or greed or fear, continue to
desire to increase their fighting strength, no arrangements for
proportionate disarmament are likely to be effective. On the other hand,
if the basis of a really valid league or federation can be laid,
precluding the most ambitious State from any reasonable hope of
indulging dreams of successful conquest, while relieving timid States
from the apprehensions under which they have lived hitherto, the natural
play of political forces within each State will favour disarmament. An
international arrangement that meets our requirements must be strong
enough to reverse the motives, aggressive and defensive, which in the
past have caused nations to arm. Nations will not pile up armaments if
they believe that they will have no need or opportunity to use them. To
produce this belief in the uselessness of national armies and navies is
therefore a prime object of international policy. The successful
establishment of this belief involves, however, a change of disposition
among national governments amounting to the process known in religious
circles as conversion. They must be induced to forgo that right of war
which according to past statecraft has been the brightest jewel in the
crown of sovereignty.

Thus we are again brought round to our vital issue, that of the amount
and kind of cession of sovereignty required for an effective
International Government. It may be the case that it will be impossible
to induce a sufficient number of the great States to transfer the
ultimate right of waging war to a representative International
Government, or to cede to such a Government the right to legislate on
international relations with power to enforce obedience to these laws.
There are, however, many of us who hold that these powers are essential
to an international arrangement which shall effectively guarantee the
peace of the world. The abandonment of the sovereign right to make war
is essential for the future security of peace. Legislative and executive
powers for an International Government are essential to obtain by
pacific means those changes in the political and economic relations of
peoples which hitherto have only been attainable by war. No merely
statical settlement will suffice. Great new issues of national
controversy or of economic needs will certainly come up afresh for
settlement, and until some stable method of government is established
with power to determine and enforce the equities and the util