Pacts and Alliances in History: Diplomatic Strategy and the Politics of Coalitions 9780755625734, 9781848857735

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The editors would like to thank the Mershon Center for International Security Studies at the Ohio State University for supporting the conference that led to this volume and for further supporting its production. Tony Crain, James C. Helicke, Ann Powers, Carole Fink, and Peter Hahn were integral to the project. We owe much gratitude to Shannon D. Lindbloom for sterling copy-editing. Melissa would also like to thank David Graeme Yeager, who was born at the same time as this project, for napping sufficiently to enable its completion.

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ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

Kathleen Burk is Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London (UCL). The author or co-author of seven books and the editor of four, she specialises in Anglo-American relations and on finance and foreign policy. She also writes on wine. Charles Carter is a Ph.D. candidate in European History at the Ohio State University. His areas of specialization include the Cold War, German–Soviet relations, and business history. His dissertation examines West German trade with the Soviet Union (Osthandel) from 1969 to 1991 and argues that this commercial relationship had a deleterious effect on the USSR economy. He received his B.A. and M.A. from the University of Georgia. Yasser El-Shimy is a Political Science doctoral candidate at Boston University, and a former diplomatic attaché at the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Mr. El-Shimy earned his B.A. and M.A. in Political Science from the American University in Cairo. He currently resides in Washington D.C. where he lectures part-time at the Catholic University of America. His blog, Underreported, can be found at: http:// el-shimy.blogspot.com. James C. Helicke is a Ph.D. candidate in International History at the Ohio State University and holds an M.A. from Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey. Helicke was formerly a correspondent for the

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Associated Press based in Turkey and also served as a Public Diplomacy Officer for the U.S. Department of State in the Kurdistan region of Iraq. He is managing editor for the online history magazine, Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective. Michael McKoy is a Ph.D. candidate in the Politics Department at Princeton University, studying International Relations. His research focuses on the international causes and effects of forceful government overthrow. He has received fellowships from the Bradley Foundation and the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies. Jean-Bertrand Ribat graduated from the Ecoles Préparatoires aux Hautes Etudes de Commerce (prépa HEC), followed by the Ecole Superieure de Commerce de Bordeaux. He was a manager for almost twenty years and a specialist in outdoor expeditions, before going to the United States to study at Columbia University and the University of Montana-Missoula. He is currently in the Political Science department at Indiana University (Bloomington) finishing his Ph.D. dissertation on the management of coalitions. Mark Rice holds a doctoral degree in history from the Ohio State University, with a field in diplomatic and international history. His dissertation is entitled “The Alliance City: NATO and Berlin, 1958–1963”. Before beginning at Ohio State, Mark received his Masters degree from Ohio University, through the Contemporary History Institute, and his Bachelor of Arts (Honours) from the University of Toronto. He is currently an instructor at Minnesota State University, Mankato. William Stueck has written extensively on the Korean War and U.S.–Korean relations. He is currently a distinguished research professor of history at the University of Georgia. Teddy J. Uldricks is Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Asheville. He is currently completing Global Conflict: An Interpretive History of the Second World War.

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Melissa P. Yeager is Assistant Professor in European History at Longwood University in Virginia. She has published (previously under the name Melissa Pine) on Harold Wilson, Britain and European integration, British, French and American nuclear collaboration, history and theory.

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INTRODUCTION Charles Carter

Pacts and alliances have been a prominent feature of international relations for centuries, and especially since the time of Napoleon. Diplomats and officials consistently have believed that these structures, in some form or another, are necessary for the preservation of order and stability in any given society. Indeed, diplomacy itself presupposes two or more nations joining forces from time to time to combat or ward off a perceived threat, whether real or illusory, despite conflicting evidence about whether alliances prevent or encourage conflict.1 Yet at its most basic level, pact-making is not always a calculated political, military, or strategic move but often a social activity, the presence of which has existed in all nations, from the most primitive city-states to the most advanced superpowers. From the time when kings threw feasts as they gave their daughters in marriage to solidify an alliance, to the grand ceremonies of today in which representatives from member nations of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) toast one another, transnational bonds have been formed through alliances. Given the perceived necessity of alliances among officials, together with the social features inherent in pact-making, there is little reason to imagine that the creation of pacts and alliances will ever be an obsolete process. At the same time, history has not smiled favorably on the perseverance of pacts and alliances over time. As the political, strategic, military, economic, or cultural objectives of nations have changed, nations have formed new relationships on the international scene, a process which almost always has culminated in the breaking of old and making of

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new pacts. Domestic politics have also played an important role in the maintenance and disintegration of alliances. Although the Quadruple Alliance against Napoleon set the example for a strong European alliance, for example, the Holy Alliance of Austria, Russia, and Prussia failed to address domestic impulses for liberal change and, in the process, undermined the lasting peace that the Quadruple Alliance had helped produce. Additionally, a change in leadership often has been a central issue that has determined whether a pact or alliance will continue or end. A master of balance-of-power politics, Germany’s Bismarck made sure he did not anger England excessively by intensively building up his country’s navy, and he secured a “Reinsurance” treaty with Russia. Yet an insecure and militant Wilhelm II not only antagonized Britain through naval development but also discarded the treaty with Russia and, in doing so, set the stage for deep antipathy between Tsarist Russia and Germany, no doubt a prerequisite for the First World War.2 Perhaps more important for international politics have been the unforeseen, sometimes devastating, consequences of pact-making. The complicated system of alliances that began to emerge in the late nineteenth century, comprised of the Dual Alliance, the Franco-Russian Alliance, the Triple Alliance, and later the Entente Cordiale and the Anglo-Russian Entente, helped set off the Great War, creating unprecedented destruction in terms of human lives and property.3 A similar alliance situation, though less formal and much more unpredictable, contributed to the even more destructive Second World War. Given the unprecedented scale of violence wreaked through these wars, observers cannot help but ponder the extent to which alliances contributed to the bloodshed. Although some assert that the systems of alliances made such wars more bloody, others retort that, without strong alliances to defeat leaders like Hitler, much more blood could have been spilled in the long term. Given the counterfactual nature of examining the role of alliances in such conflicts, though, no single answer ever is likely to be persuasive. In the postwar period, Cold War Europe has raised some of the most interesting issues about alliances, as scholars have examined the role of integration and political organization to shed considerable light on pact performance. In the aftermath of the Second World War, both Western Europe and Eastern Europe took steps toward integration.

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Military integration, as seen in NATO and the Warsaw Pact, reinforced economic and cultural integration, creating a clear divide between a democratic Western Europe and a communist Eastern Europe. That the democratic nations of Western Europe experienced no wars amongst themselves has lent credence to the claim that the secret behind longterm pact success may be found not only in economic, political, and cultural integration but also in what has been loosely called “democratic peace theory”, a notion that goes back to Kant and claims that democratic nations rarely declare war on one another.4 Amid integration grounded in the liberal democratic model, Germany and France, for the first time, were able to put aside their differences and peacefully move forward. Although totalitarian Eastern Europe also saw considerable economic, political, and cultural integration, it did not experience the peace that its western counterpart did. The Soviets, after all, used or at least employed the threat of tanks at various times to control East Germany, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia, and there was a similar fear with regard to Poland well before the momentous events of 1989 that put the nail in the communist bloc’s coffin. The Eastern European experience, not covered in this volume, suggests both that fear and force are requisites to sustain the cohesion of authoritarian alliances, and that they are ultimately self-defeating. Understandably, given this fertile research ground, the broader scholarship surrounding pacts and alliances is complex. However, although providing reasons for why a particular pact or alliance succeeded or failed, historians largely have declined to say anything broader about the factors or causation involved. While the workings of alliances during the nineteenth century have been examined in various balance-of-power interpretative frameworks, such as those by eminent historians like Paul Schroeder and A. J. P. Taylor, political scientists have studied the cohesion of pacts and alliances in much deeper ways.5 As early as 1937, L. P. Jacks noted that alliances were “far more precarious” than “legal contracts between individuals” largely because of the “mutability” of governments.6 In their pathbreaking work on NATO, Mancur Olson and Richard Zeckhauser introduced many new ideas about the functioning of security alliances, including the argument that an increase in the “non-collective benefits” of

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an alliance, paradoxically, “improves the functioning” of that alliance.7 More recently, Emerson M. S. Niou and Peter Ordeshook have stressed the “fundamental divergence” in the foreign policy objectives of “small” versus “large” states or between “land” or “sea powers” to explain alliance workability.8 In addition, David G. Sirmon and Peter J. Lane have examined the effects of cultural differences on international alliance performance in various business enterprises. They argue that “the closer the domain of a social group is to the value-creating activities of an alliance, the more disruptive cultural differences between the partners’ members of that social group will be.”9 Political scientists have been active in proposing generalizable explanations of alliance formation, success and failure – activity to which historians must surely respond. This project began as a conference, held at the Mershon Center for International Security Studies of the Ohio State University in April 2010. The call for papers produced a fascinating and eclectic response, bringing together historians and political scientists from several countries on five continents.10 Its cross-disciplinary character proved to be an excellent medium for discussion, as did its welcoming of both eminent and rising scholars to present new theoretical frameworks and case studies in order to address several research questions. Participants were challenged to consider, first, what are the common denominators shared by alliances that have succeeded in their stated objectives? Second, why do pacts and alliances disintegrate? Third, is the eventual demise of pacts and alliances inevitable? Finally, what are the implications of all these issues on pact and alliance making in the increasingly globalized twentieth-first century? Understanding the inner workings of pacts and alliances is not only critically important for the next generation of policymakers, but it also helps to frame the enquiries of scholars as they try to understand the key events in international relations. One advantage of this volume, emanating from its conference origins, is its breadth, both chronological and geographical. Although most of the contributions in this volume address alliances and pacts of the twentieth century and present, others deal with the Napoleonic era and one goes back as far as the fifteenth century. In addition, alliances

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on four continents are represented in this volume – although of course that does not make the panorama complete, and the editors invite comments from scholars of other periods and geographical regions. A limited periodization and geographical focus will result in no firm conclusions to the issues in question? This volume is organized into two sections, each addressing an important aspect about the nature of pacts and alliances. The first deals with pact or alliance successes, and the second with failures. The contributors to this volume marshal sufficient case studies to test the explanatory power of some of the theories about alliances previously mentioned, while granting primacy to the four central questions. Two political scientists, Michael McKoy of Princeton and Jean-Bertrand Ribat of Indiana University, reveal new theories about alliances.

Section One – why alliances succeed In “Power and culture: the origins and durability of the KoreanAmerican Alliance”, historian William Stueck explains the foundation for strong, enduring US-South Korean relations for more than fifty years, despite different and sometimes mutually hostile US and South Korean governments. Stueck suggests that alliances continue over time so long as the leaders of both sides continue to believe that national interests necessitate such an arrangement. Yet if the United States were to use military forces stationed in South Korea to protect Taiwan against an attack from China, such an action could lead to the disintegration of the alliance because South Korean governments have consistently argued that any conflict with China is not in keeping with their national interests. In stressing bilateral national interests, Stueck elucidates a key component of alliance durability over time. The next chapter, from political scientist Jean-Bertrand Ribat, is entitled “Opening the balance of power theory’s black box, do we need a coordinator?” His chapter examines Britain’s role during the wars of the French Revolution to critique realist and neo-realist balance of power theories, both of which consider a coordinator nation

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unnecessary for the successful creation and implementation of an alliance. In his analysis of a multipolar alliance, Ribat finds that a single coordinator may not be a requisite in successful alliancemaking. Nevertheless, Ribat finds that a strong coordinator makes alliance success more likely and argues that skilled diplomacy, enormous resources, and relative invulnerability are the most important qualifications for a coordinator. These characteristics help “to generate levels of cooperation and coordination needed to defeat the challenger.” Ribat’s analysis provides an important addition to Stueck’s emphasis on national interests in helping to explain successful alliances. The third article in the “Successes” section is James Helicke’s “Turkey’s accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, 1945–52: a qualified success?” Helicke draws attention to the importance of domestic politics in the maintenance of alliances. He shows how Turkey’s Democratic Party consolidated its power by appealing to a mass domestic audience that desired its entry into NATO. His work implies that, so long as there is overwhelming domestic support for an alliance, policymakers in democratic nations will likely seek to maintain or strengthen such an arrangement. In its focus on the domestic arena, Helicke’s chapter gives insight into the question of whether the disintegration of alliances is ultimately inevitable. The fourth success story comes from Mark Rice, who examines the development of NATO’s doctrine of flexible response as a demonstration of the difficulty of maintaining an alliance in which the security of all members depended ultimately on the commitment of just one. His careful diplomatic study of members’ “concessions and compromise” raises new questions about the role of national interest in alliance formation and maintenance from the 1950s to the present, shedding light on how NATO has remained relevant in the twentyfirst century. Finally, and bridging the two halves of the volume, Kathleen Burk returns to the grand historical sweep with her chapter on AngloAmerican relations. Her chapter begins with the American War of Independence but focuses on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries in seeking to illuminate how one great power was able to pass the

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baton to the next not only without a battle being fought, but with the maintenance of a close – and possibly even “special” – relationship. Her conference starting point, that “history is messy”, could be taken as a leitmotif of the volume as a whole.

Section Two – why alliances fail Turning attention to why alliances fail, in “Coalition dynamics and the Sèvres Pact: do opposites attract?”, Michael McKoy calls into question basic assumptions that political scientists and historians have about alliance-making. Theories of alliance formation, McKoy notes, presuppose that shared goals and interests bring nations together. Yet McKoy shows that the 1956 Sèvres Pact did not arise because of shared interests or goals. Rather, he suggests that a common target but divergent outcome preferences drew the nations into this coalition. Mutual mistrust, McKoy suggests, was an essential ingredient in the formation of the Sèvres Pact. Yet this same mistrust also meant that the coalition in the long run inevitably failed. McKoy’s emphasis on preferences, trust, and mistrust is echoed throughout the remainder of the volume. Teddy J. Uldricks’ “The impossible alliance: strategy and reliability in the Triple Entente negotiations of 1939” goes on to explore the failure to reconstruct a British, French, and Russian alliance to combat Hitler’s aggression in Eastern Europe. France and Britain, Uldricks argues, lacked the will to become an ally of Stalin and instead hoped that the Soviets would engage Germany without their involvement. Uldricks’ work, in contrast to McKoy’s, makes clear that mutual mistrust can prevent the formation of a coalition. The two chapters together raise an interesting question: how much mistrust is too much? Melissa P. Yeager’s chapter on the European Defense Community (EDC) offers a fresh look at a much-studied institution, confirming recent research that it was never the high point of supranational European integration that it is often claimed to be. Although treaties were signed for its creation, and ratified by a number of states, Yeager argues that “no participating government desired or anticipated success in creating

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the EDC.” She asks important questions about why governments participate in alliance negotiations in the first place, and what they hope to gain by so doing, highlighting both McKoy’s emphasis on outcome preferences and Helicke’s focus on domestic politics. Finally in this section, Yasser El-Shimy probes the failure of the Moscow-Cairo alliance between 1956 and 1976, suggesting that it can be attributed to diminishing utility, despite Cairo’s need for a means to address the “present and constant” threat posed to its sovereignty and territorial integrity by Israel. Through a close reading of SovietEgyptian relations in the context of the Cold War, this perspective overturns traditional realist explanations of alliance formation and maintenance. Together these scholars suggest answers to the research questions laid out above. The participation of both historians and political scientists ensures very different kinds of responses. Nevertheless, the discussion gives rise to some compelling – and provocative – conclusions: notably, that states are averse to making alliances at all.

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CHAPTER 1 POWER AND CULTUR E: THE OR IGINS AND DUR ABILIT Y OF THE KOR EAN-A MER ICAN ALLIANCE William Stueck

In its creation and durability, the Korean-American alliance represents an instance in which strategic factors – control of territory and resources, denial of the same to others, and international stability – have often overcome cultural differences in language, ideology, lifestyle, and psychology.1 This pattern is not always the case with alliances, or with international relations in general. Even when cultural considerations are secondary, they are rarely irrelevant. Yet the analysis of culture has its limits in explaining the interaction of nations. Cooperation between states can occur in the midst of considerable cultural divergence, and cultural convergence does not always eliminate or even reduce conflict. Indeed, conflict is sometimes exacerbated by such convergence. An examination of the pre-history and history of the alliance between the United States and the Republic of Korea (ROK) reminds us of the continuing need to combine traditional with newer modes of analysis.2

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The questions addressed herein are as follows: Why, given the response to the North Korean attack of 25 June 1950, did the United States refuse to accept a formal alliance with the Republic of Korea (ROK) when its government pleaded for one in the spring of 1949, or even adopt a more concerted effort at deterrence in the year that followed? Why, given the obvious difficulties in relations with the ROK government led by Syngman Rhee, did the United States agree to a military pact with it in the immediate aftermath of the armistice in July 1953? Why has that pact endured to this day, a generation after the end of the Cold War that produced it? And, why, during the administrations of George W. Bush in the United States and Roh Moo Hyun in South Korea, did the alliance come closer than at any time during its history to breaking down? A starting point for understanding the US refusal to form an alliance with the ROK in 1949, as well as the decision to withdraw the final American combat units from the peninsula, is an assessment by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in September 1947 of Korea’s significance to the United States. “From the standpoint of military security,” they declared, “the United States has little strategic interest in maintaining . . . troops and bases in Korea.” In any offensive operation on mainland Asia, the United States would bypass the peninsula and, although with control of Korea the Soviet Union might “interfere with United States communications and operations in East China, Manchuria, the Yellow Sea, Sea of Japan and adjacent islands”, that threat could be neutralized with air power based in Japan and Okinawa. The military leaders warned that a forced American withdrawal under the pressure of disorder and unrest in South Korea would represent a much greater blow to US international prestige than a voluntary disengagement.3 This assessment reflected a distinct change in emphasis from one by the same group during the previous April: This is the one country within which we alone have for almost two years carried on ideological warfare in direct contact with our opponents, so that to lose this battle would be gravely detrimental to United States prestige, and therefore security, throughout the world. To abandon this struggle would tend to confirm

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the suspicion that the United States is not really determined to accept the responsibilities and obligations of world leadership.4 That is, with the joint occupation of the peninsula by the Soviet Union and the United States, the sharp deterioration in their relationship generally, and the struggle of the occupiers to advance their own political and economic systems in their zones, a US withdrawal and Communist takeover of the entire country would produce a serious blow to American credibility on a global scale. The shift in emphasis between April and September 1947 was in part an outgrowth of the fact that in the earlier case the Joint Chiefs were commenting on the desirability of a major program of economic aid for South Korea whereas in the later one they were addressing the issue of a continued US troop presence. There is no denying, though, that at the later date the Joint Chiefs were far less inclined than before to argue that saving South Korea warranted a major effort. The question is, why? The answer is threefold: conditions in Europe, conditions within the United States, and conditions within Korea. In strategically critical Europe, the United States had decided to take on major new responsibilities in the face of economic conditions that, if continued, would work to the advantage of the Communists and the Soviet Union. In the United States, Congress, confronted with growing demands for expenditures elsewhere, had refused to consider a major program of economic aid to South Korea and had substantially cut the Truman administration’s proposed military budget for fiscal year 1948. The latter move included a reduction in the army of 58,371 civilian employees and 12,500 officers, while the former made it increasingly difficult for the United States to maintain stability within South Korea.5 In South Korea, in fact, conditions had been deteriorating for over a year. Economically, the division of the peninsula into two occupation zones had proven a major drawback and American administration and policies in its zone had sometimes actually worsened conditions. Politically, large numbers of South Koreans sympathized with the Left and the vast majority were tired of the American occupation and longed for independence. Koreans on the Right, led by Syngman Rhee, had made

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it impossible for the United States to reach a compromise with the Soviet Union on the establishment of a provisional government for the entire peninsula. Most American soldiers were tired of being stationed in an economically backward land, which was at the end of the US supply line and whose people were less and less deferential to their liberators from Japan. The Americans often made their discontent known in letters home, to family, to the War Department, and to their representatives in Congress, thus helping to erode patience with the occupation on Capitol Hill.6 The pressures that led to the September 1947 assessment of the Joint Chiefs continued to drive their position on Korea all the way to the North Korean attack in June 1950.7 For the State Department, however, the Joint Chiefs’ April 1947 judgment seemed equally compelling. While military leaders produced and sustained the momentum for rapid withdrawal of American troops, the diplomats stretched out the process until June 1949. In the end, the State Department, influenced by the same pressures as the Joint Chiefs – if not quite to the same degree – accepted the final departure of US combat units from a now independent ROK in the South. The diplomats did so despite having led the charge to take the Korean issue to the UN General Assembly in September 1947 and then to ram through the interim committee of that body a resolution paving the way for UN-supervised elections in South Korea alone.8 This course could not help but lead to the establishment of two independent and hostile governments on the peninsula. (The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea [DPRK] appeared in the North in September 1948.) Yet in mid-1949 the State Department resisted President Rhee’s quest for either formal or informal security guarantees against an attack from the North. When in May the ROK government released a statement distorting the circumstances under which the country had become divided, implying that it was the fault of the United States that Communists were in Korea and threatened the ROK, and omitting the role Rhee had played in sabotaging the American effort to reach an agreement with the Soviets to end Korea’s division, US diplomats bridled. They warned ROK leaders that they must do more to put their own house in order, including a buildup of

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their own army, and to avoid provocations along the tense 38th parallel boundary, where skirmishes between the ROK and DPRK armies were commonplace. When the ROK ambassador in Washington noted with concern to American officials that the United States was distancing itself from the Nationalist government in China as the Communists advanced there, he was told that South Koreans should learn from that case that US aid could not stem the Communist tide unless indigenous forces put up a stiff resistance.9 Among other things, the exchange revealed the deep psychological and cultural chasm existing between officials of the two governments. On the one hand were people representing the richest, most powerful nation on earth, who were attempting to cobble together a new global order in the face of concerted opposition from without and only limited acquiescence from many of their countrymen. To US officials dealing with Korea, ROK leaders were a contentious, willful group who showed little appreciation for the American role in freeing their country from Japan, had enormously complicated the American task in the recent occupation, and now presided over a corrupt, autocratic, and inept government facing active resistance from a significant portion of the South Korean populace.10 That regime constantly sought aid, resisted any strings attached, and attempted to maneuver the United States into an open-ended commitment to its survival. Such a pledge was out of the question, not the least because it might encourage ROK’s belligerence toward the DPRK – unnecessarily provoking a conflict that was contrary to American interests – and/or discourage the government from pursuing domestic policies that would broaden public support and enhance prospects for economic development. Under the circumstances, the overt ROK campaign for a clear US commitment simply underscored its absence, thus undermining a more modest effort to deter an outside attack. On the other hand were people from a small nation that had for centuries sought to isolate itself from the outside world. It had largely succeeded in doing so through a loose attachment to a relatively unobtrusive China, in the Confucian worldview its “elder brother.” In the late nineteenth century, Korea was dragged unwillingly into relations with the larger world, was fought over by the three great powers

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surrounding it, and then, early in the twentieth century, was conquered by the strongest among them. Their country too weak to win independence on its own, Korean exiles sought the assistance of stronger powers, but divided over their preferred patron. When they finally escaped the Japanese grasp in 1945, it was at a price of occupation by two other great powers, both of which held interests and perceptions that conflicted with Koreans’ desire for immediate independence. In the end, those who became ROK leaders chose to postpone unity so as to grasp independence under conditions in which they dominated half the country. Having achieved that objective, partly through manipulation of the United States, they found themselves in the uncomfortable position of resenting their sponsor for its condescension and its failure in 1945 to prevent Soviet entry into the North, yet expecting it to play the “elder brother” role in providing protection against hostile outside forces.11 Given those divergent perspectives, the US failure to employ measures adequate to deter an outside attack on the ROK is hardly surprising. Even Ambassador John Muccio, a patient diplomat more sympathetic than most Americans to South Korean leaders, was distrustful enough to ensure that the allocation of US military aid to the ROK was sufficiently piecemeal to discourage adventurism toward the North.12 In the spring of 1950, South Korean warnings of an impending attack from the North fell largely on deaf ears.13 Although cultural/psychological differences played a part, the small place of Korea in a US strategy that remained very much a work in progress qualifies as the main factor in the inadequacy of American deterrence. In the summer of 1950, the strong American response to the outbreak of conventional war occurred despite cultural/psychological differences. The explanation is encapsulated in the reasoning of the Joint Chiefs in the April 1947 memorandum quoted earlier, which gained reinforcement from US sponsorship of the ROK through the UN General Assembly and the blatant nature of the DPRK attack. Under the circumstances, fears of repeating the experience of the 1930s dictated strong action.14 Much the same can be said about the conclusion of the US-ROK security treaty in 1953–54. To be sure, the psychology of the

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relationship had changed dramatically by then because Koreans and Americans had fought and died alongside each other in repulsing the Communist onslaught. The United States had lost over 36,000 men in combat and the ROK had lost over three-and-a-half times that many. The mutual effort persuaded South Koreans that Americans would endure sacrifices in their defense and Americans that the South Koreans would do the same to ensure their freedom from Communist rule. By the last year of the war, ROK army units manned 70 per cent of the front lines, clear evidence of both their determination and their growing competence.15 Yet a giant cultural gap continued to exist between the two peoples – in language, in material well-being, and in social and political norms. That gap was strikingly apparent in the ongoing difficulties with verbal communication, most notably between members of the US Korean Military Advisory Group (KMAG), who numbered nearly 2000 by the end of 1952, and personnel in the ROK army they were helping to train, as well as between members of the Korean Augmentation to the US Army (KATUSA), over 20,000 strong for most of the war, and American soldiers in the US Eighth Army units in which they served. The disparity also existed in living conditions, whether between Americans and Koreans in their respective homelands or between Americans in Korea, including those in the armed forces, and the vast majority of the host population.16 The gap in political culture is illustrated dramatically by events in the spring of 1952, when, in South Korea, Rhee used the national police and other forms of intimidation to force the National Assembly to amend the Constitution to provide for popular election of the president rather than election by the legislature. The move assured him a second term as president. The United States, of course, was in the midst of a Red Scare at home in which hundreds of citizens were unfairly labeled security and/or loyalty risks and denied the ability to pursue their careers. However, when President Truman clearly overstepped his authority in seizing the steel mills to fend off a labor strike, the Supreme Court ruled against him, and the chief executive immediately accepted the decision.17 In the South Korean case, members of the US embassy were sufficiently appalled to argue for assistance to

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elements in the ROK army to remove Rhee from power. US military commanders vetoed the move, insisting that such a course might disrupt operations at the battlefront. Thus common needs in wartime trumped differences over political culture.18 The Americans again considered removing Rhee from office during the summer of 1953, when the ROK president tried to prevent an end to the fighting short of unification of the peninsula and even delayed an armistice six weeks by releasing 27,000 ROK prisoners of war. This time US military leaders were willing to join the conspiracy if he tried to remove ROK forces from the United Nations Command (meaning, in reality, the US Command). But Washington offered to cut a deal with the recalcitrant Korean leader, who in return for not disrupting an armistice was promised massive economic assistance, funding for the further expansion of the ROK army, and a military pact. Possessing an uncanny talent for gauging how far he could push his “elder brother,” Rhee accepted the compromise, although he refused to actually sign the armistice. US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles rushed to Korea immediately after conclusion of the armistice to negotiate the treaty. “Never,” one wit observed, had “so ragged a tail wagged so large a dog.”19 It was hardly the most propitious circumstances for the establishment of an enduring military alliance! Yet the war had greatly reinforced Washington’s concern about US credibility, the same concern that the Joint Chiefs had expressed in April 1947 and that had led to American sponsorship of an independent government in South Korea in 1948 and to American military intervention two years later. With the presence of over a million Chinese forces in North Korea and the buildup of Soviet air power in Manchuria, concern also had grown regarding the physical security of Japan.20 Moreover, the war had provoked a threefold increase in US defense spending, a huge expansion of US armed forces, and the conclusion of security treaties with Australia and New Zealand, the Philippines, and Japan. Since it was settled that the United States could not withdraw in a manner that would lead to a Communist victory in Korea, the promise of a security pact to help persuade Rhee to go along with an armistice was hardly a giant step. For the moment, considerations of power overcame differences in culture and priorities.

