This collection examines various aspects of the efforts made to limit warfare through arms limitation and disarmament agreements in the period from the first Hague conference to the outbreak of World War II in Europe. The issue for each contributor is not necessarily to show whether individual endeavors, separate conferences, and the rest were successful or unsuccessful--though this is an important consideration. Rather, each chapter tends to offer differing points of view on accomplishments and failures because, as is so often the experience in historical study, the record is mixed; and this situation is certainly no less characteristic of arms limitation and disarmament between 1899 and 1939.

Written by experts on disarmament issues, these chapters put into historical perspective how and why the effort, to restrain war were undertaken at the Hague conferences, the Washington conference, and among antiwar groups. Each contributor approaches this task using the method he or she deems most appropriate. Some employ an historiographical approach; others undertake to produce analyses based heavily on archival holdings in order to offer new interpretations of the past or revise existing ones. This book will be of interest to students and teachers alike of modern history and political science.