Internationalist Dunkirk

The opening phases of World War II convinced many in liberal international society that they needed to move quickly to preserve those branches of the League that supported the larger goal of liberal world order. In this moment, Americans fully appreciated that aspects of the League’s technical work could aid the refashioning of the liberal world order into one increasingly tailored to fit US specifications. The fall of France in 1940 made undeniable the vulnerability of the League to isolation and even possible fascist co-optation. A spectrum of agents representing powerful interests in international society that also characterized its diversity—advocacy groups, universities, foundations, international organizations, and individuals as well as governments—mobilized to save what were seen as critical strategic resources. The flight of the League's Economic and Financial Section with much of the vital data it had gathered to the US in August 1940 was part of a larger story of exile in the period but also the transfer of critical capacities to a United States that would become vital resources in efforts to defend liberal world order.