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The Administrative Anatomy of Failure: The League of Nations Disarmament Section, 1919–1925

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2021

Haakon A. Ikonomou Open the ORCID record for Haakon A. Ikonomou [Opens in a new window]
Haakon A. Ikonomou*
Affiliation:
Saxo-Instituttet, Københavns Universitet, Att. Haakon A. Ikonomou, Karen Blixens Plads 8, DK-2300 København S
*
ikonomou@hum.ku.dk
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Abstract

This article investigates the creation and workings of the Disarmament Section of the League of Nations Secretariat. It shows that the Disarmament Section was an outlier of the Secretariat: supressed by the Great Powers, it had less autonomy than other parts of the administration, which from an early stage limited its bureaucratic practice to the production of information. This bureaucratic production created unreliable factual foundations for negotiations and unrealistic public expectations. Thus, the article argues that the troubled birth and administrative strangling of the Disarmament Section of the Secretariat should play a significant role in our understanding of the broader collapse of general disarmament. By making this argument, the article breaks new ground by introducing failure as an analytical category to understand the role and practices of international public administrations.

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Article
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Contemporary European History , Volume 30 , Issue 3 , August 2021 , pp. 321 - 334
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Copyright © The Author(s) 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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References

1 Salvador de Madariaga, the first official Director of the Disarmament Section of the League Secretariat, in Disarmament (New York: Coward-McCann Inc., 1929), 361.

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28 The League had greater success with limited efforts at international disarmament: Andrew Webster, ‘Making Disarmament Work: The Implementation of the International Disarmament Provisions in the League of Nations Covenant, 1919–1925’, Diplomacy & Statecraft, 16, 3 (2005), 551–69.

29 Robert G. Kaufman, Arms Control During the Pre-Nuclear Era: The United States and Naval Limitations Between the Two World Wars (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990).

30 Webster, Strange Allies, 9. This is a criticism Webster levels at much of the state-centric analysis of interwar disarmament.

31 Gram-Skjoldager and Ikonomou, ‘Construction’.

32 Drummond, Memo: Organisation of the Secretariat of the League, 31 May 1919 [Registry Files] R1455, League of Nations Archives, Geneva [henceforth LoNA]; Drummond to Cecil, 05 July 1919, R182, LoNA.

33 Lord Colum Crichton-Stuart “Disarmament”, Undated, R182, LoNA.

34 Note, Drummond, 21 July 1919, R182, LoNA. My italics.

35 Walters to Drummond, 17 July 1919, R182, LoNA; Buxton to Drummond, 18 July 1919, R182, LoNA.

36 Drummond to Hankey, 22 July 1919, R182, LoNA.

37 Walters to Drummond, 17 July 1919, R182, LoNA; Note, Drummond, 21 July 1919, R182, LoNA.

38 Sackville-West to Drummond, 21 June 1919, R184, LoNA; Drummond to Sackville-West, 24 June1919, R184, LoNA.

39 Minutes Directors’ Meeting [henceforth DM], 1 Oct. 1919, 3 Dec. 1919, LoNA.

40 DM, 3 Dec. 1919, LoNA.

41 Drummond to Sackville-West, 16 June 1919, R184, LoNA; Drummond to Hankey, 22 July 1919, R182, LoNA.

42 Webster, ‘Absolutely’, 374.

43 Article 12. Rome Resolutions: Report. On the functions, composition and work of the Secretariat of the PAC, 16 Apr. 1921, R1455, LoNA.

44 ‘Report of Committee No. VI: Armaments’, Records, 1st Assembly, 515-20, 14 Dec. 1920, LoNA.

45 The PAC only spent 52,833,09 Gold Francs of its appropriated 200,000 Gold Francs in 1921 and budgeted with 100,000 Gold Francs in the following year. Budget, 5th Fiscal Period, OJ-3-34-1923, LoNA.

46 Webster ‘Absolutely’ (see footnote 12 for a list of its most important members). See also Andrew Webster, ‘The Transnational Dream: Politicians, Diplomats and Soldiers in the League of Nations’ Pursuit of International Disarmament, 1920–1938’, Contemporary European History, 14, 4 (2005), 493–518, 499; Donaldson, ‘Secret’, 436.

47 C.E./1-27-1921: Minutes, 4th Committee, 2nd Meeting, 19 Nov. 1920, LoNA.

48 Webster, ‘Absolutely’, 376.

49 ‘Consideration of Assembly Resolutions on Reduction of Armaments and Kindred Question’, Report, Bourgeois, Council, Feb. 1921, LoNA.

50 Report, 16 Apr. 1921, R1455, LoNA.

51 Reduction of Armaments: Resolutions adopted by the Assembly, 1 Oct. 1921, LoNA.

52 Drummond to Branting, 29 Sep. 1921, R217, LoNA.

53 By 1923 the PAC-secretaries accounted for 42 per cent of the budgeted spending on salaries, while the chef de section and two MoS absorbed 37,5 per cent. In 1924 the chef and MoS took up 29,3 per cent of salary budget. Estimates based on: Budget, 5th Fiscal Period (1923), OJ-3-34-1923, LoNA; Salaries for 1924 decreased from 168,000 to 141,358 Gold Francs. Based on: Annex to the General Report on Financial Questions. Amendments to the original budget estimates introduced or approved by the Fourth Committee, OJ-3-10-1924, LoNA.

54 Comm. Adams by Aghnides, 24 May 1939, Geneva, Personnel Files [henceforth PF] of Adams, LoNA.

55 Drummond to Cecil, 16 June 1930, Geneva, Add-MS-51112, Cecil Papers [henceforth CP], British Library, London [henceforth BL].

