Et tu, Britain?
This is what a lot of Americans are thinking with the news that a British parliamentary committee has pronounced the special relationship ‘dead’.
Actually, one of the wonderful things about a special relationship is that it has more lives than a cat. Brits and Americans have been pronouncing the special relationship dead since the Suez Crisis, when the United States demanded that Britain end its invasion of Egypt. LBJ was furious with Harold Wilson — and vice versa — over the Vietnam War. Margaret Thatcher was furious when Ronald Reagan invaded Grenada (a member of the British Commonwealth whose official head of state is Queen Elizabeth II) without giving her so much as the courtesy of a phone call. Later, George H. W. Bush pushed the reunification of Germany against the combined objections of Thatcher and French president Francois Mitterand.
Yet somehow the relationship survived, and somehow it continued to be special — a relationship that, for all its drama and frequent disappointments, is like no other international relationship in the world.
Bulldog or Poodle?
But as Winston Churchill (who coined the phrase back in 1946) would have surely understood, the British and Americans, divided by the possession of a common language, understand the meaning of the phrase in different ways. For the Brits, ‘special relationship’ means more than a special feeling of connection or a persisting parallelism in our interests; it is a strategic idea. By sticking close to the United States, successive British governments have hoped that they could gain special influence over the United States, and that influence or the perception of it would contribute to Britain’s own power and prestige in the wider world.
This vision for the relationship has always led to disappointment; even Winston Churchill was shocked by the ease with which Franklin Roosevelt ignored (or actively opposed) Britain’s imperial goals during World War Two. When furious British pundits and politicians asked what Tony Blair got as ‘payoff’ for supporting the United States in the Iraq War, they were looking at the special relationship from this characteristically British point of view. Was Britain’s support for the US paying off? Was the United States giving Britain something valuable in return for its support? Was Britain’s prestige enhanced by its closeness to the United States?
The answer in the Iraq case was no and, as the parliamentary committee observed, Britain actually lost prestige in the world to the degree that the country was regarded as an “American poodle.”
When the parliamentarians tell Brits to give up on the special relationship, they mean that Britain should give up on the dream that fawning dependence on the US will make it somehow stronger and richer. The United States is not willing to pay a high price for British support, and so Britain should make foreign policy with less deference to Washington’s wishes and more attention to its own needs.
I can’t disagree; it’s going to be rare that Britain can extract major concessions from the United States in this way and in any case neither the British nor we would consider that kind of relationship either honorable or appropriate.
Together: Like It Or Not
But the special relationship is not really a matter of favors received and favors bestowed. The United States and Great Britain have a special relationship because our views of the world and our interests are so similar (though they are far from identical) that more often than not we both want the same things. This is no secret; the rest of the world knows that the two of us (along with the other ‘cousins’ in Canada, New Zealand and Australia and, increasingly, Ireland) will constantly bicker, but more often than not we end up on the same side.
Charles de Gaulle vetoed Britain’s entry into the European Union because he thought Britain was a “Trojan horse” that would introduce American ideas and priorities into the inner councils of Europe. He was right. Ever since the British got into the club (after de Gaulle gave up the French presidency), they have worked to make the EU more ‘Anglo-Saxon’. They work for freer markets and they fight the centralization of power in Brussels. They steadfastly support expansion, partly to dilute the power of France and Germany in the club, and partly because they know that a wider EU will be less likely to grow into the kind of ‘superstate’ which would erode Britain’s own independence.
Globally, Britain and the United States agree far more often than they differ. We both like free trade, financial market regulation that is only as restrictive as it absolutely has to be, and we care deeply about the free flows of investment and ideas. We don’t object to the development of regional associations (like ASEAN, the EU and so forth) but we want these regional organizations to remain open to the rest of the world. We both dislike illiberal regimes; we like to see regional balances of power; we combine aspirations for a more peaceful world with a belief that force is sometimes necessary. We both like capitalism more than other people (perhaps in Britain the English like it more than the Scots these days) and over the centuries we have both been pretty good at it.
There are significant differences between us as well. The British establishment and the British equivalent of the federal government are much stronger than their counterparts in the United States. Overall the Brits (and especially the Scots) are a bit to the left of Americans, and social class matters more there than it does here. (Race matters less in the UK than in the US — but relations between some of Britain’s Muslims and the rest of society are significantly more difficult than in the US.) But while these and other differences are real and important, the resemblance between the two countries is so strong and the parallelism in their interests so obvious that diplomats from all over the world assume that most of the time the US and the UK will stand pretty close to each other on the major issues of the day.