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Still, the United States did not give Rhee nearly all he wanted in the treaty. He asked for a provision stating that the lawful jurisdiction of South Korea extended “throughout the traditional area of Korea, and specifically northward to the Yalu and Tumen Rivers.”21 The United States refused. Rhee wanted the treaty to stay in effect indefinitely; the United States insisted on an escape clause: either side could withdraw with one year’s notice.22 Rhee wanted an automatic, “effective” US military response in the event the ROK was attacked23; the United States agreed only “that it would act to meet the common danger in accordance with its constitutional processes.”24 Such provisions differed substantially from those of the NATO treaty of 1949, reflecting different levels of trust and strategic commitment on the part of the United States. Even so, the maintenance of forward-deployed American forces meant that, in the event of renewed war, immediate US embroilment was virtually guaranteed. From 1953 into the 1990s, the US-ROK alliance featured a nearly constant divergence between a dominant power that feared entrapment and a subordinate one that feared abandonment.25 Ironically, in the early years US concern about entrapment provided an impetus to maintain a substantial military presence on the peninsula. Once the armistice went into effect, pressure in the United States quickly developed to withdraw the bulk of its military forces from South Korea as part of a scaling down of expenditures on national security. President Eisenhower believed that, if continued over time, the high level of defense spending ushered in by the Korean War would severely damage the US economy.26 Moreover, he regarded long-term military occupations as highly undesirable. (Even the American troop presence in Europe was regarded as temporary by him.)27 By the end of 1955, US forces in Korea were down from a wartime high of over 300,000 to below 60,000, and the commander-in-chief expressed sympathy for further reductions to a token level.28 Such reductions did not occur under Eisenhower, however, and the reason, first and foremost, was that the Americans saw less risk of further entrapment, i.e. another war in Korea, through the maintenance of sizable forces there. The Americans did not trust the Chinese and North Koreans, who had flouted the articles in the armistice regarding

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inspections and the introduction of new weapons onto the peninsula. Nor did the Americans trust Rhee, who constantly pressed for an end to the armistice and a march north. Only with a sizable ongoing presence in the South could the United States expect the ROK to keep its armed forces in the UN command under US leadership. A sizable US presence also provided a source of stability within the South, where Rhee’s support was in steady decline after 1956, and a reassurance to Rhee that was essential if US pressure to reduce the size of his own army were to succeed. During 1957 the United States commenced a modernization program of its own and ROK forces that included the introduction, under American control, of atomic weapons.29 US concerns about entrapment through action initiated by the South declined after Rhee’s fall from power in April 1960. Even the coup engineered by Park Chung Hee in May of the following year did not result in a prolonged crisis in the alliance, as it soon became clear that Park’s flirtation with Communism in the late 1940s was a thing of the past and that he was perfectly willing to place reunification well back on his agenda and economic development at the very top. His course from 1963 to 1966 brought the alliance relationship to a peak of cooperation never before attained, as Park gave up his position in the army, held a relatively free election for president – which he won only because the opposition was divided – concluded a settlement with Japan, and committed two divisions of ROK troops to Vietnam to support the US campaign there, all the while pursuing a policy of economic growth that promised over the long term to reduce the ROK need for aid. For its part, the United States granted generous subsidies for Korean troops in Vietnam and concluded its first statusof-forces agreement (SOFA) with the ROK giving its junior partner limited jurisdiction over US troops who committed crimes on Korean territory.30 The alliance prospered not because the United States regarded Park as a leader likely to guide his government toward a liberal democracy recognizable in the West, nor because Park liked, felt comfortable with, or even trusted Americans.31 (Unlike Rhee, who had attended an American missionary school in Seoul as a teenager, had lived for decades in the United States, and was fluent in English, Park had

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traveled little abroad, spoke no English, and was influenced by the Japanese during the late colonial era when they were at or on the verge of war with the United States.) Rather, Park and the Americans got on because they served each other’s purposes. Park provided stability in South Korea and pursued a strategy of economic growth that both he and the Americans hoped over the long term would make the ROK less dependent on the United States. The United States, in turn, provided military security and economic and military assistance that, for the moment, was essential for the ROK’s survival and growth. The relative amity in the relationship began to weaken in 1968, in the aftermath of the attempted raid on the Blue House by North Korean commandos and the North Korean seizure of the US spy ship, Pueblo. The incidents occurred within days of each other and on the eve of the Tet offensive in Vietnam. The Blue House raid came after two years of escalating skirmishes along the DMZ and infiltration from the North. Park was furious and was determined to retaliate militarily, a move that the United States, already tied down in one costly war, sought to prevent. Moreover, since the North Koreans had captured an American ship and its crew while initiating no follow-up action directly against the South, Washington regarded the Pueblo incident as an ongoing crisis that warranted priority over any effort to punish Pyongyang. The results were that Park was restrained from retaliating and that, after sending Cyrus Vance on a special mission to Seoul in February to calm South Korean tempers, the Americans concentrated on negotiating the return of the Pueblo crew largely through talks with the North in the Military Armistice Commission at Panmunjom. Park accepted the outcome grudgingly, and the US-ROK relationship was never the same.32 Indeed, following on the heels of the dramatic events in East Asia of early 1968 came the Nixon doctrine, the withdrawal of a US army division from the ROK, the rapid scaling down of American troops in Vietnam, US-Soviet détente, and the US rapprochement with China, all of which undermined Park’s confidence in the reliability of the United States. In his turn to emphasis on the development of heavy industry in South Korea, including the production of war materiel, and his overtures to North Korea, Park responded adeptly. In imposing a more

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pervasively authoritarian regime on his country, in starting a secret program aimed toward building nuclear weapons, and in developing intense and often illegal lobbying efforts to influence the US Congress, he stumbled badly, and at considerable cost to his support base in the United States. Jimmy Carter entered the White House in January 1977 determined to withdraw the remaining US ground forces from Korea as well as to press Park for liberalization on human rights. The United States was already behind on its provision of funds for the modernization of ROK armed forces and, with the breaking of the Koreagate scandal in Washington, Congress was in no mood to be generous in granting new funding for that program. The US-ROK alliance entered into the most tumultuous period in its history prior to the first decade of the twenty-first century.33 The late 1970s offer a classic reminder of how individuals matter, but also of how they can be constrained by the political culture that surrounds them, especially in the United States. Despite Carter’s concerted effort, powerful elements in the national security bureaucracy, Congress, and the press applied such resistance to the withdrawal of troops that in July 1979 the administration announced the suspension of its plans. The intelligence community was especially important in the result as it provided an ongoing upward reassessment of North Korea’s military strength relative to the ROK.34 Even at the height of acrimony between Carter and Park, though, neither party talked seriously of ending the alliance. The events of 1980 provide an important instance in which considerations of power took priority over those of culture. In May that year the president with the strongest commitment to human rights of any in American history stood by largely passively in the face of a coup d’etat by ROK General Chun Doo Hwan that included the brutal suppression of dissenters in the regional capital of Kwangju. To put it mildly, Carter did not like what happened, but at the time he faced the consequences of two recent anti-American revolutions abroad, in Nicaragua and Iran, and a tough reelection fight at home. He simply did not believe that either he or the United States could afford to risk the kind of prolonged instability that might have occurred in Korea

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if it intervened to make a serious effort to stop or later reverse Chun’s action. Consideration of US security interests prevailed over the strong cultural preference of the American president.35 President Ronald Reagan welcomed Chun to the White House less than a month after taking office, although a precondition for the visit was that the new ROK leader commute the death sentence hanging over the head of dissident leader Kim Dae Jung. Clearly Reagan’s priority was to reestablish confidence on both sides of the alliance after a lengthy period of decline. For the short and medium term, he succeeded. In 1987 the Reagan administration even assisted in smoothing the transition in South Korea from an authoritarian to a democratic government. It did so, however, only after it became apparent that to refuse might result in widespread unrest and even violence within the South, which could have produced a dangerous security environment on the peninsula. In this case, the American cultural preference for democracy jibed with the US security concern for internal stability, and the ending proved a happy one.36 South Korean democratization occurred simultaneously with the scaling down and ending of the Cold War, and at a time when, economically, the ROK had left its competitor in North Korea in the proverbial dust – a reality that would become only more extreme after the Soviet Union ended economic assistance to North Korea in the early 1990s. These events could not help but produce a good deal of rethinking on both sides of the US-ROK relationship. On the one hand, the end of the Cold War led many Americans to expect a “peace dividend.” Given South Korea’s economic superiority over the North and its much larger population, the achievement of savings through a reduction in the US military presence on the peninsula seemed to be a logical avenue for exploration. On the other hand, South Koreans were increasingly self-confident and extremely proud of their achievements, especially after their successful hosting of the Olympics in 1988. More and more South Koreans under the age of 40 bore serious resentments over the presence of US forces and, in particular, over their failure to prevent Chun’s repression during the past decade.37 Fortunately, the relationship was in good hands, with George H. W. Bush, the US president, and Roh Tae Woo his ROK counterpart.

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Roh launched a policy of Nordpolitik designed to explore possibilities for expanding relations with China, the Soviet Union, and even North Korea. The United States had begun talks with North Korea in Beijing at the end of the Reagan administration and was supportive of Roh’s initiatives. Under pressure from Congress, Bush devised a plan to gradually scale down US forces on the peninsula while cautioning that “abrupt and major changes in our security posture [in the Pacific] would be destabilizing” and might even produce “a regional arms race and a climate of confrontation.”38 By the end of 1992, the United States had reduced its presence in Korea by 6,000 military personnel, had withdrawn its nuclear weapons entirely, had turned over peacetime control of ROK forces to the South Korean government, had amended the status-of-forces agreement to give the ROK greater control over US soldiers who committed crimes while off duty, and had reduced the size of the Yongsan military base in downtown Seoul. For its part, South Korea had agreed to increase its share of the costs of maintaining US forces in the country. South Korea also had established full diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union (later Russia) and China, had been admitted to the United Nations along with North Korea, and had signed two potentially path-breaking agreements with North Korea, the “Agreement on Reconciliation, Nonaggression, and Exchanges and Cooperation” and the “North-South Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”39 Yet in its April 1992 report to Congress the Bush administration cautioned that US interests in the Pacific region had not changed – indeed, America’s economic stake was greater than ever, and the need remained to prevent “the rise of any hegemonic power or coalition” and numerous potential security breakdowns. “With the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War,” the paper declared, “the United States’ regional roles, which had been secondary in our strategic calculus, have now assumed primary importance.” In fact the role of American forces in the Pacific extended all the way to the “Persian Gulf/Southwest Asia region” and US capacity to project military power in the south-west and central-west Pacific – and westward from there – was in transition due to the closing of bases in the Philippines.40

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As for specific security concerns, the report noted that deterring North Korea remained important, as it had failed so far to implement the agreements of the previous December, had “still not allowed effective bilateral monitoring and inspection of its nuclear program,” and had “continued to build up its massive, oversized [and mostly forward deployed] conventional forces.” In addition, although the threat to South Korea from beyond the peninsula had diminished, Russia still possessed major naval and air forces in the region and “a formidable nuclear arsenal.”41 Thus Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney had postponed any US troop reductions from Korea beyond those already being implemented. To the south of Korea and Japan, numerous uncertainties existed. China had stabilized after suppression of the Tianamen uprising in June 1989, but internal volatility was nearly certain “as Deng Xiaoping and the current octogenarian leaders pass from the scene,” and turmoil within or on China’s borders could lead to military conflict, either in Southeast Asia or over conflicting territorial claims in the South China Sea.42 While in the past US forces in Northeast Asia with a regional role and a rapid deployment capability had been restricted to Japan, the report suggested that by 1996 those in Korea might take on an expanded mission as well.43 The bottom line was that numerous imponderables remained in the Pacific region in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War and, while they remained, neither the United States nor the ROK wished to alter their alliance fundamentally. Bush proved to be a careful manager in carrying out adjustments in the alliance that recognized South Korea’s growing influence and self-confidence. As for Roh, although his initiatives abroad were more dramatic than those of the United States, he moved astutely to keep his senior partner in the loop and to make clear that the alliance remained a central part of the ROK’s national security policy.44 The smooth operation of the relationship did not long survive the departure from office of Bush and Roh in early 1993. Presidents Bill Clinton and Kim Young Sam lacked their predecessors’ experience in international politics and responded to often divergent constituencies on their home fronts. What is more, the issue of North Korea’s nuclear

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program moved rapidly toward crisis, a development that would have tested even the most sure handed of leaders. The crisis produced a buildup of US forces in and around the peninsula, a move designed to signal North Korea that any military action on its part would be met with swift and decisive countermeasures. US preparations certainly minimized South Korean fears of abandonment, but they also heightened concern that Washington, determined to prevent the disruption of the balance of power on the peninsula and nuclear proliferation at the regional and global levels, would launch a preemptive strike against North Korea’s nuclear facilities at Yongbyon. Although ROK leaders possessed the same concerns as their American counterparts, especially at the local and regional levels, any attack on the North might produce a counter strike on the ROK, the capital city of which was only thirty miles from the demilitarized zone and vulnerable to forward-deployed heavy artillery just north of the tense border. For the first time fears of entrapment appeared on the side of the weaker partner, fears rooted partly in the realization of an increasingly affluent population that it had an awful lot to lose in the event of war.45 On the other hand, in the interest of reaching a negotiated settlement with the North, Washington proved willing to conduct bilateral talks with Pyongyang, a course that President Kim resented and feared would lead to US concessions at the expense of ROK interests. Kim’s determination to show strength and independence in his relationship with Clinton, which was motivated in part by his sensitivity to public opinion in the now democratic South Korea, sometimes led to public statements critical of US policy. Such statements accentuated substantive differences on how best to deal with North Korea. Yet survival of the alliance never appeared to be in doubt, as its utility in the face of uncertainties regarding North Korea seemed apparent on both sides even though the parties did not always agree on the precise course to be followed. When progressive Kim Dae Jung entered the Blue House in February 1998, the relationship largely got back in sync. The new ROK president had no sympathy with the effort to promote regime-change in North Korea over the short term. Although under attack from right-wing Republicans in Congress and the press, Clinton stuck with his effort to engage North Korea through

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a variety of carrots and sticks. He generally supported Kim’s “sunshine policy” aimed at a major breakthrough in North-South relations. By the end of Clinton’s second term, Kim had met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang and Clinton’s secretary of state, Madeleine Albright, had visited the North Korean capital and met with him as well. While a last-minute visit to North Korea by Clinton fell through, by the beginning of 2001 high hopes existed in many circles in the United States and South Korea that the North could be increasingly integrated into the international community and that the process could occur without compromising the US-ROK alliance.46 The rise of George W. Bush to the US presidency dramatically changed the momentum in US policy. Unlike his father, the second Bush had little experience in or feel for the complexities of international politics and he and his top advisers, with the exception of Secretary of State Colin Powell, possessed a strong predilection toward reversing Clinton’s policies on a wide variety of issues. President Bush’s conservative constituency in Congress always had disliked the Agreed Framework concluded with North Korea in 1994, which gave that country economic benefits without definitively eliminating its nuclear program. The new president also held a strong distaste for North Korea’s Kim Jong-il, who starved his people while he and his immediate coterie lived in luxury and devoted their resources disproportionately to maintaining gigantic armed forces. In contrast to Powell, Vice-President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and Under Secretary of State John Bolton preferred a confrontational approach aimed at regimechange. Bush leaned toward the hard-liners, thus putting contacts with North Korea on hold while his subordinates squabbled and South Korea’s Kim Dae Jung grew increasingly impatient. No high-level contacts occurred between Washington and Pyongyang before the terrorist attacks on the United States of 11 September 2001 (9/11).47 Despite expressions of sympathy by North Korea in the aftermath of 9/11 and hints of a desire for talks, American hard-liners used the attacks to ratchet up concern about possible DPRK sales of nuclear materials and missiles to terrorist groups. In his State of the Union address of 29 January 2002, the president even included North Korea, along with Iraq and Iran, in the “Axis of Evil.”48 Inclusion reflected

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more a desire to include in the group a non-Islamic nation than any plan to increase pressure on the DPRK; however, Bush’s subsequent talk of taking “the battle to the enemy” in the war on terror and release in September of a National Security Strategy paper endorsing “preemptive actions to counter a sufficient threat to our national security [by] . . . rogue states and terrorists” worried many, in the United States and elsewhere, that the option of attacking North Korea was being actively considered within the administration.49 Concerns were reinforced among South Koreans by a potential change in the mission of US forces stationed on the peninsula. It was noted above that the first Bush administration had considered revision of that mission from a local to a regional one. Yet such a revision had lain dormant over the next decade, despite occasional flare-ups over China’s pressure regarding Taiwan. The second Bush’s accession to the White House, the appointment of Rumsfeld to head the Pentagon, China’s initiation of a major modernization of its armed forces, and 9/11 all rekindled interest in the possibility. The new president had close ties with the domestic constituencies most favorable to the defense of Taiwan, the military buildup of China focused on its ability to project power beyond coastal waters, the new secretary of defense placed high priority on reforming the US defense posture to exploit the mobility and firepower of American forces abroad, and 9/11 directed attention at potential threats to US interests in the form of widely dispersed terrorist groups, thus upgrading interest in expediting that process of reform.50 The prospect of a changed mission for American forces on the peninsula produced the unusual circumstance of magnifying fears in the ROK of both abandonment by the United States due to commitments to the Global War on Terror (GWOT) or of entrapment in a conflict with China through the deployment of US units based in Korea to a campaign to save Taiwan. An upcoming presidential election in the ROK in December 2002 served to dramatize potential dangers on the horizon. Added to the mix was a June accident in which an American armored vehicle on a military exercise north of Seoul ran down and killed two teenage Korean girls on their way to a birthday party. The tragedy outraged many South Koreans, and sentiments escalated further in November,

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when an American military court acquitted two US soldiers of criminal responsibility in the incident. A month earlier, American officials had confronted North Korea over its alleged highly enriched uranium program, which DPRK diplomats appeared to acknowledge, thus strengthening Bush administration hard-liners who wanted to destroy the Agreed Framework.51 Anti-American sentiment in the ROK grew dramatically and paved the way for the victory of liberal candidate Roh Moo Hyun in the December balloting.52 Incumbent Kim Dae Jung was a liberal as well, but he was old enough to remember critical and costly American aid to the ROK in the Korean War. In addition, US intervention in the 1970s and 1980s had twice saved him from death at the hands of military dictators. He was widely traveled, had many American acquaintances, and was a long-time and thoughtful observer of international politics. Despite his irritation with Bush, he understood the connection between the American presence in his country and the stability of Northeast Asia. In contrast, Roh had little background on foreign policy, had never visited the United States, and had won election by exploiting anti-American sentiments among a younger generation of voters who possessed no memory of the Korean War and had reached adulthood during the 1980s while the US supported the last South Korean military regime. These people tended to view North Korea as a wayward cousin to be encouraged to rejoin the family rather than an ongoing security threat, and to regard the United States as an overbearing bully.53 To make matters worse, the Bush administration had been none-too-subtle during the campaign in showing its preference for conservative candidate Lee Hoi Chang.54 Although in the post-election period Roh insisted that he did not want to end the US-ROK alliance but simply to make it more equal, his rise, combined with Bush’s leadership, was bound to test the relationship. That test manifested itself when, as Roh took office in February 2003 and the Americans made final preparations for war in Iraq, the US Defense Department informed Seoul of the impending withdrawal of 12,500 troops from the ROK and the retreat of those remaining from positions north of Seoul. Only weeks earlier, North Korea had withdrawn from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and negated its safeguards agreement with the International Atomic

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Energy Administration. Bush, in turn, had refused publicly to rule out military action against the DPRK. While Roh desired revisions in the US-ROK alliance on such issues as base location, the statusof-forces agreement, and command relationships in wartime, he had hoped that any reduction in US troops and redeployment away from the DMZ would come only after resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue and through mutual agreement rather than an American fait accompli. In the annual Security Consultative Meeting of defense officials held in Seoul late the previous fall, the United States had insisted on the Future of the Alliance Policy Initiative (FOTA), which provided for a series of sub-cabinet level talks to pave the way for adjustments in the alliance in accordance with the developing global security environment and the modernization of American and South Korean forces. With the first installment scheduled for the spring of 2003, the news that the United States already had decided to reposition troops and reduce their numbers came as a shock to ROK leaders. Some observers saw the impending moves as punishment for the growing anti-Americanism in South Korea, while others viewed them as intended to get US troops out of range of North Korean artillery in the event that Bush decided to launch air strikes against DPRK nuclear facilities.55 The Bush and Roh administrations clearly wanted the US-ROK alliance to survive, at least for the short term, but they never quite got into sync. Both were divided internally over how best to deal with North Korea as well as with each other, and both catered to constituencies at home that were bound to drive them apart. Neither president was good at managing divisions within his own house, and both possessed a penchant for acting without careful, sustained deliberation. At a time when the two sides possessed genuine and legitimate divergences in strategy growing out of the global perspective of the United States and the local one of South Korea, the limited capacities of the two leaders generated a prickliness in relations that often spilled out into the public. After a relatively successful May 2003 summit in Washington, which was preceded by Roh’s commitment of 675 non-combatant troops to the Iraq war (in the face of 80 per cent opposition to the conflict among his constituents), relations largely went downhill. The

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issues that produced acrimony fit into two broad categories: the role and conditions under which US forces in the ROK operated. Yet agreements in the former category bore out that both sides wanted the alliance to survive. During 2003 and 2004, a phased transfer of ten defense missions from US to ROK forces was agreed upon and commenced implementation. After the United States revealed publicly the intention to withdraw permanently 12,500 troops from the ROK, the two governments agreed to stretch out that process until the end of 2008. They agreed as well that a large portion of the military equipment of the withdrawing forces would be left behind and that longrange bombers would be transferred on a permanent basis from the US homeland to Guam. Already the United States had advanced an $11 billion program to modernize the remaining American units and the two sides had agreed on a US withdrawal from the Yongsan military base by the end of 2008, with the consolidation of US forces into two “hubs” in the Osan-Pyongtaek and Daegu-Pohang areas. Meanwhile, Roh had earned some goodwill in the United States through a commitment of 3000 more ROK troops to the war in Iraq. To be sure, distribution of the costs of the Yongsan evacuation and the general US withdrawal to positions south of Seoul, including the costs of “base decontamination,” remained to be negotiated. So did matters of wartime command of ROK forces, the strategic flexibility of US forces to operate outside the peninsula, and the role of those forces if North Korea collapsed. These issues defied easy solution, and the atmosphere for negotiations was greatly complicated by public opinion in South Korea, a large portion of which viewed the United States as a greater threat than North Korea to the security of their country.56 By October 2005, when the Roh administration proposed to begin consultations with the United States for the eventual transfer to the ROK of wartime command of its own military forces, Rumsfeld was so angry that he immediately countered with a timetable that would complete the process by 2009, well before South Korea could make the adjustments necessary to safely assume the responsibility.57 Yet although negotiations between the two allies often became acrimonious and press reports on the South Korean side sometimes fed anti-American sentiments, at least partial agreements emerged on

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a variety of issues, indicating that both sides preferred a transformation of the alliance rather than its termination. In January 2006, US secretary of state Condoleeza Rice and ROK Foreign Minister Ban Ki Moon confirmed agreement in principle on the strategic flexibility of US forces in Korea as follows: The ROK, as an ally, fully understands the rationale for the transformation of the US global military strategy and respects the necessity for strategic flexibility for the US forces in the ROK. In the implementation of strategic flexibility, the US respects the ROK position that it shall not be involved in a regional conflict in Northeast Asia against the will of the Korean people.58 During the remainder of the year and into 2007, the allies reached agreement that the first 15 of the projected 59 US bases to be evacuated were decontaminated – meaning that the ROK would assume any remaining costs for removing environmental hazards there – that the ROK would increase by 6.6 per cent its contribution to the cost of the stationing of American forces on the peninsula, and that during 2007 they would begin work on the details of a plan for joint action in the event of the collapse of or instability in the DPRK. At the end of 2006, the United States also transferred the ninth of the ten military missions, agreed to in 2004, to the ROK. Prospects for future transfers beyond the original ten had gained impetus earlier in the year when the ROK National Assembly passed a defense reform bill providing for the modernization of the country’s armed forces over the next 15 years. Early in 2007 agreement emerged on the transfer to the ROK of wartime control of its own forces on 17 April 2012 and partial accord was achieved on cost-sharing for the expensive process of relocating US forces from Yongsan and bases north of Seoul.59 Most Americans breathed a deep sigh of relief in December 2007 after conservative Lee Myong Bak won a landslide victory in the presidential election to succeed Roh, but it hardly could be denied that the trend over the last two years had been away from dissolution of the alliance. Why did the alliance survive the Bush-Roh years? The best answer is that rational calculations of national interests by both parties prevailed

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over ideology and emotion. On the US side, growing troubles in Iraq combined with diminishing support at home and ever-increasing criticism abroad convinced President Bush that, first, the use of force against North Korea was not an option and, second, that China would not pull his chestnuts out of the fire by applying the kind of pressure on the DPRK that would bring about regime-change. The American leader probably understood the first point by the time he took the oath of office for his second term in January 2005, but it may have taken until the fall of 2006, when North Korea defied the rest of the world and tested a nuclear device, for him to grasp the second. Within weeks of that event Washington had determined that it must negotiate more seriously with Pyongyang, and that decision could not help but enhance its relationship with Seoul.60 Replacement of Rumsfeld as secretary of defense by the steady, mild-mannered Robert Gates did not hurt either. On the South Korean side, Roh also faced sinking approval ratings and economic constraints at home as well as growing uncertainties beyond his borders. His effort to reach out to North Korea paid limited dividends and his lean toward China ran into difficulties in 2004 over Chinese claims regarding the ancient Korean state of Korguryo, which incited concern that, as North Korea declined, China would attempt to exert control over border regions. In addition, Roh’s hesitation in cooperating with Japan combined with his touchy relations with the United States to create the risk that the latter would downgrade its alliance with the ROK, thus concentrating on its relationship with Japan to protect its interests in the region. Such a scenario might leave the ROK largely alone to deal with North Korea, China, Japan, and even Russia. When in March 2005 Roh floated the idea of South Korea as a “balancer” between the United States and Japan on the one hand and a rising China on the other, he generated widespread criticism, including a trenchant analysis by his predecessor, Kim Dae Jung: Basically, South Korean foreign relations work most effectively within three frameworks: solid South Korea-US relations; the triple entente among Japan, the US, and South Korea; and collaboration among four major powers in the region. This is not a

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choice, but a position that we have to accept fatalistically. This is our destiny.61 With fears growing of economic dependency on China as that country became South Korea’s largest trade partner, source of investment, and, potentially, competitor for markets in high-value-added products and with slowing internal economic growth forcing Roh to scale back ambitious plans for a military buildup, the material and psychological price paid by South Koreans for its relationship with the United States appeared reasonable compared to the costs and risks of abandoning it.62 While the democratic politics of the ROK during 2002 and 2003 had exacerbated anti-Americanism, from 2004 onward they produced countervailing forces that over time discouraged any sharp break with the past in relations with the United States. Yet scholar Gi-Wook Shin has argued recently that we should not presume that the movement toward alliance maintenance that prevailed during the later stages of the Roh administration and the early stages of Lee’s represent the pattern for the foreseeable future. Shin emphasizes the significance of the rethinking of “identity politics” in South Korean foreign policy over the last two decades, a process growing out of material prosperity, democratization, and the end of the Cold War. Rooted in Koreans’ perceptions of themselves as a distinct ethnic group (or race), identity politics caught on most dramatically with the initially encouraging results of the normalization with China and Kim Dae Jung’s sunshine policy, and it continued to grow in the aftermath of 9/11 and the shift in US policy toward North Korea. It included the views, first, that US influence was too great and too compromising of traditional Korean values and culture63; second, that given the long history of Korean relations with China and China’s cultural influence on the peninsula, that country was perhaps a more suitable “elder brother” than the United States (if, indeed, there existed a continuing need for one); and, third, that, over time, South and North Koreans could work things out amongst themselves but that the US-ROK alliance represented an impediment in doing so. Shin points out that neither North Korea’s testing of missiles and nuclear weapons, nor Lee’s election, silenced progressive voices for a “nationalist identity,” which

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contend fiercely with “conservative” ones over all issues involving the US-ROK alliance. “Democratization,” he notes, “makes the processes of contention over identity more messy and complicated, especially when combined with the rhetoric of ethnic nationalism.”64 Although Shin provides reason for concern about the future of the alliance – and certainly cautions against complacency under any circumstances – his analysis also suggests (to this writer, at least) that the odds are better that rational calculations of national interest on both sides will prevail over South Korea’s identity politics. For one thing, he points to a June 2006 World Gallup Poll of South Koreans indicating that 66 per cent believed that a US withdrawal from the ROK would “greatly impact the stability of Northeast Asia” and that over 70 per cent preferred a continued US military presence.65 Public opinion polls alone are a poor gauge for estimating long-term trends in a relationship, but for the numbers to be this strong after years of often harsh public attacks on US policy in much of the South Korean press cannot help but encourage alliance supporters. For another, Shin describes political scientist Stephen Walt’s list of conditions “under which alliances become less likely to endure”: They include cases in which the state posing the original threat becomes weaker, an alliance member becomes ‘convinced that their adversaries are not as bellicose as they once feared,’ the passage of time makes ‘shared historical experience’ less relevant, and elites seek to improve their domestic political position through attacks on an alliance, especially when sovereignty issues are at stake.66 Shin concedes that, while “reasonable arguments can be made that all these conditions applied to the study period [1992–2003], the US-ROK alliance has endured.”67

Conclusions and prospects The alliance endured because, when pressed leaders on both sides calculated that on balance national interests were best served by the

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relationship’s perpetuation and they had sufficient domestic support to sustain their positions. Their calculations, in turn, generated mutual efforts to adjust to new realities, in particular to the increasingly complex security environment of Northeast Asia and beyond, the growing relative power of South Korea, and the growing pride that that development produced in the ROK. There were many bumps in the journey, and domestic politics in both countries sometimes produced sizable potholes in the relationship. But if leaders of the limited capabilities and diverse constituencies of George W. Bush and Roh Moo Hyun could sustain the alliance, it is reasonable to surmise that their successors will do so for some time into the future as well. So long as South Korea remains “a shrimp among whales,” most of its people, most of the time, are likely to remain convinced that the presence, however limited, of the most distant whale serves a useful purpose. Given the strong institutionalization of the alliance, which helps to perpetuate habits of cooperation, that should be enough. So long as East Asia remains a primary setting for great power competition, the odds remain good that the United States will continue to assume a share of the burden of sustaining the alliance, including maintenance on the peninsula of a small contingent of its military forces. If there is one issue that could tear this analysis asunder, it is the US determination to retain the freedom to use forces based in Korea to assist in the defense of Taiwan or some other area to the south against a Chinese attack. Yet that issue would be likely to come to the fore only if such a Chinese attack became imminent, and prospects of such a contingency are not high for the near future. For the long term, the danger to the alliance might be overcome through the maintenance of purposeful ambiguity in US intentions regarding the use of American forces on the peninsula and the continuing buildup of US forces in the region, especially in Guam and other islands of Oceania.68 Management of that potential problem will take patience and skill on both sides, but when one considers the issues and the changes in the international and domestic environments that the alliance has survived to date, it hardly appears insurmountable.

