British Policy-makers Research Articles

Army and Empire: British Soldiers on the American Frontier, 1758-1775 (review)

Reviewed by: Army and Empire: British Soldiers on the American Frontier, 1758–1775 Bruce Vandervort and John Shy Army and Empire: British Soldiers on the American Frontier, 1758–1775. By Michael N. McConnell. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004. ISBN 0-8032-3233-0. Maps. Photographs. Illustrations. Tables. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Pp. xix, 211. $49.95. The British Army in North America before the outbreak of the Revolutionary War is not a neglected subject. John R. Alden aroused modern interest with his 1948 biography of its commanding general, Thomas Gage, and Sylvia Frey as well as this reviewer have contributed studies of the army, its soldiers, and its mission. But one of the primary concerns of British leaders who made the decision in 1762–63 to break with historical precedent by maintaining a large, regular military force in mainland North America was the obvious need to secure the vast new territory acquired as a result of British victory in the Seven Years' War. Policing a presumably unfriendly French-Canadian population in the St. Lawrence valley would absorb a sizeable portion of that force, but a long frontier zone straggling from the Great Lakes through the Ohio and Mississippi valleys to the Gulf Coast and Florida peninsula posed a terrific challenge to British policy makers and military commanders on the ground. A great variety of Indian tribal groupings, many of them closely tied to the defeated and departing French and Spanish regimes, thinly populated this enormous area. Never adequately discussed by British authorities was the question of what small garrisons stationed at key points in the frontier zone might actually be expected to accomplish. Michael McConnell takes us down to the level of daily life in these garrisons, and by careful research and clear exposition effectively answers the question. The great Indian war of 1763–64 demolished any idea that the garrisons could "defend" the frontier against Indian attack, and in its aftermath the smaller posts built by the French were abandoned. Another idea, pushed by a few British leaders and colonial officials, that military posts could become centers of regulation in the notorious Indian trade, and their garrisons could prevent migrating colonists from moving onto land claimed by [End Page 833] Indians—both missions intended to allay the kind of Indian grievances that had led to the 1763 war—also shattered itself on the physical realities of the frontier. What McConnell shows beyond any doubt, in chapters on the frontier forts, social life, work, diet, and health, is that the troops had all they could do just to survive, keeping the rain off their heads and finding enough healthy bodies to mount guard on ever-crumbling ramparts. Evidence of daily garrison life is not as ample as one might expect. Best-documented by administrative correspondence is the constant—and costly—deterioration of poorly constructed and ill-sited fortifications. Rain, heat, snow, ice, and wind played hell with the wood, mud, and stone used to build the forts. British infantry lacked skilled workmen essential for timely repair and construction. The human side was not as well recorded, except in surviving personal letters and diaries. The author has located a few personnel reports buried in British archives for these regiments, and has combed colonial newspapers for mention of British soldiers. He is well informed on relevant work in social history and military archaeology. This valuable monograph may be faulted on two points. First, in the unavoidable reliance on examples to illustrate general phenomena, the author relies too heavily on incidents drawn from the last few years of the war, 1758–64, when papers of field commanders like Henry Bouquet are littered with good stories, and the outbreak of peace had yet to dull the tone and content of periodic reports. Second, another chapter, on the human environment—the Indians and European civilians—who collected around each of these posts (more numerous at Detroit and Fort Pitt but present everywhere), and on how redcoats and their near neighbors interacted, would have rounded more fully an otherwise excellent book, placing it firmly on the growing shelf of new studies of the American frontier. Bruce Vandervort Virginia Military Institute John Shy University of Michigan Ann...

Secret agents: Anarchists, Islamists and responses to politically active refugees in London

The literature on the securitization of migration has characterized a growing trend in migration legislation to treat migration as a security issue. This legitimizes increasingly harsh responses to migrants. Recent legislation in the UK has responded to security concerns directly through the immigration system, where discrimination on the basis of national origin remains permissible, rather than the criminal justice system, where it is not. A historical comparison of two refugee communities reveals the extent to which the security response has become ingrained in British policy-making on migration issues. At the end of the nineteenth century Parliament was faced with a very similar set of issues to those faced by government a century later but a strong liberal consensus implemented very different legislation. Migration policy should not be governed by the actions of a tiny minority of real or imagined ‘secret agents’. The only just solution is to deal with the situation through the criminal justice system, rather than as an immigration issue.