This is not going to change anytime soon, and the parliamentary committee that called the special relationship over acknowledged as much. As they say in their conclusions:
We conclude that the UK has an extremely close and valuable relationship with the US in specific areas of co-operation, for instance in the fields of intelligence and security; that the historic, trading and cultural links between the two countries are profound; and that the two countries share common values in their commitment to freedom, democracy and the rule of law. (Paragraph 48)
The committee calls less for deep changes in the relationship than for the Brits to stop analyzing it incessantly, and to stop expecting a quid for every quo. Additionally, the parliamentarians complain, endless press fascination with the personal chemistry between particular British prime ministers and American presidents is not helpful.
This is all in all pretty sensible — not that it’s going to work. No matter what earnest parliamentary committees write the British press will continue to speculate about the personal chemistry between prime ministers and presidents, and Britons looking for signs that their country still matters in the world will look for signs of British influence over American policy.
But Americans should not take our relationship with Britain lightly. Britain, Canada and Australia remain our closest and most trusted allies. Given the common history, language, legal systems and interests that we share, nobody understands us better than they do — and nobody is more likely to be there for us when the dark hour comes. Honoring these relationships and ensuring that they flourish is one of the ways that we demonstrate that we pay our debts and recognize our friends. It’s worth repeating something I wrote earlier in the week: doing well by our existing best friends is one of the best ways to attract new ones.
Europe and The Special Relationship
Yet if that relationship is to have a future, both the American and British sides need to think more creatively about what we can do together to advance our common interests and vision. The key may well be what Charles de Gaulle feared all those years ago: working together on Europe.
For the Brits, Europe and the EU have been an enormous frustration. The European Union at its core is an agreement between France and Germany. As such it gave continental Europe some independence from the United States during the Cold War; it also consigned Britain to the fringes of the European political system. For centuries the British had worked to defend the interests and liberties of smaller countries in Europe as part of a grand strategy that preserved the balance of power in Europe to enable the British to build a worldwide system of power and trade. The British had always been able to count on the jealousy of the European powers; the weaker powers would fear the strongest, and willingly cooperate with Britain to limit the power of an aspiring hegemon.
The rise of the Franc0-German alliance and the EU challenged all the assumptions of British policy in Europe. With Germany tamed (partly because the ongoing American presence in Europe reassured the other countries, including France, that German economic power would not lead to a resurgent Germany that would threaten its neighbors’ security), the two largest west European powers, France and Germany, formed a durable alliance. With the American security umbrella over everyone, the smaller European countries were willing to cooperate as well, and the EU gradually took shape.
From an American point of view this was an excellent thing: no more wars in western Europe — but the EU showed (and shows) no signs of becoming a great power rival to the US. From the British point of view, it is a little trickier. The EU is so advantageous (a continental free market), that Britain can’t stay out, but Britain’s political position in the EU is so difficult that the arrangement remains unsatisfactory and troublesome. More than fifty years after the Treaty of Rome, both France and Germany continue to pay more attention to each other than either does to Britain. The EU is a tougher issue for Conservatives (whose voters tend to be more oriented toward sovereignty and free markets) than for Labour, but EU relations test all British governments, and the country is constantly agonizing over whether to join up with new European projects or stay out.
The United States can help Britain solve its Europe problem while advancing our own interests there. The expansion of the EU from the original six who formed the European Community back in 1957 (France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and tiny Luxemburg) has reduced the power of the Franco-German core. The new members in central and eastern Europe are instinctively worried about both Russia and Germany — and they don’t trust France as to protect their interests. These countries, still in recovery from communism, also tend to embrace a more aggressively capitalist economic model than much of western Europe; they are hungry to grow.
Britain and the United States are the natural partners of these countries. The Americans want to ensure their independence as part of our own vision for European and Atlantic cohesion and security. The British can and should be their natural allies within the EU. To ensure fair treatment for the new members of the union and to throw Britain’s weight behind them will help rebalance political power in the union, shift both its economic and its political policies in directions that redound to both British and American benefit, and give Britain something it has needed ever since the loss of Empire: a role.
It is not the job of the United States to meddle in the internal affairs of the European Union, much less to tell Britain how to manage its European policy. Nevertheless, from the admission of Turkey to the reform of the EU’s trade-distorting and grossly unjust system of agricultural subsidies, the US and the UK share some important interests in the outcome of EU debates.
After the upcoming British election, the United States should urge Britain to develop a strategic plan for Europe involving closer, deeper ties with natural allies in the EU, and as that plan develops, the United States to look for ways to put our weight behind it, encouraging our friends in the EU to work closely with Britain. The goal is not an anti-French or anti-German network; the goal is the classic British agenda in Europe — the protection of the rights and interests of smaller states.
