of economic expansion and settlement". The Baldwin Government, which had won the election on a ticket of support for the League, blanched when it learned what its foreign minister had done. The public was angered not only because they were disgusted at the winning of an election by false pretenses, but also the return to secret negotiations and the sharing of Africa. The British dissatisfied because they had not done the right things, tried to put an end to the war with collective measures. Britain failed, and Mussolini demolished Ethiopia. The Ethiopian war brought forth the fact that collective security is inefficient, and rearmament of individual states is necessary. This war caused the first serious rearmament effort by the British army. The transfer of two Italian divisions to Libya in September 1935 provoked the British, for the first time, to consider the possibility of an attack on Egypt by Italy. 16,500 British soldiers, some of who had to go to Palestine, reinforced the Egyptian army of 10,000. Recent Italian gains threatened British oil supplies, threatened the safety of imperial communications through the Suez Canal to the east and especially to India, and also threatened the British possessions and protectorates in the region and especially Egypt. The Italian conquest gave rise to the doubts in the Middle East as to whether the British retained either the capacity or the determination to defend her positions in the region. The Italian conquest of Ethiopia, to the eyes of the Arabs and the Egyptian population, was a trial of strength between Great Britain and Italy, in which Britain had resulted in being in the worst position. At this time, Germany was not thought of as a big threat yet. In fact Germany gained a lot from Abyssinian war since it took all the attention of the world from Europe and gave Hitler the freedom to do what he pleased in Europe. Britain had already lost some of the prestige and power in its name when ...
