This article analyses the strategic reconfiguration of Britain’s information strategy towards its ally, Japan, during World War I. Faced with the failure of direct, state-branded propaganda—the ‘visible hand’—due to political distrust, geographical distance, and a competitive media environment, British policymakers systematised an indirect ‘invisible hand’ approach. This strategy involved secretly co-opting the commercial news agency Reuters to disseminate state-selected information under the guise of objective journalism. The paper traces this evolution from an ad-hoc response to documented failure to its institutionalisation as national strategy with the 1918 establishment of the Ministry of Information and its symbiotic partnership with Reuters, built on secret subsidies. Drawing on British archival sources, this study argues that the transition from visible to invisible methods was a rational strategic choice, demonstrating how state propaganda can be effectively embedded within commercial structures. This study focuses on the supply-side of the information warfare equation: the British strategy, its rationale, and its institutional architecture.

The purpose of this research paper is to analyze British policy in the Balkans at the end of the Second World War, focusing on the diplomatic dispute with Yugoslavia over the Trepça mining complex in Kosovo. It investigates Britain’s efforts to safeguard strategic economic interests in Southeastern Europe, curb Soviet regional influence, and oppose the proposed Yugoslav-Bulgarian federation, which London viewed as a potential extension of Soviet hegemony in the Balkans. The scientific novelty consists in its contribution to the underexplored field of British economic diplomacy in the post-war Balkans. Drawing on British diplomatic sources from 1944 to 1948, it shifts attention from dominant geopolitical narratives to the strategic role of British capital. Particular focus is given to the London-based Selection Trust, which by the late interwar period controlled approximately 80% of British mining investments in Yugoslavia, most notably Trepça. Conclusions. The paper explores how efforts to protect these assets became entangled with broader regional diplomacy. Following the war, British attempts to regain control of Trepça were rejected by Yugoslavia’s new authorities, prompting a shift from ownership claims to compensation demands. Although Tito initially offered assurances regarding the protection of British property, nationalization policies rendered restoration unfeasible. Bilateral negotiations culminated in a 1948 agreement under which Yugoslavia paid £4.5 million in compensation to British investors. Simultaneously, British policymakers regarded the Balkan federation project as a Soviet-aligned threat to Western influence, particularly in Greece, and sought to delay its implementation within the broader context of early Cold War rivalry. British policy in the Balkans at the end of the Second World War and during the immediate post-war period reflected a calculated effort to balance geopolitical containment with the protection of key economic interests. The Balkan federation was perceived as a challenge to Western influence, particularly in the eastern Mediterranean. British diplomacy prioritized securing major investments in Yugoslavia’s industrial sector, with Trepça emerging as a site of both economic and strategic significance. Although efforts to reassert control were blocked, sustained diplomacy secured compensation. The 1948 settlement marked a pragmatic resolution of Britain’s claims. The Trepça case illustrates how resource sovereignty, foreign capital, and geopolitical rivalry shaped British-Yugoslav relations during a pivotal moment in postwar European realignment.

Abstract For a brief moment in the late-1950s, British policymakers and key African politicians shared a vison: an East African Federation of Kenya, Tanganyika, and Uganda. For British officials, one of the leading advantages would be transforming the colonial King’s African Rifles into a federal army. This aspect of the plans has rarely been recognised, but this article shows that British planning for the KAR became inextricably intertwined with federal thinking. Late colonialism was a time of alternative federal visions in addition to increased interventionism as British officials foresaw the end of colonial rule and sought to remake African institutions. A federal army was a key aim in such plans. This article argues that although no federation or federal army came into being, planning for them substantively shaped the military inheritance of the region at independence. Uganda and Tanganyika achieved independence with armies that were not fully autonomous, while Kenya took most of the shared colonial facilities. Thus, the article highlights the impact late colonial plans could have even when these did not come to fruition.

In recent decades, several historians have argued that Herbert Samuel had a significant role in British policy-making during the 1914 war crisis, especially on 1–2 August, when weeks of tension between Austria-Hungary and Serbia ended in a continental conflagration, dragging in Austria’s ally Germany, and its rivals, Russia and France. Since London had formed ententes with France (1904) and Russia (1907), the question of British involvement in the conflict became pressing, creating deep divisions within the Cabinet, where a majority of ministers were initially committed to neutrality but some key figures, including the Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, prioritised the entente cordiale with France and came to support intervention. This article considers claims that Samuel’s did much to keep the Cabinet united, defining a ‘formula’ (or formulae) to guide Britain’s decision on whether to fight. It finds the case a thin one, principally reliant on a few of Samuel’s letters, the contents of which historians have embellished. Alternative contemporary sources show that ideas often claimed as Samuel’s actually originated with other ministers and that his colleagues did not see him as a major player in their debates. 1