56 Procès-Verbal: 5th Session, Council. Rome, 14–19 May 1920, 2nd Public Meeting, 19 May 1920, PAC, Bourgeois, LoNA.

57 Drummond, Memorandum: Secretariat of PAC, 11 Apr. 1923, R229, LoNA. In April 1923 the Section consisted of one Chef de Service, one MoS, three military secretaries, one statistics clerk and five assistant secretary-stenographers.

58 Discussions, Réquin and Drummond, Apr.–Sept. 1923, R229, LoNA.

59 Report: PAC to Council, 06 Sept. 1923, R229, LoNA.

60 Drummond to Cecil, 13 Aug. 1923; quote from Drummond to Cecil, 11 Sept. 1923; Walters to Drummond, 10 Aug. 1923. All from Add MS-51110, CP, BL.

61 Drummond to Cecil, 13 Aug. 1923, Add MS-51110, CP, BL.

62 Already noted in the ‘Noblemaire Report’ (1920). Gram-Skjoldager and Ikonomou, ‘Construction’, 265–68.

63 Financial Questions, General Report adopted by the Assembly, 28 Sept. 1923, 5-LoN-OJ-3-10-1924, LoNA; Annex to the General Report on Financial Questions. Amendments to the original budget estimates introduced or approved by the Fourth Committee, 5-Lo-OJ-3-10-1924, LoNA.

64 Drummond to Sloutzki, 6 Feb. 1925; Attolico to Sloutzki, 24 Nov. 1925; Madariaga to Sloutzki, 3 Nov. 1926. All PF of Sloutzki, [Section Files] S883, LoNA.

65 Drummond to Aghnides, 17 June 1921; Note, Staff Committee: Aghnides, 17 June 1921; Angeli to Dudgeon, 22 Sep. 1921. All PF of Aghnides, S699, LoNA.

66 Attolico: Note, Aghnides, 20 Dec. 1922; Drummond to Aghnides, 28 June 1922. All PF of Aghnides, S699, LoNA.

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69 Torsten Kahlert and Karen Gram-Skjoldager, ‘The Men Behind the Man: Canvassing the Directorship of the League of Nations Secretariat’, in Haakon A. Ikonomou and Karen Gram-Skjoldager, eds., The League of Nations: Perspectives from the Present (Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2019), 19–29.

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73 AC, 11 June 1930, S957, LoNA.

74 Madariaga, Morning, 25.

75 AC, 27 June 1922, S954, LoNA.

76 AC, 14–15 Nov. 1927, S956, LoNA.

77 AC, 11 June 1930, S957, LoNA.

78 Note: Weizsäcker, 21 Feb. 1930, R96796, Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amts, Berlin [henceforth AA].

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83 Webster, ‘Absolutely’, 374.

84 The Information Section, ‘The League of Nations and Reduction of Armaments’, Dec. 1923, 6–9, LoNA.

85 DM, 08 July 1921; 11 Nov. 1921; 01 Feb. 1922; 21 Apr. 1922, LoNA.

86 DM, 08 July 1922, LoNA.

87 See https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/leagcov.asp#art8 (last visited 13 Apr. 2020).

88 Donaldson, ‘Secret’, 441; Akami, ‘Beyond’.

89 Webster, ‘Transnational’, 501.

90 Webster, ‘Making’, 558–9.

91 ‘Reduction of Armaments, I. Work of the [TMC]’, July 1923, 730, LNOJ-4, LoNA.

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94 Report by the Secretariat, 1033.

95 The Secretariat suggested groups based on shared borders, like a Northern Group of Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland, and groups based on ‘centres of unrest’, like a Group of Succession States to Austria-Hungary.

96 Report by M. Salandra, Resolution adopted by the Council on 07 July 1923, Annex 537. C.443.1923. IX. Reduction of Armaments. Exchange of Information. (Assembly Resolution No. IX.), Aug. 1923, 1031-1036, LNOJ-4, LoNA.

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101 Sloutzki, World, 126–7, 15, 18, 9; Donaldson, ‘Secret’, 458ff.

102 Quote from Webster, ‘Internationalism’, 140.

103 Bourgeois, Procès-Verbal: 5th Session, Council, 19 May 1920, LoNA.

104 Walters to Drummond, 17 July 1919, R182, LoNA.

105 DM, 3 Dec. 1919, LoNA.

106 DM, 1 Oct. 1919, LoNA.

107 DM, 29 June 1921, LoNA.

108 Reduction of Armaments. Report, 3rd Committee. Adopted by the assembly 1 Oct. 1921, 27 Sept. 1921, R217, LoNA.

109 TMC. Propaganda for the reduction of Armament, 15 Feb. 1922, R217, LoNA.

110 Aghnides to Drummond, 3 Apr. 1922, R217, LoNA.

111 Aghnides to Drummond, 13 Apr. 1922, R217, LoNA.

112 Davies, ‘Great Experiment’, 410.

113 Webster, ‘Internationalism’, 150.

114 Davies, Possibilities, 79–109.

115 Davies, Possibilities, 71; Drummond to Cecil, 27 Apr. 1927, Add-MS-51111, CP, BL.

116 Drummond to Cecil, 24 Apr. 1928; Cecil to Drummond, 27 Apr. 1928. All Add-MS-51111, CP, BL.

117 Cecil to Drummond, 27 Jan. 1926, All Add-MS-51111, CP, BL.

118 Comert to Sweetser, 17 Apr. 1926, Geneva, Box 30, Arthur Sweetser Papers, Library of Congress, Washington [henceforth ASP]. My Translation.

119 Davies, Possibilities, 79–109.

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