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CHAPTER 2 DO WE NEED A COOR DINATING STATE TO BUILD A SUCCESSFUL ALLIANCE? THE CASE OF THE WAR S OF THE FR ENCH R EVOLUTION AND EMPIR E Jean-Bertrand Ribat

In Europe, since 1494, several states have attempted to become hegemonic through war. Each time they have been defeated by a successful alliance. In the case of the systemic wars which have plagued the European system four times in five hundred years the conclusion seems indisputable: alliances successfully prevent the rise of hegemons. Most realist scholars believe that a successful alliance is a necessary outcome when one of the great powers operating in the multipolar international states system acquires the capacity to challenge the existing equilibrium.1 Unfortunately, in their overwhelmingly Eurocentric works these scholars have black-boxed most of the processes happening between the emergence of the pressures generated by the rise of a would-be hegemon and the defeat of this challenger, a defeat accompanied by the restoration of the balance between great powers. The present analysis does not intend to contest the realist proposition.

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Instead, it argues that, confronted with a potential hegemon, states face a collective action problem due to lack of trust, and that if it were not for the presence of a great power endowed with unique capacities, there would have been no successful coalition.2 Using the case of the wars of the Revolution and the Empire, this chapter considers if – and eventually, why and how – Britain played the role of coordinator in the coalitions created to stop France between 1793 and 1814. It criticizes the element of automaticity at the core of the realist and the neorealist balance of power theory. It tests a model that argues for a necessary but not sufficient condition for checking the rise of a hegemon in the post-1495 European states system. This condition is that a coalition will emerge and successfully stop a hegemonic challenger only if there is a state with the means required to coordinate the challenger’s opponents. In a world that, once again, may become multipolar, one must consider the possibility that, in order to prevent the rise of a hegemon, there will have to be present in the system a state capable of providing the financial means required to oppose the challenger and of improving the level of cooperation between the great powers threatened by this rise.

The balance of power theory A set of interrelated propositions Few realists studying the European states system support the view that balance of power theory is not a central element for understanding how the European system worked.3 In spite of this widely shared appreciation, there are many interpretations of the balance of power theory.4 Yet, as Levy and Thompson write, Despite their many disagreements, nearly all balance of power theorists would accept the following set of interrelated propositions: (1) the prevention of others from achieving a position of hegemony in the system is a primary security goal of states; (2) threats of hegemony generate great-power balancing coalitions; and (3) as a result, sustained hegemonies rarely if ever

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form in multistate systems. This consensus among balance of power theorists concerns counterhegemonic balancing by great powers.5 Realist scholars argue that when a state destabilizes the system by growing at a faster rate than its peers, the balance existing between great powers is automatically reestablished.6 They add that the pressure exerted inside the system necessarily leads states with a diminished relative amount of power to restore the balance of power7; and to do so they implement balancing policies. Yet, these scholars “fail to identify the system over which hegemony might be established.”8 This chapter argues that not all systems may be oriented toward preventing the rise of hegemons through counter-hegemonic external balancing policies. What allowed external balancing policies to work the way balance of power theory predicts may be the presence in the European system of a succession of great powers displaying first, a low level of vulnerability to invasion; second, a high level of wealth; and third, leaders who understood the subtleties of the relationships existing between great powers. A puzzle Classical and, even more, neoclassical realists have never detailed what occurs between the need to balance, through alliance formation, and the successful balancing outcome that the theory supports. They have endlessly speculated on the effects of polarity, on the outcome of alliance formation, or on the size of successful alliances, but have black boxed the processes by which systemic pressure prevents hegemony through the implementation of policies centered on self-interest.9 Yet, in order to know if balance of power theory can be used outside of the context in which it has been most fully elaborated, we must understand what is within that black box. This chapter builds on the basic idea operating at the core of collective action studies. Alliances needed to stop the rise of a potential hegemon face coordination problems.10 That these problems exist and matter is illustrated in the free-riding and buck-passing tendencies that plague the process of coalition formation. Cooperation or coordination is not easy to establish between

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sovereign entities; yet alliances are created to generate cooperation between states.11 Their goal is to produce a whole that will have the capacity to procure or produce what each unit would have been too weak to obtain or to create alone. The model tested to address the puzzle The model tested in this chapter is built according to parameters that existed in the multipolar post-1495 European states system. This model suggests that without the presence of a great power that helps to coordinate the external balancing policies of states threatened by the rise of a potentially hegemonic power, the probability that a coalition will emerge or that it will be successful is low. The coordinator’s distinctive role is to generate a level of cooperation sufficient to have a coalition with the capability (the level of military power) required to stop the challenger’s bid for hegemony. The capacity to play the role of “coordinator” exists when a state is wealthy, enjoys a high level of invulnerability to invasion, and has leaders with a good understanding of the different threats and opportunities faced by each of its potential critical allies. The first two elements guarantee that the coordinator will not be easily deterred by the challenger. The second and the third elements ensure that it will have the material and human means positively to affect the level of cooperation. This chapter applies this model to the case of the wars of the French Revolution and the Empire.

Elements characterizing the coordinator Invulnerability and wealth Invulnerability gives a state the freedom that is needed to play a crucial role in a system. It cannot be invaded by the challenger when this state begins its military expansion. Nor can it be blackmailed by its potential allies, because even if one or more abandon the alliance, the outcome does not create a security issue for an almost invulnerable state. Wealth gives a state the capacity to undertake activities that other powers cannot afford. A wealthy state can finance states too poor to last for long in a conflict involving a rising great power. Such a state

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can increase the probability that even a great power reluctant to go to war may participate. It will offer to give subsidies to the hesitant power, which may choose to side with the alliance because the cost of going to war is reduced. A wealthy state can also encourage a great power already at war to remain in the alliance even when, under the pressure of the cost of war, it no longer has the means to finance its future campaigns. However, if a state is sufficiently wealthy to help finance the members of an alliance, it becomes a prime target for a rising hegemon. That is why a coordinator cannot simply be wealthy. It needs also to be highly invulnerable. At the same time invulnerability, which is relative, is the product of natural barriers and of a state’s capacity to exploit them. Consequently, a wealthy state will be more capable of exploiting its natural barriers and transforming them into an obstacle that the challenger will not be able to overcome. Although a state may be highly invulnerable and wealthy, it does not guarantee that it will be able to enhance cooperation between allied powers. A state’s foreign policy is generated and implemented by its leaders and civil servants. Leaders need to choose and implement policies that will help to improve levels of cooperation. If they do not have the necessary knowledge of international relations or if they lack diplomatic skills to implement their policies, an important element will still be missing. Interestingly, because wealth and relative invulnerability make their state difficult to invade, the leaders of the coordinator can go through a learning process. They also allow the political elite of the coordinating state to make a few mistakes along the way without endangering their country’s survival. Their country’s wealth also guarantees that their mistakes will not exhaust their capacity to test other policies. The relation between the coordinator’s will to oppose the challenger and its wealth and invulnerability Before testing the model it is necessary to understand the relation between the coordinator’s will to oppose the challenger and its wealth and invulnerability. The coordinator’s willingness is not a required

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preexisting condition for establishing a country’s capacity to serve as coordinator. Instead, it is the result of processes generated by the coordinator’s wealth and invulnerability. A wealthy and invulnerable great power has the capacity to remain the center of the opposition when all other opposition seems crushed. This capacity inevitably attracts the challenger’s attention. In addition, a rising hegemon with an expansionist policy has growing financial needs. The wealth of the potential coordinator necessarily attracts its attention. This state’s leaders are quickly aware of this unsolicited interest and have to consider going to war to protect their country’s wealth. The will to oppose the challenger inevitably emerges with the realization that invulnerability is a relative good. The growing power of the challenger increases the probability that it will acquire the material means necessary to overcome what transforms a natural defense into a protection almost impossible to overcome. For example, British leaders were not willing to involve their country in a war against France. In 1792, after the victory of the Republican Army against two great powers and the invasion of the Low Countries, they modified their position.12 This transformation was a result of France’s acquisition of the strategic coast of present-day Belgium, plus the river Scheldt and the harbor of Anvers – an area far better suited to launch a seaborne invasion of England than the coast on the French side of the Channel. The necessity to protect both their state’s wealth and security (wealth is needed to build security and security is required to get wealth) prompts the leaders of a state with the power to coordinate a coalition to oppose a challenger even if their country is not immediately attacked.

Case selection: the wars of the French Republic and Empire There are a limited number of cases involving the rise of a potential hegemon in post-1494 European history. They consist of the challenges posed by Charles V, Philippe II, and by Louis XIV; the rise of revolutionary and then imperial France between 1792 and 1814–15; and the German case between 1914 and 1945.13 The second case, the wars of the French Revolution and Empire, offers the advantage that within a single case study there is variation in the dependent variable: successful and

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unsuccessful coalitions. The first five coalitions were unable to restore a balance of power, while the sixth was successful and defeated the challenger.14 In addition, this case offers a remarkable variation in the level of understanding displayed by British leaders in matters of international relations. The learning process which British leaders went through is clear and allows us to distinguish three phases – 1793– 1805, 1806–12, and 1812–14 – as sub-cases for the present study. These three sub-cases make it possible to study more carefully the levels of cooperation that exist between potential opponents to the challenger, with special attention to the degrees of understanding of international relations demonstrated by the British leaders. The first phase corresponds to the rise of the challenger in the system. From the point of view of Britain’s foreign policy, it was dominated by the outstanding personality of Pitt the Younger. During the second phase, France enjoyed the status of a quasi-hegemon in continental Europe. It was also a period of decomposition (under the Cabinet of All-the-Talents) and re-elaboration of Britain’s foreign policy under the aegis of Canning. The third phase corresponds to the progressive defeat of the challenger and its ultimate demise. It was dominated by Castlereagh, who, like Canning, was one of Pitt’s heirs. It witnessed the implementation of a British foreign policy that would affect the European system over two decades due to a heretofore unseen level of involvement in European affairs and understanding of continental interstate relations.15 Britain’s levels of wealth and invulnerability In the case of Britain, invulnerability is the product of natural defenses and naval capability. This latter element is partially the product of its insular location. As an island nation, Britain could only be invaded by a great power with a navy more powerful (and effective) than the British Navy, and any power seeking to invade Britain would have to overpower the British Navy preferably using either Holland’s or the Flanders’ coastline as a springboard. As a merchant nation, Britain had a large merchant fleet, which meant that it had the technology and industries needed to build a navy and that it had access to a pool of

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qualified seamen for its navy. The British naval industry lacked raw materials – timber, iron, hemp, etc. – but it could trade for these products. In order to maintain Britain’s high level of invulnerability, British leaders’ main goal had remained constant since the reign of Elizabeth I. They needed to be sure that no continental great power had a navy significantly stronger than their own, nor was in control of the coastal provinces part of the Netherlands.16 To reach this goal, they developed British maritime activities (essentially trade and colonial activities) and sought to ensure that their naval industry had access to the necessary raw materials. Because the promotion of trade and colonial activities has always been a matter of national security, British leaders have regularly helped to promote the economic prosperity of the kingdom. They created a wealthy and financially sophisticated state, with financial resources notably higher than those available to states with economic activity founded primarily on agriculture. The country also enjoyed the trust of big investors. Unlike Spain and France, the British government never defaulted on its sovereign debt.17 On the eve of the conflict with revolutionary France, Britain’s situation in terms of wealth was unique. It was the most prosperous European state, if not by the size of its economy – France’s economy was two to three times larger in 1789 – then at least due to its government’s extractive capacity. It was the only state with the capacity to spend, year after year, more than it could collect through taxation without running the risk of bankruptcy.18 Due to Pitt’s economic policy, Britain had compensated for the loss of the thirteen American colonies. The country’s trade and industries were developing more quickly than ever. Its finances were sound, despite a large debt that Pitt was eager to reduce.19 For the duration of the war, nothing really interfered with this prosperity.20 The crises of 1796 and 1799 did not last, and the continental system, implemented by Napoleon to bankrupt Britain’s merchants during the 1807–12 era, never affected Britain’s overall wealth.21 Some economic activities suffered as a result of the war, but government spending for the fleet and war materials needed for its armies and allies helped other branches. The continental system was not the burden Napoleon wished to create. Fewer products were sold on the continent, but the prices received were higher. The

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most significant nuisance disturbing the British economy was panics affecting the financial market from time to time; yet there were few of them – mainly during the first decade of the war – that lasted only a few months, and had no long-term effects. Still, British leaders faced difficulties in knowing how appropriately to use this wealth: they never knew exactly what the country could afford to spend on subsidies without endangering its capacity to borrow at a reasonably low cost. Because there was no way to know how much debt would be accepted by the market, British leaders had to be careful when subsidizing allies. Pitt’s prudent policy in the matter of subsidies is perfectly understandable, but it may have prevented him from using British financial might to influence positively the level of cooperation between allied powers. Canning and Castlereagh were not significantly more generous than Pitt. They attempted to modify the perception other states had of Britain by improving the way they treated the states that needed Britain’s financial help. Pitt and Grenville had a hard time finding a way to use British financial might. They both were unwilling to let continental great powers exploit the British governments’ capacity to get the money needed in times of war. Grenville said that the continental powers should not see Britain as a “milch cow.”22 The result of their fear was that both of them became more interested in limiting the cost of the war on British finances than in spending the money appropriately. Actually, Pitt and Grenville’s main mistake may not be that they should have spent more, but that they should have spent more quickly and with more concern for the feelings of the subsidized party – the very problem Canning solved. They spent too much time negotiating the tiniest details of subsidy treaties. They wanted to find a “fair” way to proceed, based on a normal cost per soldier put in the field.23 They also wanted an agreement on a way to measure the number of soldiers really in the field. To powers at war already this was pettiness, the manifestation of a shopkeeper mentality.24 Britain’s invulnerability is based mainly on its insularity and prosperity. Prosperity allowed British leaders to finance a powerful navy, which was in turn essential to exploit the protection offered by

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insularity. Goldstein and Rapkin observe that, countries that augmented their insularity with superior sea power escaped much of this destruction as the front line of combat never passed through their home territory. More fundamentally, because they could avoid the “knockout punch” of their continental adversaries, insular states faced a security dilemma less acute than that which confronted states vulnerable to invasion.25 Over the course of 20 years, Britain’s level of invulnerability never fluctuated wildly. At the end of the 1780s, revolutionary France was alone and lacked the means to challenge the British fleet in the Channel.26 Actually, on the eve of the conflict the French navy was unusually weak because it had lost many of its aristocratic officers. In 1793, France was isolated and Britain’s level of invulnerability was high. However, this level slowly declined as the republican government worked to rebuild the fleet. In 1796 Spain switched sides and formed an alliance with France, which had taken control of Holland the year before. The consequence of all these events was that, theoretically, France had access to a large navy and that Britain’s level of security reached a low point in 1796–8, obliging the British Navy to leave the Mediterranean Sea.27 It was during these years that the fear of invasion most affected the British people and the economy of the kingdom.28 Yet, by the end of the 1790s a series of victories over the Dutch, Spanish, and French fleets had restored Britain’s high level of invulnerability.29 The threat of an invasion reemerged only in 1804, but Nelson’s victory at Trafalgar in 1805 followed by the successful British attack on Copenhagen in 1807 ended it for good.30 During the subsequent years, Britain never experienced the kind of panic that occurred in 1796–7. After 1805 the fear of invasion receded (though without ever completely disappearing). Considering Britain’s wealth and level of invulnerability during the 1793–1814 era, it appears that Britain fits two of the three the requirements established in the model to be a coordinator. It had wealth and was highly secure. During the years 1793–1814, in terms of invulnerability and wealth, Britain was in a unique position. No continental great power had such

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high levels of both wealth and security. While Russia benefited from the vastness of its territory, it was unable to subsidize allies. Indeed, Russia’s financial capacity improved only during the last years of the conflict. Although Russian leaders asked for and received British subsidies to participate in each of the coalitions except the fifth, Russia actually proved capable of financing its war effort by itself in 1812 and throughout the first months of 1813. As d’Ivernois, a British citizen and financier who had access to all financial information available in St. Petersburg, reported to Vansittart, the Chancellor of Exchequer, financial reforms implemented between 1808 and 1812 by Michel Speranski transformed Russia’s financial capacity.31 D’Ivernois noted, however, that though the Tsar could finance a war against Napoleon within the borders of Russia, he could not finance a campaign in Germany. This was because paper money produced by Russian authorities could be used within Russia but was virtually worthless outside of the country.32 What is more, Russian leaders had no access to the kind of financial resources Britain could mobilize outside of her borders due to its positive current account balance (before all forms of subsidies). Prussia and Austria, on the other hand, were both highly vulnerable to invasion and had shaky finances. Their capacity to sustain a prolonged war effort was dependent on Britain’s capacity, and will, to subsidize them. The case of Austria in 1795–7 shows that this great power could not borrow without the backing of the British government. Among the three great Eastern European powers threatened by the challenger, Russia was the only power with a significant level of invulnerability, but was far behind Britain in terms of financial capacity. In the final analysis, Britain truly stands apart at the end of the eighteenth century as a result of its invulnerability and capacity to mobilize the financial means needed for a lasting conflict. The values of these two variables were so high that they created a situation in which Britain had the level of security and resources needed to allow its leaders to implement the policy of a coordinating state. British leaders’ role Considering that material elements (wealth and invulnerability) did not prevent Britain from playing the role of coordinator, and that the

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different coalitions created before 1813 failed to stop France’s expansion while the sixth (1813–14) was successful, the question remains whether it was indeed British leaders’ capacity to choose and implement the right foreign policies that explains both their failure[s] and success in creating a successful alliance. British leaders’ capacity to manage a foreign policy focused on the promotion of cooperation between great powers in order to stop a potential hegemon is somewhat more difficult to evaluate than is Britain’s levels of wealth or invulnerability. The talent these leaders displayed varied from one person to the next and from one era to another due to the learning process that took place. First, it is necessary to keep in mind that Britain tended to isolate itself deliberately from the continent and that these long periods of isolation affected the quality of the foreign affairs personnel.33 Patronage and seniority often played a more important role than qualifications. As a result, the Foreign Office was not a reliable source of skilled personnel or reliable information, and much depended on the personal qualities in this domain of the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Between 1792 and 1813, three different sets of leaders dominated British foreign policy. From 1793–1805 (which includes the first three coalitions and the period of the Peace of Amiens), Pitt and Grenville were the main figures shaping British policy. Canning was the most important British leader during the second period, 1806–12 (encompassing the fourth and fifth coalitions). Castlereagh dominated the final period, 1812–14 (the period of the sixth coalition). 1793–1805 Pitt became Britain’s Prime Minister in 1783 after the conclusion of the war in America. In 1791 he chose his friend and cousin, Lord Grenville, to head the Foreign Office. Together, they managed British foreign affairs until the first Pitt ministry fell in 1801.34 From 1801 to 1804 Addington headed the government with Lord Hawkesbury as his Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Under their administration the Peace of Amiens was signed with France (March 1802). Pitt

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returned to office in May 1804, resumed the war with France, and helped to create the third coalition. He continued to serve as Prime Minister until his death in January 1806. British leaders faced a number of constraints. From the outset, Pitt and Grenville, who worked in close collaboration, grasped the geopolitical constraints imposed on their country, as well as the type of challenges confronting the European system when a potential hegemon was rising in its midst. They were able to take these constraints and challenges into consideration and use them to elaborate a comprehensive strategic plan of action. Pitt and Grenville refused to go to war in 1792 – when Britain’s strategic interests on the continent were not at stake – but once French acquisition of the Austrian Low Countries put British strategic interests in play, the two men did not hesitate to act. Most British statesmen understood the considerable strategic advantages and limited constraints resulting from Britain’s insular location. As Goldstein and Rapkin indicate, “[i]nsularity provided a measure of ‘surplus security’ unavailable to land powers, provided favourable positioning in maritime trade networks, and more generally supported a strategic orientation and vision that was global rather than regional in scope.”35 In the same way, most British leaders knew that political choices limited their country’s capacity to be directly involved on the continent.36 At the end of the eighteenth century, the geopolitical constraints that a British leader needed to take into consideration had been in place for a century.37 Jeremy Black observes that “the politics of strategy helped to provide a considerable measure of continuity, with issues and problems interpreted and debated in terms of over a century of experience of conflict with France.”38 France had to be exhausted before it could be thoroughly defeated. Such a goal could be reached only if France was forced to fight both on sea and on land against a coalition of great powers as large as possible, as France had the capacity to muster more resources than any other single great power. Attacking France both on sea and on land would prevent France from pouring all its considerable resources into one theater of operation. Another strategic precedent, established during the war of Spanish Succession, was the need for allied forces on the continent to create several fronts to divide French forces, with one front preferable at France’s back. In

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order to implement such a plan, British leaders needed a navy that could not be matched, as well as large land forces. Britain could provide the navy but had to rely on continental partners to provide the armies. With its relatively small population, the navy, and the garrisons needed for the protection of its empire and international maritime trading routes, drained most of the men available for service in war.39 And thus, Britain could not expect to defeat France alone. In this context, Pitt and Grenville’s strategic vision was globally correct and was not significantly modified by the successive British cabinets. They understood (and perhaps even overestimated) the usefulness of an economic war that would deprive France of the wealth generated by its trade with the Antilles and increase British prosperity. To fulfill this aim, Pitt and Grenville immediately launched a costly war in the Caribbean. They did not overlook the benefit of creating multiple fronts, including one at France’s back (if possible in the Pyrenees). Therefore, from the beginning, Pitt and Grenville subsidized Sardinia’s war efforts in the south-east of France.40 They also encouraged Spain to attack France in the Pyrenees and tried to finance the royalist opposition in western France, eventually sending troops to support an announced upheaval. Even before the amazing victories of Bonaparte in Italy in 1796 (Arcole), 1797 (Rivoli), and 1800 (Marengo), Pitt and Grenville grasped that an unusually large alliance would be needed to defeat revolutionary France and to reestablish a balance of power, and that this alliance would necessitate the participation of all the continental great powers.41 Grenville wrote to the adviser of the King of Prussia that “L’Europe dans sa crise actuelle ne peut être sauvée que par la réunion des Grandes Puissances.”42 He added that, L’Angleterre et la Prusse se concertant ensemble, et établissant (si la chose est encore possible) une intelligence réelle et sincère avec les deux autres Grandes Cours, on se mettrroit tous les quatres en état de présenter a la France d’une manière imposante les bases de la tranquillité future de l’Europe . . . Au contraire, en se tenant en réserve et en méfiance, les uns avec les autres, on s’expose à être toujours séparément attaqué.43

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British diplomatic activity in 1793 was a product of this understanding. British diplomats were able to sign treaties with most of the great and medium European powers. Officially, the goal of these treaties was to stop revolutionary France. In addition to Holland, which had signed a treaty with Britain before the war, the following powers also joined the coalition gathered around Britain: Sardinia (25 April 1793), Spain (25 May 1793), Naples (12 July 1793), Prussia (14 July 1793), Austria (30 August 1793), and Portugal (26 September 1793).44 A treaty was also signed with Russia, but this treaty did not truly commit Russia to the war. Catherine II played with Pitt and Grenville’s desire to get all the great powers on board. Her aim was to neutralize them, giving her the time and freedom needed to dismember Poland at will. In reality, the treaty with Russia is only one of many cases illustrating British leaders’ limited understanding of what really motivated leaders of the Eastern European great powers. As a result of British leaders’ traditional reluctance to involve their country in the management of continental affairs, Pitt and his successors were not well equipped to understand the type of relations shaping continental great powers’ interstate relations. “Despite undeniable good intentions towards Austria, the British seemed unable to see the Austrian point of view or deal skillfully with it”, writes Schroeder, referring to the situation in 1813.45 What makes this observation (which could have been written for any of the previous years of war) especially enlightening is that in 1813 British leaders’ relations with Austria were unusually good. Yet Schroeder’s remark illustrates the two basic problems that prevented Britain’s leaders from significantly improving cooperation among the members of alliances created to stop France: first, a lack of understanding of the other great powers’ concerns and second, a lack of diplomatic skill. In the management of Britain’s relations with continental great powers, Pitt and Grenville never demonstrated that they had the kind of tactical insight required to accomplish their task. This deficiency was all the more apparent because from the onset they understood the strategic constraints of a war against a powerful France and the limitations faced by their country. What was lacking was a real understanding of the kind of equilibrium existing in Central and Eastern Europe.

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Writing on the British leaders of the years 1812–13, Schroeder also says that they “had no clear concept of the German problem, or any particular interest in it, and were unaware of what the emerging Polish-Saxon question implied for Austria and central Europe.”46 What was true in 1812–13 was even truer twenty years earlier. Pitt and Grenville’s desire to create a large and tight alliance was doomed from the beginning because they did not grasp the way the eastern and western parts of the European system were linked, nor the way eastern leaders understood international relations. The two British leaders spent huge amounts of money, political capital, and time to keep Prussia in the war against France, when Prussian leaders’ real interest was in Poland.47 At the same time, both Pitt and Grenville displayed a lack of interest for an effective alliance with Austria because Austria was not willing to fight for its territories in the Low Countries and was more interested in annexing Bavaria or territories in Italy. Pitt and Grenville needed to accept the idea that their allies always considered the effect that their participation in a war with France would have on the balance between countries in the east.48 At the end of the eighteenth century, Austrian and Prussian leaders were considering international relations in Europe almost exclusively in terms of the balance of power existing in Eastern/Central Europe. At least until 1805, and again after 1812, they feared the effects of Russian expansionism. Although Pitt and Grenville were genuinely willing to create as large and effective a coalition as possible, they failed to do so because they allowed their personal likes and dislikes to interfere with objective analysis of the situation, as illustrated by the way in which they dealt with Austria. Pitt and Grenville’s extremely hostile attitude toward the country goes back to Austria’s desire to exchange the Low Countries for Bavaria. Pitt and Grenville’s resentment reached new heights in 1797, when Thugut, the Austrian Chancellor, refused to ratify the second loan treaty. Both Pitt and Grenville had invested a great deal of political capital to convince the British Parliament to guarantee the Austrian loan. They were so furious that, after 1797 and until 1800, they refused to discuss a new alliance directly with Vienna. While Pitt and Grenville had seemingly justifiable reasons for disliking and distrusting Austria, any objective analysis of the

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situation would reveal that Austria was the power most tempted to oppose France. This was of course because both France and Austria desired possession of the Rhineland and Italy. Whoever controlled these two areas controlled the door to Austria’s heartland. This was a security issue comparable to Britain’s own with the Netherlands. Yet, British leaders refused to see the situation for what it was and kept courting Prussia and Russia, which were far less interested in fighting in the west if it was going to be a costly war. Pitt and Grenville understood the strategic necessity of a conflict with an expansionist power on the continent but were apparently unable to grasp which practical policies needed to be implemented and were hindered by their lack of diplomatic skills. 1806–12 In the second period, 1806–12, British foreign office leaders at last grasped how to use the most important tool of British diplomacy: subsidies. Yet the quality of Britain’s foreign policy sank even lower before it could improve. Between 1806 and 1807, with the cabinet of All-the-Talents, the administration of Britain’s foreign policy reached its nadir.49 Fox, who had been Pitt’s main critic with his opposition to the war with France, became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs at this time. He prosecuted the war he inherited but desired to restore peace. Grenville, who was now First Lord Treasurer, used his experience and prestige to continue strongly to influence British foreign policy. By this time Grenville had grown to dislike and deeply distrust the eastern great powers, especially Prussia. Made uneasy by Prussia’s attitude while he headed the Foreign Office, Grenville’s apprehensions were confirmed when Prussia accepted Napoleon’s proposition to take over Hanover – a personal possession of King George III. As a result, when Prussia unexpectedly went to war with France, the Cabinet refused to subsidize it, or even to end officially the state of war that existed between Britain and Prussia.50 During this era, the tsar’s request for more financial help received the most disheartening answer. London sent £500,000, less than one tenth of the sum Alexander had requested. Furthermore, this

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remittance was provided, not as the beginning of a new subsidy, but to cover the balance due under the 1805 subsidy granted by Pitt. Sherwig writes that Alexander, who was going through the worst year of his reign and had discovered that he could expect nothing from Britain, said to Napoleon at Tilsit, “I hate the English as much as you do.”51 It is difficult to argue that this was a sound basis on which to build cooperation in the future. British leaders’ traditionally cautious and pragmatic approach affected their country’s capacity to lead a coalition. Their attitude was easily interpreted as stingy. Such behavior, coming from a country that in 1806–7 had almost no soldiers fighting on the continent while all the other great powers were crushed one after the other in Eastern Europe, was unlikely to establish the credentials necessary for future leadership.52 It is not surprising that Britain, with such men leading the country, was utterly unable to improve cooperation between the great powers opposed to Napoleon’s rise. Yet, after the low point that was the administration of All-theTalents came a dramatic and positive change in the way British leaders managed their country’s foreign relations. It was Canning, Pitt’s student, and British Foreign Minister in the Cabinet of the Duke of Portland (1807–9), who truly revolutionized the way British leaders dealt with the subject. In particular, Canning at last grasped how to use the most important tool of British diplomacy: subsidies. Canning was not more generous than Pitt concerning the amount offered to allies, but he decided to pay without waiting for formal treaties. This avoided the initial delays that had prevented Britain from helping its allies in a timely fashion. It also diminished the allies’ resentment. In addition, Canning offered to finance all the powers that were ready to fight effectively against France. Following Canning, British leaders courted more than just the great powers, offering to subsidize any country’s army if it agreed to go to war. What mattered from Canning’s time forward was the reality of a state’s undertakings. Thus, Britain financed the armies of medium powers, such as Spain and Portugal, for years. In the process they created the second front in France that Pitt had desperately tried to create in western France in 1795.