In January 1984, seven British and one US national were jailed in the 'independent' Bantustan of Bophuthatswana for their roles in a complex fraud at a Sun City casino. This article demonstrates how the Bophuthatswana 'government' tried to use the detainees as pawns in their efforts to gain recognition of the territory's independence, and the difficulties this created for British policymakers. While the Bophuthatswana authorities initially allowed British and US officials to visit the detainees, they soon became obstructive and demanded that permission be sought from their Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As neither the UK nor the USA recognized Bophuthatswana's independence, such formal contact was ruled out. However, as this article will demonstrate, a well-orchestrated campaign by the families of the detainees put pressure on the British government, which ultimately made concessions to Bophuthatswana regarding the visa process its ministers had to undertake prior to visiting the UK to allow contact with the prisoners. This article will also demonstrate the degree of sympathy that certain sections of the British elite had for Bophuthatswana's quest for international recognition. Indeed, the deal regarding the visa restrictions and access to the detainees was arranged through Sir Peter Emery, a Conservative member of the British parliament and chairperson of Shenley Trust, a firm hired by the Bophuthatswana government to facilitate its gold sales.

Abstract This article explores the UK experience in Afghanistan (2001–2021) to understand why British policymakers did not foresee the rapid collapse of the Afghan state in August 2021. Through interviews with foreign policy practitioners, it highlights the dissonance between the narratives and expectations of UK foreign policy towards Afghanistan and the reality of enacting it within the institutional culture and behaviour prevalent in decision-making circles. It finds that foreign policy formulation was unrealistic, policymakers failed to acknowledge how little agency the UK had in the UK/US relationship, tactical operations provided a false sense of progress towards strategic goals, and Afghan military effectiveness was almost wholly dependent on nato support. Compounding this, the British government’s Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy evacuated those vital to the future success of the Afghan state and created a perfect storm in which policymakers were unable to foresee the imminent crisis.

ABSTRACT This paper examines the historical, administrative, and socio-political history of Pitcairn Island, a British Overseas Territory in the Pacific, which was compounded by the external threat of French nuclear testing in the Pacific. Despite its negligible economic and strategic value, Pitcairn exemplifies the complexities of Britain’s smaller territories in the post-decolonisation era, because the UK remains responsible for its administration and people. The island's isolation, dependency on external aid, and declining population have posed unique challenges for British policymakers, who have grappled with balancing local autonomy and cultural identity with the logistical and financial demands of maintaining such a remote territory. The study contextualises Pitcairn’s position as a ‘problematic remnant’ of empire, exploring its symbolic importance, the implications of nuclear testing in its vicinity, and the broader legacy of imperial governance. Highlighting Pitcairn’s social, economic, and administrative history, the paper situates the island within the broader narratives of decolonisation and the ‘smaller territories problem,’ ultimately reflecting on its status as a microcosm of Britain's imperial legacies and the limits of post-imperial responsibility.

ABSTRACT By the 1970s, Japan had become a key player in international relations. Less than two decades after the 1952 San Francisco Peace Treaty, and the formal end of the Second World War and Japanese occupation, the nation now stood as one of Richard Nixon’s ‘three pillars’ of the Western World, with her Gross National Product placed third internationally. Scholarly attention has reflected this inflection point, particularly with regards to the European Community and American relations towards Japan. However, little coverage of how Britain strategized towards Japan has been done for the same period. Utilising recently released archival material, this article identifies core strategic concerns for policymakers when it came to Japan, and how these concerns acted as a framework for a steadily evolving strategy. For Britain, an inherent tension existed between keeping the Japanese ‘bound’ to the Western political system and the domestic political imperative of safeguarding British industry and jobs from a rapidly expanding Japanese export juggernaut. As both Japan’s and Britain’s positions in the world changed, so too would the ways in which British policymakers would envisage methods to balance these strategic ends. This would be marked by an increasing level of centralisation of strategy regarding the Japanese, moving key decision making away from the Foreign Office specialists in the periphery of government towards the Cabinet Committee system. Though the specialists never lost their influence over the direction of strategy, by the late 1980s British policymakers had developed a fully coherent, all-of-Whitehall approach vis-à-vis Japan.

This paper explores the role of British anti-communist anxieties in shaping policies and strategies towards Mandatory Palestine during the critical years of 1946–1949. Against the backdrop of the Cold War, British policymakers viewed Jewish immigration and Zionist aspirations as potential vehicles for Soviet influence in the Middle East. Key officials, including Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, were deeply concerned that the establishment of a Jewish state could create a Soviet-aligned entity, threatening British imperial interests and regional stability. This article draws on extensive primary sources to analyse how these fears influenced British responses to illegal immigration, Zionist militancy, and the broader geopolitical dynamics with the United States. While past scholarship has primarily focused on Arab considerations in British policy, this study highlights the significant yet underexplored factor of anti-communism. It argues that Cold War paranoia profoundly shaped British strategies, from counter-insurgency efforts and naval blockades to diplomatic campaigns in America designed to frame Zionism as a communist threat. However, these fears led to flawed assumptions about Soviet influence within the Yishuv and Aliyah Bet operations. Ultimately, this article contributes to understanding how Cold War anxieties intersected with decolonisation and the Israeli state’s formation, reflecting Britain’s struggle to maintain global influence amidst shifting geopolitical realities.

