-- \ \ "bad faith” but the other side will see only a just recovery of their former position, Treaties of alliance have had a decidedly spotty record, Since the possible effect of an alliance is to draw a third party into a war which is not of his doing, the strain on the treaty is very great unless both allies fecl at the time that they are equally threatened. It seems too much to expect that a nation which has no interest in the outcome of a war will risk its very life merely to fulfill a promise contained in a treaty of alliance, It may well do so if the Qi hia. risk of losing is not very great, but one should not expertthis if the odds are fs f clearly against victory. e ' \ _t Where conditions have changed radically and unobeosediy Since a treaty was Signed, a nation which suffers real injury by such change will on occasion refuse to be bound by its promises, While it is true that under international law the injured state is not justified in doing so without the acquiescenc> of the other side, nevertheless the absence of any disintcrested method of enforcing treaty changes to accord with changes in surrounding circumstances can cause great hardship and will sometimes induce the injured party to take things into its own hands. In these cases it usually happens that the nation opposing any change will raise aloft the banner of pacta sunt servanda as the basic norm of all international relations, yet to the other side it will seem that insistence upon ‘the letter of the treaty is merely black reaction dressed up in the white garments of morality. . Efforts to limit armaments by treaty have certainly not enjoyed a brilliant success, On the other hand, it cannot be said that they have wniformly failed. The more recent criticism levelled against the Washington Treaty for the Linitation of Naval Armament of 1922 was not that it was ineffective but that it was So largely observed. One lesson seems clear and that is that not much can be expected from attempts at limitation of armament which are not closely tied in with the international political pattern of the times or which go counter to the