but such historical therapy is evident in all the belligerent countries. In that process, the two world wars are intricately connected, each seen refractively through the prism of the other. This article focuses on Britain whose national obsession with the two world wars is particularly acute. The first and second sections suggest that British public discourse has been able to construct a satisfying narrative of - but not of -, meaning a narrative that has both a clear beginning, middle, and end and also a stark moral meaning. Viable narratives draw on the events themselves, the words used to conceptualize them, and the interpretations of 'instant' histories and memoirs. The third section argues that the elevation of - in national discourse as our 'finest hour' (Churchill) has aggravated the problematic nature of - for the British. In the wake of Brexit, the last section argues that Britain -unlike France and Germany -has found it difficult to move on from the era of the two world wars by locating these conflicts in a more positive narrative of the twentieth century as the eventual triumph of European integration.
What have been the most important factors in international relations for Australian foreign‐policymakers over the last sixty years? Five broad themes stand out: the end of empire; Cold War dependency; the changing nature of security; economic development; and race and national identity. Cumulatively, and often in intertwined ways, these themes have amounted to little short of a revolution in Australia's place in the world since the Second World War. The challenges facing Australians have, as a result, been considerable. The international context in which Liberals have made foreign policy has been reshaping Australia as it has been reshaping the external environment.
Anthony Eden. By Robert Rhodes James
Anthony Eden at the Foreign Office, 1931–1938. By A.R. Peters
The Fringes of Power: Downing Street Diaries, 1939–1955. By John Colville
Descent to Suez: Diaries, 1951–56. By Evelyn Shuckburgh
The Geneva Conference of 1954 on Indochina. By James Cable
The Failure of the Eden Government. By Richard Lamb
This review examines some of the recent British, American, and Russian scholarship on a series of important international transitions that occurred in the years around 1945. One is the shift of global leadership from Great Britain to the United States, in which, it is argued, the decisive moment was the fall of France in 1940. Another transition is the emergence of a wartime alliance between Britain and America, on the one hand, and the Soviet Union, on the other, followed by its disintegration into the Cold War. Here the opening of Soviet sources during the 1990s has provided new evidence, though not clear answers. To understand both of these transitions, however, it is necessary to move beyond diplomacy and strategy to look at the social, cultural, and economic dimensions of the Second World War. In particular, recent studies of American and Soviet soldiers during and after the conflict re-open the debate about Cold War ideology from the bottom up.
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