsequently by real supporters
of the League as the turning point in its career. There was an outburst of public sentiment
against this selfish and cold-blooded action. Zimmern, who knew more than he revealed,
went to Oxford in May 1925 and made a brilliant speech against those who were
sabotaging the League. He did not identify them, but clearly indicated their existence,
and, as the cruelest blow of all, attributed their actions to a failure of intelligence.
As a result of this feeling, which was widespread throughout the world, the Group
determined to give the world the appearance of a guarantee to France. This was done in
the Locarno Pacts, the most complicated and most deceitful international agreement made
between the Treaty of Versailles and the Munich Pact. We cannot discuss them in detail
here, but must content ourselves with pointing out that in appearance, and in the publicity
campaign which accompanied their formation, the Locarno agreements guaranteed the
frontier of Germany with France and Belgium with the power of these three states plus
Britain and Italy. In reality the agreements gave France nothing, while they gave Britain a
veto over French fulfillment of her alliances with Poland and the Little Entente. The
French accepted these deceptive documents for reasons of internal politics: obviously,
any French government which could make the French people believe that it had been able
to secure a British guarantee of France's eastern frontier could expect the gratitude of the
French people to be reflected at the polls. The fundamental shrewdness and realism of the
French, however, made it difficult to conceal from them the trap that lay in the Locarno
agreements. This trap consisted of several interlocking factors. In the first place, the
agreements did not guarantee the German frontier and the demilitarized condition of the
Rhineland against German actions, but against the actions of either Germany or France.
This, at one stroke, gave Britain the legal grounds for opposing France if she tried any
repetition of the military occupation of the Ruhr, and, above all, gave Britain the right to
oppose any French action against Germany in support of her allies to the east of
Germany. This meant that if Germany moved east against Czechoslovakia, Poland, and,
eventually, Russia, and if France attacked Germany's western frontier in support of
Czechoslovakia or Poland, as her alliances bound her to do, Great Britain, Belgium, and
Italy might be bound by the Locarno Pacts to come to the aid of Germany. To be sure, the
same agreement might bind these three powers to oppose Germany if she drove westward
against France, but the Milner Group did not object to this for several reasons. In the first
place, if Germany attacked France directly, Britain would have to come to the help of
France whether bound by treaty or not. The old balance-of-power principle made that
clear. In the second place, Cecil Hurst, the old master of legalistic double-talk, drew up
the Locarno Pacts with the same kind of loopholes which he had put in the crucial articles
of the Covenant. As a result, if Germany did violate the Locarno Pacts against France,
Britain could, if she desired, escape the necessity of fulfilling her guarantee by slipping
through one of Hurst's loopholes. As a matter of fact, when Hitler did violate the Locarno
agreements by remilitarizing the Rhineland in March 1936, the Milner Group and their
friends did not even try to evade their obligation by slipping through a loophole, but
simply dishonored their agreement.