It challenges many existing interpretations and argues that the basis of the Anglo-American special relationship was laid by Roosevelt and Chamberlain, that Roosevelt preferred Stalin to Churchill, and that the origins of the Cold War should be seen as a British education of the Americans to the Soviet threat. Suez is reassessed following the recent release of material in the Eisenhower Library. There is a consideration of the relationship of 'mutual interdependence' and why Wilson and Heath chose to move instead towards the European connection, as well as Mrs Thatcher's reasons for preferring the Atlantic alliance.
During the years following the end of the Second World War the British Labour government was preoccupied with the threat posed by Russia. Britain could not contain Russia on its own; indeed, only the United States possessed the necessary power. At the beginning of 1949 this was emphasized by the newly formed permanent under secretary's committee headed by William Strang. That committee considered the Anglo-American special relationship as the pivot of British foreign policy: British interests were best likely to be ensured by its maintenance and consolidation. An inequality was, however, inherent in the association, and Britain thought that the alliance would be least effective in Asia and the far east, an area where American naivety and selfishness were particularly evident. The spread of Mao Tse Tung's communists across the Chinese mainland emphasized Britain's predicament, especially as, initially, the Chinese were regarded as orthodox communists.
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