the league of nations
...roved useful in settling minor international disputes, but they had a hard time stopping aggression involving major powers such as, Japan's occupation of Manchuria in 1931, Italy's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935-36, and Germany's seizure of Austria in 1938. It collapsed early in World War II and ended in 1946. Its ending in 1946 was because it had some basic and fundamental problems such as dealing with aggression involving major powers. Countries like Japan and Italy were able to just walk over the League of Nations because it had no armed forces of its own and it relied upon the co-operation of its members. This problem was inter-linked with the fact that the League was very slow at making decisions. With no armed forces this made it difficult to impose decisions. Therefore when a crisis occurred the league was supposed to act fast with resoluteness. Although, often the League met too infrequently and took far too long to make critical decisions. This need for all members to agree on a course of action undermined the strength of the League. The League was too indecisive they needed some influential countries. The absence of the powerful USA and, until 1934, the USSR were felt, this could have been the answer to the League's problems. However these countries did not join and again this contributed the failure of the league, as non-members, they could and did trade with countries facing League sanctions and therefore to a certain extent it was in their own interests to remain detached from such a commitment as the League. Another problem for the League however, was that it was being too closely linked to the victors of the First World War and the Peace Treaties. Another reason why the league failed was that because one their aims, 'To keep collective security…' failed. Britain and France along with other members were more concerned about their own interests. As a result they were reluctant to get involved in collective security (one of the reasons why Britain and France were reluctant to commit troops to fight for the League of...