Armament > Conference for the control of the international trade in arms, munitions and implements of war

Document 8.
REPORT SUBMITTED BY MAJOR J. W. HILLS AND M. L. DUPRIEZ
TO THE FIRST SUB-COMMISSION OF THE TEMPORARY MIXED
COMMISSION AT ITS MARCH 1924 SESSION.
The first question which arises is upon what text the new Convention should be based.
It would seem that preference should unhesitatingly be given to the text of the Convention
of St. Germain. In the first place, it should be observed that, of the twenty-five articles which
that Convention contains, twenty have given rise to no objection or criticism and may be retained
almost unchanged.
Further, if a practical result is to be obtained and if the adhesion of the Powers concerned
is to be secured as soon as possible, the framework and, as far as possible, the system and termino¬
logy of the Convention of St. Germain must be preserved. In that case, those Powers which had
already decided to ratify that Convention will be able to see and understand at a glance the
additions, omissions and alterations made by the new Convention in the texts which they had
already accepted and they will be able to adhere with much less delay than if they were confronted
with a new organisation and with a text conceived on different lines. Moreover, those Powers
which have hesitated to ratify the Convention of St. Germain will be able to decide readily and
without difficulty whether, in the new drafts submitted to them, sufficient regard is paid to their
objections and their scruples.
The Convention of St. Germain must, however, be amended and amplified.
It must be amended in order to secure the adhesion of the United States, which is in every
way desirable. With this object, the right to export arms of war must no longer be limited to
arms exported to the Governments of the Powers signatory to the future Convention. More¬
over, all provisions most be omitted which might result in placing the United States in any sense
under the supervision of the League of Nations or of a body subsidiary to the League.
The Convention of St. Germain must also be amplified, for while it organised, through a
number of highly detailed provisions, a perfected system of control for the traffic in arms and
munitions in certain parts of Africa and Asia, it merely laid down some fundamental principles
as regards the same traffic in other parts of the world. The new Convention must, therefore,
include provisions which will ensure and guarantee, by means of definite measures, that these
fundamental principles will be observed and respected.
Before surveying the proposed additions and amendments to the Convention of St. Germain,
however, it may be well to explain clearly the fundamental principles which guided the framers
of the Convention of St. Germain and those which have been followed by Admiral the Marquis
de Magaz and M. Jouhaux, the authors of the two new drafts submitted to the Sub-Commission.
The Convention of St. Germain regulates — by means of two different regimes — a general
regime, which applies in principle to the international traffic in arms and munitions to all countries,
and a much stricter special regime, which applies to almost the whole of Africa and to certain
Asiatic regions. For the moment, we will leave on one side this special regime, which has undoubt¬
edly, though only by implication, been accepted by all the Powers concerned, has given rise to
no criticism at the meetings of the Temporary Mixed Commission, and was not dealt with by
the authors of the two new drafts. We will, therefore, for the present, confine our attention
entirely to the general regime.
For the purposes of this general regime, the Convention of St. Germain distinguishes three
categories of arms to which very different regulations are applicable:
First Category. — Arms of war, of which a detailed and specific list is given, though this list
does not include all arms "adapted to warlike purposes”. The traffic in these weapons is subject
to two regulations:
(1) Absolute prohibition of international traffic, subject to the right of each Contracting
Party to grant export licences to meet the requirements of the Government of another
High Contracting Party;
(2) Obligation to publish the full number of export licences granted to meet the require¬
ments of any Government.