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1812–14 The third period, 1812–14, corresponds to the beginning of the Earl of Liverpool’s ministry. Reflecting on the state of foreign affairs on the eve of this new era, Ward observed that, for years, of course, the profession of English diplomacy in Europe had almost been suspended, since diplomatic relations had practically ceased to exist with the majority of European states. Inferior agents, half-diplomatists half-spies . . . were the only links connecting the British government with the Continental Courts.53 It is in this context that Castlereagh became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. The Viscount Castlereagh was another of Pitt’s students. He had worked with Pitt during Pitt’s last years in power and, like Canning, had learned from the mistakes of the teacher. He immediately began to demonstrate that he was a fast learner and a skilled diplomat. He followed the subsidy policy inaugurated by Canning, making sure that money would reach Britain’s continental allies in time, but he also added a new dimension to this policy, distributing more money during his three years in office than had been distributed during the fifteen previous years combined. Britain provided subsides of £26,216,001 during the three years of the sixth and seventh coalitions (1815 is the year of the seventh coalition, during Napoleon’s One Hundred Days) versus £14,687,538 during the eight years of the first and second coalitions.54 Although Britain’s economy grew between 1792 and 1814, this increase was much smaller than the increase affecting the subsidy policy. Castlereagh began to demonstrate his diplomatic skills as soon as he went to Europe to join the leaders of the continental powers. During the first months of 1814 Castlereagh prevented the collapse of the coalition and answered Napoleon’s last series of victories with the treaty of Chaumont (9 March 1814). This British accomplishment was the first treaty signed by all the great powers since 1793 and the first time in more than twenty years that a common goal was clearly established between the allies. For Castlereagh the treaty was

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the result of work he had begun five weeks earlier, after his arrival in Basel at the end of January 1814. Castlereagh, as Schroeder says, “wished above all to hold the coalition together until France was ready to make peace.”55 He adds that the Austro-British partnership had the power to restrain both the Prussian and the Russian military leaders, given their countries’ “financial dependence on Britain and the crucial role of the Austrian army.”56 Castlereagh’s accomplishment in 1814 demonstrates how Britain could, and actually did, improve the level of cooperation between allies. Schroeder writes that, Castlereagh’s positive contribution to allied unity was even more important than Napoleon’s negative one. In reassuring the allies that Britain would not cut off its subsidies or retire from the Continent and retain its colonial conquest, he deftly reminded them of what Britain could do and how they could neither wage war nor make peace without her . . . His central goal was now to preserve the unity of the alliance during the war and after the war.57 Schroeder’s analysis suggests that the mere reaction to the challenge posed by a would-be hegemon – the desire to form a coalition – was not enough to generate an effective coalition. Another factor was needed to guarantee the victory – the intervention of a political leader representing a country with means that were not available to other great powers. This leader, who, according to Schroeder, “deftly reminded” his peers of the unique capability of the great power he represented, was also a diplomat who knew how to impose his view without provoking his partners. During his sojourn on the continent Castlereagh honed his diplomatic skills and learned to take into consideration more than mere British interests. He came to understand the complexities of the continental states system, an achievement none of his predecessors had accomplished. With his new tactical insight, he was able to play on Britain’s unique position in the system – geographical, political, and economic – to impose a British objective dating from the earliest years of the country’s involvement in the war: the

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creation of a coalition comprising all the great powers and united by a common goal. Representing the only state French armies had never invaded, the wealthiest state of the system, the state that directly or through subsidies was financing most of the men fighting in France, and with a new understanding of the interstate relations existing on the continent, Castlereagh was capable of bridging the gap that existed between Austria, Russia, and Prussia. He was able to coordinate goals and plans for the future. He brought cooperation to a level that allowed the allied powers to remain united until the end of the war in 1815.58

Testing the model Observed effects of British leaders’ foreign policy on the level of cooperation In order to test the model – to evaluate if Britain enhanced cooperation among states opposed to the rise of France – it is necessary to observe the effects of cooperation and to see if British leaders’ undertakings affected them. Consequently, it is necessary to focus on the effect of diplomatic action and of subsidization. There are three main elements that can be improved through diplomatic activity and the use of subsidies and that can be observed more or less accurately. If Britain acted as a coordinator and helped to improve the levels of cooperation, it should be possible to see this country: first, helping to increase the number of states participating in the alliance; second, helping to define a common goal; and third, helping to improve the level of military cooperation. Did Britain help to increase the number of states participating in the alliance? An alliance may be too weak to fulfill its goal when too few great powers belong to it. Lack of trust between leaders and state’s selfish interests often motivate free riding, buck passing, or bandwagoning. The leaders of the coordinating state need to understand what causes the lack of trust. In order to make an attractive counteroffer they must see which advantages are gained through non-balancing policies. They need to have at their disposal subsidies to smooth things over but above all they need a good understanding of the nature of the relationships between the great powers they need in the alliance.

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During the first phase (1793–1805) British leaders were actively trying to increase the number of participants in successive coalitions. Yet they lacked the understanding of the rivalries between the eastern great powers that would have helped them design better coalition-building policies. In addition, the way they used Britain’s finances – failing to subsidize Austria and offering hefty amounts to Prussia, Austria’s rival in Germany – added to the problem more than anything else. This pattern lasted throughout the first phase. During the second phase (1806–12) the defeat came too quickly to allow Britain to play a role. It is during the last phase (1813–14) that British leaders’ attempts at increasing the size of the alliance may have been the most effective. It is difficult to say if Britain’s role increased the number of great powers at war with France in 1813–14. Yet, it is possible to argue that without the huge subsidies and military materials Castlereagh and Liverpool poured into Russia, Prussia, and Austria in 1813–14 and without Castlereagh’s personal intervention in 1814, it is unlikely that the sixth coalition would have included all the great powers opposed to Napoleon in 1813 and/or that they would have remained united until the end of the conflict.59 The military situation was poor until the Battle of Leipzig, when the allies, with the exception of Britain, were either exhausted or afraid to challenge the man who had proven his capacity to beat enemies with superior capabilities.60 What would Austrian leaders have decided in 1813 if they had not been assured that their allies had the material means to fight Napoleon? Metternich may have been inclined to support the allied powers, but his master, the Emperor, was reluctant to provoke the wrath of his son-in-law. Had the perception of the allied powers’ capability been lower, it is not absurd to suggest that the Emperor’s fear might have prevailed and produced a different Austrian foreign policy. British leaders’ will to pour as much money as needed to support the allies likely both directly and indirectly affected other leaders’ decisions to form an alliance. Because it had structural causes, the lack of trust among the eastern powers in 1813 could not be solely affected by Britain’s financial might. Austrian leaders were certainly as (and probably even more) afraid of Russia as they were of Napoleon, and they had some good reasons to

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be – as Castlereagh quickly discovered in 1814.61 The changes imposed on the European system by Napoleon had not affected the eastern great powers’ respective locations on the European map. Austria and Prussia were still rivals in Germany. Russia and Austria were similarly interested in the fate of the Ottoman Empire. Russia and Prussia still had to agree on a division of Polish lands. The only way Britain could have interfered with the strategic consequences of geography was to involve itself diplomatically in the game. Unfortunately, its ministers to the courts of Vienna, Berlin, and St Petersburg were not up to the task. They were actually ignored during the negotiations between the three eastern great powers that took place during spring and summer 1813. It was only when Castlereagh went to the continent in January 1814 that things began to change. As a result of his diplomatic activity, Austrian leaders felt less insecure and did not abandon their allies – something they might have done considering the nature of the stakes involved between Austria and Russia and the absolute lack of trust between the Tsar and Metternich. There is no way to determine definitively what role Britain had in bringing and keeping all the great powers together in one alliance in 1813–14. Yet, Britain certainly had a more decisive effect on the number of great powers participating in the alliance in 1813–14 than ever before. The important role Castlereagh played in 1814 cannot be denied. Indeed, at the least it contributed to unifying the alliance and may very well have saved it altogether. To prevent a breakdown of the coalition and protect their country’s interests on the continent, British leaders gave Castlereagh all the freedom and authority he needed to negotiate with continental leaders. They also allowed him to give up most of Britain’s considerable gains out of Europe, and £5 million, in order to establish an alliance on sound bases that would encompass all the great powers and guarantee Europe’s stability.62 One cannot deny that throughout most of the war subsidies were a bonus, not a deciding factor, and that British leaders had little influence over the number of great powers that agreed to be part of the alliance built against France.63 However, this changed once Castlereagh – a leader who learned from his predecessors’ mistakes – entered the scene. He followed the path opened by Canning, improving elements

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of Britain’s new approach and the number of great powers participating in the sixth coalition. Second, as indicated, the presence or absence of a common goal is another good indicator of the level of cohesion between the members of an alliance and is something that a coordinator may help to define and to promote. The absence of a common goal suggests that at the origin of the coalition there was a low level of cooperation and that tensions will plague the alliance while it fights the challenger. British leaders’ failure is most obvious in the case of the elaboration of a common goal. During the first phase of the conflict there was no common goal. It was at the end of the first phase (1793–1805), after years of defeats, that a common goal began to emerge. Britain, Austria, and Russia wanted to deprive France of its post-1792 conquests. However, Prussian leaders refused to follow the other great powers. They even accepted Napoleon’s offer to add Hanover – which had belonged to King George III – to their territories. As a result, Britain and Prussia were officially at war with one other. During the second phase, the desire to stop France certainly rose, but Napoleon’s domination prevented the birth of an alliance that included all the great powers sharing a common goal. Finally, in the third phase, Britain was able to affect the definition of a common goal. Still, at the beginning of the phase, Russia’s success (at the end of 1812) barely changed the situation. Austria’s and Russia’s goals were at odds. Austria wanted to push France behind its natural borders (the Rhine River, the Alps, and the Pyrenees) to keep a strong counterweight to Russia’s sudden growth in the east. Russia wanted a weak France in the west – a goal not far from Britain’s own. British leaders wanted to push France out of the former Austrian Low Countries and of the Left Bank of the Rhine. They wanted to ensure that France could not strike again. It was not until 1814, with Castlereagh’s sojourn on the continent, that things truly changed. The signature of the Treaty of Chaumont was the result of the new method used by Castlereagh to improve cooperation between leaders. According to Lord Ripon, Castlereagh’s closest collaborator in 1814, Castlereagh wanted, and actually did, bring “all the respective parties into unrestricted communications common to them all, and embracing

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in confidential and united discussions all the great points in which they were severally interested.” 64 Analyzing Lord Ripon’s observations, Webster indicates that “[a]bove all [Castlereagh] regarded himself as a mediator in the continental disputes . . . and one of his great desires was to bring harmony between the rival parties.”65 Castlereagh’s method allowed him to keep both Austria and Russia in the same alliance, a fate in itself considering the lack of trust existing between Metternich and the Tsar, and to define a common goal. Finally, were the British able to improve military cooperation? In military terms, Britain certainly contributed to increased levels of cooperation during the first phase. It did so in 1793, during the first coalition, when Britain brought Spain into the alliance (which contributed to the creation of a new front in the Pyrenees). Britain distracted the French in 1795 with (ultimately failed) attempts to help the royalists in Brittany and Vendée. It also weakened France by severing France’s ties with its colonies. During the second coalition, Britain launched a seaborne operation, with the support of Russia, against Holland under French control. The goal was to distract French forces from the main theater of operation in Italy and southern Germany. Before that (ultimately failed) invasion, the British Navy had destroyed the French fleet at the battle of the Nile, blocking an important French army far from the European theater. During the second phase, Britain’s main contributions were first on the seas. After 1808 Britain helped to build a new front in France’s back, using both its own forces and Spanish and Portuguese soldiers. At that point, Britain’s contribution to military operations kept growing until during the third and last phase Wellington was able to invade southern France in 1814 with his British/Spanish/Portuguese army. In 1813 and during the first months of 1814 there was no coordination between the military operations going on in Spain and in Germany. Yet, it is certain that the British/Spanish/Portuguese-coordinated military force under Wellington’s authority played a crucial role in depriving Napoleon of tens of thousands of trained men who could have fought on the eastern front against Russia, Prussia, and Austria. According to Webster, it was even possible that Wellington’s major victory at Vittoria in 1813 affected Austria’s political decision to side with the allies.66

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Actually, Britain played a more important military role than is often acknowledged. In addition, its leaders, with the exception of the Cabinet of All-the-Talents, were able to improve the level of military cooperation between medium powers opposed to France. Their only major failure was their inability to improve the level of military cooperation between the great powers. Overall, it is clear that British leaders were bent on improving cooperation between the great and medium powers opposed to Revolutionary/ Imperial France in a way that continental leaders were not. They used Britain’s resources to try to accomplish this but were handicapped by their lack of understanding of continental interstate relations. During the first phase of the conflict they spent time, energy, and money to increase the number of powers willing to fight France. They also did their best to increase military cooperation, but they never succeeded in defining war goals that could truly unify the coalitions that were formed. During the second phase, after the fall of the Cabinet of All-the-Talents, British leaders resumed their attempts, but Napoleon’s military victories created a context that doomed their efforts. However, after Napoleon’s setback in Russia, British leaders were finally able to act more effectively. During the third phase, Castlereagh’s and Liverpool’s foreign policy may not have dramatically affected relations between their allies, but it certainly played a role and most probably a crucial one. Even if the improvement in the level of cooperation was limited – Austria remained in the alliance in 1814 due to Castlereagh’s intervention which alleviated their fear of a Russian hegemony succeeding France’s – it was sufficient to affect the end result. A coalition, financed by Britain, including all the great powers was created. Britain provided its allies not only with the financial means they needed to field their numerous armies but also maintained in the rear of France a second front that divided Napoleon’s military forces. The alliance was able to survive military setbacks in 1813 and early 1814 until the ultimate victory. Using its wealth and the newly acquired understanding of European politics among its political leaders, Britain helped to improve military cooperation, define a common goal, and convince, directly or indirectly, all the great powers to form and remain in an alliance.

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Conclusion Applying the model supported in this chapter to the case of the wars of the French Revolution and Empire shows that Britain had the capacity to be a coordinator – throughout the war it managed to preserve the requisite levels of invulnerability and wealth. It also shows that even if British leaders were not absolutely aware that their country had a special role to play in creating a more effective coalition of powers opposed to the rise of a potential hegemon, most of them behaved as if they had this understanding. Pitt, Canning, and Castlereagh, each in his own way, implemented policies that were intended to increase cooperation between great powers opposed to the rise of France. In so doing, they recognized the special role Britain needed to play in order to create or reinforce a coalition capable of stopping France. The case indicates that the diplomatic skills held by British leaders affected Britain’s capacity to improve cooperation between great powers opposed to the challenger. It also shows that Britain’s financial capability played a role in Napoleon’s defeat (through the huge amounts of subsidies distributed in 1813 and 1814, and through the financing of a second front in the Iberian Peninsula) but that British financial might did not give its leaders the capacity to dictate the foreign and military policies of other great powers. The study of the case suggests the following: first, that systemic constraints affect – negatively as much as positively – the willingness to participate in a coalition more than do subsidies alone; second, that when states are at war, the presence in the system of a power with considerable financial capacity and invulnerability helps to increase cooperation when its leaders have the diplomatic skills required to use effectively the means of action at their disposal; and third, that the leaders of the coordinating state can improve the level of cooperation between the members of a coalition only if they grasp their potential allies’ real interests and find a way to elaborate a common goal that will not be opposed to these more selfish interests. The case of the wars of the Revolution and Empire shows that there is an element missing in the realist approach to balance of power theory. Although there are pressures exerted by the system – the leaders

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of the great powers confronted with the rise of a challenger are induced to implement external balancing policies – these pressures may not always be enough to overcome the lack of trust that exists between them. In the case of the European system it was the intervention of a great power with exceptional levels of wealth and of immunity to invasion that helped to improve the level of cooperation between allies opposed to a systemic challenger. The improvement may not have been spectacular but happened at critical times and affected decisive elements, like Britain’s subsidies policy and diplomatic undertakings in 1813–14. In non-European states systems, the absence of a state endowed with the same characteristics may explain why the states willing to oppose the rise of a potential hegemon have not always been able to solve the collective action problems they have faced.67 The present study supports the proposition that when there is a challenger in a multipolar system, the desire to oppose this challenger results in a winning alliance if there is a state which can play the role of coordinator. The concept of a coordinating state and the possibility that the presence of such a state is a necessary condition to the formation of winning coalitions offers interesting possibilities that could be worth studying in different settings. Among others, the presence of a coordinating state may affect the behavior of other states, and can help to explain why some states choose bandwagoning, hiding, or buckpassing policies instead of external balancing.

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CHAPTER 3 TUR KEY’S ACCESSION TO THE NORTH ATL ANTIC TR EAT Y ORGANIZATION, 1945–52: A QUALIFIED SUCCESS? James C. Helicke

On 18 February 1952, Turkey, along with Greece, joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). In the Cold War that unfolded after 1945, Turkey not only moved from a neutralist foreign policy to a staunch pro-Western orientation, but made a quick and unprecedented leap into multiparty politics. The Republican People’s Party, the party of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk that had ruled the Turkish nation-state since the country’s founding in 1923, lost its political monopoly in the 1946 elections and was defeated by the rival Democrat Party in the 1950 elections. In several respects, the period after the Second World War is second in its transformative scope to the radical period of Atatürk, who transformed Turkey into a staunchly secular republic. Issues of religion, the parameters of Turkish national identity, and Turkey’s relationship with the Ottoman past that had once been shoved to the background by the single-party regime were suddenly back on the table as a range of political actors asserted themselves and as new press outlets challenged politics as usual.

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This chapter suggests that Turkey’s drive for membership in NATO cannot be understood fully without also understanding these complex changes in Turkish politics and society. It examines how Turkey’s NATO accession, which culminated in the country’s membership in the organization in 1952, played out at a public level within Turkey. It shows how Turkish leaders – faced with significant economic, political, and social turmoil within the country – were occupied not only with threats from the Soviet Union, but also domestic challenges. Turkish leaders used NATO accession not only as a way to protect the country from a perceived Soviet threat from outside, but also as a way of consolidating power inside the country. In this way, efforts to sell NATO accession to both a skeptical West and a divided Turkish public cannot be separated from a peculiarly Turkish Cold War that did not simply mirror the Cold War of Washington, but that was particularly Turkish in character and framed by Turkey’s historical memory. In short, Turkey’s NATO accession must be seen in terms of two interrelated processes that straddled domestic and international politics: first, a problematic shift from neutrality to collective security that was intensely scrutinized at a public level, and second, attempts to consolidate power at the domestic level within a peculiarly Turkish Cold War political context. In these terms, Turkey’s accession to NATO might be seen as a qualified success: while it helped to anchor Turkey into a Western security apparatus so that Turkey participated in efforts to contain the spread of communism at the international level, it also helped to stabilize an increasingly authoritarian government at the domestic level.

Turkey after the Second World War While international historians have long recognized Turkey’s central location in Cold War politics, especially the dispute with the Soviet Union over the strategic waterways that bisect Istanbul, scholars have given insufficient emphasis to the complex range of changes that occurred within Turkey during this period that also helped bring the Cold War to Turkey and motivated Turkish leaders’ efforts for NATO membership.

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Although Turkey did not directly participate in battles, the Second World War left deep scars on the country with profound domestic and international implications. Turkish leaders, handpicked by the authoritarian government of President Ismet Inönü and profoundly affected by the disastrous results of the First World War that led to the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire, vigilantly sought to avoid a similar fate by staying out of the war through the pursuit of a pragmatic policy of what one scholar has called “active neutrality.”1 Fearful of European aims in the region and eager to preserve their country’s sovereignty, Turkish leaders remained suspicious of outside powers. Turkey’s wavering wartime stance led to strained relations with the Soviets, who by the first part of 1945 had declined to renew a three-decade long friendship pact, thereby raising fears over possible demands on Turkish territory and control over the Turkish Straits. An April 1945 document from the US Office of Strategic Services stated that although the Soviet Union had revealed no immediate aggressive aims, Turkey’s probable postwar course remained unclear. Turkey was likely to “maintain her advocacy of an international security organization as the best guarantee against domination resulting from an alliance with any major power.”2 Thus, Turkey sought in United Nations membership a collective security arrangement that would help it avoid the pitfalls of its precarious wartime situation. Nonetheless, its postwar pro-Western orientation was not yet certain. Postwar Soviet demands on Turkey were central to Turkey’s shift toward an alliance with the West. Tensions boiled over in August 1946 when the Soviets renewed their demands for Turkish territory and claims to the Straits – in diplomatic maneuvering that encouraged the Truman Doctrine speech early the next year. Whereas the Soviet leadership acquiesced to a UN solution for the question of Iran (which had remained under partial Soviet occupation in 1946), the international body’s inability to solve the crisis over Turkey and the Straits and to address Turkey’s immediate security concerns exposed Turkey’s vulnerability in the international arena. From a Turkish perspective, the Truman Doctrine provided much needed military aid, but also underscored questions by the Turkish leadership and public about the utility of collective security rooted in the United Nations.

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Yet, it is also important to recognize that Turkey’s movement toward an alliance with the West did not occur in a vacuum, but coincided with broader shifts in Turkish society, politics, and economics. Foremost in this regard was the dire state of Turkey’s economy. The single-party government’s decision on 7 September 1946 to devalue its currency in accordance with the Bretton Woods Agreement failed to give significant attention to social and economic conditions within the country and led to an immediate spike in the price of imported goods and ultimately a general increase in the cost of living.3 Anger toward the government also increased. George McGhee, who served as coordinator for Greek and Turkish aid in the late 1940s and would become US ambassador to Turkey in early 1952, noted that Turkey in 1948 had been spending more than 50 per cent of its annual government revenues on national defense, which left little for agriculture, industry, and transport and kept consumption of consumer goods below postwar European levels.4 Walter Wilds, who was also acting as coordinator for aid to Greece and Turkey, expressed concern about the volatility of Turkish society, arguing that “improvement in the living conditions of Turkey’s workers and peasants” was needed to strengthen the country as a bulwark against communism.5 Perhaps, the most salient example of the volatility in Turkish society in the postwar period is to be found in the political realm. The origins of Turkey’s transition to a multiparty system during the early years of the Cold War have not been adequately explained. Scholars have often suggested that US pressure on Turkish leaders played a prominent role. However, there is little evidence of direct US intervention in American documents.6 The formation of the United Nations, at least initially, held greater sway than Washington in shaping Turkey’s transition to multiparty politics. Citing the Charter of the United Nations, President Inönü declared in 1945 that the government and politics “shall develop in all aspects and in every way, and as the conditions imposed by war disappear, democratic principles will gradually acquire a larger place in the political and culture life of the country.”7 While one might question Inönü’s sincerity, opposition leaders used Turkey’s ratification of the United Nations Charter to press for political reform. Citing the Charter, prominent lawmakers submitted

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a parliamentary motion demanding greater democracy and freedom of the press and published newspaper articles critical of the government, resulting in their ouster from the Republican Party in early 1946.8 Both the first officially sanctioned opposition party, the National Development Party (founded in 1945) and the much more important Democrat Party consisted of former members of the Republican People’s Party who had challenged the party leadership. Under pressure, Turkey held multiparty elections in 1946, but the results were universally seen as fixed and the Democrats only picked up a small fraction of the seats held by the Republicans. Yet, this outcome did not solve the instability plaguing the Republican Party. The Republican government that came to power in 1946, led by Recep Peker, fell the following year after losing a parliamentary vote aimed at strengthening the premier’s authority. Hasan Saka formed a more moderate government, but his attempt to bridge differences between the authoritarian and more liberal factions proved unsuccessful. The Turkish public largely blamed the Republican Party for the country’s economic stagnation, for unpopular measures against the practice of religion (e.g., the ban on the Arabic call to prayer), and for limitations on political freedoms. A third government, led by the pious Şemseddin Günaltay, assumed power in 1949, seeking to implement democratic reforms, but its reputation was tarnished by popular frustration with the governing party.9 The transition to a multiparty system coincided with and was reinforced by a sharp surge in the number of publications after 1945. Draconian censorship enforced during the Second World War was slowly eased. Ahmed Emin Yalman, who was one of the most important critics of the Republican government and came to be associated with the Democrat Party, was given permission to resume publication of his Vatan newspaper. A variety of mass-circulation publications – Islamist, leftist, nationalist, and local in orientation – got underway during this period and stirred new debates on issues such as religion and national identity.10 Many of these resumed social, political, cultural, and religious debates that had commenced in the late Ottoman period, but that the Kemalist regime had attempted to end.11 In short, the proliferation of opposition publications openly challenged the government’s monopoly on information and political power.12

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The Turkish press reinforced popular attitudes and perceptions of foreign powers and shaped many Turks’ understanding of the nascent Cold War. Historical memory played an important role. Yalman summarized the views of many Turks in arguing that “Russians chose Marxism to cloak their ancient imperialism.”13 In this sense, anticommunism sometimes served as a guise for a much older and widely held suspicion toward Russia that was easily defended before the Turkish public. Thus, the Republican government engaged in a series of purges targeting leftist groups, many of which were “Turkish” in character and whose alleged ties with the Soviet Union might be questioned.14 Although it is difficult to gauge the relative support that these groups enjoyed, it is also clear that the Turkish government often overestimated or exaggerated the strength of these groups. Amid anticommunist hype in the 1940s and 1950s, the Turkish government sometimes linked ideologically disparate groups and used the “communist threat” to crack down on political opponents.15 Many Turks were also suspicious of European powers, including Britain. The Islamist journal Sebilürreşad published a long series of articles over several years entitled “How did the Europeans cause the Ottoman Empire to collapse?” which linked designs by the Great Powers on the Ottoman Empire to the contemporary challenges of Turkey and reflected broader suspicions in Turkey about Europe. Yalman similarly published a series of articles accusing Britain of pursuing imperialistic policies toward Turkey, a sentiment that drew criticism from the government as it pursued increasingly pro-British policies.16 While Britain’s announcement of the cessation of aid to Greece and Turkey in early 1947 alarmed the Turkish government, the latter soon found support from the United States much easier to swallow. Support from a non-European power provided not only military assistance, but also political leverage. Military aid supplied through the Truman Doctrine totaling $100 million, $108 million in direct aid, and another $75 million in indirect support through the Marshall Plan between 1948 and 1950 provided much-needed budgetary relief and economic assistance.17 While the government continued to avoid the impression of a “revival of Capitulations” of the Ottoman period and a potential

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“Egyptianisation” of Turkey and sought to avoid direct supervision of credit in 1947, US assistance proved a much easier deal to sell to the Turkish public. “The Truman Doctrine was a great comfort to the Turkish people, for it made them feel that they were no longer isolated”, stated a prominent member of the government who served as Foreign Minister later in 1947.18 The North Atlantic Treaty, adopted in 1949, however, proved a political liability for the Republican government. In autumn 1948, US officials had informed the Turkish government that the pact was intended for the “North Atlantic” realm and the Foreign Minister briefed Turkish lawmakers to that effect.19 Throughout 1948, the Turkish government held talks with Greece and Italy about the establishment of a Mediterranean Pact, as it scrambled in 1948 to attain a “security guarantee.”20 The eventual decision to include Italy in the Atlantic Pact caused great concern in Turkey. This change, in the words of the Turkish Foreign Minister, “gave the impression that Turkey – the most exposed of all the European countries to Soviet pressures and attacks – was being abandoned and excluded from the thinking of the Western powers regarding security arrangements.”21 Turkish leaders voiced concerns that the United States was no longer as concerned about Turkey. Hoping to gain a sympathetic ear from Washington, the Foreign Minister warned US officials that Soviet propaganda sought to take advantage of the situation.22 While members of the governing Republican People’s Party and other parties criticized the West for failing to include Turkey in 1949, the opposition Democrats assured the Turkish public through its official press outlet that this decision was a “temporary” delay and that Democrats remained committed to Turkey’s inclusion in the Atlantic Pact.23 Foreign policy would become an important issue of political debate not because of fundamental differences between the Republicans and Democrats, but because the opposition could challenge the Republican government’s performance in foreign affairs.24 In this context, closer cooperation with the United States filled several voids. Foremost, it sought to address a very real perceived threat from the Soviet Union and provided much needed economic support for the government. It also provided political collateral for the

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government. One perceptive Turkish journalist noted that the Truman Doctrine aid indirectly contributed to the Democrat victory in 1950s elections by helping “strengthen Turkey against foreign pressure, particularly from her Soviet neighbor to the north, and to stabilize to some extent her economic situation.”25 One thing it did not anchor was Turkey’s Republican government.

