A critical examination of an international legal document leads to a discussion of trivialities and to hypotheses of almost impossible possibilities. Of course it is true that the carrying out of a great international agreement in the light of the facts and conditions of international life as they arise does not proceed along the technical lines that I have followed, but rather along those lines of policy which really control international action. I do not mean necessarily selfish policy, but policy in the larger sense of decisions based upon the best judgment of those in power for the time being.
What really ought to be done in studying any proposal such as the Protocol of Geneva, is to realize, if possible, the ultimate purpose of the document and to visualize, so far as we can, what would happen if it came into force, not so much what might happen under a particular phrase, but how the international relations of the world would proceed if the whole agreement were a reality.
I have mentioned more than once that the Protocol of Geneva contemplates that its provisions shall form part of the Covenant; in other words, that the two documents shall be amalgamated, forming an amended Covenant. With the hope of facilitating a general view, I have endeavored to put the two documents together in the form of an "amended" Covenant, and the result of this effort is set out below.[[1]]
Looking at the text of this "amended" Covenant, one may observe that while twenty of the present twenty-six Articles remain unchanged in form, Articles 12 to 17, inclusive, are expanded and somewhat rewritten; and eight Articles are added; and I do not think that the text of the "amended" Covenant could be phrased in much less language than it appears below.
Of course the length of a document in itself is not of much consequence; but it is not unimportant to observe that the "amended" Covenant is very much longer than the Covenant as it now reads. This fact, I say, is important, because it is the visible evidence of a reality. The Protocol of Geneva is not a mere completion of the provisions of the Covenant. Advocates of the Protocol make a very serious mistake when they erroneously say that the Protocol of Geneva is merely a rounding out of incomplete and partial agreements of the Covenant.
And it must be borne in mind that new or varied phrases in one Article may change the whole; the amended Covenant is altered not only in those Articles which may be textually amended, but throughout; I attempted to show this in detail as to Article 10 of the Covenant[[2]]; like any other document, the entire new paper must be read together.
What the Protocol of Geneva does is to create a new and a different League of Nations. It is true that what I may call the procedural and structural functions of the League are not changed; but the system of international relations which is now set up under the League is so much changed that one may properly say that it is an entirely new and different system.
To my mind, there are three outstanding features of the "amended" Covenant. It creates a complete system of compulsory arbitration; it consecrates the legality of the status quo; and it is a general defensive alliance.
Now let us compare these three features of the "amended" Covenant with the ideas of the existing Covenant.
The first mentioned, the system of compulsory arbitration, is by far the most important and the one that should be the starting point for any view of the "amended" Covenant as a whole. In this arbitration system is contained the idea of outlawry of war which the document embodies. The arbitration of disputes under the new system is to take the place of war, which is outlawed.