Strategy and Foreign Policy in Great Britain, 1930–1938: From the Pursuit of the Balance of Power to Appeasement

Abstract

This volume of essays focuses upon Britain's international and imperial role from the mid-Victorian era through until the immediate aftermath of the Second World War. Individual chapters by acknowledged authorities in their field deal with a variety of broad-ranging and particular issues, including: 'cold wars' before the Cold War in Anglo-Russian relations; Lord Curzon and the diplomacy of war and peace-making; air-power as an instrument of colonial control; Foreign Office efforts to frame and influence the historical narrative; Winston Churchill's alternative to, and the pursuit of, policies of 'appeasement'; British responses to conflict and regime change in Spain; the Secret Intelligence Service and British diplomacy in East Asia'; Neville Chamberlain and the 'phoney war'; efforts to combat American misperceptions of Britain in wartime; and British-American differences over the future of Italy's colonial possessions. This collection, along with the accompanying volume covering the period after World War 2, is dedicated to the memory of Professor Saki Dockrill. Introduction Saki Ruth Dockrill, 'no ordinary professor'; Brian Holden Reid -- 1. 'A Very Internecine Policy': Anglo-Russian cold wars before the Cold War; T.G. Otte -- 2. Curzon's War and Curzon's Peace; John Fisher -- 3. Markers of Modernity or Agents of Terror?: Air Policing and Colonial Revolt after World War I; Martin Thomas -- 4. Addressing the Past: The Foreign Office and the Vetting of Diplomatic and Ministerial Memoirs During the Years between the World Wars; Keith Hamilton -- 5. The Secret Intelligence Service and China: The Case of Hilaire Noulens, 1923-1932; Christopher Baxter -- 6. Strategy and Foreign Policy in Great Britain, 1930-1938: From the Pursuit of Balance of Power to Appeasement; B.J.C. McKercher -- 7. 'Thank God for the French Army': Churchill, France and an Alternative to Appeasement in the 1930s; Philip Bell -- 8. Britain and the Spanish Connection, 1931-1947: Non-intervention and the Regime Change; Glyn Stone -- 9. 'To Gamble all on a Single Throw': Neville Chamberlain and the Strategy of the Phoney War; Joe Maiolo -- 10; The Committee on American Opinion on the British Empire, 1942-1944; Andrew Stewart -- 11. The Colonial versus the Anti-Colonial: the Failure of Anglo-American Planning on the Future of the Italian Colonies, September 1943 -- June 1945; Saul Kelly.