The Democrats assume power The Democrats’ overwhelming victory in Turkey’s first free multiparty elections on 14 May 1950 was a shock for many Turks. The Democrats captured around 400 of 474 seats in parliament. The importance of Turkey’s election for Turkey’s democracy is well known, but its equal importance for foreign policy and Turkey’s accession to NATO has been described to a lesser extent. Foreign observers largely stressed the continuity between the two regimes, especially in the realm of foreign policy. The Times of London observed that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans had made foreign policy an issue in the election. Fuat Köprülü, the new Democrat Foreign Minister, had indicated no major shift in the foreign policy orientation of the previous government.26 Likewise, US government officials largely perceived the difference between the two governments as limited to domestic, rather than foreign, policy. McGhee argued that the change in the government had been caused by frustration with the economic situation and with single-party government and not foreign policy.27 Yet, it is also important to recognize a subtler shift in the way that the Democrat government would use foreign policy, namely, as a means of consolidating power within the country. Unsurprisingly, the government took up a number of domestic measures that were opposed by the Republicans, including a controversial amnesty bill and, most symbolically, allowing the Islamic call to prayer to be recited in Arabic, rather than Turkish, as had been dictated under the single party regime.28 Within weeks, the new government carried out a series of purges of senior government officials, aiming not only at provincial governors, but also nearly two dozen generals (including the

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head of the general staff) and many of its most important ambassadorial posts, including Washington, Moscow, the United Nations, and Athens, thereby asserting control over the state apparatus.29 Moreover, foreign policy was not untouched. Although there was continuity in the basic tenets, the government made clear its intention to pursue a more assertive policy than that of its predecessor. As Foreign Minister Köprülü stated, “our foreign policy, which has been oriented towards the West since the Second World War, will take a more energetic form in this direction.”30 The outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950 provided the new government the opportunity to demonstrate this new assertiveness. On 30 June, Köprülü briefed lawmakers about UN Secretary-General Trygve Halvdan Lie’s request for support for UN efforts to solve the crisis. Köprülü also sent a response expressing support and pledging to uphold Turkey’s obligations as a member of the international body. The cause proved popular and a campaign began soliciting youths to sign up for a “volunteer legion” to fight in Korea.31 On 25 July, the government made an unexpected announcement: Turkey became the second UN member state to send troops to support the United Nations (after the United States), providing 4500 armymen to Korea. This was also the first time Turkish troops were sent outside Anatolia since the establishment of the republic and represented an important break from its isolationist foreign policy. The cause remained popular: rallies were held throughout the country and telegraphs of support flooded government offices.32 The reasons for public support for this campaign are complex and diverse. Nationalist sentiment, intense anticommunism (often a guise for historically rooted anti-Russian sentiment), a desire for a more assertive foreign policy reminiscent of the Ottoman past, and solidarity with the West provide some explanations. For Islamists, religious motivations – the fight against atheist communism – provided a more important motivation and illustrates the complex, multifaceted, conflicting, and ambiguous motivations underlying the Turkish public attitudes toward the deployment.33 The deployment incensed the opposition. The Republicans and the smaller Nation Party complained about the government’s failure to consult with the opposition. Both argued – probably correctly – that

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the government had failed to secure parliamentary authorization for the dispatch of troops as required by the constitution. The government argued that the broad, perhaps spontaneous motion of support given by parliamentarians on 30 June and Turkey’s ratification of the UN Charter provided the necessary authorization. Moreover, opposition leader Inönü expressed concern about the possibility of retaliation from neighboring or nearby communist states.34 Most importantly, Inönü criticized the existing system of collective security rooted in the United Nations, according to which each state could decide whether to contribute to the mission or not and could lead to a dangerous situation. “If Turkey were attacked tomorrow,” Inönü was paraphrased as saying, “would she have to wait until every other nation made up its mind about the nature and amount of assistance it could offer?”35 Inönü’s remarks reveal the extent to which collective security remained a contentious issue in Turkey and the role of foreign policy in domestic debate. The deployment to Korea was never an end in itself. A few days after the troop announcement, Turkey renewed its campaign to join NATO. In early August 1950, Foreign Minister Köprülü discussed the issue during a trip to a meeting of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, where he lobbied British Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin and French Foreign Minister Robert Schuman. It was clear from the beginning that the deployment of troops to Korea was tied to Turkey’s aspirations for a formal American commitment to defend Turkey and the government paraded the troops as an example of Turkey’s commitment to the pursuit of “peace” – also its public justification for joining NATO.36 A newspaper editorial published the same week as the announcement of Turkey’s new NATO bid emphasized the pact as the best way to protect the country’s independence. It accused the previous government of wavering and pushing for a Mediterranean alternative to NATO. “At that time, those in power were saving themselves with their statements against the public who did not know about the Pact. In reality, the nation, the country was left exposed”, it said.37 However, Turkish hopes for full membership soon gave way to frustration. In September, the US Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended that Turkey not be given full membership but “associate status” for the

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time being. It argued that such a status would allow greater coordination between NATO and Turkey. The recommendation expressed concern that immediate inclusion of Turkey and Greece “might adversely affect the progress” of NATO, stating that currently “the defense of Western Europe is of the greatest importance to the defense of the Treaty in general and to each signatory in particular.”38 President Bayar expressed his concerns to the American ambassador, who stressed the importance of Turkish membership: We have shown our good faith by forthright action towards meeting the Korean crisis. I fear frankly that, if the Atlantic Pact Council of Foreign Ministers turns down our request, our morale will be seriously affected. We are not a people readily influenced by propaganda. In this matter, however, there is a widespread concern and uncertainty. We feel our very future is at stake.39 At a September summit in the United States, NATO leaders followed the US line and failed to back Turkish membership. The official decision, based on a draft put forth by US Secretary of State Dean Acheson and endorsed by the foreign ministers of the United Kingdom and France, stated that it was not feasible to accept Turkey as a member at the present time, but that it was desirable for Turkey to associate with the alliance.40 Official Turkish reaction was one of disappointment. As Assistant Secretary of State McGhee noted, Turks felt they were being treated as second class members of European society and were growing more and more dissatisfied . . . the perception was growing in Turkey that Washington’s interests focused only on Western Europe and that Turkey was being abandoned. The Turkish ambassador in Washington warned that since the Turkish government made public its request for admission to NATO, “a dangerously bitter mood could emerge” amongst Turks.41 Only Italy backed Turkish membership.42

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The mood in Turkey toward NATO quickly soured. The Turkish press blamed Britain for the refusal, despite the fact that Acheson had drafted the decision. The opposition immediately called into question the desirability of joining the pact. Former Foreign Minister Necmettin Sadak, a member of the opposition Republicans, argued that concerted military plans might fulfill shared security concerns more practically than adherence to NATO.43 The question of NATO membership again threatened to be a political liability for the Turkish government as it had been under the previous Republican administration. Turkish leaders sought to placate the public. In his first address to a new session of parliament on 1 November 1950, President Bayar stressed Turkey’s role in a broader collective security arrangement. He called for the United Nations to be strengthened, but called NATO the “most effective security organization against aggression” and reiterated his government’s wish for Turkey to be included. Yet, in an apparent bid to win public sympathy, he also emphasized that it was not just Turkey that needed the alliance; the alliance also needed Turkey: “With its strong and honorably army, Turkey is not only the most important element for its own security, but for the peace and security of the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East.”44 Still, many Turks remained angry over the rejection of Turkey’s bid to join NATO. Stoking the resentment, in late 1950 General Omar Bradley published remarks suggesting that a war launched by the Soviet Union against countries such as Turkey was likely to remain a “limited war.” Many Turkish newspapers took this as a further indication that the United States did not intend to protect Turkey and published sharply critical articles.45 The government sought to reassure the public that Bradley’s remarks had been taken out of context.46 However, an unexpected boost followed Turkish military success in the difficult battle of Kunu Ri in December 1950. Thereafter, opposition Republicans muted their criticism of Turkish involvement in Korea. In a move indicative of its own questionable commitment to democracy, the government used the success to close the group organizing opposition to the deployment of troops, the Turkish Organization for Peace, for alleged leftist sympathies.47

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Public debates about “collective security” became more acute by the first half of 1951 and US policymakers became increasingly alarmed by the prospect that Turkey might retreat to a neutralist path. A classified US National Intelligence Estimate in February emphasized Turkey’s status as a firm ally and its strong resistance to Soviet expansion, but it suggested Turkey could adopt a neutral stance if the United States were to waver in the face of Soviet aggression.48 Speculation that, in the absence of concrete assurances of membership in NATO, Turkey might even shuffle its government suggested that the future of Turkey’s government was still uncertain. In April, Menderes called for increased cooperation with the opposition to uphold order and deal with “elements, inspired from abroad, which wanted to undermine national unity.” Indicative of the growing concerns inside Turkey, Köprülü said in remarks published by the foreign press that Turks, like their ancestors, were prepared to defend their independence, even if alone.49 In late April, the government convened a three-week-long diplomatic conference to discuss Turkey’s foreign policy. The Times expressed concern that, in the meantime, “Communist propaganda is working actively to take advantage of Turkish disappointment to cast doubts on the intentions of western Powers, especially Britain.”50 Perhaps the most prominent example thereof was the case of Turkey’s most famous poet, Nazim Hikmet (Ran), a Marxist whose hunger strikes in prison had sparked an international campaign for his release that proved a thorn for the previous government. The poet, who benefited from a sweeping amnesty approved by the Democrat Party government in the summer of 1950 after more than a decade behind bars, fled Turkey for Bulgaria in June 1951. From abroad, Nazim Hikmet soon participated in a series of Radio Moscow broadcasts that emphasized his allegiance to his homeland and assailed the government’s pro-Western foreign policy. On 25 July 1951, around the same time a reluctant Britain announced support for Turkish NATO membership, President Bayar signed a decree stripping Hikmet of his citizenship – an order that was only rescinded by the Turkish government in 2009.51 Turkish leaders sought to exploit US sensitivities about Turkey’s alignment and it seemed to work: Turks, “although they sought

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strongly to join NATO, were becoming discouraged and considering alternative courses of action if their entry was further delayed.”52 In June, the Turkish ambassador in Washington requested an urgent meeting with the assistant secretary of state to convey a letter that had been sent to President Bayar. The letter, written by the prominent leftist Zekeriya Sertel, evoking patriotism and not Marxism, called for Turkish neutrality. Bayar, the ambassador said, “feared this sort of nationalist argument could become very popular within Turkey, seriously eroding support for NATO membership, unless some definite action were taken soon to remove Turkish suspicions regarding US support.”53 This was supported by increasing concerns about Turkey’s role in the event of a general war with the Soviet Union that had grown since late the previous year and Washington’s endorsement in spring 1951 of the idea of a formal US commitment to Turkish security.54 By summer, the mood of the allies – spurred in part by fears of “losing Turkey” – had shifted in Turkey’s favor. In July, Britain, which had favored a separate security Middle East or Mediterranean arrangement for Turkey, reversed course and announced support for Turkey’s entry into NATO. The decision reflected greater willingness toward broader Western involvement in the Middle East and the belief in Britain that it would assume the leadership role. This decision, reported by a grateful Foreign Minister, drew loud applause from Turkish lawmakers. Yet, the fact that news coverage pointed to Turkey’s “double aspect” in defending both the Middle East and Europe hinted of a broader strategic ambiguity over Turkey’s accession.55 By late summer, the Democrat Party had both the international and the domestic support it needed for NATO membership. In September, less than a week before NATO leaders gathered in Ottawa to decide on accession for Greece and Turkey, the government cleared a final hurdle: a by-election to decide 20 contested seats in Turkey’s parliament. The government scored a resounding victory, winning 18 of the contested seats in what The Times called “a fair test of public opinion”, a sign of “stability in Turkey”, and “a useful asset to the Turkish Government as it prepares to enter into discussions with the Atlantic Treaty Powers . . .” The article noted that although domestic affairs – continuing disregard for the opposition party’s long domination over

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the country – were largely responsible, lack of progress in Turkey’s NATO accession would have likely dealt a blow to the government’s “prestige” ahead of the polls.56 In Ottawa, diplomats from the last country to oppose Turkey’s entry, Denmark, were given instructions to vote in favor of Turkish membership for the sake of NATO unity.57 NATO leaders gave Turkey and Greece the green light for NATO accession. The Turkish press greeted the decision with joy. Even a once critical Inönü conceded, “[t]he security of our country increased in political terms as a result of sharing a common fate with this great international organization.” Prime Minister Menderes greeted the decision with joy, noting Turkey had been accepted “with equal rights” to other members.58 Yet the government’s struggle was not over. Reports of NATO’s intentions to integrate Turkey’s military into the alliance through a separate Middle East command – rather than through the European command that integrated other members – immediately appeared in the Turkish press and soon sparked concern of a separate status for Turkey.59 The issue went to the heart of US and British differences over the strategy for the region. The British envisioned Middle East defense, centered in Suez, as a “means of continuing British influence in the region,” while the US focus was on bolstering the defense of the region as a whole from Soviet aggression.60 Many Turks resented being linked to Britain’s domination and a British command. Such a scenario brought with it other challenges in the region, including opposition by Egypt, which was at the center of the regional initiative envisioned by Britain. In January 1952, Turkish leaders were so incensed that they threatened not to join the pact and to consider a policy of neutrality.61 The issue was resolved in February through a French compromise that stated that Turkish and Greek forces would serve “temporarily” under Admiral Robert Carney, an American who was the commander in chief of the Allied Powers in Southern Europe – thereby leaving open the possibility of the British initiative while placating Turkish concerns.62 The government also carefully crafted its efforts to “sell” NATO to the Turkish public. Apparent talking points on NATO prepared for senior government officials stressed that NATO would contribute

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to peace and economic development for Turkey and promote ideals of “shared civilization” among member nations. The remarks for Turkey’s Chief of the General Staff emphasized the continuing threat to Turkey and NATO’s altruistic nature: it must not be forgotten that today those who are fixed in nourishing goals of aggression possess great military force and resources. Such a force may only be stopped with force and by being prepared. Thus, the Atlantic Pact states have sworn to perform selfsacrifice by all means with the aim of strengthening their defense forces both individually as well as collectively. While these statements were undated, they were apparently intended for a public event shortly after Greece and Turkey became members and their contents highlight the government’s careful campaign to market NATO membership both at home and abroad.63 Turkey and Greece were officially invited to be members of the Atlantic Pact in February 1952. Turkey’s accession was greeted as an occasion of jubilation. “It represented to them acceptance by the West on a basis of equality, and it presaged a broadening of the scope of Turkey’s relations with its new NATO allies, particularly the United States”, wrote McGhee. Yet, there is another side to the story as well. Turkey’s NATO membership, pondered, questioned, and challenged by Turks in a public forum, was adopted unanimously by Turkey’s parliament – with only one abstention – in a remarkable political victory for the Turkish government.64

Epilogue and conclusion This chapter has argued that Turkey’s accession to NATO and its foreign policy more broadly cannot be separated from its volatile domestic political and social environment. Turkey’s efforts to join NATO were profoundly affected by two interrelated processes: a problematic shift from its earlier policy of neutrality to an equally complex idea of collective security, and, second, efforts to consolidate power within a unique Turkish Cold War political context.

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The establishment of NATO and Turkey’s initial exclusion at a time of great social turmoil reinforced a public impression that the Republican government was incapable of asserting authority both at a domestic and international level. Despite the commonly held view that the Democrat Party simply maintained the foreign policy of its predecessor, foreign policy soon became hotly contested as the new government sent troops to Korea and intensified efforts to join NATO despite objections by the opposition. Both the dispatch of troops and Turkey’s acceptance to NATO in February 1952 boosted the Democrat Party’s efforts to consolidate power. The Democrat Party continued to strengthen in the aftermath of Turkey’s NATO accession, asserting greater authority both at home and abroad and buoyed by many Turks’ aspirations for a more assertive foreign policy and important military aid from the United States. An assassination attempt by a religious “reactionary” (as described by contemporaries) on the Turkish journalist Ahmed Emin Yalman at the end of 1953 provided the necessary pretext for the government to crack down on its domestic opponents. Yalman, who was often regarded as the Democrat Party’s journalistic mouthpiece, expressed his view that the incident was orchestrated by the Soviet Union and described a Cold War that went beyond international military issues to include unexpected domestic opponents as well: We are mistaken in calling the state of actual war with the Iron Curtain world a cold one. It is a very hot one indeed. Firearms are still used in a limited way, but Moscow has chosen to use other weapons of a character enabling it to undermine the security and order in other parts of the world without incurring any risks itself. No counter-weapons have been devised against the armament that Moscow uses . . . the character of the battle in progress in Turkey against the forces of evil organized by Moscow . . . used the camouflage of religious reaction and national chauvinism just as it was doing in other Muslim countries.65 Such justification helped the Democrat Party to pursue purges of opponents of all stripes in the name of a broader, international struggle

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against communism, of which Turkey, through its membership in NATO, was part. Indeed, Prime Minister Menderes increasingly dominated the political scene after the 1954 elections and edged toward dictatorial rule until a 1960 military coup. The fight against “communism” often struck not only leftist groups, but also Islamists, dissidents, and members of the opposition. NATO membership also allowed Turkey to demonstrate a more assertive foreign policy of its own. In an interesting reversal of course, Turkey subsequently pressed the West for a Middle East alliance – not unlike the one it had repeatedly rejected in 1951. These efforts, encouraged by London and Washington, culminated in the short-lived and unsuccessful Baghdad Pact. This time, it might be argued, the terms were Turkey’s, rather than part of Britain’s plans to maintain a diminishing empire. The case of Turkey’s accession carries broader lessons for understanding the role of alliances and alliance formation. As the Turkish case demonstrates, NATO membership was never simply a matter of foreign policy, but had profound domestic implications as well. Whereas the alliance proved a political liability for an increasingly unpopular Republican People’s Party, an ascendant Democrat Party used the alliance as a way of showcasing its effectiveness and mobilizing supporters. A foreign policy success in the form of NATO accession, coupled with “anticommunist” rhetoric at the domestic level, boosted the Democrat Party as it consolidated power. Many aspects of Turkey’s NATO accession are undoubtedly unique to that country. The accession of Greece and Turkey represented the first expansion of the alliance and affirmed its transformation from a “North Atlantic” pact to one grounded in the Eastern Mediterranean as well. Turkey remains NATO’s only predominantly Muslim member and the continuing debates surrounding Turkey’s European Union accession are eerily reminiscent of early questions about Turkish NATO membership – associate versus full membership and concerns over geography and overreach. Nonetheless, the Turkish case illustrates the fact that NATO accession has long represented more than the containment of communism at the international level, but has impacted domestic politics as well. In this regard, the case study of Turkey offers

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additional historical perspective on policy and scholarly debates over the role of NATO and the merits of its expansion. Whereas more recent critics of the alliance have questioned the wisdom of expanding NATO and have ultimately called into question NATO’s very future in a world without communism, proponents often pointed to NATO’s role in promoting democratic institutions and pro-Western regimes, particularly in the cases of former members of the Soviet bloc. While the maintenance of democracy in NATO members in recent years may appear to support that conclusion, the Turkish case also points to a bleaker early history, in which alliance membership also helped to bolster Turkey’s domestic regime even as the governing party inched toward totalitarianism.

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CHAPTER 4 LEADING FROM THE MIDDLE: M AINTAINING THE NATO DETER R ENT IN THE 1960S Mark Rice

From its beginnings, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) had a nuclear dilemma. The Alliance was founded as a collective defense organization based on each member providing security to the others against attack from a third party, always known to be the Soviet Union. However, in order for that collective defense to be credible, NATO needed more than just a treaty or even a unified and integrated military command. From the beginning, it needed the deterrent power of American nuclear weapons, tied to the defense of Western Europe through the provisions of the North Atlantic Treaty and NATO’s military structure. However, relying on that nuclear umbrella raised problems for the Allies, as few of them were willing to contemplate the consequences of using nuclear weapons, especially on the European battlefield and especially as those weapons increased in power through the 1950s. But so long as the American nuclear force remained dominant in the Cold War, the Allies could avoid facing those consequences. By the 1960s, though, American nuclear dominance was declining as the Soviet Union increased the size and yield of its own nuclear forces,

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and began attaching them to operational intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that could reach North America. These nuclear-capable ICBMs could potentially undermine the credibility of the American nuclear deterrent, and the European members of NATO began to have doubts about the ability of an American president to risk nuclear attack on the United States in order to protect Western Europe. Although both Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy maintained that the new strategic balance that the Soviet ICBMs seemed to herald did not change the American nuclear commitment to NATO, they were never able to eliminate completely the possibility of the umbrella being lifted from Western Europe. In order to maintain the credibility of the American nuclear deterrent, therefore, the United States had to remain constantly in a position to enhance the NATO deterrent. In the early years, this was simple. A few small nuclear weapons delivered by medium-range bombers were more than a match for any response that the Soviets could make, even after the Soviets detonated their own nuclear weapons. By the early 1950s, thermonuclear weapons greatly increased the destructive power of the American arsenal relative to the Soviet one, and new mediumand then long-range bombers added to the credibility by making the deterrent force less vulnerable to Soviet counter- or pre-emptive attack. Even as the Soviets developed their own thermonuclear weapons, longrange bombers, and then intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), the stationing of medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBMs) in Europe provided a new credibility by once again increasing striking power and lowering vulnerability. The question by the 1960s was whether the West would lose its technological and strategic lead, and whether the growing Soviet arsenal would increase the vulnerability of not only the American deterrent, but also the American homeland, to the point of the loss of the deterrent’s credibility. If so, not only would the Soviet Union gain position relative to the West in Europe and the larger Cold War, but the very foundations of NATO might be undermined. A more powerful Soviet Union could very well become more aggressive in Western Europe, raising the risk of war on the continent. Some members might then re-evaluate their priorities, and conclude that the risks of nuclear war outweighed the protection of the nuclear umbrella, leading them

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to seek alternative solutions. Conversely, they might decide that the new American vulnerability would cause the Americans to re-evaluate their own priorities, and to conclude that the risks of nuclear attack on North America outweighed the benefits of keeping the nuclear umbrella over Western Europe. In such a case, the European allies might find it better to seek their own protection, including in their own nuclear weapons. Thus the United States, as the leader of the Alliance, needed to find ways to enhance the credibility of the deterrent without scaring away the allies worried about nuclear war, or disillusion those worried about the American commitment. This was a fine line to navigate, and one that kept American policymakers active throughout the Cold War, since nothing they developed could completely solve the problem. During the 1960s, American officials pushed hardest for a new strategic doctrine, one that emphasized flexibility in the use of nuclear weapons, as opposed to the previous doctrine of Massive Retaliation, which emphasized an immediate and overwhelming response to Soviet aggression, in order to deter that aggression. This strategy found significant opposition within NATO, however, as they feared that removing the immediate and overwhelming nuclear response would remove the deterrent as a whole. From the American point of view, however, flexibility did not undermine deterrence, but rather enhanced it. If the new Soviet strategic power undermined the credibility of nuclear deterrence by making Western nuclear forces vulnerable, then other means of deterrence, whether at the conventional level or the lower nuclear level, would help to restore that credibility. Through the 1960s, the United States and its allies in NATO went back and forth over this new direction in strategy, putting the Alliance under tension and threatening to rip the entire enterprise apart. At the same time, however, these disputes opened the door to new ideas and new solutions to bridge the gaps between the perceptions of deterrence. The solutions that the United States, and NATO, found thus say a lot about how NATO found success in that difficult environment. While unable to find the silver bullet to maintain NATO’s deterrent, the Allies were able to find many acceptable solutions for the interim, even if

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they often raised impracticalities that called their value into question. Whether deploying MRBMs paid for by the European allies but armed with American nuclear warheads, creating stockpiles of nuclear weapons in Europe under American control but theoretically available to the Allies in time of need, or designing ships collectively crewed by the Europeans but armed by the Americans, these ideas provided assurance that NATO would take the steps necessary to keep the deterrent credible. But perhaps more importantly, they provided the Allies with a sense that they had a degree of control over nuclear policy, both in its conception and in its use during war. This control meant that they could prevent American disengagement and protect the deterrent, and thus these proposals had a strong political and psychological effect, even if they were illogical from a practical point of view. Therefore, even when the impracticalities became apparent, their failures allowed for the consideration of a previously politically impossible alternative: flexible response. NATO had worked its way around similar problems before. In the 1950s, one of the core issues the Alliance overcame was the need to rearm West Germany. In response, European leaders sought various solutions, settling on the notion of a European Defense Community (EDC) that would place German military units within a highly integrated multinational force, thereby eliminating the danger to European security that a new German army might present. At first the EDC seemed like the ideal solution to the problem of German rearmament, and NATO signed off on it in early 1952. But even early on there were misgivings about the idea. Winston Churchill, just returned as British Prime Minister, called the EDC a “sludgy amalgam” and a “bucket of wood pulp.”1 In general, the British called it “completely impracticable.”2 The Minister of Defense believed that the Soviets would laugh at the idea.3 Although it was a French idea, many of the top leadership, especially in the military, believed it unworkable.4 But by 1953, the United States was so committed to the plan that its imminent demise prompted Secretary of State John Foster Dulles to threaten an “agonizing reappraisal” of the American position in NATO and Europe.5 The EDC did fail, but not because it was militarily unsound. Rather, it ran into the growing political difficulties within the French Fourth

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Republic, and never made it through ratification by the National Assembly. Thus there is no way to know if the idea of mixing nationalities within a single army would have worked. Yet even still, the EDC plan did succeed in the larger goal of rearming and integrating West Germany. For in the debates over the EDC, the nature of the conversation shifted from whether the Federal Republic should be rearmed, to how the Federal Republic should be rearmed. The crisis that followed the death of the EDC was not about the survival of NATO – despite Dulles’ words – but about what remaining methods there might be to accomplish the initial goal.6 Several years later, NATO found itself facing a new problem – that of its nuclear strategy. On the face of it, NATO’s nuclear strategy was simple: the United States had nuclear weapons and the means to use them against nearly the entire Soviet Union, and in case of war would do so. NATO’s conventional power was important, but secondary to American nuclear power.7 In 1957, the Alliance codified this strategy even further in the Strategic Concept. Although there was an expectation that Allied ground forces deployed in Central Europe would be a part of the battle to defend Western Europe, it was the strategic nuclear attack that would determine the course of the war by destroying the enemy’s ability and will to fight.8 The strategic concept was very clear about NATO’s attitude toward nuclear weapons. NATO’s members not only expected to use nuclear weapons at the outset of a war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, but also made sure to stipulate that since “NATO would be unable to prevent the rapid overrunning of Europe unless NATO immediately employed nuclear weapons both strategically and tactically, we must be prepared to take the initiative in their use.”9 As with the American strategy of Massive Retaliation on which the Strategic Concept was based, there was not much question about the possibility of a limited conventional war, or of escalation in stages from conventional combat to general nuclear war, but rather the expectation of an immediate escalation from outbreak of hostilities to the launching of the strategic nuclear offensive.10 The main focus for such a strategy was the deterrence of a full-scale Soviet offensive, one that by 1957 would almost certainly include the

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use of nuclear weapons on both the tactical and strategic levels. Even with the increase of the Soviet nuclear arsenal through the mid- and late 1950s, this strategic concept displayed the NATO countries’ confidence that American strategic power would be sufficient to deter the Soviets from launching such an attack, so that it could be “assumed . . . that [the Soviets] will not deliberately launch a general war so long as they know the West is prepared to retaliate with nuclear weapons.”11 Even if a war started with just conventional weapons, the Strategic Concept limited any flexibility to fight without nuclear weapons: “the situation would call for the utilization of all weapons and forces at NATO’s disposal, since in no case is there a NATO concept of limited war with the Soviets.”12 By the start of the 1960s, all of the Allies seemed comfortable with this strategy, which provided a powerful deterrent to any Soviet aggression not only in Europe, but also seemingly around the world. Yet doubts were starting to creep in, doubts that suggested that Massive Retaliation might not be capable of deterring the Soviets, especially if the Soviets began to believe that they could be aggressive with little or no risk to themselves.13 The first sign that Soviet thinking might be headed in that direction came with the launching of Sputnik in October 1957, showing that the Soviet Union had made great strides in long-range rocketry. The same strides that allowed them to launch an artificial satellite into space might also allow them to attach nuclear warheads to similar rockets and launch them against the United States, giving them a potential deterrent against American retaliation.14 French President de Gaulle famously put it: “[n]o U.S. President will exchange Chicago for Lyon.”15 As Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev boasted over the next several years about the Soviet ability to produce such ICBMs in large quantities, the doubts about the West’s retaliatory capabilities increased. To find ways to reinforce the credibility of the deterrent without undermining members’ confidence in the Strategic Concept, NATO began looking at expanding access to nuclear weapons.16 The idea was that if the nuclear deterrent was not tied directly to the United States, the Soviet Union could not hold its ICBM threat over American leaders with quite the same effect. Through 1958 and 1959, NATO

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countries began adding new nuclear-capable weapons to their forces: strike aircraft, bombers, and surface-to-surface missiles and artillery.17 While the countries could not supply their own nuclear weapons, they would have access to American missiles and bombs in wartime. These weapons would be stockpiled in Europe, under American control, and could be released to national forces in an emergency.18 To ensure that the weapons were only used by multilateral decision, they were eventually equipped with Permissive Action Links (PALs) that locked the weapons unless two separate actors released them.19 However, these weapons were relatively small, and NATO did not primarily intend them to be part of strategic deterrence, but rather part of the defensive military plans should war break out. NATO forces themselves did not have strategic deterrent capabilities, even though American – and British – nuclear forces were committed to the Western deterrent. Under the shadow of Sputnik, NATO began to look for ways to gain more control over the strategic deterrent, without upsetting the Strategic Concept, or running afoul of American law that largely prohibited the sharing of nuclear weapons. Once again, NATO’s commander, American General Lauris Norstad, hit upon an elaborate solution: Western European members would station Medium or Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles on their soil, and would have the control over them in a wartime scenario.20 Essentially, the idea was similar to the stockpile of tactical nuclear weapons, only now involving strategic weapons, and officials hoped that it would provide a sense of unity and purpose among NATO members.21 Norstad envisioned these MRBMs as being a truly NATO nuclear force, one that was separate from the American strategic forces under the Strategic Air Command (SAC). While the United States would keep a veto over their use by another ally, so would the other ally have a veto over their unilateral use by the United States.22 Thus, if the European allies believed that the United States was ignoring their interests – and especially the protection of their territory from a nuclear exchange – they could prevent the use of the MRBMs, either from the deterrent force or from the defense force. Conversely, if they believed that the credibility of the American strategic deterrent was weakening, they could fall back on the credibility of their deterrent force (although it would

