•Throughout the 20th century, Australia and New Zealand went to extraordinary lengths to safeguard access to the phosphate resources of Nauru.•For most of the 20th century, the resources of Nauru ...were depleted to support the economic growth of Australia and New Zealand.•Without access to phosphate, neither Australia nor New Zealand would have been able to establish the industrial agricultural systems that were fundamental to their demographic, economic and social expansion.
The remote, equatorial Pacific island of Nauru once possessed perhaps the world’s purest deposits of rock phosphate, the precursor of the agricultural fertiliser, superphosphate. Scheming for this resource by the big nations of the western Pacific has seen Nauru play a major role in a series of global geopolitical dramas during the course of the 20th century.
In 1900, the economies of Australia and New Zealand were overwhelmingly agricultural. Yet both countries had begun to experience serious declines in agricultural productivity as the initial fertility of their soils was exhausted, and both possessed large tracts of marginal land unexploitable because of its low fertility. Access to phosphatic fertilisers was essential, not only to maintain and stimulate the agricultural sector, but to promote the development of the rest of the economy.
The discovery in the early 20th century of vast reserves of high-quality, easily accessible phosphate on the islands of the equatorial Pacific promised to be the catalyst that both nations needed to transform their economies. The largest reserves were those discovered on Nauru, and Australia and New Zealand went to extraordinary lengths to safeguard access to the island’s resources. This began in 1914 when Australia seized the opportunity offered by the start of the First World War to invade the then-German protectorate, deport the German population and secure control of the island. With the end of the war, and at risk of losing the spoils of victory to the idealistic philosophies that gave rise to the League of Nations, the Australian Prime Minister threatened the USA, manipulated the Empire Delegation to the Paris Peace Conference and even considered refusing to sign the Treaty of Versailles until Australia was guaranteed access to the island and its resources. A similar set of events played out at the end of the Second War. Captured and garrisoned by the Japanese, Nauru was by-passed and cut off by the Allied advance across the Pacific. The island was once again secured for Australian interests by Canberra’s prompt dispatch of HMAS Diamantina to accept the Japanese surrender.
For most of the 20th century, the resources of Nauru were depleted to support the economic growth of Australia and New Zealand. Between 1922 and 1966, at least 83% of Nauru’s annual output ended up on the fields and paddocks of Australia and New Zealand; whilst, along with Banaba and Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean, Nauru supplied almost the whole of Australia’s superphosphate needs for much of the 20th century.
Without access to phosphate, neither Australia nor New Zealand would have been able to establish the industrial agricultural systems that were fundamental to their demographic, economic and social expansion. Without superphosphates, agriculture in Australia and New Zealand may not have been viable, whilst in marginal areas cultivation may not have been possible at all. The histories of these nations would have followed unpredictably different paths, their development would have been impeded and it is possible that neither country would have achieved First World standing.
Izbijanjem Prvoga svjetskoga rata, češko vodstvo u egzilu započinje diplomatsku borbu za uspostavu neovisne čehoslovačke države koja je trebala biti u bliskom savezništvu sa zapadnim silama Antante. ...Svjesni nepovoljnog geostrateškog položaja buduće države, češki lideri Masaryk i Beneš od samoga početka projekt uspostave neovisne Čehoslovačke vezuju uz stvaranje neovisne Poljske i južnoslavenske države. U tom kontekstu barataju i s idejom Slavenskog koridora koji bi preko zapadne Ugarske – naseljene Nijemcima, Mađarima, ali i gradišćanskim Hrvatima – trebao spojiti dvije slavenske države i onemogućiti obnavljanje Austro-Ugarske, ali i spriječiti daljnji njemački Drang nach Osten. Na temelju teorije strukturalnog realizma, rad proučava ideju koridora u ratnoj fazi, kada je inicijativa u rukama češke političke emigracije, te u fazi Pariške mirovne konferencije, kada inicijativu preuzima "Velika četvorka". Rad nastoji pružiti odgovor na pitanje je li Slavenski koridor predstavljao jedan od temeljnih zahtjeva političkih predstavnika Čehoslovačke ili je korišten kao pregovarački alat za ostvarenje važnijih geopolitičkih ciljeva.
After the outbreak of World War i, the exiled Czech leadership began its diplomatic quest for the establishment of an independent Czechoslovak state that was to become a close ally of Western entente powers. Fully aware of the adverse geostrategic position of their future state, Czech leaders masaryk and Beneš coupled the project of establishing an independent Czechoslovakia with the creation of an independent poland and South Slavic state. in this context, they were considering the idea of a Slavic Corridor that would connect Czechoslovakia with Yugoslavia through a passageway in Western Hungary – an area populated by germans, magyars and Croats. the erection of the Corridor would neutralize the threat of an austro-Hungarian restoration and hinder germany’s advance towards the east (Drang nach Osten). Based on structural realism theory, the paper explores the idea of the Corridor during the war phase, when the initiative is in the hands of Czech political émigrés, and in the phase of the paris peace Conference, when the initiative is seized by the "Big Four". the paper attempts to resolve the question whether the Slavic Corridor was a central demand of Czechoslovak representatives or if it was used as a negotiation tool for the attainment of more important geopolitical goals.
The First World War (1914-1918) has been widely considered as a European conflict and a struggle for dominance among the European empires. However, it is important to note that non-European ...communities from various parts of the world such as the Chinese, Indians, Egyptians and Fijians also played significant roles in the war. This paper intends to provide an analysis of the involvement of China in the First World War. During the outbreak of the war in 1914, the newly established Republic of China (1912) encountered numerous problems and uncertainties. However, in 1917 the Republic of China entered the First World War, supporting the Allied Forces, with the aim of elevating its international position. This paper focuses on the treatment that China had received from the international community such as Britain, the United States, France and Japan after the war. Specifically, this paper argues that the betrayal towards China by the Western powers during the Paris Peace Conference and the May Fourth Movement served as an intellectual turning point for China. It had triggered the radicalization of Chinese intellectual thoughts. In addition, China's socialization during the Paris Peace Conference had been crucial to the conception of the West's negative identity in the eyes of the Chinese that has remained in the minds of its future leaders. It has also reinforced China's uncompromising attitude over territorial disputes till today. This study also highlights the contribution made by the Chinese Labour Corps (CLC). As the involvement of CLC has hardly been recognized after the First World War, this work not only elaborates China's involvement in the war but equally important, it also focuses on the role of the CLC which has been long forgotten.
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