The Evening Star (March 23, 1946)
Iran issue scheduled to be met squarely
UNO Security Council seeking to avoid League’s mistakes
By Bertram Benedict
The first meeting of the UNO Security Council in London last January dodged the dispute between Russia and Iran. The Council agreed to leave it to direct negotiations between the two countries, although reserving the right to be kept informed of the negotiations. The second meeting of the Council, to open in New York on the coming Monday, now seems determined to meet the Russian-Iranian issue directly.
The course adopted by the UNO Council in January was similar to the course taken by the League of Nations in the first ticklish problems to come its way. And perhaps the UNO Council has become convinced that the dodging tactics adopted by the League in its first years were one prime reason why the League failed.
The League had a plausible pretext for dodging the issue of the Polish-Russian war. The League had come officially into existence on January 10, 1920; before then, France, Great Britain and Poland were unofficially at war with the Soviet government. Winston Churchill was quoted by Sen. Pepper of Florida in the Senate last Wednesday as saying: “The Allies… stood as invaders on Russian soil. They armed the enemies of the Soviet government. They blockaded its ports and sank its battleships. They earnestly desired and schemed its downfall.”
Sidestepped problem
So when the unofficial war broke out into official war in April 1920, when Polish troops invaded Soviet territory, the Council could truthfully say that this was a pre-League problem, still being handled by the Supreme Council of the Allies. Russia wasn’t a member of the League.
When the League came into existence, Poland and Lithuania were in dispute concerning Vilna and the surrounding territory. The new state of Lithuania had made Vilna its capital. When Polish and Lithuanian troops clashed in the disputed territory in August 1920, Lithuania appealed to the League, of which it was not yet a member.
On October 7, Lithuania and Poland signed an agreement whereby Vilna went to Lithuania. But three days later Polish irregulars under Gen. Zeligorski occupied the city. The League called for a plebiscite, but this couldn’t be held while the Polish troops were in possession, and they refused to get out. In March, 1921, the League called off the plebiscite. The League washed its hands of the problem in January 1922, and in February 1923 practically accepted the Zeligorski fait accompli.
Memel and Lithuania
The Peace Conference had detached the city of Memel (chiefly German) and the surrounding territory (chiefly Lithuanian) from Germany, but had not reassigned them. For three years they were governed by a small French force acting for the Allies. In January 1923, Lithuanian troops moved in. The League first left the problem to the Council of Ambassadors, itself took up the problem in September 1923 ultimately let Lithuania keep Memel, with certain trade rights for Poland.
In August 1923, four Italian nationals engaged in delimiting the Albanian-Greek frontier were murdered on Greek soil. Mussolini delivered a stern ultimatum to Athens, which accepted some of its provisions, rejected others, offered to submit the dispute to the League. Thereupon an Italian squadron bombarded the Greek island of Corfu and then occupied it.
On the same day Greece, like Italy a League member, submitted the dispute to the League, also consented to jurisdiction by the Council of Ambassadors. Mussolini rejected the jurisdiction of the League, but accepted that of the ambassadors. The League let these handle the situation; their decision was favorable to the great power and unfavorable to the small one.