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also surely lose considerable credibility in that scenario, given the American control of the nuclear weapons). The NATO MRBM force underwent several iterations over the next several years. Norstad pushed strongly for a truly independent NATO force, provided by the European members with the provision of American warheads.23 Some of these MRBMs were deployed, most notably the Thor missiles in Britain and the Jupiter missiles in Turkey and Italy. However, these forces never left American control, and never constituted a true NATO deterrent as Norstad saw it. In his conception, NATO would become a fully capable nuclear power, the fourth nuclear power as many termed it, that could supplement American nuclear power in ways that the stockpiles and tactical weapons could not. Although his idea was not to set NATO up as a competitor to the American position in the West, many officials argued that giving the NATO commander that much authority and independence might be dangerous, and the MRBM program never saw full fruition.24 But the concept remained at the center of NATO policymaking from the bureaucratic level up to the foreign minister level, and provided vital support to the Alliance’s attempt to adapt to the changing strategic environment by the early 1960s. It was especially popular for the West German government, which saw it as a way to improve its standing in the Western system without unduly upsetting its neighbours in the West or its adversaries in the East.25 Under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, one of Germany’s main foreign policy goals was to keep the other powers from discriminating against it, especially as they had done after the First World War. Adenauer wanted to ensure that Germany was treated equally, as any other major state, and that it was not subject to unwarranted restrictions on its policies.26 The one area where Adenauer was willing to accept some restrictions was on the production of nuclear (along with biological and chemical) weapons, and West Germany agreed not to produce them when it joined NATO in 1955. However, Adenauer was keen to make certain that these restrictions did not undermine West Germany’s security, and so he sought to allow at least for the arming of West German forces with nuclear weapons.27 Therefore, plans like the nuclear stockpile and the

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MRBM force were attractive to West Germans, providing a loophole out of their nuclear constraints. For many of the other NATO members, a NATO nuclear strategy opened the door to a greater say in the control of the Alliance. The United States was the clear leader of the Western Alliance, and none of its partners was looking to change that standing. At the same time, however, many NATO partners often felt that the Americans were ignoring their interests and their viewpoints, or at the very least were not taking them into proper consideration.28 Having more of a say in NATO’s nuclear strategy would provide the smaller powers with more leverage in the rest of NATO’s affairs, and ensure that the larger powers were not overlooking their interests, or putting them at risk of nuclear annihilation, without their say.29 The problem was that these types of multilateral solutions often ran up against the unilateral nature of nuclear weapons policies. The British prided themselves on being the first to undertake nuclear weapons research, on their role in the Manhattan Project that gave birth to those weapons, and on their position as the West’s second nuclear power. They were not about to abandon their work in building their own nuclear arsenal, and the expense it had taken, and subordinate their nuclear policy to NATO.30 Thus, Britain consistently stood outside of NATO’s nuclear programs, although the government was always careful to support a nuclear role for NATO. Likewise, the French did not consider themselves nuclear have-nots, even before they detonated their first bomb in 1960. The French nuclear weapons program was well under way by the time he came to power, and President de Gaulle saw nuclear weapons as a means to enhance France’s power and gloire, and to keep it alongside the United States and Britain at the top of the Western hierarchy.31 He would not allow French nuclear weapons to be part of a NATO scheme, nor would he allow the United States to dictate France’s nuclear policy through NATO. These various perspectives posed a problem for American policymakers. The United States had an interest in keeping its allies satisfied with the overall strategy. Its leadership was not coercive, and officials recognized that trying to impose policy on NATO would result in a backlash that might pull Allied unity apart, thus pulling containment

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apart.32 However, the United States did recognize that there had to be some fundamental shared interests, and that she was best placed to coordinate them. Thus, the Americans had to navigate carefully in order to keep everyone on board. Under the Eisenhower administration, nuclear sharing was not a high priority, but was an important part of policy toward NATO. Eisenhower was not particularly concerned with the Sputnik launch or the Soviet claims of nuclear superiority, and he believed that Massive Retaliation still operated as a credible deterrent. Likewise, the other NATO allies at the time were committed to the Strategic Concept, which was strongly tied into Massive Retaliation, and were more concerned with the loss of the American nuclear umbrella that a change to either strategy might bring. However, at the very end of the Eisenhower administration, some new thinking on nuclear strategy did appear, in the form of a report by former director of the State Department’s Policy Planning Staff Robert Bowie. Bowie recognized the dilemma NATO faced regarding nuclear deterrence. His study of NATO’s current situation led him to conclude that, [g]rowing Soviet missile nuclear capabilities are now eroding the credibility of the threat of a strategic nuclear response to less than an all out Soviet attack. In consequence, NATO Europe may become vulnerable to threats of both limited aggression and nuclear blackmail: Europeans will fear both an excessive NATO response to limited aggression and the absence of a US strategic response to greater threats. The Soviets may seek to exploit this vulnerability for divisive effects.33 The dilemma between relying on nuclear weapons and fearing their effects was becoming more apparent to the NATO allies, and it was undermining the very credibility of the deterrent within the Alliance. European allies increasingly feared “a prospect of Western casualties [in nuclear war] on a scale which makes the threat unacceptable to our allies and incredible to the Soviets.”34 Bowie argued that losing the credibility of the deterrent would not only invite further Soviet provocation at low levels, but would also subject NATO to possibly unbearable strain, thus threatening American security directly.35

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Bowie focused his criticism on the inherent problems of Massive Retaliation. As the Soviet nuclear arsenal increased not only in size but in range as well, the certainty about an American nuclear response to what he termed “expanded” attack decreased.36 Because of this uncertainty, he concluded that the West “cannot be confident that threats of massive retaliation could again be a reliable deterrent against every expanded action in Europe. And, where the stakes are so high, gambling simply will not do.”37 He thus argued that strengthening the conventional power of NATO would reduce uncertainty, and thereby increase the effectiveness of NATO’s deterrent.38 Although this line of reasoning appeared to undermine Massive Retaliation, Bowie clearly intended it to supplement the existing strategy, and made sure to state explicitly that the American strategic nuclear deterrent remained the main deterrent against general nuclear attack by the Soviets. However, he argued throughout that changes in the strategic balance between NATO and the Soviet bloc made it necessary to adapt the West’s deterrent power, largely through the provision of conventional deterrence. Because Bowie’s report came so close to the end of the Eisenhower administration, it did not have much of an immediate impact on American policy. However, it did fit into a growing body of thought regarding the inflexibility of nuclear deterrence, best exemplified publically by former Army Chief of Staff Maxwell Taylor’s book The Uncertain Trumpet, published that year. And when a new administration under John F. Kennedy took office in 1961, it was prepared to re-examine nuclear strategy in this light, and then to begin pushing NATO toward a more flexible strategy based on a stronger conventional deterrent alongside the nuclear one. Throughout his time as Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara led this charge, eventually culminating in NATO’s decision to make Flexible Response the basic strategy in 1967.39 The idea behind Flexible Response was that the West would base its nuclear strategy upon calibrated reactions to specific scenarios. Thus, if the Soviet Union attacked Western Europe with only conventional forces, NATO would initially respond with conventional forces. Only if escalation was required would the next step – the use of tactical nuclear weapons – come into play.40 However, this type of graduated

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escalation required high levels of control in order to execute properly. Unless the Alliance gave clear signals about its intent to escalate, or not to escalate, the strategy’s deterrent effect – both before and during a state of war – would be weakened. Thus, the Kennedy administration believed it essential to have a central authority for Western strategy, and that since the American role in that strategy was primary, Washington should take the lead. McNamara formally introduced the new strategy at a NATO meeting in Athens in April 1962.41 He began by presenting the situation in fairly stark terms, highlighting the changing nuclear landscape since NATO’s founding, and the potential for 75 million European and 115 million American deaths from a Soviet nuclear strike in 1966.42 Under the current strategy, McNamara argued, nuclear war was not militarily feasible, and so had little deterrent power, since the Soviets could calculate that the West would rather make concessions than face the threat of such losses. In order to make fighting – and winning – a nuclear war more feasible, McNamara proposed “programs which will enable the Alliance to engage in a controlled and flexible nuclear response in the event that deterrence should fail.”43 And once the Alliance could be secure that it could actually fight – and win – a war that went nuclear, then its deterrence posture would be stronger, and the likelihood of such a war would in fact decrease. McNamara made certain to reassure his audience that he was not proposing an end to nuclear deterrence, and that the United States was still prepared to launch immediate retaliation against a Soviet nuclear attack or full-scale conventional attack. But he also made clear that more ambiguous attacks were not only possible, but highly probable, and that using nuclear weapons in such ambiguous circumstances might not be politically possible, especially if it meant those kinds of casualties. Thus, McNamara argued, it was necessary for the Alliance to differentiate between different levels of response. Some cases would require nuclear retaliation, and so the United States would maintain powerful nuclear forces in service to NATO. But other cases would call for lesser responses, either through the use of tactical nuclear weapons rather than strategic forces, or through the use of non-nuclear forces.44

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Many of the Allies reacted negatively to his ideas. They were, for the smaller powers, what they had feared might happen; that the United States might begin to shift away from a strong deterrent, and maybe even decouple its security from Europe’s.45 The British and the French were concerned that the new American turn was directed more toward reducing the importance of their own nuclear forces and deterrents, and toward further centralizing Western strategy under American control.46 This perception was perhaps the most threatening to the new American turn, since it cut to the very heart of what Kennedy and his team were trying to accomplish, that is, to enhance deterrence by introducing flexibility and increased control over escalation. With the British, there was already a long history of nuclear cooperation that the United States could draw on to help bring them onboard, including the Skybolt air-to-surface nuclear missile that the Americans were then developing and had promised to the British. However, by the end of 1962, the project was meeting practical difficulties, and the Americans had decided against further development. The cancellation left Britain empty-handed, and so at a meeting in the Bahamas in December, Kennedy agreed to sell Britain the new Polaris missiles for use on British submarines, thus extending the life of the independent British deterrent into the foreseeable future.47 Although the Anglo-American special relationship played into the Polaris deal, the decision actually aligned with the United States’ broader NATO nuclear plans as well. Recognizing that NATO members would need some role in the new deterrent strategy, even if it were more centralized, American officials had begun to promote a new proposal, known as the Multi-Lateral Force (MLF). MLF would consist of naval surface ships manned by mixed NATO crews and armed with Polaris missiles paid for by the NATO participants.48 Again, NATO members would thus share joint control over nuclear strategy, and hold a similar veto – just as the United States would – over the use of the weapons. MLF actually had its genesis back in the Bowie Report. One of Bowie’s suggestions had been to shore up the deterrent force of the American strategic arsenal by incorporating a NATO deterrent as well. This idea was, of course, not in and of itself new; Norstad had been

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pushing for a variation on the theme for some time. Bowie adapted the idea to the existing situation and technology by proposing that NATO create a multinational submarine missile force under the control of the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe (SACEUR) commonly owned and financed by the European members, and manned by mixed multinational crews. While NATO built this force, the United States would assign some of its own Polaris missile submarines to NATO as an interim force, after which NATO could buy the American submarines to add to the new multinational force.49 The goal of Bowie’s proposal was to ensure the credibility of the deterrent in the minds of the European allies, without giving them incentive to create independent nuclear forces of their own, which might ultimately fracture the overall deterrent credibility of the West more than relying on the American deterrent would. By making the force’s crews multinational, NATO would ensure that no single state would gain independent control of the nuclear weapons, and the unified nature of the Alliance itself would be enhanced. As with many of Bowie’s other recommendations, the idea for a multinational missile force within NATO would have to wait for the arrival of a new administration in 1961. Unlike the conventional deterrence aspects of the report, however, the multinational force idea initially did not go very far in the Kennedy administration. It was only after the fairly hostile response to McNamara’s Athens speech that Kennedy officials began looking for new ways to maintain the NATO deterrent without losing control over strategy. Here again, the Nassau Agreements were key, since they included a British pledge to assign part of its new Polaris submarine force to NATO, a pledge strikingly similar to Bowie’s idea of an interim force leading to the creation of a NATO multinational force. It was not long before American officials began looking at the idea of a multinational force, now to be called a Multilateral Force (MLF). At a speech before the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa in May 1961, President Kennedy publicly broached the idea of “establishing a NATO sea-borne force, which would be truly multi-lateral in ownership and control,” essentially repeating Bowie’s offer of Polaris missiles for European allies.50 Once again, the proposal met with mixed

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reviews. The French rejected the concept, seeing it as a means of undermining their nascent independent nuclear program. The British likewise regarded MLF sceptically, with Lord Montgomery calling it “utter and complete poppycock,” but were willing to listen to the proposal for the sake of the special relationship and the Nassau Agreements.51 Most of the other European allies were not opposed to the idea, but initially saw little of benefit to them, especially in terms of cost and commitment. Having been somewhat burned by the experience of the EDC nearly a decade before, few leaders were willing to jump onboard another multinational, multilingual amalgam force. The exception was West Germany. As German stature grew within the Alliance, in accord with its growing economic power and growing ratio of forces within NATO, the German desire to play a larger role within the Western deterrent grew. The Federal Republic had already pledged never to seek its own nuclear weapons, but participating in a multilateral nuclear force would provide a loophole to the possession question, just as participation in NATO tactical nuclear forces had provided a similar loophole. Meanwhile, the NATO allies would not have to fear German access to strategic nuclear weapons, as the MLF would help keep West Germany “on a leash,” in the words of George Ball.52 Thus, along with MLF-friendly elements within the American bureaucracy, the West Germans became the plan’s most enthusiastic supporters. Technical questions about the feasibility of the MLF quickly surfaced. Rather than arm submarines with the Polaris missiles, the American backers of the plan decided to use surface warships. Since surface ships would be more vulnerable to pre-emption and counterattack than submarines, almost immediately questions arose about the viability of such a force during a crisis or a war. There were logistical questions of who would pay for which ships and missiles.53 The language problem was also an issue, with the Americans insisting that each ship would have to be manned by crews from at least three different NATO members, in order to reduce the possibility of one or two governments deciding to use the missiles for independent purposes. Finally, there were concerns about the American veto over the missiles’ use. The language from the Kennedy administration’s

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proposals suggested that at some point, once the MLF was up and running to a sufficient degree, the United States would relinquish its veto over the nuclear warheads. Both the vague nature of this plan, and its feasibility in the face of American law concerning the sharing of nuclear material, made the likelihood of an American handover slim, reducing the MLF’s credibility in many European leaders’ eyes. Still, American backing of the plan through 1962 and 1963 kept it at the forefront of NATO nuclear discussion over the next several years. Just as with the EDC, the MLF had a political value that overrode, for a time, the concerns about its military value. At the very least, with the Americans behind the MLF, even the most reluctant allies were willing to consider its merits, even if they saw those merits as few.54 The MLF would assuage the fears among the smaller powers that any changes in nuclear strategy would mean the end of the American nuclear umbrella, and assure them that nuclear deterrence would remain in place. Most importantly, MLF would provide the European allies with a new degree of control over nuclear strategy. No longer could the Americans decide what form the nuclear deterrent would take. With MLF, the other allies would have their own mechanism for making such decisions, which would allow them to retain their faith in the credibility of the American deterrent, even as that deterrent changed. For the Americans, the MLF provided an opening to push that strategy away from Massive Retaliation and toward Flexible Response, without giving up too much control over the big picture of nuclear strategy. However, while Polaris and MLF covered many of the British and European allies’ concerns with the new American direction, the French were feeling increasingly isolated. Although Kennedy was likely open to a similar deal for Polaris as the British got, de Gaulle was not interested in moving in the Americans’ direction. He continued to believe firmly that only a strategy based on the immediate and overwhelming use of nuclear weapons would suffice as a deterrent.55 And as the Americans moved away from such a policy, while the nuclear balance shifted increasingly in the Soviets’ favor, de Gaulle became convinced that France’s security best lay in its own nuclear deterrent, the force

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de frappe.56 Brushing aside the Americans’ concerns that independent nuclear forces weakened the deterrent, especially as the Soviet nuclear strength grew, de Gaulle belittled both Britain’s Polaris strategy and the MLF. Through these debates, the United States continued to walk a middle line. American officials would not side with French arguments that the West could in no way weaken Massive Retaliation, and that any new focus on conventional forces, flexibility, or controlling escalation did little to enhance deterrence. At the same time, the Americans would not side with the British and other members who argued that the West could not risk nuclear war, and so must seek solutions other than deterrence. Instead, they proposed a new policy, based on deterrence, that they believed was enhanced by its flexibility, and would provide the West with options other than nuclear war both to deter and overcome the Soviets, whether in peace or war. And they offered their allies a new place within this strategy, with access to strategic nuclear weapons in addition to tactical weapons, so that they would have greater control over the strategic deterrent. Unfortunately for its supporters in the United States and West Germany, few other allies were willing to get on board with MLF. By 1964, the lack of enthusiasm had become apparent, and even the British, under a new Labour government, were backing away from their commitments. As more and more of the Johnson administration’s attention turned toward Southeast Asia, solving the NATO nuclear problem became less of a priority. And as long as the French continued to obstruct all movement away from the existing strategy, ideas such as MLF held little currency around the table at the North Atlantic Council (NAC).57 By the end of 1964, President Johnson made the decision to step away from the MLF. Although not formally dead, without American backing there was little chance of the MLF seeing the light of day. Yet the nuclear dilemmas remained, no matter how much Johnson may have wanted to look past them, or the French may have wanted to ignore them in favor of retaining a Massive Retaliation strategy. With the failure of the MLF “hardware” option, thoughts began to turn to a “software” solution; namely, using institutional means within the

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existing NATO structure to get at the problems the nuclear dilemma posed. Those problems continued to revolve around the question of the credibility of the American deterrent, and especially how the European allies might have some control over that deterrent. Under the “hardware” options like the MLBM program and the MLF, that control would be physical. While the European allies would not have physical control over the warheads, they would have it over the missiles, and thus would have some control over the larger strategy. Under a “software” option, the allies would not gain any more physical control over nuclear strategy, but they would gain considerable control over the planning and preparation of that strategy. They would also be a part of the initiatives behind American nuclear policy in advance, rather than reacting to American announcements, as they had to do up to that time.58 Following the demise of the MLF, the “software” approach gained new currency as the best way finally to solve the issues surrounding NATO’s nuclear strategy. Again, it was McNamara who provided the initial proposal for a new solution. In May 1965 he proposed to the NAC that they establish a committee to deal with issues of nuclear sharing and consultation. This McNamara Committee, as it came to be known, was not meant to be a permanent arrangement, but was meant to overcome the obstacles that presented themselves again with the end of the MLF, especially Germany’s place within the nuclear alliance.59 In particular, the idea was to expand consultation, since at the time it was increasingly felt that the often unilateral American changes to nuclear policy undermined the credibility of nuclear strategy in general.60 While there was once again not much enthusiasm for the idea from the other members – and France once again wholly declined to participate – there was enough interest to form committees to handle the various issues involved in nuclear consultation, and American officials began pushing the McNamara Committee’s work as the solution to the Alliance’s nuclear problem.61 Once the talks began, they gained a momentum of their own. Several allies who had been reluctant to participate soon decided to join in the discussions. It also became clear that the type of work the committees were doing was useful in assuaging many of the concerns the

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smaller allies had with nuclear strategy. As a later Western European Union report noted, the non-nuclear members of the Alliance recognise that, through improved consultation, they will secure a more real share in the planning of nuclear defense of the Alliance as a whole than they could hope to obtain by participating in a small joint nuclear force, the use of which would inevitably be subject to a veto by the United States.62 McNamara decided early on to provide much more detailed briefings on American strategic capabilities and plans than American officials had done before. Opening the doors to this level of information gave a significant boost to European confidence in the American nuclear umbrella. While they may not have gained control over the physical elements of nuclear strategy, they had gained influence over that strategy in a new way, and thus had more control over plans for the future use of nuclear weapons.63 Attitudes toward not only the current American strategic plans, but also the future plans involving Flexible Response, began to change within NATO, and opposition to the new strategy declined.64 In particular, German attitudes toward the nuclear dilemma changed, due both to domestic political changes and to the work in NATO. The influence that West Germany would get within the new nuclear planning structure now looked to German leaders like a suitable solution to West Germany’s place in the Alliance. It would preclude any concerns about German acquisition of strategic nuclear weapons, but would not discriminate against the Federal Republic in nuclear matters (in fact, West Germany gained a privileged position as a permanent member of the Nuclear Planning Group).65 As a result, it became apparent that turning the McNamara Committee into a permanent element of the Alliance could be a solution to the issues surrounding nuclear strategy.66 Work quickly moved to creating the mechanisms necessary to formalize the committee’s existence, and again even the reluctant powers went along. The exception continued to be France, which under de Gaulle continued to move away

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from its NATO allies. When de Gaulle announced France’s decision to withdraw the country from NATO’s military structure in 1966, he also removed the main obstruction to the shifts in NATO’s strategy. In December 1966, the other NATO countries made the decision to formalize the nuclear consultations within the Alliance structure, and the Nuclear Planning Group, and its counterpart the Nuclear Defense Affairs Committee, came into being. From then on, the Allies could separate strictly nuclear matters from the issues confronting the Alliance (including the larger questions of deterrence, allowing for the formal acceptance of Flexible Response the following year), so that they could tackle those problems individually with more success.67 The American leadership position within NATO undoubtedly helped officials to bring the Allies around to Flexible Response, even if it took some time. France was, of course, the exception, but its departure from NATO’s military structure in 1966 did not fundamentally alter the trend of NATO policy. While the nuclear question was certainly one of the reasons that de Gaulle chose to leave, France had been headed in that direction even before Kennedy took office, and questions about the level of integration within NATO’s military, along with France’s declining leadership position within the larger alliance, probably played a bigger role than the nuclear issue. And while MLF never came into fruition, the idea’s existence, like that of the EDC, smoothed the way for the Allies to reach consensus about a difficult issue. With the creation of the Nuclear Planning Group in 1966, NATO developed an effective means for allowing the smaller powers a consultative voice in nuclear strategy, without compromising the American desire to centralize that strategy.68 There is reason to believe that NATO would have survived its nuclear dilemma in the 1960s without an MLF plan or a nuclear planning group. But it is hard to say how the Alliance would have done so, and what sort of alliance would have emerged, especially with the added complication of the French withdrawal. The MLF proposal provided the space for NATO to come to terms with the dilemmas that it faced in strategy, and to do so in a way that retained the credibility of the resulting deterrent in the minds of the allies. By the time the McNamara Committee was paving the way for the NPG, the question

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had gone from whether NATO would change its nuclear strategy, to how it would do so. The MLF and the NPG gave the smaller powers the assurance that even if American nuclear strategy became more flexible, and even if the nuclear deterrent acquired more of a conventional counterpart, they would still have a role large enough in that strategy to maintain their faith in its deterrent effect. While the MLF was in many ways as impractical in real life as the EDC had been, it served a very practical purpose within the politics of NATO. That the solution of the NPG elicited as little opposition (France excluded) as the London agreements had a decade earlier is testament to that utility. Within the struggle to overcome its nuclear dilemma, it is possible to see some of NATO’s success as an alliance. As an alliance with a clear leader, NATO did not find itself attempting to go several different directions at once. Yet although the United States was the clear leader, it did not seek to take advantage of that position to impose its interests and policies on its partners. Certainly, there were efforts at persuasion, especially when the United States sought a new course, as with Flexible Response. Yet American policymakers could usually recognize that their allies had their own interests, and that accommodations would have to be made to those interests. Rather than attempt to form coalitions within the Alliance on one side or the other of an issue, American officials were more likely to seek a middle path between the sides, trying to draw as many other members along the new path as possible. This approach might take time and require continual persuasive efforts, but was more likely to find success than dividing the Alliance along perceptions of a core issue. The nuclear dilemma also shows how NATO could successfully balance between the needs of the leader to control policy, and the needs of the others to maintain a voice in policy. Although plans like the EDC, the MRBM force, and the MLF were ultimately failures, they helped NATO overcome these conflicting aims, and move past the issues that were causing division. They created the space necessary for the Allies to accept changes that were previously thought unacceptable, whether German rearmament or a change to the nuclear deterrent. From the American perspective, these plans had a value in their own right, providing room for compromise among the various viewpoints, and thus

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they were not just means toward ends. But had the United States not backed the MRBM force, the MLF, or the Nuclear Planning Group, it is unlikely that NATO would have been as capable of finding those compromises, and the Alliance might have faced crises even larger than the French break with the military structure. Thus there were silver linings to the dark clouds of MRBMs and the MLF. NATO’s success in the Cold War came from several factors. The Soviet threat that persisted for more than forty years gave the Allies a common enemy and a common aim. The American concept of containment, even as it went through different phases, allowed a focal point for that common aim. And the shared values among most, if not all, of the Allies provided a sense of shared purpose that bound NATO more tightly together. But that success was never inevitable nor assured, and it took considerable effort and discussion on the part of all of the members to overcome dilemmas like that of nuclear strategy in the 1960s. In particular, American efforts to craft a middle ground, whether through concessions and compromise or through plans that created space for those concessions and compromise, helped reduce some of the strains between competing national interests that could be fatal to a coalition as large as NATO. These efforts not only kept NATO viable during the Cold War, but have helped keep it relevant into the twenty-first century.

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CHAPTER 5 IS THER E AN ANGLOA MER ICAN ALLIANCE? OR A PACT? OR AN AGR EEMENT? OR ANY THING? Kathleen Burk

Everyone in the world who pays attention to international affairs knows that there is a close Anglo-American relationship, although arguably, as an instrument of government, it is beginning to fade away. Is it merely a habit which both countries find convenient? In Great Britain, whenever there is some sort of crisis, or one head of government visits the other, the term “special relationship” pops up in the press. This is usually a term used by weak states: strong states do not normally need to use it, except for the purposes of flattery. Certainly, the person least likely to use the term is a British diplomat. But it does say something about the relationship, which is the most long-standing close state relationship in today’s world. An important factor in the Anglo-American relationship is that it had, and still has, power. It is particularly important for Britain today that other countries perceive this closeness, which implies that Britain has a special ability to call on American influence, and this elevates Britain’s own influence, at least in Europe, as well as, unfortunately, her attraction as a venue for terrorist bombings. But just what constitutes this relationship? Even the terms are slippery. Is it an

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alliance, which is a formal and legal instrument, usually to deal with a possible future? Is it a pact, defined as primarily an informal agreement and not legally enforceable? Interestingly, “pact” is a term which does not appear as a separate type of agreement, or, indeed, at all, in the fourth edition of the British diplomatic bible, Sir Ernest Satow’s A Guide to Diplomatic Practice.1 It does, however, make an appearance in the recently published sixth edition, where it is defined as an “especially solemn international agreement,” but, it adds, “however pithy and convenient, the term is now largely out of fashion” – so the term may again be relegated.2 Therefore, it is clearly not a pact. Is it a series of agreements? If so, what is an “agreement”? Turning again to Satow, he says, in both editions, that, in a generic sense, the term covers any meeting of minds, but that it is necessary to draw a distinction between agreements intended to have an “obligatory character” – i.e. legal rights and duties – and agreements, which are not intended to have such a character. He adds that in a restricted sense the term “agreement” means an “agreement intended to have an obligatory character but usually of a less formal nature than a treaty.”3 The Anglo-American relationship is littered with agreements intended to have an obligatory character. Prominent amongst the earlier agreements were the treaties which essentially sorted out the aftermath of the separation from England, which included the Treaty of Paris of 1783, the Treaty of Amity, Commerce and Navigation, known as Mr Jay’s Treaty, of 1795, and the Treaty of Ghent of 1814, which dealt with the War of 1812, but these are not the type of agreements relevant to this book, since they were concerned with past events rather than with future possibilities. There were those during the nineteenth century which arose from the continuing problems arising from the expansion of the American empire and Britain’s attempts to contain it, such as the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1841 over the boundary between Maine and Canada, and the Treaty in Regard to Limits Westward of the Rocky Mountains of 1846 over the Oregon Territory. There were those whose purpose was to sort out postwar conflicts, such as the Treaty of Washington of 1871 over the Alabama claims arising from the Civil War. All of these stipulated, openly or by implication, future behavior by the signatories. But none of them

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were treaties dealing with current and future threats by others, the focus of this chapter. One interesting point is that a semi-formal relationship was first proposed by the USA in 1822. George Canning, the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, was worried about the French drive to succeed to the power of Spain in Latin America; the Spanish colonies had declared their independence from Spain, and the question was, should Great Britain recognize their independence? This was of concern to Great Britain for two reasons. First, in general terms, Britain did not want France, with whom she had repeatedly been at war since the fourteenth century and most recently during the Napoleonic Wars, to again become an overweening threat. Second, and more specifically, she did not want France, or any other power, to threaten powerful British commercial interests in South America: as a French agent in Colombia wrote in 1823, “[t]he power of England is without a rival in America; no fleets but hers to be seen; her merchandises are bought almost exclusively; her commercial agents, her clerks and brokers, are everywhere to be met with.”4 Therefore, when in 1823 the American Minister in London, Richard Rush, asked whether England would remain passive in the event of a French attempt to bring the colonies under her control, Canning initiated what became known as the “Great Flirtation,” intended to produce a joint Anglo-American front against the other Great Powers.5 Meanwhile, the American Secretary of State, John Quincy Adams, was also considering recognition of the colonies. The USA had held back from antagonizing Spain until it had acquired Florida and the would-be republics had achieved some stability. In 1819 Spain ceded Florida, whilst by 1822 the fortunes of war in Latin America seemed to be going against Spain. Adams was also worried about the intentions of Russia in the hemisphere, which in 1821 had issued a ukase claiming the Pacific Coast down to the fifty-first parallel, including the sea for one hundred miles from the shore.6 Therefore, when the US government received Rush’s despatches reporting the conversations with Canning, they had to decide how to respond.7 As it happened, Canning had already decided to drop the proposal when it became obvious that agreement on terms satisfactory to both sides could not

