197

PACIFIC BLOCKADE:

A LOST OPPORTUNITY OF THE 1930'S?

Walter R. Thomas

It seems to be unfortunately with engaging naivety, that war was true that the epidemic of world outlawed. It was also becoming ap­ lawlessness is spreading. When an parent that the United States could not epidemic of physical disease starts really snuggle under a blanket of isola­ to spread, the community ap­ tion and tuck out the international proves and joins in a quarantine in community. The President, therefore, order to protect the health of the was leaning toward closer ties with community against the spread of peaceful nations-but the American the disease. 1 public was not ready. Although President Franklin D. Isolationists, pacifists, protectionists, Roosevelt's quarantine address, which and internationalists of every hue ex­ was delivered in Chicago on 5 October amined the body of the President's 1937, failed to outline any detailed speech and found, according to their national or international program which bent, some reason to reject it. Spectres would deter potential aggressors, this of embargoes, sanctions, boycotts, for­ particular speech was at least a frank eign entanglements, neutrality viola­ and open invitation to military and tions, and the abandonment of the political leaders at home and abroad to Monroe Doctrine stalked across the reappraise the tenets of isolationism and pages of America's newspapers and appeasement which had become im­ periodicals. These critics continued to bedded in the basic structure of their haunt the President until, with dis­ nations' foreign policies. Perhaps the couraging finality, the abortive Brussels' President was not individually ready to Conference of late 1937 disclosed that initiate or direct an international pro­ unity of effort was an unstable com­ gram of collective action but, by 1937, modity in both the domestic and the he was becoming obviously un­ international market. comfortable "rithin the confines of the This germ of isolation, which had Neutrality Acts where, to some extent, infected the country since World War I, he had placed himself and the country. had not altogether spared the officers of Japan's earlier refusal to abide by her the United States Navy, even as late as naval limitations and the gradual col­ 1937. One wrote: lapse of the League of Nations, together The New World with the sup­ with the years of creeping conflicts up port of the United States is to 1937, had a profound and dis­ completely self-sufficient and im­ couraging effect upon that Kellogg­ pregnable to almost any type of Briand world which had been assured, attack. The United States and the 198 New World remain intact in the other state in time of peace to coerce face of potential world destruc­ the latter into acting in accordance with tion.2 the wishes of the blockading state or states. '>4 Collective Blockades. Although many Great Britain and the United States, courses of positive action could have for example, had recently acquiesced to been effected under the President's this legal gambit when Japan set up a "quarantine" banner, there is an obvi­ "pacific blockade on 25 August 1937 of ous facet of naval involvement which is the territory between the mouth of the particularly noticeable by its absence. Yangtze and Swatow for all Chinese The concept of collective pacific block­ vessels and nonpeaceful cargo of third ades, which had been formerly em­ states. "5 ployed with some success, was not By the spring of 1938, then, the considered as a possible ocean strategy in ternational legality of collective against aggressors between 1935 and pacific blockades was generally un­ 1939. Was this because of international questioned; the naval forces of the reluctance, military inability, illegality nonaggressor members of the League of (under international law), or a genuine Nations, together with the United States failure to review the operational prac­ Navy, was superior to the collective ticality of suppressing aggression navies of Japan, Germany and Italy; the through limited confrontation on the violation of the Versailles Treaty and high seas? the Kellogg-Briand Pact provided As a precedent for action there had sufficient aggravation for all other sig­ been about 20 collective pacific block­ natories to demand a cessation of ade cases effectively recorded before hostile acts; and the world seemed World War II. In 1827 Russia, France, ready, if not really eager, to listen to and Great Britain, acting in concert, advocates of containment. It is there­ blockaded the Morea to prevent the fore surprising that naval officers and Turkish fleet from coming out of Nava­ seapower savants-including President rino during one of the many Turkish­ Roosevelt and Mr. Churchill-did not at Greek disputes. Again, in 1833, the least gravitate toward the advantages of French and British forces blockaded the using their combined naval forces as a Netherlands until the Dutch carried out threat against the greedy nations, par­ an 1831 treaty which provided for the ticularly since the success of collective independence of Belgium. pacific blockades had been well docu­ From 1845-1850 the French and the mented. British blockaded Uruguay to cut off Argentine supplies to the Oribe forces; Enforcement and Theory. Ad­ and in 1897 Britain, France, Austria, mittedly the use of blockade as a Germany, Italy, and Russia blockaded weapon is hazardous for it can be as Crete to prevent other nations from easily pointed in error toward the delivering weapons to Greek insurgents. saintly as in honor toward the sinful. These collective blockades were both There are, nevertheless, certain singular pacific and effective and demonstrated advantages in using pacific blockades: how combined naval action could create 1. Pressure can be applied on actual stability within an area. 3 or potential aggressors away from terri­ The League of Nations also could torial boundaries by warships of the have directed a collective pacific block­ blockading states. ade based on its covenant and the 2. Economic restrictions are effected principle that "any state or states may without directly involving the native blockade the coasts and ports of an- populace in conflict. 199