An Anglo‐Barbadian dialogue: the negotiations leading to Barbados' independence, 1965–66

This article pays particular attention to Barbados' decisive move to independence in November 1966, using previously unseen archival evidence. It attempts to provide a solid explanation of why, unlike the neighbouring British dependencies in the Eastern Caribbean, Barbados moved smoothly to constitutional independence. Particular attention is paid to the island's domestic landscape, tracing the immediate catalysts leading it to go it alone. In evaluating Barbados' transition to independence, the study reconstructs not only the differing perspectives of the various components of the colonial leadership but, equally importantly, brings to the surface the positions espoused by British policy makers both in the Cabinet and Colonial Office, as well as the stances adopted by their counterparts in the Johnson Administration in Washington.

Between imago and res: The Revisionist-Zionist Movement's Relationship with Fascist Italy, 1922–1938

The inter-war period saw not only the creation of a Jewish national home in Palestine, but also the progressive disengagement of British policy-makers from the 1917 pro-Zionist Balfour Declaration....

The British Political Elite and the Soviet Union, 1937-1939 (review)

Reviewed by: The British Political Elite and the Soviet Union, 1937–1939 Mary Glantz The British Political Elite and the Soviet Union, 1937–1939. By Louise Grace Shaw. Portland, Oreg.: Frank Cass, 2003. ISBN 0-7146-8333-7. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Pp. xiv, 210. $26.50. The period 1937-39 was a crucible for European diplomacy. As Germany's expansionist desires became increasingly difficult to misconstrue, other European governments, especially the British, French, and Soviets, struggled to formulate an appropriate response. The ideal response—the one that eventually emerged from the exigencies of war—would have been an Anglo-French-Soviet alliance to contain and deter Germany. But in the pivotal prewar period, efforts to create that alliance repeatedly failed, resulting in the devastating German-Soviet Pact of August 1939. This process is the subject of Louise Grace Shaw's The British Political Elite and the Soviet Union, 1937-1939. Combing through archives and personal papers, Shaw attempts to reconstruct the thoughts and motivations of key British foreign policy actors and to tie those thoughts to their actions in the diplomatic arena. As a result, Shaw concludes that responsibility for the failure to create an Anglo-French-Soviet alliance rested primarily with British cabinet members, in particular the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. Shaw's analysis lies squarely within the counter-revisionist school of thought on this period. She repeatedly and powerfully challenges the revisionist contention that policy-makers labored under structural constraints that inhibited their ability to formulate an alliance with the Soviet Union. In her history, British policymakers are much more personally culpable for the failure to create a system that might have stopped Hitler. According to Shaw, certain cabinet members willfully refused to put aside their ideological distrust of the Soviet Union in order to forge an alliance against a far greater threat to Europe, namely Germany. Shaw heaps particular scorn upon Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who, unlike the other cabinet members who were willing to reach an agreement with the Soviets by summer 1939, "consistently refused to suppress his own intense ideological suspicion and resentment" (p. 190). Shaw's account is convincing. It is well written and thoroughly researched, based upon extensive investigation of both official documents and private correspondence. Shaw also avoids judging British actors in a historical vacuum. She consistently grounds her assessments in both an analysis of the information available to the actors at the time, and in an examination of French and Soviet actions and policies. Thus her critique of the British cabinet, particularly Chamberlain, is that much more damning. Shaw occasionally overreaches in her conclusions. She argues, for example, that Chamberlain should have accepted Soviet expansionism into Eastern Europe in 1939 as a small price to pay in comparison to the devastation of World War II. However, this conclusion uses a bit of historical hindsight unavailable to diplomats of 1939. How were they really to choose between German and Soviet expansionism into Eastern Europe, especially before they knew about the cost of the war and the eventual Soviet expansion into that region anyway? [End Page 987] Such overreaching is the exception rather than the rule, however. Shaw's book is an outstanding contribution to the field. All who are interested in the history of World War II would enjoy reading it; specialists in the period will find it a necessity to read. Mary Glantz Dulles, Virginia Copyright © 2004 Society for Military History

Is Northern Ireland Abnormal?

