One day, to its own sweet time, the International Court at the Hague will decide whether it has any authority to deal with the Anglo-Persian oil dispute. This is rather like you or me going to the police and asking them to protect us against a man who is going to kill us, and being told to wait until after we are dead, at which point the police will decide whether they have any authority to intervene. [The World Court later announced that it lacked jurisdiction in the oil dispute.]

Persia has now seized all the assets of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. She has done this by breaking the 30-year contract she had with the company. Persia says the international court has no authority, because this is a domestic matter; Britain says the court certainly does have authority, because an international treaty is at issue. Around midwinter, perhaps, the court will decide whether it can hear Britain’s case or not. Meanwhile, the British are out of Persia.

But supposing the court decided that it did have authority; and supposing it ruled that the Persian seizure of the oil installations was contrary to international law, what then? This, it seems to me, is the point at which all these high-minded attempts to put international relations on a law-abiding basis break down. For everybody, including the Persians, knows that the court has no way of enforcing its decision. If it rendered a decision against the Persians, and the Persians then (as they almost certainly would) told the court to go fly a kite, the court could do nothing. Ah, the international lawyers will say, but Persia will stand branded at the bar of world opinion. To which the answer is, so what?

In the civilized countries, we are so accustomed to a society where relations between one man and another are governed by the law that we forget how the law came to be paramount, and what keeps it that way. We say we are law-abiding; but in the last resort we are law-abiding only because the law is capable of bringing overwhelming force to bear against the law-breaker. (If you doubt that this threat of force is a factor just reflect on what happens to “law-abiding” people when the restraints are removed.)

If a man commits a murder, he will be arrested by a policeman. He may kill the policeman who comes to arrest him, in which, case a great number of other policemen will soon arrive. If there aren’t enough policemen, they can swear in a bunch of special constables and arm them. If that isn’t enough, they can call out the militia. If that isn’t enough they can summon the regular army, and if necessary the air force and the navy as well. No conceivable concentration of power could stand up against the forces of law and order if applied with determination.

It took centuries, in Britain, for the paramountcy of the law to be established. Until Henry VII made gunpowder a government monopoly, the country was full of barons who openly laughed at the King. Yet we expect to keep nations in order by signing treaties and conventions and high-sounding declarations, without making the slightest attempt to put teeth in these so-called international “laws” or to give them the force necessary to back them up.

If the international court wants to see its decisions stick, it must first establish a police force strong enough to enforce the law against any offender, no matter how powerful. If the United Nations, which has some pretention to being a world Parliament, wants to see its legislation effectively enacted, it must have its own armed services under its own control. The King of England never wielded effective power until he had his own armed forces, instead of relying on troops provided by barons who might or might not on the King’s side.

The United Nations and the international court are today in about the same stage of development as the British monarchy at the time of the Wars of the Roses. Powerful factions are struggling for supremacy, and in the resulting confusion the law has no effect whatever. Why don’t we stop kidding ourselves?