3. Military units can be maintained affiliation with quarantine bears scru­ in nonsovereign waters. tiny, not only because of the natural 4. International decisions may gravi­ affinity benY'een naval power and for­ tate toward areas less combatant in eign relations, but because writers, both nature than war. then and now, have neglected to advo­ 5. The alternate avenues of arbitra­ cate the possibility of using seapower tion, mediation, and conciliation can be and collective pacific blockades as an thoroughly explored before war be­ obstacle to expansionist movements. comes inevitable. The theory of pacific blockade also Navy Posture in the 1930's. The has exceptional attraction. It is usually primary interests of the United States bloodless, which appeals to the humane; Navy in the 1930's were in the funding it is done with a minimum of military of a badly needed shipbuilding and force, which entices economists and research program and in the tactical politicians; and it is imposed on the sea, training and operational readiness of its away from the territory of the offend­ officers and men against possible future ing state, which results in an irresistible adversaries. charm for statesmen and naval advo­ If the United States Navy had been cates. Admiral Powers has written: modernized and brought to the parity Although it has been stated limits allowed by the Washington and that unilateral pacific blockade is London Conferences, perhaps her sea no longer permissible for an indi­ supremacy over all other nations, except vidual member of the United Great Britain, would have encouraged Nations, the possibility of one adventures in power ploys abroad. At should not be dismissed. A uni­ least, such leadership would have issued I a teral declaration of pacific a temptation to use this force in interna­ blockade which was stated to be tional discussions by" 1937-despite the in the interest of world peace, isolationist sentiment that might have which was justified by the action refused to sanction its actual applica­ of the nation blockaded, and tion. Unfortunately, the American Fleet which was accepted by the world, was approximately 65 percent of treaty should be upheld.6 strength at this time, while the Japanese By 1937, a similar posture of en­ Fleet approached 95 percent; and, even forcement which did not directly when marines were being sent to Shang­ threaten the political structure of an­ hai in August 1937, the Asiatic Fleet other nation nor intrude upon its sover­ was only a modest force. It was not eignty with armed forces may have been until after Great Britain entered World the only rational answer to overt aggres­ War 'n that President Roosevelt asked sors. Congress to expand the Navy beyond No attempt has been made to charge, the old treaty limits or to beef up the in retrospect, that American leaders or island outposts in the Pacific. naval officers were delinquent in not The pretense of naval superiority publicly proposing that collective pa­ through ceiling limitations had, in cific blockades were a panacea for early reality, severely handicapped the United Axis aggressions. Neither is there a States. The Navy had neither the ships directed verdict that collective pacific nor men to enforce a unilateral pacific blockades could have been successfully blockade against Italy in" 1935, and it effected or that their initiation would was even less capable of effecting such have thwarted or delayed the ambitious action against Japan by 1937. designs of Italy, Germany, or Japan. It There were, however, adequate is merely that the lack of naval grounds for proposing that the Presi- 200 dent's quarantine might he translated President Roosevelt dedicated his later into the fonuidahle posture of collective efforts. pacific hlockades. While such a plan An examination of comhined allied would have heen more effective if it had naval strengths and the suitahility of heen. initiated against Italy in 1935, collective naval hlockades indicates that continued against Genuany in 1936, the fonuulation of a combined sea­ and used in its third phase against Japan power posture would have heen one in 1937, there was still an opportunity practical application of quarantine for a forthright comhined naval program under international law-though cer­ in early 1938 if future European allies tainly not the only possihle hulwark to had joined the United States in a rela­ the cupidity of the Axis leaders from tively moderate confrontation of the 1935 to 1939. three major aggressors hefore Munich. However, after Great Britain deter­ It is easy. to discard moderate sea­ mined to recognize Italy's conquest of power proposals as futile hecause they Ethiopia and Hitler occupied Austria, could not have altered the inevitahle there was no longer a major detour course of hiStory. By 1937, for ex­ around Munich. No leaders sincerely ample, the Nine Power Treaty had desired to ratify aggression, hut neither crumhled, initial aggression had heen did they wish to emhrace conflict. tolerated, and the U.S. Neutrality Acts Collective action, while contemplated, were a stern reality; hut the leaders of never hecame a matter of active military many nations seem to have· heen involvement. .Pacific hlockades, while awakening to the need for action, even logical, were not equated with quaran­ if they were divided or completely tine hy naval or civilian scholars. The unaware of how their efforts could he fleeting opportunity to test quarantine directed. as a deterrent to aggression passed The imposition of collective pacific over the heads of seapower advocates hlockades, therefore, still might have from Octoher 1937 until Octoher heen a valuahle strategy as a response to 1962. the President's quarantine quandary. It Since estahlishment of the United would have required delicate diplomacy, Nations, claims coercively to hlockade a strong legal position within the re­ are to he measured against the require­ straints of international law, coordi­ ments of self-defense, enforcement nated naval tactics, and exceptional action hy regional arrangements, or leadership hy the heads of nations who police action hy the organized com­ contrihuted unit support. Perhaps these munity. The position of quarantine, elements could have led puhlic opinion however, as a collective pacific hlock­ into the peace offensive toward which ade, still remains nehulous.

NOTES

1. Franklin D. Roosevelt, The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt (London: Macmillan, 1941), VI, p. 410. 2. Howard Gray Bronson, "Sea Power and World Peace," United States Naval Institute Proceedings, December 1937, p. 1697. 3. Neill H. Alford, Jr., "The Cuban Quarantine of 1962: an Inquiry into Paradox and Persuasion," Virginia Journal of International Law, January 1964, pp. 37-73. 4. Alfred E. Hogan, Pacific Blockade (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1904), p. 70. 5. Payson Sibley Wild, International Law Situations 1938 (Washington: U.S. Govt. Print. Off., 1940), pp. 58-59. 6. Robert D. Powers, Jr., "Blockade: for Winning without Killing," United States Naval Institute Proceedings, August 1958, p. 66. ----'f1----