This article places Northern Ireland within the unfolding sociological debate on religion in modern Britain. It measures secularization along Casanova’s three dimensions (1994): religious differentiation, decline and privatization. It finds that Northern Ireland has, in common with Britain, high levels of religious differentiation, grey areas of religious belief and little convinced secularism. However, Northern Ireland differs in that it has higher levels of religious affiliation and practice, and religion plays more roles in civil society than it does in other parts of Britain. The article explores the role of conflict in forming these religious trends, asking if they represent a persistence of the sacred, or simply mask deeper ethnic divisions. It concludes that the social dimensions of religion are just as important as the supernatural, and that they often inform each other. Finally, it suggests that the dynamics of religious change are comparable across regions and, as such, Northern Ireland might be a useful case study for British policy makers, particularly as it becomes increasingly multicultural and religiously plural.

‘Because I Don't Trust Him, We are Friends’: Signals Intelligence and the Reluctant Anglo-Soviet Embrace, 1917–24

Signals intelligence was crucial in helping British policymakers come to grips with Communist subversion – real or imagined – in this country. Still, though released by GCHQ in the late 1990s, Soviet diplomatic intercepts have yet to feature prominently in any study of early Anglo-Russian relations. While they ought not to be regarded on their own as the definitive source on Soviet foreign policy, GCCS intercepts tell us a great deal not only about how Moscow used the threat of subversion as a bargaining chip but also about personalities and bureaucratic rivalries on the Soviet side.

Indirect pressure: Moscow and the end of the British mandate in Palestine

Soviet efforts to undermine Britain's position in the Middle East after the Second World War encountered an Anglo-American determination to deny Moscow a foothold in the region. As Britain appeared politically most vulnerable in Palestine, the Kremlin set out to influence events there by helping to bring an end to the mandate, without initially committing itself to either the Arabs or the Jews. Ignoring British demands to the contrary, it allowed more than a quarter of a million Jews to flee from Eastern Europe both to Displaced Person camps in Germany and Austria and to Palestine. The escalating Cold War made it difficult for London to counter effectively the indirect pressure Moscow was thus able to bring to bear on British policy-makers.

Becoming Dependent on the Kindness of Strangers: Britain’s Strategic Foreign Policy, Naval Arms Limitation and the Soviet Factor, 1935-1937

This article refutes claims that the 1935 Anglo-German naval agreement represented a finite stage of the Royal Navy's interwar naval disarmament diplomacy, and, indeed that the agreement reflected the Royal Navy's preoccupation with dealing with the German naval menace of the late 1930s. Instead it was merely a continuation of a greater strategy to control and contain naval armaments in Europe through diplomatic means. By controlling naval armament levels in Europe the British naval strategic decision-making elite hoped to limit the threat to the empire emanating from Japanese navalism. Japanese naval expansion was a threat which fed off Western naval arms increases and, therefore, the Royal Navy sought to deter Japanese building through limiting the naval expansion of other, smaller, European navies, so that Britain had no need to increase its own home fleet forces. The Soviet Union held a critical point of convergence in this strategy, as any increases it made threatened both Germany and Japan. An unchecked Soviet naval programme could inspire either nation to build a larger naval force, a condition that the Royal Navy and the UK wished to avoid. This article explains some of the interconnections of the strategic dilemma facing the British strategic policy makers and how the Soviet Union fit into one aspect of Britian's interwar strategic environment.

Raising Frankenstein: Great Britain, ‘Balkanism’ and the Search for a Balkanlocarno in the 1920s

This paper explores the utility of the interpretive device of ‘Balkanism’ for the analysis of British foreign policy-making in the 1920s. It does so through the case study of the efforts to construct a regional security pact involving guarantee and arbitration treaties reconciling former enemies, a so-called ‘Balkan Locarno’. This was not the most important or fruitful initiative in interwar diplomacy, but it is nonetheless revealing. On the one hand, it illustrated the existence amongst British policy-makers of a network of deeply embedded negative and essentialising assumptions about the region and its peoples. On the other, it casts new light on the nature of the 1925 Locarno settlement itself: the terms in which British policy-makers construed the extension of the Locarno principles indicates that in endowing it with mythic significance, they overlooked the fact that it was concluded only because of the coincidence at a particular moment of otherwise divergent national interests.

