Special Relationship - Churchillian Emphasis

Churchillian Emphasis

Although the special relationship between the United Kingdom and the United States was most famously emphasised by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, its existence had been recognised since the 19th century, not least by rival powers. Their troops had been fighting side by side—sometimes spontaneously—in skirmishes overseas since 1859, and the two democracies shared a common bond of sacrifice in World War I.

Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald's visit to the United States in 1930 confirmed his own belief in the 'special relationship', and for this reason he looked to the Washington Treaty rather than a revival of the Anglo-Japanese alliance as the guarantee of peace in the Far East. However, as David Reynolds observes: ‘For most of the period since 1919, Anglo-American relations had been cool and often suspicious. America’s “betrayal” of the League of Nations was only the first in a series of US actions—over war debts, naval rivalry, the 1931-2 Manchurian crisis and the Depression—that convinced British leaders that the United States could not be relied on.’ Equally, as President Truman's secretary of state, Dean Acheson, recalled: 'Of course a unique relation existed between Britain and America—our common language and history ensured that. But unique did not mean affectionate. We had fought England as an enemy as often as we had fought by her side as an ally.'

Arguably, 'the fall of France in 1940 was decisive in shaping the pattern of international politics', leading the special relationship to displace the entente cordiale as the pivot of the international system. During World War II, as an observer noted, 'Great Britain and the United States integrated their military efforts to a degree unprecedented among major allies in the history of warfare.' 'Each time I must choose between you and Roosevelt,' Churchill shouted at General Charles de Gaulle, leader of the Free French, in 1945, 'I shall choose Roosevelt.'

Churchill's mother was American, and he felt keenly the links between the English-speaking peoples. He first used the term 'special relationship' on 16 February 1944, when he said it was his "deepest conviction that unless Britain and the United States are joined in a special relationship… another destructive war will come to pass".

He used it again in 1945 to describe not the Anglo-American relationship alone, but the United Kingdom's relationship with both the United States and Canada. The New York Times Herald quoted Churchill in November 1945:

We should not abandon our special relationship with the United States and Canada about the atomic bomb and we should aid the United States to guard this weapon as a sacred trust for the maintenance of peace.

Churchill used the phrase again a year later, at the onset of the Cold War, this time to note the special relationship between the United States on the one hand, and the English-speaking nations of the British Commonwealth and Empire under the leadership of the United Kingdom on the other. The occasion was his 'Sinews of Peace Address' in Fulton, Missouri, on 5 March 1946:

Neither the sure prevention of war, nor the continuous rise of world organization will be gained without what I have called the fraternal association of the English-speaking peoples ...a special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire and the United States. Fraternal association requires not only the growing friendship and mutual understanding between our two vast but kindred systems of society, but the continuance of the intimate relationship between our military advisers, leading to common study of potential dangers, the similarity of weapons and manuals of instructions, and to the interchange of officers and cadets at technical colleges. It should carry with it the continuance of the present facilities for mutual security by the joint use of all Naval and Air Force bases in the possession of either country all over the world.
There is however an important question we must ask ourselves. Would a special relationship between the United States and the British Commonwealth be inconsistent with our over-riding loyalties to the World Organisation? I reply that, on the contrary, it is probably the only means by which that organisation will achieve its full stature and strength.

In the opinion of one international relations specialist: 'the United Kingdom's success in obtaining US commitment to cooperation in the postwar world was a major triumph, given the isolation of the interwar period. A senior British diplomat in Moscow, Thomas Brimelow, admitted: 'The one quality which most disquiets the Soviet government is the ability which they attribute to us to get others to do our fighting for us ... they respect not us, but our ability to collect friends.' Conversely, 'the success or failure of United States foreign economic peace aims depended almost entirely on its ability to win or extract the co-operation of Great Britain'. Reflecting on the symbiosis, a later champion, former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, declared: 'The Anglo-American relationship has done more for the defence and future of freedom than any other alliance in the world.'