After the establishment of the peace arrangements in and around Paris during 1919 and 1920, Great Britain and British foreign policy were not much exercised by the countries of Eastern and Southeastern Europe, ceding the initiative in this region to France. The sole exception, through its geographical position, was Greece, which had always occupied an important place in British foreign policy on account of its importance for imperial strategic interests. The 1925 Treaties of Locarno confirmed the inviolability of the Franco-German and BelgoGerman frontiers, but gave no guarantees for Germany’s eastern borders. The British indifference can be attributed to a number of factors. For a start, Great Britain by then no longer counted as the world’s top-ranking power; it was slipping lower below the pinnacle that it had occupied among nations through its authority alone, even before the Congress of Vienna in 1815. Its economic strength had likewise been blunted, and the United States was displaying much more rapid and dynamic development. The British preference for peace also played a part. A distinct sense of guilt had arisen among a segment of British public opinion that Germany had been punished too severely and unjustly at Versailles. The countries of Eastern Europe were not worth another conflict with the defeated enemy, if only for that reason; moreover, the region was not really important from an economic or strategic standpoint, notwithstanding the fact that during the 1920s Great Britain backed the Bethlen government’s endeavours to stabilize the Hungarian economy by offering substantial loans under favourable conditions. The significance of the loans lay not only in their stabilizing impact on the country’s finances but also in their value in sending out a powerful message that British financial circles were confident about the consolidation of Hungary’s political régime and economic outlook

and about the efforts being made by the Bethlen government to overcome the country’s international isolation.