Helping Britain develop and implement a serious, long term European strategy is good politics and good policy for the United States no matter who wins the next British elections. If the Conservative party forms the new government, this kind of approach could be particularly useful. Putting America’s weight behind a sensible British strategy in Europe, one worked out with other Atlantic-minded members of the EU, will strengthen the western alliance and promote openness, growth and reform in Europe.
All this won’t, as de Gaulle feared, weaken Europe. It will make Europe stronger, wealthier and more respected in the world. It’s win-win-win, for the US, the UK and for both the old and the new members of the EU.
I think Mr. Mead is exactly correct in saying there is a special relationship between the U.S. and the Brits, one which I feel goes beyond cultural & traditional issues to include a deep spiritual root.
And it is this latter linkage which will have the two countries walking the beaches of the world together like, say, the Walrus and the Carpenter (or brothers like Ephraim and Manasseh) for many years to come.
(By the way, Mr. Mead, great imagery you used from ‘Through the Looking -Glass’. It was spot-on and was the most creative & insightful I’ve come across in many, many a year.)
I think the pressures of Great Depression 2.0 are more likely to break the EU up into its national units, than to strengthen what is an over regulated, inefficient, socialist, brittle, central command style organ. The monetary union is in deep trouble, (PIIGS) and when the Euro breaks, many of the newest members in the east will look elsewhere for their future.
I don’t see the EU as a successful model for the future. The sooner it breaks apart the sooner something more flexible and adaptable can take its place. I don’t think the newly independent states want to be part of the inefficient socialist welfare state model. They have already experienced how badly that system performs, and are most receptive to the Capitalist system of the US. (I envy their flat income tax)
A new US, UK marshal plan which provided matching funds for US, and UK company investment in democratic central and east European countries, would allow bilateral trade treaties separate from the restrictive, and over regulated EU. It would build and strengthen a buffer zone between the aggressive Russian and Moslem areas to the East and South. As well as provide necessary economic competition to a nearly moribund Western Europe.
“nobody is more likely to be there for us when the dark hour comes”
That is the real heart of the matter.
A quick note on “free trade.” There have always been winners and losers when trade restrictions are relaxed. The theory of comparative advantage merely states that the gains of the winners will outwiegh the losses of the losers — which means in theory that everyone can be made better off.
However when the comparative advantage lies in a relative abundance of one of the two main factors of production — labor and capital — the losers are not in one industry only but across the factor as a whole. The gains are real (in terms of average GDP per capita) even as average real wages fall in the high-wage countries. In other words a redistribution of income from labor to capital takes place that is larger in volume than the gains of trade.
I bring this up, Mr. Mead, because the consequences of doing business with China will be as big a challenge for Britain, and Europe, as for the United States (and Canada and all other high-wage countries in the world).
There are alternatives to protectionism I hasten to add, but they necessarily involve a re-redistribution of income to undo the effects of trading with populous low-wage countries as big as China. We don’t know how to do income redistribution just yet, at least not in a way that is fair and efficient and that preserves the incentives to save and invest. In theory the answer is wage subsidies and a graduated consumption tax (like an income tax, but with savings exempt) as was embodied in the so-called USA Tax introduced by Senators Nunn and Domenici back in the 90′s. We need to take another look at that important piece of legislation. Those guys weren’t dolts.
[...] Make The Relationship Special Again [...]
It would be nice, Mr Mead, to correct your first sentence. It should say, “Et toi, Britain” instead of “et tu”.
It is one of these small mistakes which can display in some people a lack of knowledge in French language and French affairs.
You are not among them though, as inter alia many comments posted at AI prove it. Still, it is annoying, all the more than continental countries such as France are among the topics dealt with in the post.
Thanks, John for the suggestion but I’ll leave it as it is. The reference is to a Latin phrase — attributed (incorrectly but frequently) to Julius Caesar when he realized that Brutus was among his assassins. It would be better Latin if the line were “Et tu, Brute?” since that is the vocative form of the name Brutus but the phrase is very commonly cited in the form I used. From somewhere dim in my memory comes the thought that Caesar’s last words were actually in Greek: kai sou teknon; “You, too, child?”. Brutus was rumored to be a natural son of Caesar who at one time had been a lover of his mother. However, if I had been trying to use French, your suggestion would be right.
Professor Mead, the strength of the special relationship is its lack of explicit policy goals. It has managed to survive for so long because it is based upon cultural affinity, shared economic principles and a fairly similar political culture. Outside of ’42-’45 and our common realization that absolutist ideologies can’t be tolerated, we do not have many specific policy goals in common. That is a great strength since we have arguably treated Japan and Germany better since WWII than the Brits and their national interests.