After fifty years: the San Francisco Peace Treaty in the context of Anglo-Japanese relations, 1902–52

The approach of the British government towards Japan in 1950–1 was more negative than that of the United States. The British attitude was influenced by several factors: the ignominy of the surrender of Singapore in 1942, resentment at American domination of the Occupation of Japan, apprehension concerning renewed Japanese competition affecting textiles, potteries and shipbuilding, and bitterness resulting from atrocities inflicted on the prisoners-of-war. For most of the century preceding the Pacific War Britain had been the principal power in Eastern Asia and British policy makers found it difficult to adjust to the reduced role Britain occupied in 1950. Labour cabinet ministers revealed some hostility towards Japan during diplomatic exchanges with John Foster Dulles in 1951. Herbert Morrison, the Foreign Secretary, and Hugh Gaitskell, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, were compelled to accept American decisions except on the limited issue of the Congo Basin treaties where Dulles made a concession to Britain. Significant differences in approach to the rival Chinese regimes also created problems in 1951. British forecasts concerning the future of Japan were negative: it was anticipated that, within a decade, Japan could become assertive, with the risk of reactionary right-wing groups emerging.

The sugar industry and the abolition of the slave trade, 1775-1810

Selwyn Carrington analyzes the complex state of the British West Indian economy at the end of the 18th century, crucial years for the Caribbean colonies and the slave trade. Drawing on a wealth of primary materials, from plantation records and estate day-books to correspondence among plantation owners, merchants, and overseers, his book presents a detailed portrait of an economic system in decline for 30 years prior to the British abolition of the slave trade. Carrington explores planter flight, lack of investment in the older sugar islands, and failed attempts to rationalize sugar production and to reduce sugar imports to England. He marshals an abundance of statistical evidence to trace other factors in the shift from one slave system to another - such as trade relations, debt crises, hired labor, management techniques, and local and foreign sugar markets - and their impact on the slave trade, slavery, and the British West Indian economy. He concludes that with the arrival of what Eric Williams called mature capitalism, the sugar colonies once at the core of the Atlantic economy became irrelevant to the new economic life, and their labor system, in the eyes of British policy makers and political commentators, became a millstone to be cast off. Utilizing primary material and statistical data never before presented, Carrington provides a rich source for those interested in the Caribbean economy between the American Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. His study will also add a meticulous and insightful chapter to the history of the Atlantic slave trade and its demise.

British policy on teenage pregnancy and childbearing: the limitations of comparisons with other European countries

British policy makers justify their concern about youthful pregnancy and childbearing by comparing relatively high British teenage pregnancy rates with lower rates in other European countries. These comparisons are a feature of 'technical/educational' explanations for youthful childbearing (explanations that depict adolescent pregnancy as a consequence of a lack of sex education and poor use of contraception). Such comparisons are inappropriate for a number of reasons. They fail to take account of the variation in adolescent reproductive behaviour and outcomes in the rest of Europe (such as variation in pregnancy rates and differential use of abortion). They also attribute low rates of teenage pregnancy to sexual openness and sex education, yet the evidence for this is mixed. In addition, such comparisons assume that Britain can learn from the experience of other European nations, despite evidence that Britain is unique, in some respects, within Europe. Policy makers must recognize the multiple reasons for early childbearing.

America in Indochina, 1957–1963: British Perceptions, Hopes, and Strategy

AbstractBritish perceptions of the United States in Indochina between 1957 and 1963 were cautious and constructive. This article examines the perceptions of policymakers in Prime Minister Harold MacMillan's government and public opinion as expressed in the Times of London. British policymakers had basic doubts regarding American policy in Indochina, but Britain remained involved in the region after 1954 and agreed with the United States on defining the problem and on the broad methodological approach to the crisis. London wanted to ensure that Washington pursued the “right” policy in Indochina, that Britain utilized its expertise in post-colonial and counter-insurgency, and that the Anglo- American alliance maintained its importance for both countries. The study of these perceptions reveals some concerns which we would anticipate, but also shows that Britain respected the United States as a leader in the region and that it agreed with the United States on core issues.

'A formula may have to be found': Ireland, India, and the headship of the Commonwealth

During 50th anniversary commemorations of the 1949 Declaration that had facilitated the Republic of India's continued membership of the Commonwealth, only The Round Table recalled other events of 1949. The Republic of Ireland left the Commonwealth just nine days before the member nations accepted the King as symbol of their free association and as such Head of the Commonwealth. The origins of the symbolic headship are examined, from Eamon de Valera's proposal for external association in 1921 and Eire's recognition of the King for diplomatic formalities only in 1936, to Nehru's acceptance of the symbol and head in 1949. After clinging tenaciously to the concept of 'common allegiance to the Crown' for over a quarter-of-a-century, British policy-makers relaxed the requirements remarkably quickly in face of India's intention to become a republic. Attlee tried hard to persuade Nehru to find a rôle for the King, and British officials considered the Eire model as a possible compromise. In the end, Nehru accepted the idea of a non-constitutional 'head of the association', and the traditional concept of 'allegiance to the Crown' was quietly set aside for the Commonwealth.

