Basic Outline of the Washington Disarmament Conference

The Washington Disarmament Conference was held from November 1921 to February 1922. Also commonly known as the Washington Naval Conference and the Washington Arms Conference. The conference was held in Washington which was called by President Warren Harding and was led by the U.S. Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes.

Cause:
Senator William Borah believed that the arms race between Britain, the U.S. and Japan needed to be slowed down, in order to avoid another war. Japan's militarism was gaining strength fast, which made Borah persuade Harding and Hughes to negotiate disarmament with both Japan and Britain. There was also tension among nations because of territories in the Far East and Harding and Hughes decided the best way to solve these conflicts was to hold a conference with eight other nations.  America's main goals were to keep the Japanese navy from expanding in west part of the Pacific Ocean, decide on naval restraints, and to resolve the tension in Eastern Asia.

Countries Involved:
-The United States (obviously)
-Great Britain
-France
-Japan
-Italy
-Belgium
-the Netherlands
-China
-Portugal

Great Britain, France, Japan and Italy were invited to discuss naval reduction and Belgium, the Netherlands, China and Portugal were invited to talk about the current tension in the Far East.

Outcome:
The Washington Naval Conference led to the creation of three major treaties: The Five-Power Naval Treaty, The Four-Power Treaty and the Nine-Power Treaty.

The Five-Power Naval Treaty: This treaty was based off of Hughes's idea of ship ratios. This gave the U.S., Great Britain, Japan, France and Italy a set amount of certain amount of battleship tonnage they could have. Both the U.S. and Great Britain could have 525,000 tons and Japan could have 315,000 tons. France and Italy were set to have the least at 175,000 tons.

The Four-Power Treaty: The Four-Power Treaty involved the U.S., Britain, France and Japan. These four countries agreed that if a future crisis happened in the Far East, they would consult each other first before taking action. This Treaty also eliminated the Anglo-Japanese alliance which was an agreement between the British and the Japanese. The U.S. wanted to get rid of the alliance because if they went to war with Japan, the British might have to join the Japanese side. By eliminating the Anglo-Japanese alliance and establishing The Four-Power Treaty, all countries involved agreed they would not be obligated to engage in a future conflicts between any of these four nations.

The Nine-Power Treaty: This agreement involving all nine nations at the conference, stated to globalize the Open Door Policy in China. All of the nations who signed the Treaty would keep the territorial boundaries in China and China would not refuse to let other nations do business in their country.