The Brits are too quixotic about EU politics to allow for a sustained Anglo-American cooperative policy. For British politicians and academics, it is still very much a zero sum game. A new British government would pull out and the State department would be left holding the bag and the object of justified kvetching from Paris and Berlin. Until the Tories and Labour can agree on more than ‘save the rebate’, the American government would do well to stay put.
At the risk of sounding sycophantic, this is another in a long line of brilliant posts by Mead. His blog is truly indispensable. Let’s hope that someone in the Administration, preferably Hillary Clinton or the President himself, reads it regularly; they would certainly learn alot.
We know that Obama and crew take what journalists say very seriously. We’ve heard that after months of excoriating the Administration on the stimulus bill and health care reform, Paul Krugman was invited in for a tet a tet with the President and Larry Summers. We’ve also heard that from time to time the President has invited Tom Friedman to chat over a round of golf.
My suggestion is that Obama should invite Mead to a night at the opera; Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov’s “The Golden Cockerel” might be just perfect; it’s based on a story by Pushkin about a foolish king. At dinner before the opera or during drinks afterwards, Mead could school Obama about what an intelligent foreign policy should look like,
Mead is right that shared values make the American-British relationship special and enduring. An excellent example of this is how differently Americans and British treat their Muslim citizens than the French, Germans and much of the rest of Europe,
The Germans have a difficult relationship with their Turkish immigrants and their descendants. 8 of Germany’s 16 states place restrictions on the wearing of the Hajib and many Turkish residents feel alienated from German society. If anything, this is even truer in France, where President Sarkozy has made the banning of Muslim garb a cause celebre. In the Netherlands, Italy and even liberal Denmark, Muslim immigrants feel discriminated against and proposals are pending to ban the Hajib or the Burqua.
The United Kingdom takes a much more relaxed approach to all of this. A large number of South Asian Muslims reside in London and the U.K. (like the United States) has experienced terrible Muslim terrorism.
Despite this, we don’t see the emergence of far right political parties focused on Muslims like we do in France, the Netherlands and Germany. While Tony Blair and Jack Straw created a stir by criticizing the Hajib in 2006, we don’t see legislation proposed to ban Muslim garb. Nor do we see legislation enacted to ban minarets like we did in Switzerland.
Although the U.K. has experienced home-grown terrorism, South Asians are integrated into British society better than Turks are in Germany or the Netherlands or than Algerians are in France.
Like the United States, the United Kingdom is a far more tolerant nation than its European brethren.
This seems like a good thing to base a special relationship on to me.
Enjoyable, as always. That there still exists a more rigid class structure in England, at least until relatively recently, is something I can attest to. In 1987, I was invited to the rowing regatta at Henley. The viewing stands were segmented into groups, which required special badges for admission, and the closer you got to the finish, the more rarified the social circle that the spectators belonged to. In the last section, you would have thought you’d walked onto a set from Brideshead Revisited, marred only by the fact that the Soviet men’s eight crushed all the other competitors.
Race-wise, I’m not so sure. About ten years ago, I was with some friends from England–Oxbridge types who are very progressive on social issues–and they managed to occupy part of a two-hour drive upstate with Irish jokes, told with great relish.
British wishes with respect to America were best conveyed in Love, Actually, where the Tony Blair figure portrayed by Hugh Grant tells off the Bush/Clinton figure played by Billy Bob Thornton. But if the British really did go their own way, would they really enjoy that much more prestige or influence? Does France, for all its Gaullist/anti-U.S. tendencies, wield greater influence?
One of the great things about Walter’s God and Gold, a history and analysis of the rise of the Anglo-Saxon powers, is that he weaves together a lot of themes that can be explored elsewhere in more specialized volumes.
Adam Kirsch, a great literary critic at the New Republic and Tablet Magazine, gave a very positive review to a new book by Harvard prof Eric Nelson, which traces a lot British Enlightenment ideas about the proper form of government to a close analysis of the Hebrew bible by scholars of the period.
http://www.tabletmag.com/arts-and-culture/books/28275/political-legacy/
Walter, I’d also be curious if you thought this new history of Christianity, by Diarmaid Maccullough, was worth a read.
I think generally most Americans on both Left and Right are willing to continue, nurture and have so called special relationship with Britain. Recent migrants like me from Sub Continent (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, etc.) are also equally supportive of a strong and special relationship between UK and USA; despite the colonial history.