‘Privileging the Visible’: A critique of the National Learning Targets

Abstract This article takes as its background the shift over time in Britain towards models of target setting in education which are based almost entirely on measurable outputs. The original ‘headline’ targets proposed by the National Council for Educational Technology were of a very different nature, as are those of many other developed nations. The article outlines some alternative models involving targets for both inputs and processes, and the use of targets which are exhortative rather than directly measurable. It is suggested that the main reason these more ‘qualitative’ targets have disappeared from British policy‐making is that they are not considered to be directly measurable. This is contrasted, at least in some accounts, with the more visible output indicators. However, the substantive purpose of this article is show how weak the claim is that we can ever adequately measure even these privileged targets. The article therefore argues that if a policy of target setting is to be pursued, and given other findings from the authors' study in Wales this is far from clear, then more sophisticated models than those in current vogue may be required. The expense involved in setting up such an extension to our already heavily audited society may be unjustified—for it is surely better to spend money on improving lifelong learning even if we cannot measure that improvement definitively, than to have an accurate metric revealing a picture of stagnation or worse.

London's policies towards British volunteers for the International Brigades: an attempt to safeguard her precarious diplomacy

British foreign policymakers saw the Spanish Civil War as a vital issue in avoiding a European conflagration. They saw the British volunteers as a hindrance to British diplomacy. If the Spanish Civil War were allowed to complicate the relationship with Italy, France, and Germany, Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and others in the British Government believed that Europe might spiral into a world war. As Britain tried to stay neutral, the volunteers for the International Brigades were seen as a possible complication to these relationships. British policymakers believed the Spanish issue was the key to European war or peace. Some historians have argued that class and political prejudices rather than strategic considerations motivated leaders in the British Government. This article will argue that close reading of the top decision-makers' motivations does not support this thesis. Eden and others in the British Government believed that the volunteers had the potential to upset the delicate European balance of power, and to drive Europe closer to war, and thus they attempted to restrict Britons from going to Spain and attempted to withdraw them once they were there.

‘Ideal’ and ‘punch‐bag’: Conflicting views of the balance of power and their influence on interwar British foreign policy

It is possible to identify two general descriptive applications of the term ‘balance of power” that affected British policymaking in the years following the First World War. These two applications reflected simplistic historical interpretations of the European States System in the period before 1914 and Britain's role in it. One application of the term was pejorative and associated with the discredited system of pre‐1914 Great Power diplomacy. The second application stemmed from a more a positive assessment of Britain's prewar diplomacy, seeing it as the traditional goal of preventing the domination of the European continent by a single power. The purpose of this article is to examine both uses of the expression balance of power and demonstrate how tliey influenced the direction of British diplomacy in the interwar period.

Legitimacy in British Policy-Making: Functional Alternatives to the Civil Service

Legitimacy in British Policy-Making: Functional Alternatives to the Civil Service

‘Rival Desirabilities’: Britain, East–West Trade and the Cold War, 1948–51

This article provides a new perspective on British trade policy towards the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe in the late 1940s and early 1950s. It argues that the Attlee government pursued an ambivalent economic strategy during the formative years of the Cold War. On the one hand, British policy makers sought to prevent Soviet military build up by implementing an international embargo on East–West trade. On the other, the economic and financial weakness of the United Kingdom drove Whitehall to sign trade agreements with the Soviet bloc governments in order to preserve access to the profitable non-dollar markets of Eastern Europe. This approach led to conflict with the Truman administration over Cold War economic policy, as the United States wanted to restrict Soviet access to Western technology and industrial goods. By 1951 Britain had succeeded, in partnership with France, in moderating US demands for a comprehensive trade embargo which, if instituted, would have severely limited the access of the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC) nations to the non-strategic markets of the Soviet bloc countries. As such, this episode offers further evidence to suggest that British governments exercised considerable influence over the USA during the early years of the Cold War.