The Geneva Protocol, by David Hunter Miller

CHAPTER XV. 59
However, the question is of interest only from the point of view of the meaning of language; if the possibility
should arise, it would doubtless be taken care of by the Council.
Another and also comparatively unimportant point may be here noticed and that is in regard to the relations
between the signatories to the Protocol and the Members of the League not signatory thereto, another phase of
the temporary situation heretofore considered. As to this, it may be said very briefly that such relations would
continue to be governed wholly by the Covenant. The Members of the League which do not ratify the
Protocol could not during this temporary period be regarded as being in any way affected by what, as to them,
would be in the nature of proposed amendments to the text of the Covenant itself. These non-Signatories of
the Protocol would therefore continue to look only to the Covenant for the regulation of their relations with
any Member of the League. The Protocol does not contemplate a League within a League; it simply
contemplates, during this temporary phase, a situation where certain Members of the League had assumed
certain obligations without any constraint or effect whatever upon such Members as might not choose to
assume them.
The really vital question is as to the effect of the Protocol and of the Covenant upon non-Members of the
League in their relations with Signatories to the Protocol.
Even assuming that the plans now proposed for the admission of Germany to the League are carried out, there
will remain for a considerable period two Great Powers, the United States and Russia, outside the League; and
there are two other States of occasional international importance, the admission of which to the League is not,
so far as I know, presently contemplated, these being Mexico and Egypt.
Accordingly, the possible effect of the Covenant and the Protocol on non-Members of the League is one of
very great consequence. It is a question which is being actively discussed in so far as it may have a bearing on
the relations between Great Britain and the United States.
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It is unquestionably true that the Protocol may have a real effect on non-Members of the League. Of course
there is a legal formula which correctly says that a treaty cannot bind States not parties thereto, res inter alios
acta; but even in the strictest legal sense this formula is only part of the truth in international matters. Any one
who questions this will be convinced by reading Roxburgh's International Conventions and Third States.[2] A
treaty between State A and State B may harm State C or it may benefit State C, as the Treaty of Versailles
benefited Denmark by the cession of Slesvig, though Denmark was a neutral and not a party to the Treaty of
Peace.[3]
Let us consider the matter first from the point of view of the Covenant. There are sanctions which may be
applied under the Covenant and the application of these sanctions might affect a non-Member of the League
either because they were applied against that particular non-Member or because they were applied against
some other State.
It is rather curious that this question has not been very much considered under the Covenant; interest in it has
been greatly revived by the Protocol; but the possible realities under the Covenant are, it seems to me, in some
respects more important than those under the Protocol alone.
In considering this question it is well to look at it from the concrete point of view with a specific instance or
example before us.
The sanctions of the Covenant[4] are an economic and financial blockade. These sanctions may be applied
either as against a Member of the League which resorts to war contrary to the provisions of the Covenant or
they may be applied against a non-Member of the League which resorts to war against a Member after