National Security and Imperial Defence: British Grand Strategy and Appeasement, 1930–1939

McKercher, B. J. C.

doi:10.1080/09592290802344954

Cited by 9 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…41 While diplomats endeavoured to establish 'an accommodation with Japan within a revised East Asia balance of power', the military leadership began strategic planning for a potential conflict with it. 42 In March 1932, the British Chiefs of Staff Sub-committee argued that the Manchurian crisis demonstrated that the so-called 'ten year rule'-the strategic assumption that the British empire would not face a major conflict within the subsequent ten years-should be cancelled. Despite financial constraints, this was agreed by the government the same year.…”

Section: First French Moves On the Paracelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Strategic forgetting: Britain, China, and the South China Sea, 1894–1938

Hayton

2023

Mod. Asian Stud.

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This article clarifies a mythologized episode in the early development of the South China Sea disputes and shows how it was later ‘forgotten’ by British policymakers for strategic reasons. Using documents from the UK National Archives it confirms, for the first time, that Qing/Chinese officials did deny responsibility for the Paracel Islands in 1898/1899. It then shows how this correspondence was strategically ignored by British officials during the 1930s in the context of renewed disputes between China, France, and Japan over the sovereignty of the islands. It argues that during the 1930s, British officials sought to bolster the Chinese position in the South China Sea because of a concern that France would remain neutral in any forthcoming conflict. This resulted in Britain taking a view on the sovereignty disputes that was at odds with the evidence in its own archives but which provided useful political support for the Republic of China.

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Section: First French Moves On the Paracelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Strategic forgetting: Britain, China, and the South China Sea, 1894–1938

Hayton

2023

Mod. Asian Stud.

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Britain's Grand Strategy during the 1930s

Lobell

2012

The Challenge of Grand Strategy

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When states appease: British appeasement in the 1930s

Trubowitz¹,

Harris²

2014

Rev. Int. Stud.

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When do states appease their foes? In this article, we argue that governments are most likely to favour appeasing a foreign threat when their top leaders are severely cross–pressured: when the demands for increased security conflict sharply with their domestic political priorities. We develop the deductive argument through a detailed analysis of British appeasement in the 1930s. We show that Neville Chamberlain grappled with a classic dilemma of statecraft: how to reduce the risk of German expansionism while facing acute partisan and electoral incentives to invest resources at home. For Chamberlain, appeasement was a means to reconcile the demands for increased security with what he and his co-partisans were trying to achieve domestically. We conclude by discussing implications of the analysis for theorising about appeasement and about how leaders make grand strategy more generally.

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National Security and Imperial Defence: British Grand Strategy and Appeasement, 1930–1939

Cited by 9 publications

References 0 publications

Strategic forgetting: Britain, China, and the South China Sea, 1894–1938

Strategic forgetting: Britain, China, and the South China Sea, 1894–1938

Britain's Grand Strategy during the 1930s

When states appease: British appeasement in the 1930s

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