Fighting With Allies: America and Britain in Peace and War

by Robin Renwick

Overview

It was Winston Churchill who, in his speech at Fulton, Missouri, advocated a 'special relationship between the British Commonwealth ... and the United States ... the continuance of intimate relationships between our military advisers, leading to the common study of potential dangers'.

Through the eyes of Churchill, Roosevelt and their successors, Robin Renwick traces the development of the Anglo-American relationship since the desperate summer of 1940, and the part it played in shaping the post-war world.

Detecting once again a whiff of the 1930s in the air, he concludes that, as one of the ties that binds Europe and North America, the relationship remains an important one, and not only to Britain and the United States.

There are many on both sides of the Atlantic who will think that the world would have been poorer without it. Its future will depend on learning the lessons of military overstretch in Iraq and Afghanistan and resolving the mismatch between Britain's desire to play a role in world affairs and the resources allocated to doing so.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781785901102
Publisher:	Biteback Publishing, Ltd.
Publication date:	10/06/2016
Sold by:	Bookwire
Format:	eBook
Pages:	300
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Robin Renwick, Lord Renwick of Clifton KCMG, is a crossbench peer in the House of Lords. He was ambassador to South Africa in the period leading up to the release of Nelson Mandela, then British ambassador to the United States between 1991 and 1995. He is the author of many books including A Journey with Margaret Thatcher and Ready for Hillary. He lives in London.

Table of Contents

List of Plates ix

Acknowledgements xi

Foreword xiii

Prologue xxv

1 'You must not speak of us as cousins' 1

2 'We will get nothing from the Americans but words' 15

3 'In the long history of the world this is a thing to do now' 23

4 'Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars' 33

5 'The Prime Minister of Great Britain has nothing to hide from the President of the United States' 45

6 'The only way in which we could possibly lose this war' 53

7 'My God! Now they've started shooting' 63

8 'This is much the greatest thing we have ever attempted' 73

9 'Even splendid victories and widening opportunities do not bring us together on strategy' 83

10 'Ike and I were poles apart when it came to the conduct of the war' 95

11 'The greatest American friend we have ever known' 103

12 'Allies of a kind' 113

13 'I must always know what is in the documents I sign' 119

14 'The patient is sinking while the doctors deliberate' 127

15 'The Jews are a religion, not a nation or a race' 135

16 'I think it improbable that the Americans would become involved' 139

17 'All the passion of a woodchuck chewing a carrot' 147

18 'The timely use of atomic weapons should be considered' 155

19 'What could be more earthy than coal or steel?' 161

20 'Never had so few lost so much so stupidly and so fast' 167

21 'The most powerful of the anti-colonial powers' 173

22 'United States policy is exaggeratedly moral, at least where non-American interests are concerned' 181

23 'The US are being very difficult' 191

24 'Nothing justifies double-crossing us' 203

25 'We can furnish a lot of fig leaves' 209

26 'If anything goes wrong you may be sure that Mr Dulles will place the blame elsewhere' 217

27 'They have complete confidence in me' 225

28 'It is going to be a cold winter' 231

29 'Thank God they've turned back, just before the Prime Minister gave way' 239

30 'The lady has already been violated in public' 245

51 'This frightful tangle of fear and suspicion' 253

32 'I don't think we are in for a very happy four days' 259

33 'We do not suffer in the world from such an excess of friends' 273

34 'A couple who have been told by everyone that they should be in love' 279

35 'He wanted to establish his own special relationship' 291

36 'Your problems will be our problems and when you look for friends, we will be there' 299

37 'That little ice-cold bunch of land down there' 307

38 'Doing the work of the free world' 315

39 'The focus of evil in the modern world' 329

40 'The objective is to have a world without war' 339

41 'No time to go wobbly' 355

42 'All necessary means' 369

43 'The whole of the Balkans are not worth the bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier' 377

44 'The British were furious' 381

45 'She could not see any policy differences between them' 385

46 'The closest relationship I would have with any foreign leader' 389

47 'We were fortunate to have them on our side' 397

48 'I will be with you, whatever' 403

49 'I hope that's not the last time we see them' 413

50 'It was, after all, the casus belli' 421

51 'This isn't working' 427

52 'We had no idea what we were getting into' 431

53 'When we saved the world' 439

54 Britain 'may not want to play as central a role in world affairs' 445

55 The Special Relationship 453

56 Britain, the United States and Europe 461

57 Special any more? 469

Notes and References 479

Bibliography 501

Index 509