Abstract In the late 1850s and early 1860s, the idea of building a passage through the Isthmus of Kra in the Malay Peninsula was hotly debated amongst British officials, merchants, and investors. This study finds that the British East India Company's rule over the Straits of Malacca had been a dilemma for itself and British merchants in China. The Second Opium War and the Indian Revolt of 1857 exacerbated the dilemma and pushed some British policymakers and investors to seek an alternative route between India and China. The proposal of the Kra passage was the response and solution to the Malacca dilemma. In historicising the Kra passage proposal and putting it in the context of the British empire's simultaneous crises in Asia in the mid-nineteenth century, the case of the proposed Kra passage reveals the complex relations between different actors within the British empire and the challenges of integrating multiple imperial interests into a British world system

Abstract This article analyses British policymakers’ efforts to court Enos John Mabuza, Chief Minister of the self‐governing South African homeland of KaNgwane, in the final years of apartheid. It contends that despite taking place nearly 30 years apart, there were striking similarities between British policy at the end of apartheid and in the era of decolonisation, particularly the efforts to build relations with moderate nationalists in an effort to maintain long‐term influence. While KaNgwane was a small territory lacking in material resources, Mabuza, as a moderate Black leader working within the law to challenge apartheid, took on greater importance in the minds of British policymakers seeking a peaceful transfer of power in South Africa. This was helped by Mabuza's ability to maintain relations with a diverse range of important political actors including the South African government, KwaZulu Chief Minister Mangosuthu Buthelezi, and the African National Congress in exile. Additionally, KaNgwane's close proximity to Mozambique, which at the time was in the midst of a civil war, also gave the territory greater prominence. This article will highlight how Mabuza used these interconnecting factors to demonstrate his value as an important ‘interlocutor’ for Britain, which in turn saw him extract important resources for both the KaNgwane people and his own family, as well as a degree of protection from interference by the South African government.

Abstract How can UK and devolved governments be more effective when addressing chronic problems like inequalities or crises like climate change? The dominant story is of pessimism: policymaking is bound to a Westminster tradition of short-termism, elitism, and centralization, and reform efforts are doomed to failure. We present a more cautiously optimistic account about the prospects for a more effective government, grounded in theory-informed lessons from two decades of UK and devolved government reform efforts. We describe a potentially more innovative and less blundering state and present a coherent Positive Public Policy agenda that can help to realize this potential.

This article explores the quest for legitimacy and popular consent during the British occupation of north-western Germany between 1945 and 1949. It does so through an analysis of two major propaganda campaigns that sought to publicly legitimise the British occupation at home and in Germany: ‘Germany under Control’, a large-scale exhibition put on display in London in 1946; and ‘Operation Stress’, the largest propaganda campaign in the British Zone, run in 1948 to legitimise food policies. Through an investigation of the internal rationale amongst British policymakers, the objectives behind the campaigns, the popular reception, and the broader outcomes, the article shows that both campaigns ended in failure and did not succeed in convincing the population of the need to maintain British rule in Germany. Propaganda was an ineffective tool to generate popular legitimacy at a time of austerity at home and severe material suffering in the British zone of occupation. As such, the British authorities encountered populations whose ‘moral economy’ and expectations from government were fundamentally opposed to the maintenance of the occupation. Both campaigns, therefore, epitomise the pitfalls of propaganda campaigns when facing bitter social realities and demonstrate the intricacies of the quest for legitimacy during military occupations.

There is a growing consensus that the end of empire did not necessarily equate with a severing of imperial ties. Some historians have even argued that there was a shift from formal to informal empire in Britain’s relations with the emerging Gulf States. This is especially so with respect to Bahrain which had represented the epicentre of Britain’s position in the Gulf. Nevertheless, an analysis of British relations with Bahrain from the withdrawal East of Suez to the Iranian Revolution belies any notion that Britain succeeded in establishing an informal imperial position after 1971. Not only were Britain’s economic interests in Bahrain eroded by growing competition from its industrial rivals, but also its political and military position was challenged by the encroachment of regional powers. Any hope that Britain could retain an imperial role in Bahrain was undermined still further by the emergence of new internal political forces in Bahrain beyond the direct control of either the ruling family or Britain itself. The unfeasibility of maintaining an imperial relationship with Bahrain after 1971 persuaded British policymakers to seek to establish recognizably post-imperial relations with the Emirate in the decade following the withdrawal from East of Suez.