But I am not sure most Americans would be much supportive of core of Prof. Mead’s suggestion that USA generally back UK in it’s European project of being guardian of smaller states against over powering Russia and Germany. There are many complications in that. What Prof. Mead is forgetting here is it is much more beneficial for USA to have stronger and healthier relations with both Germany and Russia and that is what Obama is doing. In other words, willingness on part of Germany and Russia to accommodate American view point is present and it makes sense for America to take advantage of that. There is little bit forgetfulness of the fact that USA (despite all the reality of decline) is the Super Power and hence it can get what it wants in Europe by directly interacting with Russia and Germany and does not need to go through UK. On other hand it is much more negative for USA to try to meddle in Europe which strengthens UK at the cost of Germany, France or Russia. No matter, that is really no-no for USA. So far Americans have been wise enough not to get involved in Europe or with the strangled relationship of UK-EU. Literally there is no place for USA in that. USA will loose very badly if it tries any such silly endeavours.
On the other hand if some one suggests USA should back UK against Argentina in Falkland dispute, that may make some sense. But again my hunch is Hillary may be knowing more, or is more mature in nurturing relations with S. American countries instead of allowing any nation outside of the Hemisphere to take advantage of strangled relationship between USA and Argentina due to Falkland dispute (if it sides with UK).
This means indeed there needs to be different avenues where USA will need to find ways to strengthen relationship with UK. What is that apart from cultural aspects (which are great but nothing new)?
As one starts thinking in that direction, one comes to a point in the end which goes to the heart of the core problem – how does UK want to define it’s place in today’s world? Economically and politically? It is matter of time before UK and France will loose their seats on UNSC. Economic challenges are well known. Really it is the Germany which is calling shots today and as things stand German future seems bright (and to that extent French too). Agreed EU is broken, but the way Germany is handling the Greece fiasco ruthlessly, even if EU shrinks it will deliver more to Germany. Germany has invested so far heavily in the European project, nurtured it for over half a century and today not at all hesitating in reaping benefits of all those investments.
That kind of project is what UK needs to imagine and devise. It is unlikely to be in Europe. Commonwealth, Antarctica, etc. could be the political spaces to work on. (Or McCain idea of constellation of democracies…) In absence of that when UK itself is ‘lost at sea’, even if Americans want to restore ‘special relationship’, it is unclear how it can be done. Prof. Mead’s column is not convincing either.
thanks for the treatise on anglo-american relations. all of this would be relevant to our collective future except for 2 hugely overshadowing facts: 1. as mentioned above by another commenter – the rise of china and the march toward “[low] wages” throughout the west. sure, capital will survive, but who will be enslaved, the whites or the [Muslims]?and 2. the apparently irreversible impending doom of the west given the rise of the islamic population throughout the west, exacerbated by the negative population growth of the native population. will the [Muslims] really continue on with the open, liberal societies and institutions they are inheriting from europe, then UK? will USA inculcate the growing hispanic cohort with the values that make USA the best ever? (high birth rate is a great start.) with these question open, traditional talk of anglo-american relations is academic.
Mike Flynn – is it only Muslims who are responsible for West’s decline? What about the disaster leadership at Vatican? This Pope intended to revive Christianity in Europe, but he is failing miserably and that is going to contribute to further decline of Christian character of Europe.
So don’t you think defining West in more Secular Terms could be more meaningful? Because if you want to define that in terms Islam or Religion (which is the problem for Democracy like Israel too); then there is not much space for folks like me or at best secondary or consolation place. Apart from my personal loss, I am not sure such abrogation of rights of few in itself can revive West. (Did we not try that slavery in America?)
Question is what do you want – Christian Europe with corrupt Leadership of Pope Benedict (I know Anglican Church, Lutheran and Greek Orthodox all these are competing churches in Europe and we have diaspora of Evangelical churches, Presbyterian and Episcopal Churches in USA; but taking Roman Catholicism as an example) or West where Muslims may be dominant but who are Secular in Public Sphere with equally creative at Democracy, Technology, Science and thriving Economy?
For so long India has one of the largest population of Muslims and despite all the shameful Colonial History of pitting Hindus against Muslims; that country, that society learns to live a prosperous life.
So really does it matter whether Muslims are growing in West?
Larison also posted on the Times article, taking the opposite position – It’s About Time:
“Had Britain under Blair not become a lockstep supporter of Washington’s line on anti-terrorism, nonproliferation and regime change, and if Washington had therefore not had the fig leaf of British support and the political capital that came from Blair’s endorsement of the invasion, it is remotely possible that the invasion might never have taken place.”
WRM, also note Daniel’s appearance in the comment section with a substantive response. That’s how you build a decent comment section, not correcting Latin vs. French or claiming no one understands your ironic understatement. Btw, on the internet, irony truly is dead. Best to stick to straightforward.