Why did the United Nations fail to stop World War 2?

Answer 1

The aim of the League of Nations was disarmament, to stop wars, improve lives and employment for citizens and enforce and maintain the Treaty of Versailles. The League planned to make peace and settle any disputes without violence or force. The League had some good ideas and they were successful, but overall, it was a failure. There were many reasons why it had failed to keep peace: Not all countries joined the League, therefore it was weak, there were lack of troops, economic sanctions didn't work, there was betrayal, there was self-interest of leading members and decisions were slow.

First, Germany was not allowed to join as a punishment for starting WWI, and also Russia because of rising fear of Communism. Most of all, even though it was Woodrow Wilson from USA who created the League of Nations, USA was never a member of the League due to isolationism since they didn't want to get involved in other countries' problems and issues. The next reason was that they didn't want to risk more Americans dying in a war. They felt that it would result in them making efforts by such as sending soldiers all around the world to sort out small disputes created by other countries. This caused the absence of power in the League. Furthermore, neither France nor Britain had power since they both got weakened by WWI. They had no power and enough resources like the USA, and the USA was the most powerful country in the world. The League couldn't accomplish its aim without troops, power and money.

The main weapon of the League of Nations was sanctions. Sanctions were made when countries were against Covenant. They informed countries to stop trading with aggressive countries when some countries broke the covenant, but didn't work because countries could still trade with non-member countries. When the world was hit by depression, countries' economy fell, redundancy rose trade was reduced, and businesses lost income. When the world was hit by depression in the late 1920s, countries were unwilling to lose trading partners to other non-member countries, so they kept trading. Other countries overcame depression by making a bigger empire. For example, in 1931, Japan attacked Manchuria, wanting to get over depression. The League of Nations sent a group led by Lytton to check the problem in Manchuria, and told Japanese to leave the place in 1933. However, they refused to leave and remained there. Instead, they decided to leave the League of Nations. Since so many countries had trading connection with Japan and the League of Nations didn't war to happen, they couldn't do anything.

Britain and France were the two leading members in the League and often made decisions based on their own interest. Due to the impact of WWI, they were very weak in terms of both economy and military power. In order to build up these powers, they had to make decisions often based on their own interest. For example, Italy invaded Abyssinia and the League did not try to stop Mussolini, instead, they gave part of Abyssinia to Italy so that they would not start a war, but this obviously made people of Abyssinia unhappy. Japan and Italy fully ignored the League's suggestions and orders then they soon betrayed and didn't become part of the League. This made the League of Nations appear powerless, and sometimes was overruled by other non-member countries.

Moreover, the League of Nations was unable to decide promptly. The members of the League met only once a year. They made unanimous decisions (i.e. decisions had to be agreed by all nations during the League of Nations meeting). When countries called the League of Nations for help, they had to set up a quick meeting, discuss about the situation and get the agreement of all countries. Even if only one country disagreed with a decision, the other countries had to think of another, better decision. As a result, this made the League of Nations make decisions slow to stop an act of aggression. For example, when Japan invaded Manchuria, it took a whole year for the League's decision to be made.

Another reason was that because one they the League had failed to keep collective security. 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 Nations) and their League could not make powerful countries obey their rulings.

Answer 2

Sanctions against Germany were too severe resulting in severe economic hardship that caused the German people to seek an alternative. Hitler, although a bad choice, was perceived as their only option at the time.

Which war?The League of Nations didn't even exist in WW1. The above answer is off topic and meaningless.

The league of Nations DID exist...

In an effort to avoid future destructive conflicts, at the end of WWI, the diplomats who gathered for the Paris Peace Talks created The League of Nations. Their main principal, of course, was to maintain world peace. The league had two major flaws that ultimately caused it's failure. First, was the lack of power it held to enforce decisions made by the league. Second, it relied on collective security as a tool for the preservation of world peace. The basic premise underlying collective security arrangements was the argument the concept that aggression against one state was considered aggression against ALL states, which had pledged to aide one another.

Answer 3

They needed the U.S. to join in order for them to be powerful enugh to take effect, because it was mostly made up of small counties with little or no influence. Dispite President Wilsons pleading, the U. S. would not join. The league of nations failed and were not able to prevent wars.

Answer 4

The League of Nations was good in theory, but in actuality had no "muscle behind the words".

After Word War 1, the international community, which included the League of Nations, put many sanctions on Germany. Once Hitler rised to power, he began violating these sanctions, doing exactly the opposite of what the League of Nations wanted him to do.

The League of Nations continued to threaten action, but never actually took action. As soon as Hitler realized that the League wouldn't follow through on their threats, he took it upon himself to do whatever he wanted.

By the time anyone took action, Germany had invaded Austria, Czech, and Poland.

Answer 5

The League of Nations was not formed until 1920. Therefore, it had no bearing on World War One. After the League was formed, it failed and a case can be made that if the US had joined the League, it would have been a more viable organization.

Answer 6

The United Nations was created from the alliance of wartime victors and did not exist at the time World War 2 began.

Answer 7

The League had no power other than the power of the member nations. Those nations were not disposed to enforce peace, since several of the members were the ones that started WW 2.