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1) Suez
2) After Suez
3) From Devaluation to the Winter of Discontent
Students are invited to study Britain's responses to its changing role in the world from the Suez crisis of 1956, when Britain suffered a resounding humiliation and learnt that it could not "go it alone" without the United States, to the Falklands war of 1982, when Britain learnt that with a little bit of help from its friends in the United States and the United Nations it could still, quite successfully, use its far from negligible military force in defence of its own interests.
The Suez crisis of 1956 has been seen as the defining moment when Britain was forced to face up to its diminished role in world affairs. That did not stop Britain from continuing to play a substantial role overseas in territories for which it still had some responsibility, from Malaya to Cyprus, and from Kuwait to Borneo, to mention just a few of the many troublespots in which Britain became involved, not entirely unsuccessfully. However as the 1960s progressed, Britain's financial situation deteriorated to such an extent that it was forced to review its defence commitments and ultimately put an end to its military presence "East of Suez". By the early 1980s the suggestion that Britain might once again become involved in an "out of area" conflict (i.e. one which was not located within the priority defence area covered by the NATO treaty) appeared vaguely incongruous, at least to the general public.
So when the news broke that Argentina had invaded the Falkland Islands in April 1982, almost 20 years ago, and the government almost immediately announced that a Task Force was being assembled ready to sail to the South Atlantic, most people, both in Britain and abroad, found it extremely difficult to believe that this would in fact end in fighting. It seemed too petty and ridiculous, too quaintly old-fashioned with its undertones of Palmerstonian gunboat diplomacy, to be taken seriously.
At the time, the extent of American aid was under-estimated, and in the euphoria of victory in July 1982, the Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, was keen to portray the episode as symptomatic of a revitalised Britain which had been tested in the waters of the South Atlantic and had shown that it had lost none of its courage and resolve. Britain had shown that it still had some of its former greatness, she declared to a meeting of enthusiastic Conservatives shortly after the end of the war.
Particular attention will be paid to the following:
A small selection of texts for discussion in seminars will be made available as pdf files (you will need Adobe Acrobat reader)
Text one (pdf file)
Text two (pdf file)
Text three
"The significance of the Falklands War was enormous, both for Britain's self-confidence and for our standing in the world. Since the Suez fiasco in 1956, British foreign policy had been one long retreat. The tacit assumption made by British and foreign governments alike was that our world role was doomed steadily to diminish. We had come to be seen by both friends and enemies as a nation which lacked the will and the capability to defend its interests in peace, let alone in war. Victory in the Falklands changed that. Everywhere I went after the war, Britain's name meant something more than it had"
Margaret Thatcher, The Downing Street Years (London, 1993), p.173
Discuss, with reference to post-war British history, and particularly the period from the Suez crisis of 1956 to the Falklands Conflict of 1982, the following extract from an article entitled "Island Story: Victory in the Falklands was a Turning-Point for Britain" published by The Times in March 2002 :
" ... it is now clear that, whatever their strategic importance, the decision to take back the islands and ensure that Argentina did not benefit from the use of force was a turning point in British public policy. It helped to dispel a defeatist atmosphere that had contributed to Britain’s relative decline. It demonstrated that the country could achieve its aims with sufficient will."
The Times, March 11, 2002
This was an oral examination, in which students were asked to comment on a variety of texts.
1. (04/02/03) Background. "Losing an Empire ... finding a rôle ..."
2. (11/02/03) The Suez crisis of 1956: background and events. The special relationship under strain ...
3. (25/02/03) The Suez crisis of 1956: effects. Delivering nuclear weapons and projecting world power
4. (04/03/03) A Wind of Change ... withdrawal from Empire almost completed. Rhodesia
5. (18/03/03) Withdrawal from East of Suez
6. (25/03/03) 1976: Goodbye Great Britain? No longer even a minor world power?
7. (01/04/03) Crisis in the South Atlantic
8. (22/04/03) The Falklands Factor
9. (29/04/03) Conclusions
1. (05/02/03). Intro
2. (12/02/03) BBC Suez programme
3. (26/02/02) Text one
4. (05/03/03) Text two
5. (19/03/03) Text three
6. (26/03/03)
7. (02/04/03)
8. (23/04/03)
9. (30/04/03)
The Guardian has a page summing up Suez and the other major events of 1956-57.
The BBC World Service election history site has a sound file of Anthony Eden justifying his early action over Suez and Hugh Gaitskell attacking the military action taken in Egypt in late October 1956. Click here.
The BBC has an excellent site on the Falklands War.
Channel4 also has a site on the Falklands war.
Published witness seminars from the Institute of Contemporary British History especially Sandys White Paper, Rhodesian UDI, Withdrawal from East of Suez and Nott Review. All of the published witness seminars begin with an excellent introduction with copious notes. They are however large pdf files.
Election manifestos for the Conservative, Labour and Liberal parties (Politicos web site)
BURK, Kathleen, The British Isles since 1945, Oxford University Press, 2003 (commandé BU)
FREEDMAN, Lawrence. Britain and the Falklands War. London: Blackwell, 1988
GORST, Anthony & Lewis JOHNMAN. The Suez Crisis. Routledge, 1996 (BS)
HASTINGS, Max & Simon JENKINS. The Battle for the Falklands. London: Pan, 1983
JAMES, Lawrence. The Rise and Fall of the British Empire. Abacus, 1995 (BS)
LAPPING, Brian. End of Empire, London: Granada, 1985
MORGAN, Kenneth O. The People's Peace. Oxford University Press (any of the three editions) (BS)
NUTTING, Anthony. No End of a Lesson: the Story of Suez. London: Constable, 1967, pbk 1996
PARSONS, Michael. The Falklands War. Sutton, 2000 (BU)
REYNOLDS, David. Britannia Overruled. Longman, 1991
SKED, Alan & Chris COOK. Post-War Britain: a political history. Harmondsworth, Penguin (BS)
THATCHER, Margaret, The Downing Street Years, London: Harper Collins, 1993 (BS?)
YOUNG, John. Britain and the World in the Twentieth Century. London: Arnold, 1997
July 26: Nasser nationalises Suez Canal Company
November 6: Ceasefire in Suez Canal zone
Agreement on deployment of Thor Missiles in Britain
McMahon Act repealed
First British application to join EEC
Cuban Missile Crisis
Nassau agreement on Polaris to replace Skybolt
General de Gaulle vetoes Britain's first application to join the EEC
Wilson enters into negotiations with a view to making a new application to join the EEC
Devaluation of Sterling
General de Gaulle once again declares his opposition to British membership of the EEC
Announcement acceleration of withdrawal from "East of Suez"
April 2: Argentine invasion of the Falkland islands
April 14: Argentine surrender in the Falkland Islands
July: Margaret Thatcher's speech at Cheltenham
"The wind of change is blowing through this continent, and, whether we like it or not, the growth of [African] national consciousness is a political fact" speech at Cape Town, 3 February 1960. Harold Macmillan 1894-1986 Prime Minister 1957-63
On Europe: "It does mean, if this is the idea, the end of Britain as an independent European state … it means the end of a thousand years of history." Hugh Gaitskell, Labour Party Conference, Brighton, 3 October 1962
"Great Britain has lost an empire and has not yet found a role" Dean Acheson (US Secretary of State, 1962)
Page created by Michael Parsons, last updated