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be reached, but the Americans did not know this.8 President James Monroe decided to consult two former presidents, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison – both of whom had been leaders during wars with Great Britain – and their responses are quite interesting. Jefferson wrote on 24 October that, Great Britain is the nation which can do us more harm of any one, or all on earth; and with her on our side we need not fear the whole world. With her then, we should most sedulously cherish a cordial friendship; and nothing would tend more to knit our affections than to be fighting once more, side by side, in the same cause. Madison in his own response fully agreed, writing on 30 October that, [i]t is particularly fortunate that the policy of G. Britain, tho’ guided by calculations different from ours, has presented a cooperation for an object the same as ours. With that cooperation we have nothing to fear from the rest of Europe, and with it the best assurance of success to our laudable views. There ought not, therefore, to be any backwardness, I think, in meeting her in the way she has proposed.”9 Both Monroe and Adams, however, were averse to taking a position subordinate to that of Great Britain: as Adams reported in his Memoirs, he had told the Cabinet that “It would be more candid, as well as more dignified, to avow our principles explicitly to Russia and France, than to come in as a cock boat in the wake of the British man-of-war.”10 The result was Monroe’s Message to Congress of 21 December 1823, characterized as the Monroe Doctrine, which stated that the USA would object to any attempt to re-colonize their former colonies – “to extend their system” – to any part of the hemisphere, and that the USA would not interfere in the internal concerns of any European country, and, indeed, was indifferent to what happened in Europe.11 This response by the Americans, of suspicion of Great Britain and a determination not to be in a subordinate position, was to determine

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American policy toward Britain for the next hundred years or so. The USA was quite happy to ride on British coat tails, insisting, for example, that whatever concessions the latter gained from the Chinese government should also be applicable to the USA. Again, the USA benefited hugely from being able to depend on the Royal Navy to patrol the Atlantic Ocean, although this was something seldom if ever mentioned, at least not publicly. How, for example, could the USA with its miniscule navy have responded with menaces if the European Powers had wanted to move in on Latin America? Fortunately, Great Britain had no more wish to see them making inroads into the former Spanish colonies than the USA did. In any case, for most of the remainder of the nineteenth century, the two followed separate, although related, paths: Great Britain concentrated on building and defending her seaborne empire, whilst the USA concentrated on establishing her landbased one, her dominion from sea to shining sea. The only serious conflicts arose over the Canadian-US border, and they seldom actually resulted in shots being fired in any sustained manner (although the Aroostook War of 1839, which was essentially brawling between rival lumberjacks in extreme northern Maine, should never be forgotten).12 For Great Britain, the world became an increasingly threatening place. A comment by Admiral Sir Ernle Chatfield in 1934 sets out precisely the British position at the end of the nineteenth century: [w]e are in the remarkable position of not wanting to quarrel with anybody because we have got most of the world already, or the best parts of it, and we only want to keep what we have got and prevent others from taking it away from us.13 Both France and Russia increasingly challenged Britain’s empire, formal and informal, the French primarily in Africa, and the Russians in Central Asia and Persia as part of their drive toward the border of India, as well as in China. Then in the 1890s, there emerged a third threat: Germany. Germany wanted colonies, and to gain and keep them, she planned to build a navy capable of challenging that of Great Britain – and announced this plan in the Preamble to her 1898 Naval Bill. The British government turned to the USA in anxiety and

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hope. It was anxious, because the Cabinet anticipated that if there were a war with some of the other European Powers, the USA would join Britain’s enemies, and, if that happened, Britain would lose: the opinion of the British War Office was that “the contingency of war with the United States should be avoided at all hazards”.14 It was hopeful, because the belief was that, of all of the countries in the world, the USA was the closest in interests and ideas – liberty, free trade, and peace. However, Britain had to convince the USA of the desirability of this alignment, since for most Americans, Great Britain remained the hereditary enemy. As a commentator wrote in 1914, [n]ot many years ago the [American] self-respecting ‘man in the street’ considered himself bound to declaim against Britain and everything British . . . .He saw her hand in nearly every disaster, domestic or foreign; he suspected her interference in every election that ran counter to his wishes; he wished her harm, intensest harm, with a whole heart; he rejoiced over her misfortunes, crowed over her mistakes, and thanked God that he was not an Englishman.15 A long step in the direction of a realignment was made with the Spanish-American War of 1898 and the Americans’ partial misunderstanding of British actions. The explosion on the battleship USS Maine in Havana Harbor catapulted the USA into war with Spain. (When the news reached London, crowds gathered in front of the American Embassy to pay their respects.)16 She could hardly attack the Spanish mainland, but she could attack her colonies, and the Asiatic Squadron of the the US Navy, under the command of Commodore George Dewey, steamed to the Philippines. Neutral vessels, with Germany’s the largest group – larger than the American squadron, in fact – arrived in Manila Bay to watch. The German fleet was there to claim the Philippines if the Americans did not want them, and Dewey and the German commander came into conflict. The Germans were provocative, cutting in front of US ships, taking soundings of the harbor, landing supplies for the besieged Spanish, and refusing to salute the US flag, as required by naval courtesy – a studied insult. When Dewey

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began to bombard Manila to soften it up before an American landing, the British commander, Captain Edward Chichester, moved two ships nearby to observe the effects of the American fire. In doing so, he appeared to be placing the British deliberately between the American and German ships, thereby apparently saving the Americans from a stab in the back, although it is highly unlikely that the Germans would have fired on the Americans in any case.17 Nothing that the Germans could say checked the growth of the legend, which received sustenance from an erroneous account published the following year in Henry Cabot Lodge’s The War With Spain.18 Further encouragement was given to this interpretation by the fact that only Chichester fired a twenty-one gun salute when the American flag rose over Manila. “In any case, more than any real episode, this imaginary one contributed to the belief that England was the only friend America had during the war with Spain.”19 The gratitude felt by many Americans, and Britain’s own conviction of the fundamental friendship and alignment of interests between the two English-speaking countries, encouraged the British government to develop and implement policies based on this conviction, particularly in the naval sphere. With the rise of the German Navy and what appeared to be the consequent threat to the home islands, the United Kingdom reconfigured the dispositions of the Royal Navy. The essential thrust of her strategy was to make changes on the peripheries in order to concentrate resources nearer the British Isles. She signed the Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1902, her first peacetime alliance in the modern period, allowing her to leave the responsibility for patrolling the China waters to Japan and move her ships to the Mediterranean, while moving others to the English Channel and the North Sea. But she also withdrew her fleet from the Caribbean, leaving it to the US navy to patrol that area. For the United States, this constituted recognition by the British Empire that the Caribbean was an American lake. From the point of view of Britain, however, convinced as she was that the two countries would never go to war, she had incorporated the USA into her defense strategy.20 The question of an Anglo-American alliance was never a serious one until the First World War, and then it was serious only for the British.

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The USA maintained a benign neutrality until it was torpedoed into the war in April 1917. The British then hoped that the USA would sign an alliance. This was not to be the case. President Wilson was appalled by the so-called secret treaties which had been signed by the British, French, Russians, and Italians in 1915. These set out the war aims of the Entente, which included the transfer to Russia and Italy of territory belonging to other states and which was often inhabited by other nationalities. Wilson wanted nothing to do with them. Indeed, he refused to be an ally at all, but was an “associate power,” whatever that meant in international law. What it meant in Washington was that numbers of individual agreements had to be signed. But these were more in the form of memoranda than of contracts. In effect, the USA and Britain had an alliance of sorts without a treaty, because one side believed that a treaty was neither desirable nor necessary. As far as the Americans were concerned, they were going to win the war for the Europeans, and when that assumption was combined with feelings of inferiority, and resentment that the British probably believed that the Americans were inferior – and many British did think this for various reasons and did not always hide this belief – an associate relationship combined with the good will which usually eventually triumphed was probably the best that could be achieved. Yet, however it was described, it was a nerve-wracking, and sometimes humiliating, experience for the British. The Americans feared that they would be led down the garden path by the crafty Europeans, and many were intensely suspicious. It was difficult to come to agreements over money and commodities, let alone on military matters: it was a matter of high policy that the USA would retain control over her own money and her own military forces, which made any sort of alliance with her a sometimes fraught and often disappointing affair.21 During the Second World War, the British Army commander of the Burma campaign, General Sir William Slim, wrote that “[a]llies are the most aggravating of people,” a comment with which his predecessors in the First World War would have fervently agreed.22 The interwar period can be characterized by the banal but correct phrase as demonstrating both conflict and consensus, although it was only toward the beginning of the 1940s that much of the latter

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became evident. During the 1920s the relationship was fraught with conflict, first over the First World War Debts – after all of her losses, should Britain have to pay the USA back for debts incurred in a common cause? Certainly, said the USA.23 Second, there was conflict over the size of the two navies. The US government argued for a cut in the size of navies. The Big Navy party in the USA insisted that the US Navy should be the largest in the world as befitted the strength of the USA, but, unfortunately for them, they could not get Congress to agree when the time came to fund the necessary building program. On the other hand, for the British government, given that Great Britain was an island, and depended on imported food and raw materials, a large navy was vital for the defense of the realm and the sea lanes, and they believed that the USA only wanted the biggest navy for reasons of prestige.24 By the late 1920s, relations were dangerously fraught. British ineptitude during the 1927 naval disarmament conference in Geneva (many in the British government were convinced that the American government suspected that Congress would not fund the building program required for parity, and that it would be easier for them to force the Royal Navy to become smaller), when combined with unrealistic American expectations – that Britain would concede to American demands for parity – had triggered the acrimonious break-up of the conference. Consequently, on Armistice Day 1928, President Coolidge publicly condemned the British and called for American naval superiority. In response, the British government reeled, and the Foreign Office rapidly circulated a memorandum to the Cabinet in order to make the situation clear to them. The opening sentence established the problem: “[i]t is probably safe to say that at no time since 1920 have Anglo-American relations been in so unsatisfactory a state as at the present moment.” The Foreign Office then reminded the Cabinet of some home truths, and the need to maintain good relations with the USA, given their relative strengths: Great Britain is faced in the United States of America with a phenomenon for which there is no parallel in our modern history – a State twenty-five times as large, five times as wealthy, three

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times as populous, twice as ambitious, almost invulnerable, and at least our equal in prosperity, vital energy, technical equipment and industrial science. This State has risen to its present state of development at a time when Great Britain is still staggering from the effects of the superhuman effort made during the war, is loaded with a great burden of debt and is crippled by the evil of unemployment. The interests of the two countries touch at almost every point, for our contacts with the United States – political and economic, by land and sea, commercial and financial – are closer and more numerous than those existing with any other foreign State. Dealing with the United States was frustrating, but the causes of Anglo-American antagonism needed to be sorted out, because, the Foreign Office pointed out starkly, “war is not unthinkable between the two countries. On the contrary, there are present all the factors which in the past have made for wars between States.”25 The US government itself eventually became somewhat alarmed at the extent to which relations had deteriorated, and a compromise over the size and make-up of the two navies was negotiated and agreed over a period during 1932 and 1933.26 During the remainder of the 1930s, the British were repeatedly angered by and contemptuous of the American refusal, as they saw it, to take seriously the responsibilities in international affairs inherent in her power. The USA wanted to be a Great Power, with the attendant respect and deference, but did not want the international responsibilities of such a position. For one thing, she was caught up in the Depression: could she afford it? The British tried to convince the USA that their own interests in the Far East, not just British interests, were threatened by the rise of Japan, but they were mostly ignored. The USA, after all, was caught up with domestic discord over whether the USA should be involved in foreign affairs at all. As a consequence, for most of the decade, relations between the USA and Britain, at any level beyond the mundane, were episodic and usually fruitless.27 Nevertheless, as storm clouds darkened, various American decisionmakers did come to agreements with the British. One of the first of

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these agreements concerned intelligence. In July 1940, William “Wild Bill” Donovan, the future head of the wartime Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and later of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), travelled to Britain as President Roosevelt’s special envoy to look at the current British intelligence capabilities. Roosevelt, who as Assistant Secretary of the Navy during the First World War had had responsibility for the Office of Naval Intelligence, had visited London in 1918 and had been very impressed with the British intelligence effort.28 He was thus open to Donovan’s suggestion upon his return that the two countries develop a “full intelligence collaboration.”29 Therefore, in London in July 1940 at a meeting between the British Chiefs of Staffs and the American Military Observer Mission, it was decided that the time had come for a free exchange of intelligence between the two governments. The following month, the USA broke the Japanese code PURPLE and a few months later delivered a copy of a PURPLE machine to the British and showed them how it worked. The British were more circumspect about what they revealed, and their decryption of the Luftwaffe Ultra code remained a deep, dark secret for fear that it would leak in the USA. Nonetheless, Churchill insisted that intelligence relevant to US ships be given to the Americans. British willingness to share signals intelligence grew with growing Anglo-American naval cooperation in the North Atlantic in the summer of 1941. With US entry into the war, a Combined Intelligence Committee for the Combined Chiefs of Staff was established. In late 1942 and early 1943, the two countries agreed to a fuller sharing of results. Even more unprecedented – and probably unique in modern history – they agreed on a sharing of personnel. In December 1942, Washington opened the so-called “Secret Room,” and from early 1943 the British and American cryptanalysis of naval Enigma was carried out according to a single program co-ordinated by the UK Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park. Communication via direct signal links between the U-boat tracking rooms in Washington, London, and, from May 1943, Ottawa became so close that, for the remainder of the war, “they operated virtually as a single organisation.”30 This was all formalized in the spring of 1943 by the signing of the BRUSA agreement on the complete exchange of

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intelligence and by an exchange of missions between the US Special Branch and Bletchley. The USA would take care of Japan, whilst the British concentrated on Germany and Italy. The success of this cooperation laid the foundation for the enduring post-war signals intelligence alliance, formalized by the UKUSA Agreement in 1948 and including Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.31 Deep intelligence cooperation is certainly one of the bones of the postwar Anglo-American military alliance. A second pre-war decision was initiated by the US Navy. The Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Harold R. Stark, believed that American security had previously, and still, depended upon a “strong British Navy and empire to maintain the balance of power and preclude the emergence of a hegemonic European power.” Therefore, American support of Great Britain against Germany was vital, since if Britain was defeated, the USA would lose the protection of the Royal Navy and, he wrote, would find itself “alone, and at war with the world.”32 He proposed that the USA should assume the strategic defensive against Japan in the Pacific, whilst the USA and Britain would focus on the Atlantic/European theater. Both the army and Roosevelt agreed, and Stark suggested that high-level staff conversations with the British should be initiated; these began in Washington in January 1941. Many of the American delegates were intensely suspicious of the British, with one warning the American negotiators that “never absent from British minds are their post-war interests, commercial and military.”33 There is a certain self-blinding self-righteousness here. In any case, desperate for additional agreements which would lure the USA closer to actual participation in the war, Churchill as the Minister of Defense instructed the British mission to accede to American strategic plans. They therefore all agreed that, should both countries find themselves at war with all of the Axis powers, the US Navy would assume a defensive stance in the Pacific whilst they would jointly concentrate against Germany in the Atlantic. The agreement was signed in March 1941. The following month, US military strategists similarly revamped American war plans to provide for a Europefirst strategy in conjunction with Britain and a defensive effort in the Pacific. The March 1941 agreement, signed whilst the USA was still

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neutral, became the strategic basis for the eventual formal alliance between the two countries.34 A third decision concerned the provision of finance and supplies. During the First World War the British financed in the USA the purchases of France, Russia, Belgium, Italy, Romania, and Greece besides her own, and the effort crippled her financially. As a result, the end of the war saw Britain supplanted by the USA as the supreme international financial power.35 Although recovering to a certain extent, by the late 1930s, as it became more and more obvious that Britain would soon again be at war, there was a desperate attempt to safeguard financial reserves. In 1939 the US Congress had insisted that anything sold to a belligerent should be on a cash-and-carry basis, i.e. it had to be paid for with dollars, and had to be carried away in the purchasers’ own ships. By 1940, Britain was becoming desperate. The Germans began their Blitzkrieg, and in May, the Cabinet threw financial prudence to the winds and decided that Britain would buy all of the munitions and supplies that the USA could provide until the dollars and gold ran out. It was particularly vital that the British be allowed to buy munitions and aircraft on credit, but Roosevelt for one did not believe that the British were in such dire straits as they claimed; he is quoted as commenting, after a quick glance at a US Treasury estimate of British dollar resources, “Well, they aren’t bust there’s lots of money there.”36 The British ambassador to the USA urged Churchill to make a personal appeal to Roosevelt once the November 1940 election was over. Churchill took up the idea with alacrity and provided a wideranging, synoptic view of the war situation; he then called for help with finance and shipping, and, above all, in buying munitions and aircraft on credit. Roosevelt received the letter whilst on a post-election cruise in the Caribbean, thought about it for a day or two, and then came up with the Lend-Lease idea. It was a means by which the USA could defend herself by proxy. The British were delighted, but Congress, of course, took more convincing. There had to be recompense, or the “Consideration” as it was called, but it was not to be repaid in dollars – no more War Debts – but in policies. Goods provided could not be used for exports, and discrimination against

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any product produced by the other was prohibited. Britain would be required to abandon “imperial preference,” by which members of the Empire and Commonwealth agreed to preferential tariffs for each other, and the Sterling Area, within which other currencies were tied to the pound. Britain was to embrace multilateralism, but she would still face very high American tariffs. After very tough negotiations and the threat of the fragmentation of the Churchill government, the USA backed off, and the Master Lend-Lease Agreement was signed in March 1941, the same month as the strategic agreement. By this agreement, the USA provided $27 billion worth of supplies to the British Empire; what is usually forgotten is the existence of “Reverse Lend-Lease,” by which the British provided $6 billion to the Americans, primarily raw materials from the Empire. The Americans, however, disregarded this quid pro quo, and tended to treat the British more as supplicants than allies in this area.37 Indeed, later in the war, a number of American officials used, or tried to use, Lend-Lease as a lever against the British. Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau wanted to destroy the pound as an international currency to allow the dollar to replace it, and at one time had forced British currency reserves down to £3 million. Cordell Hull, the Secretary of State, was the power behind the attempt to force an end to imperial preference – as one of his officials, the future Secretary of State Dean Acheson, said, this was “their only chance to do it.”38 The third predator was the armed services. In September 1944, the Chief of the Supply Services suggested that Lend-Lease be used to force the British to turn over their bases in the Pacific to the Americans, because the latter would need them after the war in order to exercise wide control over the area.39 According to the General Board of the Navy, this was not imperialism because “the islands had no economic value.”40 Other suggestions were that the UK be forced to turn over the Caribbean bases to the USA permanently and that the British concede unconditional landing rights for both US military and commercial aircraft at British bases around the world.41 In other words, the British would receive what they needed but no more, but the price was constant, and sometimes very strong, pressure to accede to American wishes and desires that had little to do with the war but a very great

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deal to do with American postwar power. Lend-Lease aid was vital to Britain and just sufficient, but it came with strings attached.42 The fourth pre-war arrangement was over nuclear matters. Essentially, scientists in Britain invented the bomb; whilst the USA was still neutral the UK gave to Roosevelt the Frisch-Peirls Memorandum setting this out.43 The USA, which had the money, the scientific manpower – most of Britain’s scientists at that moment were concentrating on radar – and the space, took it over and directed the development and building of the bomb. Scientists from both countries worked together at Los Alamos. This was well and good, and at the urging of Churchill, the Quebec Agreement was drawn up and signed in the autumn of 1943. It had three provisions: neither the British nor the Americans would use the bomb without the other’s consent; neither would give information to a third party without the other’s consent; and the USA had exclusive rights to commercial exploitation.44 But concern grew in Britain about the need to continue cooperation after the war, leading to talks between Churchill and Roosevelt at Hyde Park in September 1944. The result was an aide-mémoire, Clause 2 of which stated that full collaboration between the USA and the UK in developing atomic research for military and commercial purposes would continue after the defeat of Japan unless and until it was terminated by joint agreement.45 It turned out to be more informal, and thus unenforceable, than the British had expected; in spite of the agreement, cooperation and the exchange of information were abruptly ended. The legal vehicle was the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, known as the McMahon Act, which effectively cut off all exchanges of nuclear information with any country, including the UK.46 A final pre-war agreement, the Atlantic Charter, was signed in August 1941. It took place at a conference in Placentia Bay, off the coast of Newfoundland, the first of a series of wartime summit conferences attended by Roosevelt and Churchill. It produced a broad statement of war aims, even though the USA was still neutral. It pledged both countries to a postwar settlement based on a series of fundamental principles. Among these were as follows: no territorial aggrandizement for themselves, no territorial changes for others without their consent, national self-determination and self-government, freedom

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from want and fear, and the establishment of a new League of Nations. Churchill had hoped to convince the USA to declare war, but he was disappointed. Also disappointing, and even alarming, was the fact that the British had been forced to agree to a series of stipulations which they did not like. Serious differences between the two countries simmered beneath the surface and occasionally above it. But for Churchill, national survival was at stake: promise what you have to promise. It has been argued that the Atlantic Charter was in fact the Anglo-American alliance: most of the provisions would not come into force if the USA did not become a belligerent, and the clear implication of the Charter was that she would.47 And then Japan came to Britain’s rescue, and for the second time America was bombed and torpedoed into war. The ARCADIA Conference from 22 December 1941 to mid-January 1942 actually created the formal alliance. It established their global strategy and the essential principles for conducting the war, which included the innovatory agreement for a unified command, in that whichever country provided the most troops in a theater would also provide the overall commander of the troops, rather than a group of different commanders having, more or less, to work as a committee. The Combined Chiefs of Staff and many of the Combined Boards were also set up, covering a myriad of supplies and services – as one British diplomat put it, there was an “integration of effort of truly astonishing proportions between two completely independent countries.” The alliance against the Axis Powers was formally proclaimed on New Year’s Day 1942. Entitled the Declaration of the United Nations, it announced that all of the twenty-six signatories agreed to the principles enunciated in the Atlantic Charter, pledged all of their resources against the Axis, promised to cooperate with each other, and agreed that none of them would make a separate peace.48 The Declaration, then, was the first true and formal alliance between the USA and Great Britain. It is true that it was probably the closest and most successful in history, with the combined commands, strategies, and even, it seemed, civil services. Memories of many of the veterans, civil and military, were warm, and many remained close after the war, as they continued to work together in NATO or the UN

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or the diplomatic corps or the navies. But it must also be said that it was bedevilled by widespread and apparently ineradicable American suspicion of British motives. Its intensity varied. The relationship was closest in the European theater; in the Far East, though, relations were often dire. The Commander-in-Chief of the US Fleet during the war was convinced that the British were manipulating the Americans to recover their empire, and subordinates took their cue from their commander. The historian Christopher Thorne, in his classic book on Anglo-American relations and the war in the Far East, concluded that in the Asian theater, the British and the Americans were only “allies of a kind.”49 The war, in short, was transformational: the British had to learn how to give up power; the Americans had to learn how to exercise it. In 1900, Great Britain was the supreme international Power. She had an empire on which the sun never set, supported by the pound sterling, the only international currency, and protected by the Royal Navy. The United States was a non-servile dependent. By 1945 the positions were reversed. The USA was now the dominant power, and it was in Britain’s interest to maintain the alliance. There is an irony here. Recall the comment by Thomas Jefferson in 1823 that with Britain on our side, “we need not fear the whole world.” In January 1949, a group of high officials in the British government met for an informal discussion on European cooperation; their conclusion was that Since post-war planning began, our policy has been to secure close political, military and economic cooperation with USA. This has been necessary to get economic aid. It will always be decisive for our security . . . .We hope to secure a special relationship with USA and Canada . . . for in the last resort we cannot rely upon the European countries.50 It is especially interesting that it was the first time in history that one superpower passed the baton to the next without a battle between them having been fought. The UK was also of use to the USA. A State Department policy statement of June 1948 demonstrated a new appreciation of the value of the

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British Empire, probably one of the most spectacular changes in American perceptions of the world and of the UK’s place in it to have occurred since the Revolution. Written during a period of very tense negotiations between the two countries over the Marshall Plan, it states that British friendship and cooperation . . . [are] necessary for American defense. The United Kingdom, the Dominions, Colonies and Dependencies, form a world-wide network of strategically located territories of great military value, which have served as defensive outposts and as bridgeheads for operations. Subject to our general policy of favoring eventual self-determination of peoples, it is our objective that the integrity of this area be maintained.51 Or, as it was later put by Frank Wisner, head of covert operations for the CIA, “whenever there is somewhere we want to destabilize, the British have an island nearby.”52 Mutual need was, therefore, the foundation of the post-war AngloAmerican alliance of a kind. It is a military alliance. The Combined Chiefs of Staff continued their work until it was subsumed into NATO, the formal military alliance established in 1949. NATO was first proposed, and then midwifed, by the British Foreign Secretary, Ernest Bevin. Bevin was desperate for the USA to commit itself to the defense of Europe, since the alternative appeared to be Soviet domination, even if not formal occupation.53 This desperation is a major piece of evidence supporting the argument of the Norwegian historian Geir Lundestat that the US relationship with Europe was, and perhaps still is, an “empire by invitation.”54 By means of the Marshall Plan, the USA also extended economic aid to sixteen countries to enable them to kick start their economies. Each country had to sign a bilateral treaty with the USA, which contained some strict quid pro quos for the aid. Britain believed that several of the terms of the treaty were so damaging to the UK that she decided to forego Marshall aid rather than sign the Bilateral Treaty. In the end, the US need for British foreign policy support was such that she agreed to take out the offending clauses.55 As stated earlier, the bones of the alliance are the intelligence and nuclear relationships. The intelligence relationship continues because

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it benefits both countries, although the USA, with its vast resources, is the dominant partner in signals intelligence; by report, the UK is rather better at human intelligence, also known as spies. The nuclear relationship has seen more fundamental changes. The UK was so outraged at the Americans cutting off cooperation that she decided to build her own bomb: the mark of the status of a great power was to have the bomb, and, as Ernest Bevin said to the House of Commons on 16 May 1947, “His Majesty’s Government do not accept the view . . . that we have ceased to be a Great Power.”56 There were other important reasons. First of all, when this decision was taken in 1947, NATO had not yet been formed, and thus the British government could not count on American support against the Soviet Union. It was believed that deterrence was vital, since the UK had neither the population nor an army the size of the USSR’s, and only the bomb would be threatening enough to deter. Besides, the UK had invented the bomb, and she should have one.57 But it is also clear that it was to be a weapon against a friend as well as against an enemy. The British have always found it difficult to believe that the USA, if push comes to shove, will actually trade Chicago or New York for London. Besides, it was clear that to have a place at the international high table it was necessary to be a nuclear power, and that without this power, the USA would not pay sufficient attention to British interests. Again, as Bevin emphasized in Cabinet, “We could not afford to acquiesce in an American monopoly of this new development . . . we must develop it ourselves.”58 Therefore, she built a bomb, tested in 1952. The USA, however, was by then developing a thermonuclear bomb, and once it was successfully tested, the British Cabinet decided in July 1954 that Britain must have a comparable weapon. Prime Minister Churchill argued that “we could not expect to maintain our influence as a world power unless we possessed the most up-to-date nuclear weapons”; the Lord President of the Council, Lord Salisbury, hoped that it would ensure “more respect for our views”; and the Chiefs of Staff emphasized that “it would be dangerous if the United States were to retain their present monopoly since we would be denied any right to influence her policy in the use of this weapon.”59 On the other hand, British developments in the peaceful use of atomic energy were far in advance of those of the

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USA: in 1955 the first Calder Hall Magnox reactor, producing electricity for commercial use, came on stream: Magnox reactors also produced plutonium for bombs.60 Britain now had something to contribute to an Anglo-American nuclear agreement. President Dwight Eisenhower, who later told British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan that the McMahon Act was “one of the most deplorable incidents in American history, of which he personally felt ashamed,” was sympathetic to British arguments for re-establishing cooperation and the exchange of information.61 In March 1954 the two sides had, in fact, signed the secret Wilson-Alexander Agreement, the first joint targeting agreement.62 Eisenhower’s decisive move to re-establish nuclear cooperation was not unrelated to the need to rebuild the relationship after the split over Suez in November 1956, which took place at a time when there was a swirl of resentment, contempt, and apprehension in the UK over relations with the USA. The UK government, or at least the secret “Egypt” Cabinet Committee, had nevertheless assumed that the USA would, if not support, at least not oppose the joint UK/France/Israel invasion of Egypt. To the astonishment and consternation of the Prime Minister, Anthony Eden, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Harold Macmillan, the USA violently opposed it. In fact, the USA refused to support the pound, which was plummeting, and refused to supply the UK with oil to replace what the UK had lost with the blowing up of oil pipelines: as Richard E. Neustadt later wrote in a report for President Kennedy, Secretary of the Treasury, George Humphrey, strong in government and close to Eisenhower, gave the British Treasury a virtual ultimatum: as Londoners recall it, he posed the simple choice of an immediate cease-fire or war on the pound, with not a dollar to be had for oil supplies.63 Indeed, Eisenhower cut off all contact with the UK: as the sometime head of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee was later to write, [d]uring the Suez rift . . . the two intelligence communities were closer than their political masters and it is interesting that . . .

