'That' UK-US relationship..

    
�I thought this might be a good time to have another look at the so-called �special-relationship� between the United States and Great Britain�.

�The Times newspaper (dated Thursday November 30th 2006) led with a cover story concerning the present condition of Anglo-American relations, in particular the current state of play about the ongoing conflict in Iraq�.

..The report was presented by Tom Baldwin in Washington and The Times political editor Philip Webster, under the headline �London�s bridge is falling down�. The report once again brings into question the nature of an Anglo-American �special relationship��.

�The premise of the article was chiefly concerned with the one-sided political relationship between Britain and the United States, demonstrated by the supposed affiliation between British Prime Minister, Tony Blair and the American president George Bush. This �one-sidedness� has recently been highlighted by a speech made last Tuesday by Dr Kendall Myers, a senior US State Department official. In an academic forum, Myers noted that Britain�s role as a �bridge between America and Europe� was currently disintegrating and any attempts made by Britain to influence US policy had been, and are being ignored. Concerning Britain�s role in standing by the Unites States and American �anti-terrorist� policy, Myers said �it was a done deal from the beginning, it was a one-sided relationship that was entered into with open eyes�there was nothing. There was no payback, no sense of reciprocity�. Dr Myers noted that any bond that Blair and Bush had would not be �replicated� in the future�

...The US State Department has since disowned the comments by Myers, stating, �The US-UK relationship is indeed a special one. The US and the UK work together, along with our allies in Europe and across the world, on every issue imaginable��

�My first thoughts are that they would of course deny Myers sentiments on the understanding that US officials would never ever set a precedent and say that political relations with Britain are floundering and unbalanced, even if they are�.in addition, the notion of Britain being a �bridge� between Europe and America can be called into question since the Soviet Union ceased to be a viable threat to Western Europe, consequently, removing Britain�s role as America�s first line of defence against Communist expansion�.

�. For me personally, the idea of a UK-US �special-relationship� has always been one of contention. If there ever was a �specialness� in the relationship between the United States and Britain, then I think it only had real substance during World War II, where the romanticism of this association was first born�even then, the co-operation between the US and Britain always came with American strings attached. The �special �relationship� tag only seems to be trotted out on occasion when needed to re-enforce the public notion of a strong affiliation between the two countries. In political circles, I would tend to agree with Dr Myers. On an individual level, I think the UK-US bond might be an idea that is cherished. For example, during the Vietnam War, Prime Minster Harold Wilson refused consistently to entertain the Churchillian philosophy of an Anglo-American affiliation, (chiefly, to avoid sending British troops to the war in south-east Asia). However, in a conversation with the British Ambassador to the United States, President Lyndon Johnson reminded Patrick Dean that the American people �owed an incalculable debt to the British for the time when they stood steadfast and virtually alone against the scourge of Hitler.� (Lyndon Baines Johnson, The Vantage Point: Perspectives of the Presidency 1963-1969 (New York, 1971) p.316.). Nevertheless, despite this and perhaps many more examples, I think self-interest is simply and obviously at the heart of all national politics, and any alluding to �special-relationships� only serves for that period in time�

�for those interested, here is an online link to the article in full...

Edited by Act of Oblivion - 01-Dec-2006 at 09:39