INTRODUCTION

This chapter considers how the prime minister and foreign secretaries of two Labour governments, those of 1924 and of 1929–31, viewed and handled Japan. One man, James Ramsay MacDonald, held three of these positions. The fourth, Arthur Henderson, foreign secretary between 1929–31, struggled with MacDonald over foreign policy. Henderson dominated the government's decisions on China and Europe, but mattered little to those on Japan. Hence, this chapter focuses on MacDonald and Japan.

RAMSAY MACDONALD's LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM AND HIS ATTITUDE TOWARDS JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE

MacDonald's role in the collapse of the second Labour government, and his leadership of a National government in the 1930s as his mind failed, overshadow his prior record as a politician. Between 1890–1931, MacDonald was a founder of the Labour Party, and a politician of courage and principle. His opposition to British involvement in the Great War won him enemies, and friends, as did his struggle for the social democratic movement against the USSR. Despite hostility from many colleagues, he dominated the Labour Party between 1924 and 1931. Within his Party and government, he was a vain and opinionated micro-manager, but politically skilful. He did not entirely trust any of his colleagues, or officials. More than any other prime minister of his time, he challenged the Foreign Office and the fighting services on strategic policy. MacDonald had powerful and radical views on foreign policy. He yearned for Britain to promote liberal internationalism and arms limitation or disarmament. In these Labour governments, his leading priority in foreign policy was to create international agreements on arms limitation. His principal aim was to cancel military programmes, which, he believed, might cause other peoples to prepare for war with Britain. Peoples did not want war, although some of their leaders might do so. MacDonald accepted the theory of arms races, the idea that for any state to maintain powerful military forces or to expand them, created fear and suspicion among other peoples, and drove them to reciprocate. Britain could stop this danger only by avoiding military expansion, and by changing the psychological balance of power within and between countries.