ABSTRACT What explains the British decision not to lend significant support to the internal German opposition to Hitler during World War II? Some historians have labelled the absence of aid to the German resistance as an intelligence failure. P.R.J. Winter and others instead accuse the British government of policy failure by highlighting the excellent efforts of Britain’s wartime radio intelligence team, led by Hugh Trevor-Roper. But by closely reading the key piece of evidence in this case for intelligence success, the ‘Canaris and Himmler’ report, and by placing that assessment in the broader context of Trevor-Roper’s intelligence reporting through the end of the war, we argue that Trevor-Roper’s team did not lay the analytical groundwork for a shift in British strategy. Trevor-Roper neither appreciated nor conveyed to British policymakers the existence and strength of the German opposition, and he denigrated the opposition’s central hub, the Abwehr. This can be classed as a significant intelligence failure. Nevertheless, we also suggest that the intelligence versus policy failure framing of the German opposition question is something of a false dichotomy, as Whitehall’s intelligence and policy communities operated under a shared set of assumptions and reinforced each other’s beliefs about the appropriateness of British strategy.

Abstract David Edgerton has argued that the term ‘people’s war’ was not much in use during World War II and that where it did occur it was used in ‘a critical and oppositional, rather than an official-celebratory’ sense. We show that Edgerton’s conclusions are an artefact of his limited source-base and narrow reading of the evidence. The phrase ‘people’s war’ was in fact used in Ministry of Information propaganda and cropped up widely in the press, leading contemporaries to comment on its overfamiliarity. But we do not merely seek to restore previous interpretations. We show the longer history of ‘people’s war’ terminology in both Britain and America. We further demonstrate how Britain’s US sympathisers, such as the CBS journalist Edward R. Murrow, used this language to argue that British class barriers were breaking down, thus making the country worthy of American support. British policymakers consciously encouraged this, and there were consequences for US domestic politics too. The concept of the ‘people’s war’, then, was a contemporary Anglo-American co-production. It was not, as Edgerton wrongly suggests, an invention of the historians of the 1960s and after.

ABSTRACT This article studies the Anglo-Nigerian negotiations for a Royal Navy training team during the Nigerian Civil War against the background of Africa’s ‘phoney’ Cold War and Britain’s global strategic withdrawal. This allows it to show Britain’s diplomatic manoeuvres to simultaneously prevent provoking debilitating opposition against its tightrope policy of supporting Federal Nigeria against Biafra and safeguard its significant, predominantly economic – particularly oil – interests in Nigeria. Initially inconvenienced by the Nigerian request for a naval training team, British policymakers gradually agreed to send one after the war, then promised to do so already before, and, after the foreign policy establishment had overcome the Ministry of Defence’s resistance, finally sent out Royal Navy officers to Nigeria before the end of hostilities. In this process, the Nigerians had allies in the British High Commission in Lagos and the Foreign (and Commonwealth) Office, as well as substantial leverage as a result of Indian and Soviet competition in the Nigerian market for military assistance. Yet this leverage was mitigated by the Federals’ preference for British over Indian military assistance, and fear of becoming too reliant on Moscow. Not only in the British, but also in the Nigerian case, diplomatic concerns thus outweighed the military rationale for the naval training team, and this ‘diplomacy of military assistance’ contrasts with the basic tenor of the theoretical literature on military assistance in civil wars.

Journal Article Penny Sinanoglou. Partitioning Palestine: British Policymaking at the End of Empire. Get access Penny Sinanoglou. Partitioning Palestine: British Policymaking at the End of Empire. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2019. Pp. x, 251. Cloth $43.00. Martin Bunton Martin Bunton University of Victoria, Canada Email: mbunton@uvic.ca Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The American Historical Review, Volume 128, Issue 2, June 2023, Pages 1069–1070, https://doi.org/10.1093/ahr/rhad189 Published: 22 June 2023

The United Kingdom's political, economic, and social challenges have been greatly impacted by the Brexit referendum (UK). The problem of immigration to the UK is also among the most significant Brexit-related challenges. The issue of illegal immigration to the UK will be the main subject of this study. This study's goal is to analyse the most significant effects that have an impact on the prevention of unauthorized immigration into the UK. The UK government's decision to announce new immigration regulations as one of its immigration-control measures will have a significant impact on the country's capacity to manage its borders. Additionally, the Dublin Accord, which is regarded as the most significant agreement between the EU member nations with regard to the control of illegal immigration, will no longer apply to the UK if it withdraws from the European Union (EU). The conclusion of this research is that leaving the EU will result in the loss of the Dublin Agreement as a symbolic tool for British policymakers, preventing them from turning to the EU for assistance should they lose control over immigration. This will increase in the number of illegal immigrants in the UK.

Abstract 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.