A valued correspondent sends this journal a letter and leaflet concerning an agitation in Great Britain for the adoption by the government of as completely an isolationist policy as that which is still being pressed for by some sections of political thought in the United States. The British Empire Referendum is a document which speaks for itself and should not be taken too seriously. Those, who support the idea that Great Britain should return to a policy of icy isolation, apparently forget what would probably have happened from 1914 onwards if the Government had not entered into a series of agreements which enabled a strong resistance to be offered to Germany. There were some who argued at that time that it was foolish for Great Britain to go to the assistance of France and Belgium, but it was from the strength found in collective action that the German military venture was brought to failure. What would have happened had there been no understanding with France, so that France would have had to meet the German onslaught with the small help that Belgium would have been able to afford her? It requires no very vivid imagitation to realize what might have been the result, and the consequent threat which might have been levelled against Great Britain.
Had it been possible for Germany to have picked off the Allies one by one the time might have come when Great Britain would have had also to meet her single handed and to have had more than a little difficulty to protect herself and her Empire. From the practical experience of the past it is apparent that defensive alliances are important factors in securing the world peace. They may serve to establish a balance of power, sufficient to restrain nations in whose foreign policy the desire for war may play an important part, for no nation will engage in hostilities if it is convinced that the strength opposed against her is too great. The principle behind defensive alliances is exactly the same as that underlying the doctrine of collective security. The latter's application is wider, for theoretically it should bring the whole world in arms against an aggressor.
It has not, however, proved as successful in recent years for a very large number of significant reasons, but that does not mean that given better world conditions it would still have failed. It will be noticed that in the covering letter to the leaflet, all of which appears in the correspondence columns to-day the writer himself does not contemplate quite that degree of isolation which appears in paragraph (a) of the British Empire Referendum. He writes "Let the British Empire and the United States stand apart in fully armed neutrality, and what nation or combination of nations dare challenge that neutrality?" That presupposes that the two nations would combine for the protection of their common neutrality, and what the wetter fashioning of a new. In the present temper of the United States it is not likely that American opinion would accept such a posifion as the organizer of the referendum apparently has in mind. It is probable that the Government of the United States has gone as far as it dares when it announces the following of a common policy for the protection Of their interests in the Far East, not acting in union with Great Britain but along parallel lines. To some people this may seem to indicate the existence of a close union, but on reflection it sould be apparent that in the maintenance of separate identities lies adference to the traditional American foreign policy. Mr. Engledower contemplates the common defence of their common neutrality by the two Powers he names, and in effect suggests that the United States might agree to take united action. Could such an arrangement be made, it is perfectly clear that it would be a direct contradiction of the terms of his memorandum, for it would constitute nothing less than a defensive alliance, repugnant to a large body of thought in the United States, It is probably true that such a union would make for the peace of the whole world, by the establishment of what would amount almost to a benevolent tyranny—an Anglo-American hegemony for the purpose of peace over the whole world. But that is not isolation. It represents merely a re-orientation of the foreign policies of both nations and nothing more. Isolation for Great Britain must forever remain a dream. Her position in Eürope requires that she shall enter into commitments preserving something like the old balance of power calculated to preserve a sort of partial collective security in place of the complete system which was sought in the Covenant of the League of Nations. Had it been possible to secure unanimity of purpose amongst the members of the League, over Manchuria and Abyssinia, or even one of them, what is happening in China at the moment would never have occurred. It was impossible to do so, and Great Britain has been obliged to make such arrangements as will fortify her position in the world in general and Europe ili particular. Because of that lack of unanimity, as demonstrated repeatedly at Geneva, the League of Nations has suffered grievous damage. That does not necessarily mean that it is completely destroyed or that the principles for which it stands are wrong. Collective security may be a very high, if not completely unattainable ideal, but it is apparent that the modification, consisting of defensive undertakings, is exactly the same thing in a restricted form. It is true that the possibility of Great Britain being forced into common action with Russia does not commend itself to a large section of the British people, but the breakdown of collective security, and the necessity for preserving the balance of power is a misfortune which has provided Great Britain with strange bedfellows. There are many who hope that in the future there will be a considerable change in that respect, but much has still to be done before that change can be brought about, and even if it were it would not bring isolation, but a limited collective security.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.