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the CIA representative on the JIC was left as the sole US-UK channel when all other communications between the two governments had been broken off.64 This was a profound alliance failure, as Eisenhower himself recognized: in the late 1960s, he commented to his former Vice-President, Richard Nixon, that his most serious foreign policy mistake had been his failure to support Britain and France during Suez.65 In January 1957, however, within a few weeks of the end of the crisis, the USA suggested and the British welcomed the deployment of Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) in Britain. In October 1957 came the shock of Sputnik, the world’s first satellite. The UK had successfully tested her own H-bomb in May, which, like the nuclear reactor Calder Hall, she had developed entirely without American help. Eisenhower pressed Congress to repeal the McMahon Act, which they did. This cleared the way for the two countries to sign in 1958 the US-UK Mutual Defense Agreement, a nuclear alliance. Information could now be exchanged, and it also authorized the transfer of materials – the British, for example, supplied plutonium from Calder Hall to the USA. In 1962, the USA agreed to supply the Polaris missile delivery system to the UK, to be armed with British-built nuclear warheads, in exchange for the building of an American base for American nuclear submarines at Holy Loch, near to Glasgow in Scotland. In due course, Britain also received Polaris’ successor, Trident, and this relationship continues today. Theoretically, these are NATO weapons, but Britain has the right to use them if the country is in supreme peril; this right is the basis for her claim that she possesses an independent nuclear deterrent, a concession extracted from the Americans in an operation akin to pulling a tooth.66

Conclusions What, then, can be said about alliances, based on the Anglo-American experience? First of all, there have to be international interests in common, and in particular a common enemy – no country makes an alliance for the fun of it. In this case, Germany was the common enemy during

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the two world wars, the USSR during the Cold War, and unnamed terrorists now. The relationship does not have to be equal – in fact, it seldom is – but to be durable, each has to have something of value to contribute; as well, the lack of an alliance must threaten each with loss. For most of the post-war period, Britain has had a well-trained professional army which would actually fight. It went through a steep decline in the 1960s and 1970s due to British economic weakness, but her victory in the Falklands War against Argentina in 1982 convinced the Americans that British military forces would be an asset. Their worth was demonstrated in the 1991 Gulf War, and since the late 1980s, apparently, American war plans assume that the British will also be fighting. Is this analogous to Britain’s incorporating the USA into her own defense strategy in 1901? These arrangements are apart from NATO, since only in the late 1990s did all members agree that NATO troops could be used out of the NATO area. A durable alliance is likely to be based on reasonably favorable views of the other. In 1950, the State Department set out its perception of the alliance: No other country has the same qualifications for being our principle ally and partner as the UK. It has internal political strength and important capabilities in the political, economic, and military fields throughout the world. Most important, the British share our fundamental objectives and standards of conduct . . . . To achieve our foreign policy objectives we must have the cooperation of our allies and friends. The British and with them the rest of the Commonwealth, particularly the older dominions, are our most reliable and useful allies, with whom a special relationship should exist. This relationship is not an end in itself but must be used as an instrument of achieving common objectives. We cannot afford to permit a deterioration in our relationship with the British. This opinion was echoed by a former Secretary of State nearly fifty years later: “Much has been written about the special relationship between the United States and Great Britain, and the bilateral ties

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forged between us over two centuries are every bit as durable as advertised. We have no better friends than the British.” More recently, a former British ambassador to the US during the Iraq War quoted the avowal of a powerful member of George W. Bush’s team that the UK was “the only ally that mattered.”67 This statement implies more than a little fellow-feeling and trust, at least on the side of the Americans. Yet, the US government appears normally to believe that special attention need not be paid to the UK; the UK, conversely, cannot take such a detached view. Since 1945, the UK government has seen the Atlantic alliance as the absolute foundation of British security. It has therefore been deemed to be dangerous to criticize the USA publicly: neither the US government nor the American public take kindly to such admonishments. As related by a British official historian of the Second World War, “More than one British Ambassador in the United States has quoted the story of the successful Foreign Office candidate who gave to the question: What three things matter most in the world? the reply, ‘God, Love and Anglo-American relations’.68 Nevertheless, the UK has not always followed dutifully in the wake of the USA: Vietnam in the 1960s and Bosnia and Kosovo in the early 1990s are two examples of British reluctance.69 Yet – and, possibly, fortunately – there is a wide range of popular links. There is the language, first of all – as Bismarck said in 1898, when asked what was the decisive factor in modern history, “[t]he fact that the North Americans speak English.”70 As a counter to that, however, one should remember Dean Acheson’s statement that, [o]f course a unique relation existed between Britain and America – our common language and history insured that. But unique did not mean affectionate. We had fought England as our enemy as often as we had fought by her side as an ally.71 Nevertheless, a feeling of a common heritage has inclined the two populations toward sympathy and sometimes affection for the other, a feeling aided by fighting two world wars and, in earlier years, gratitude for Lend-Lease and Marshall Aid. This sentiment is a wasting asset, however, and popular culture is now a likelier glue. Arguably

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as important are the links between the academic, banking, legal, and cultural communities. On a governmental level, the navies work closely together, and the Foreign Office and the State Department exchange personnel. Britain and America share a business cycle, which is different from those of the Continental European countries. And finally, habit should not be underestimated. Public attention is paid to the closeness or lack of it between prime ministers and presidents, since they give a lead, but of equal, if not more, importance are the habitual working together of officials and officers. As a US ambassador once wrote, “in the unglamorous trenches of the bureaucracy, personal relationships are usually undisturbed as the politicians at the top come and go.”72 Even when the USA and the UK were in conflict at the UN during the early days of the 1982 Falklands War, the American and British ambassadors to the UN still informally shared with each other communications from their own governments which were thought to be interesting or useful to the other.73 The most important of all of these factors are common interests and the ability to contribute: without these, there would be little point in an alliance. The Anglo-American alliance will endure a while longer. In defense terms, whilst Britain spends vastly more than the Continental Europeans, current and future economic weakness may preclude its being enough to support a useful force. On the other hand, more than once the USA has just wanted an ally, even if it could not fight very extensively – the Vietnam War is a good example of this. As President Lyndon Johnson once growled bitterly to Prime Minister Harold Wilson, could not the British send even a token force? “A platoon of bagpipes would be sufficient; it was the British flag that was wanted.”74 Retaliation was threatened by Secretary of State Rusk: [a]ll we needed was one regiment. The Black Watch [Scottish with bagpipes] would have done. Just one regiment, but you wouldn’t. Well, don’t expect us to save you again. They can invade Sussex, and we wouldn’t do a damn thing about it.75 This was not, presumably, a decisive change in American policy. Both countries have extensive international interests, and the USA has to

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have someone to talk to. The British diplomatic corps is one of the best in the world, and its members have sometimes carried out negotiations which the Americans could not, or preferred not to, conduct themselves, for example, in the Middle East. But as American demographics change, and American interest veers from Europe to the Pacific, the USA will eventually look to others. The decision as to the durability of the alliance is probably more of an American one, although since their entry into the European Union in 1971, British policy has been increasingly intertwined with those of its European partners. Nevertheless, for the British, the single most important need since 1945 has been to co-opt American power to further its own interests. The price it pays – and it is sometimes a heavy one – is to be a dependable ally. Both gain – the question is, for how much longer? The alliance’s end would certainly constitute the end of an era which has lasted for over a century.

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CHAPTER 6 COALITION DYNA MICS AND THE SÈVR ES PACT: DO OPPOSITES ATTR ACT? Michael McKoy

The tripartite coalition of Israel, Great Britain, and France against Egypt in 1956 was one of the most unexpected military coalitions of the twentieth century. Forged at Sèvres, in the suburbs of Paris, France, it brought together long-time antagonists Great Britain and Israel, who appeared as likely to go to war with each other in 1956 as they were with Egypt.1 Unlike the Grand Alliance of the Stalinist Soviet Union with democratic powers Great Britain and the United States, the Sèvres coalition was not brought together by a shared and imminent existential threat. Though France and Great Britain had serious grievances with Gamel Nasser, only Israel faced a genuine existential threat from Egypt. Current theories of balancing and coalition formation would suggest that Great Britain and France should have passed the buck to Israel, letting Israel pay the costs and suffer the losses of fighting Egypt while they reaped the benefits on the sidelines.2 Instead, British and French leaders entered into a very costly alliance with Israel that was unpopular with their domestic constituencies and openly opposed by the United States. Given their conflictual history, the operational costliness, and the inherent difficulty of coalition

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formation, how and why did adversaries Israel and Great Britain form a military coalition against Egypt? Understanding the formation of the Sèvres coalition elucidates important dynamics that foster coalition formation and cohesion. Israel, Great Britain, and France cooperated against Egypt because, though they all had critical grievances with Egypt, their grievances were distinct and thus would not be settled without their personal involvement. Israel feared that the growth in Egyptian military power had tilted the regional balance of power in the Middle East and threatened Israel’s already fragile security. Yet the British supported a strong Egyptian state, supplying Egypt with arms less than a year before the Sinai War.3 Britain and France were more concerned about Nasser’s policies than Egyptian strength. They strongly opposed Nasser’s nationalization of the Suez Canal and his promotion of anti-Western Arab nationalism. Theories of alliance and coalition formation reasonably assume that states are drawn together by shared interests and goals.4 Yet completely shared goals create a collective action problem, whereby each state would prefer that others bear the cost of fighting while it reaps the benefits. This in turn leads to collective inaction.5 This chapter argues that coalition formation and cohesion are dependent on having a shared target but different preferred settlements from what others would impose. More generally, hope for personal gain is as an important a factor in coalition formation and cohesion as is a shared external threat. Meaningful coalition participation is dependent on each member reaping rewards that they would not otherwise gain. From a negative perspective, coalition formation and cohesion can also be caused by fears of relative loss. This fear in turn encourages coalition formation and strengthens coalition cohesion. Divergent interests are therefore a necessary condition of coalition formation, whether it be expectation of personal gain or fear of relative loss. This may appear, however, to have detrimental effects on coalition cohesion. Because of disparate interests among the coalition partners, the targeted state(s) could buy off one or more of its adversaries. The potential for a “separate peace” therefore poses a great threat to coalition cohesion. However, this threat is most prevalent during the pre-war negotiations. Coalition formation itself is a result of a prior

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bargaining failure between two disputants. Once war has begun, the targeted state can still offer separate agreements to coalition partners. Given this temptation, however, coalition partners are likely to promise each other greater gains in victory than the targeted state could offer in a negotiated settlement.6 Moreover, the targeted state would likely only offer this once it is losing, making coalition partners prefer to hold out for the greater gains of military victory.7 This chapter first reviews the leading literature on the dynamics of coalition formation and cohesion, then examines its core assumptions concerning both defensive and offensive coalitions and argues that formation and cohesion cannot be explained simply by common threats or common interests. It goes on to present a more unified theory of coalition dynamics that demonstrates the importance of both a common adversary but also divergent preferences over the ultimate outcome: though often considered an inhibitor to coalition formation and cohesion, they are in fact a necessary condition. This theory allows better understanding of the dynamics that brought together the Sèvres coalition. As Marc Trachtenberg notes, “theory, in itself, does not provide answers, [but] its main function is to bring questions into focus . . . [The] goal instead is to understand the logic that underlies the course of events.”8 Following this dictum, the chapter considers competing theories to generate questions concerning the 1956 Sinai War, and uses case study analysis to test these theories.

Theories of military coalitions A military coalition is a collection of independent, sovereign states who agree to use their separate military forces to achieve a particular set of goals. The actual use of force may not be necessary if the target chooses to concede beforehand, but the commitment to use force by two or more sovereign states must be explicit. Coalition formation is the process by which states make and honor this commitment. Prewar alliance commitments greatly influence coalition formation and composition, yet many times these commitments are not honored during actual wartime. Here, therefore, coalition formation is restricted to those states that explicitly mobilize or employ their armed forces

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for particular aims. Coalition cohesion is the likelihood all members remain in the coalition until all goals have been accomplished and the level of effort each member makes in achieving the stated goals. George Liska defines cohesion as “the degree that allies stay together and act together.”9 Other scholars provide a thicker definition of cohesion, making operational coordination among coalition members an explicit element of coalition cohesion.10 Coordination certainly affects cohesion, by increasing the efficiency of joint operations and sending a sunk-cost signal of future commitment.11 Yet cohesion and coordination do not automatically co-vary.12 Coalition partners can maintain or even increase their level of military operational coordination, even as their level of commitment or contribution diminishes. The wide literature on NATO burden-sharing confronts this very dilemma.13 Coalitions are best viewed as a necessary but undesirable burden. French General Maurice Sarrail, after participating in coalition warfare during the First World War, famously remarked to Georges Clemenceau, “[s]ince I have seen alliances at work, I have lost something of my admiration for Napoleon.”14 Yet a little over a hundred years before, Carl von Clausewitz, who fought Napoleon’s armies in several coalition campaigns, proclaimed, [p]eople who complain about the ineffectiveness of coalitions do not know what they want; what better way is there to resist a stronger power? . . . That they did not achieve everything they wanted is quite natural, for this is often the way life is.15 Forming a coalition increases security through capability aggregation, which lowers domestic mobilization costs but requires each member to sacrifice policy autonomy.16 This loss of autonomy can be difficult for allies, who then compete for intra-coalition dominance, which in turn hinders operational coordination.17 Furthermore, the loss of autonomy can itself lead to a decrease in security, when an ally is prevented from pursuing a policy that may be personally beneficial but threatens coalition unity. Allies can also act in risky or irresponsible ways that may drag a state into an unwanted conflict.18 Therefore, states have foregone coalition formation, when fiscally possible, in order to maintain

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policy freedom and avoid burdensome allies.19 All things being equal, states form coalitions when the internal costs for domestic armament and mobilization are too high successfully to deter or defeat an adversary single-handedly.20 Coalition formation is most commonly treated as a defensive measure to deter or defeat shared threats.21 Correspondingly, coalition cohesion is considered proportional to the level of strength and determination of the threatening state or coalition. Put more succinctly, “cohesion rises and falls with threats.”22 J.P. Riley notes that “coalitions, formed for adversity, seldom survive strategic success.”23 While the target remains threatening to the coalition members, the coalition endures. Once the threat has been defeated or coalition members become more threatening to each other than the targeted third party, the coalition disbands. However, if the combined strength of the coalition is still unable to match that of the threatening state, then members may individually or collectively choose to bandwagon with the threat.24 This discussion assumes that a coalition has actually formed. Coalition formation is costly on many levels, and states may prefer to avoid the costs altogether.25 When confronting a common threat, each state would most prefer to free-ride off the efforts of others. If the aggressor is a threat to multiple states and could potentially be deterred by different coalition configurations, this creates a collective action problem, as each state hopes others will bear the costs of deterrence and defense.26 Often, states move from passively free-riding to actively trying to pass the buck to one another. States engage in buckpassing through a combination of both strengthening and distancing themselves from the potential “buck-catcher,” so that the buck-catcher can capably deter or defeat the threat while reducing the likelihood the buck-passer is dragged into war.27 Defensive coalitions then only form when it becomes apparent the ultimate buck-catcher (usually the state closest geographically to the threat) cannot deter or defeat the threat alone. In most cases, this is after an attack has already occurred, and defeat is imminent.28 The defensive theory of coalition cohesion claims that coalitions should dissolve once the threat is defeated, or coalition partners begin viewing each other as more threatening than the target. Yet according to

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the logic of collective action, coalition unity should falter once it becomes clear the threat can be defeated by the other coalition members. If security and restoration of the status quo were the primary motivations for coalition formation, then defection should become rampant once victory is in sight. Buck-passing and free-riding should once again become an issue. Yet coalition membership and cohesion tend to increase once victory seems assured.29 The further Napoleon was pushed back toward French borders, the larger the anti-Napoleon Sixth Coalition became.30 The United States entered the First World War in February 1917 when the Entente was on the offensive, following a string of Central Power setbacks in 1916. These setbacks included Romanian entry on the Entente side, which itself followed the (Pyrrhic) success of the Russian Brusilov offensives.31 John Mearsheimer claims that the United States intervened once American officials became convinced the Entente powers could not defeat Germany alone, particularly following the Russian Revolution and German resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare.32 While German submarine warfare was clearly central to American decisionmaking, Woodrow Wilson was also concerned about the British threat that if the Entente won without American participation, it would be excluded from any postwar negotiations.33 During the Second World War, the United States and Great Britain accelerated plans for a European Second Front once Soviet victory over Nazi Germany appeared likely.34 The Soviet Union in turn declared war on Japan in April 1945 and began its invasion of Manchuria on 8 August, two days after the United States dropped the first nuclear bomb on Hiroshima.35 Because the defensive theory assumes that coalition formation is motivated by the inability individually to defeat a common threat, it does not explain cohesion once victory is (presumably) assured. This problem is caused by what Randall Schweller calls the “status quo bias” in international political assumptions.36 Schweller instead argues that coalitions form both to protect the status quo and to overturn it, and that a state’s preference for the status quo will determine its coalition partners.37 Offensive coalitions therefore form to change the distribution of territory and international privileges, and they maintain cohesion until either military defeat or military victory and an agreed-upon redistribution. Victory itself may end the coalition if

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partners cannot agree about a mutually beneficial settlement. Scholars claim this condition makes offensive coalitions more fragile and ineffective than defensive coalitions. Robert Jervis argues, “[i]nternational coalitions are more readily held together by fear than by hope of gain . . . . Most gains from conquest are too uncertain and raise too many questions of future squabbles among victors to hold an alliance together for long.”38 The Axis coalition is considered the archetypical offensive coalition and is commonly used to illustrate their inefficacy. Gerhard Weinberg states, the powers associated with Germany were motivated by the shared emotion of greed – as the opposing alliance would be joined by the shared emotion of fear – but very little else. Germany, Italy, and Japan were tenuously allied like a gang of thieves . . . without much inclination to defer, or even give much thought, to the needs, hopes, and intentions of the others.39 Despite such criticism, there is still an expectation that the coalition will hold together until, at least, military victory or defeat. There is less of a danger in buck-passing, since all interested parties must ensure they receive their desired portion. States still engage in offensive or “predatory” buck-passing, letting other members of the coalition carry the brunt of the fighting while making the minimal contribution necessary to ensure a share of the spoils.40 Yet even these buck-passing members are providing a negative contribution by inhibiting the formation of a stronger balancing coalition.41 Nevertheless, while recognizing that coalitions can form for offensive reasons, Schweller and others still stipulate that the status-quo based, defensive motive is likewise valid.42 This stance therefore leaves unanswered the question of defensive cohesion once it is apparent that a smaller-sized coalition could defeat the revisionist state or coalition and restore the status quo. Schweller further asserts that status quo coalitions will be, ceteris paribus, larger than revisionist coalitions, because “the larger the coalition, the less cost to each member of balancing against the threat.” While this convincingly explains the desire for a large defensive coalition, it does not explain how these coalitions

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actually form. Recognizing the free-rider problem in defensive coalition formation, Schweller nonetheless argues that it is precisely because alliance members can be expected to do less than their fair share that it makes sense to form a coalition that is clearly overpowering, not slightly more powerful, than the aggressor(s) . . . .Indeed, all states were welcomed to pool their resources to fight Napoleon, the Kaiser, Hitler, and most recently Saddam Hussein. Thus, by war’s end, the resources of the status quo alliance far exceeded those of the aggressors.43 In recognizing the empirical reality that these winning coalitions were larger than necessary for victory, Schweller asserts that the free-rider problem was surmounted, but without actually explaining the mechanisms that allowed it to happen.

Coalition dynamics: common adversary, divergent interests Coalition formation and cohesion require a common adversary but divergent preferences concerning the ultimate settlement. The former point is largely agreed upon and likely requires little explanation. As Glenn Snyder notes, “[a]dversary relations provide the raison d’être for alliances and alignments; so much is obvious.”44 Nonetheless, it is important to recognize that not only is a common adversary a necessary condition for coalition formation and cohesion, but that it is the only necessary condition regarding common interests. Coalition partners can and, in fact, must disagree about other issues, but they still need to share a common target. Despite the wide acceptance of a shared adversary as a necessary condition for coalitions, the importance of this requirement can at times be overlooked. Divergent interests among coalition partners are also often recognized, but are usually considered a detriment rather than a benefit. American First World War general Tasker Bliss complained that the biggest problem confronting the Entente was the manifest absence of unity of purpose on the part of the Entente Powers. They were allied little more than in the sense

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that each found itself fighting, at the same time with others, its own war against one enemy, and too largely for separate ends.45 General Bliss’ complaint of lack of Entente political unity is understandable when considering military coordination. Yet it is critical to fostering collective action. Stephen Gent hones in on this point to explain unilateral, multilateral, and non-existent interventions, particularly in response to humanitarian crises.46 Gent seeks to understand why universally recognized humanitarian crises often do not result in interventions, while controversial international situations elicit multilateral interventions (e.g., the 2003 Iraq War). He claims that most humanitarian interventions, like defensive coalitions, fall victim to free-riding, as members of the international community wait for others to intervene. Gent further argues that states launch joint or multilateral interventions out of fear of the type of settlement another state would impose. When their preferences for a particular outcome are identical, states prefer free-riding, since they can receive their desired outcome without paying any costs. This however often leads to collective inaction. Only when state preferences over the outcome diverge does joint action occur. Multilateral intervention is thus not simply a result of mutual concern over a particular issue, but also includes mutual suspicion of a unilaterally imposed outcome. Gent’s insights can be applied more broadly to coalition formation, but they also require further specification. For instance, Gent makes a distinction between consensual, intermediate, and divisive issues. Consensual issues lead to either free-riding or a unilateral intervention (if the hegemon is the only state capable of launching an intervention), while intermediate issues lead to multilateral interventions. According to Gent though, divisive issues can lead to either a unilateral intervention, no intervention, or a counter-intervention. Gent does not clearly specify what other issues will further determine the outcome. For divisive issues, counter-interventions or no intervention occur when two states have completely conflicting interests concerning the target state. The intervening state opposes the status quo in the target state, while the protecting state supports it. If the protector can clearly signal its intention to launch a counter-intervention, then there

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will be no initial intervention; if not, then there will be an intervention and a counter-intervention.47 Yet Gent acknowledges that during the Cold War, when there were clearly conflictual interests between the Soviet Union and the United States, the two superpowers launched a series of interventions that went unopposed. He notes that most of these interventions were in their respective neighborhoods, Eastern Europe, and the Caribbean Basin, respectively, but does not explain why these did not lead to counter-interventions.48 Certainly fear of a wider nuclear war was a major concern, though if this threat was real, such concerns should have deterred the initial intervention. Instead, each superpower recognized the other’s sphere of influence and was resigned to the primacy of its adversary’s interests concerning the targeted country. The Cold War rivals were thus indifferent concerning target selection and accepting of the outcome settlement, allowing for a unilateral intervention. For coalition formation, what distinguishes intermediate from divisive issues is agreement over target selection, and what distinguishes intermediate from consensual issues is disagreement over the outcome settlement. Agreement about target selection allows for collective action. Disagreement about outcome settlement limits the attractiveness of free-riding and buck-passing. Defensive coalitions fall victim to buck-passing when the common threat is weak enough that multiple combinations of states in the system could potentially deter or defeat the threat.49 Only when the threat is uncontainable without greater participation do more states form or join coalitions. Analysis of defensive buck-passing tends to focus only on buckpassing prior to fighting, but logically it should re-occur once the threat can be contained or defeated by a smaller coalition. Offensive coalitions, on the other hand, experience buck-passing until victory is in sight, after which the former bystanders want to secure their portion of the spoils. Offensive buck-passing is only mitigated when the buck-catcher is both willing and able to restrict the division of the spoils. Indeed, the buck-catcher may oppose coalition formation, so that it can keep all the spoils to itself. Other states in turn may insist on forming a coalition to ensure a more favorable and equitable division of goods.

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A combination of both defensive and offensive coalition dynamics allows for a more unified and parsimonious theory of coalition formation and cohesion. States, ceteris paribus, would prefer not to join military coalitions, because of both the costliness of military operations and the loss of personal autonomy. The former makes buck-passing more attractive, and the latter unilateral action. States therefore reluctantly form or join coalitions, and until victory is in sight, coalitions should be minimum-winning. When victory appears likely from the outset, oversized coalitions may form prior to fighting. During the three eighteenth-century partitions of Poland, aggressors Russia, Prussia, and Austria were all individually capable of conquering the desired territory. They formed coalitions with each other beforehand to make sure there was an equitable division of territory.50 In the 1991 Persian Gulf War, few doubted the United States could win alone, though Iraq’s defeat was faster and more lopsided than expected. Middle Eastern coalition members came on board before the fighting but after it was clear the United States was committed to intervening, in order to both ensure the limited goal of ousting Iraq from Kuwait and to receive assorted side payments.51 The United States sought allies in this war, along with the Afghan war in 2002 and the second Iraq war in 2003, to defray the financial costs, enhance legitimacy with domestic audiences, and help with postwar reconstruction. The United States has, however, consistently preferred to do the fighting alone.52 Once victory is in sight, individual membership and effort should increase, as coalition members seek to ensure their preferred settlement and stymie a unilaterally imposed settlement. The less confident an individual state is that other coalition members will impose its preferred settlement, the more likely it is to join and the greater its effort. Inversely, the more confident an individual state is that other coalition members will impose its preferred settlement, the less likely it is to join or the weaker its effort. This follows Paul Schroeder’s formulation of the pacto de contrahendo, whereby states form alliances not only to deter threats but also to maintain a level of control over the policies of their ostensible allies.53 Though often applied to grand strategies and peacetime alliances, binding strategies can likewise be applied to wartime coalitions, regardless of whether the alliance persists following victory.54

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Yet the existence of divergent interests among coalition members seemingly increases the threat of defection. If the targeted state can negotiate a separate peace with one or more coalition members, it can potentially cripple the coalition and achieve victory, or at least avoid defeat. However, the real danger of defection is more pronounced prior to war rather than during the war, for two notable reasons. First, coalition formation, like war, is a costly action only taken as a result of a prior bargaining failure.55 States would forsake forming or joining a coalition if they could otherwise achieve their desired aims. Coalition formation therefore suggests that the targeted state was either unwilling or unable to provide the different coalition members with their preferred outcome. Only when Napoleon rejected Swedish and Austrian demands for expansion into Norway and central Germany respectively did these countries join the Sixth Coalition. France and Russia first formed an alliance in 1890 only after Germany refused to renew the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia, which expressed support for Russian aims in Bulgaria and the Straits and promised German neutrality in case of conflict between Russia and Austria-Hungary.56 Egypt officially joined, and the Soviet Union assented to, the military coalition against Iraq after Saddam Hussein rejected Mikhail Gorbachev’s call for a Middle East regionwide summit.57 Conversely, Hitler originally deterred a two-front coalition against him by satisfying Soviet territorial desires in Poland and the Baltics prior to the onset of war. Similarly, it was central to Soviet strategy during the Cold War to weaken Western solidarity prior to a possible war, as opposed to waiting until the fighting began.58 The existence of a coalition is the result of a prior bargaining failure and suggests that separate deals are unlikely to occur once fighting has commenced. Second, the onset of war may change the priorities of the targeted state. The fear of defection and abandonment consistently haunts allies throughout the war effort. During both World Wars, all sides were constantly worried about the effects of an ally making a separate peace.59 Yet this very fear causes states to engage in greater intracoalition bargaining to preemptively outbid adversarial attempts at a separate peace. Just as fear of domestic retribution will lead statesmen to increase war aims, so will fear of ally abandonment.60 Furthermore,

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during war, communication and affinity increase among allies and diminish among adversaries, respectively facilitating intra-coalition and debilitating inter-coalition negotiations. Patricia Weitsman states that this in turn makes war termination that much more difficult, as allies continually promise greater gains for sustained commitment past what their adversaries can offer.61 This largely applies when there is a general stalemate with no clear end in sight. When victory is considered likely, such promises are unnecessary, since states often believe they can gain more from an overwhelming military victory than a negotiated peace.62 When defeat is considered likely, the threat of a separate peace is greatest and likely cannot be overcome. Further intra-coalition bargaining is most likely when all sides believe a united effort could still achieve victory, even if they recognize that coalition collapse will cause defeat. However, once a state believes that even a united effort will not bring victory, ally promises become meaningless.63 Barring an expected imminent defeat though, divergent interests should not cause defection.

The dynamics of the Sèvres coalition The military coalition of Israel, Great Britain, and France against Nasser’s Egypt still strikes historians as improbable and unexpected. Keith Kyle, one of the leading historians on the Sinai-Suez War, remarks, “[n]o one would have predicted that 1956 would end with . . . military action by an undercover alliance of Britain, France, and Israel against Egypt.”64 The animosity between Israel and Britain was especially pronounced, making any military alliance between the two appear quite unlikely. Yet the Sèvres coalition formed not in spite of this animosity, but in good part because of it. Great Britain feared buck-passing to Israel, lest the Israelis use the opportunity to attack Jordan. Israel, on the other hand, sought a partnership with Great Britain out of fear of a counter-intervention. France generally enjoyed good relations with both countries, which serves as a helpful comparison on the dynamics created by friendly relations versus hostile ones. What united all three was a strong opposition to Gamel Nasser’s regime. Ironically, both British and Israeli leaders welcomed the Free

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Officers’ coup in 1952 that originally brought Nasser to power. British officials increasingly accepted the need to withdraw from the Suez Canal, but considered King Farouk’s regime too inept and corrupt to protect British interests without British troops. They therefore cautiously supported the military coup, despite its anti-British rhetoric, in hopes that the new leadership could uphold a more lasting agreement.65 The Israelis made a similar assessment of Farouk’s failed leadership and hoped the new military regime would focus on internal reforms instead of external aggression. In particular, they hoped the new Egyptian government would help curb the Palestinian fedayeen incursions into Israel via Gaza and stabilize the Egyptian-Israeli border.66 Both the British and Israelis would be gravely disappointed by Nasser’s subsequent policies, and each individually began considering military options for toppling his regime. Yet British and Israeli opposition to Nasser were for distinct and, to a certain extent, contradictory reasons. British opposition to Nasser came to a head over his nationalization of the Suez Canal in July 1956. Access to the Suez Canal was vital to British interests, because Britain received Middle East oil through that waterway. It was crucial to the British that in times of war or crisis they be able to control the flow of oil. Moreover, Middle East oil was especially important, because it could be paid for directly with sterling. Prime Minister Anthony Eden personally warned Soviet leaders earlier that year that Great Britain would go to war to protect its access to the Canal.67 Yet even prior to this moment, Nasser’s goal of Egyptian primacy in the Arab world led him to stoke Arab nationalism and openly undermine Western clients. Britain established the Baghdad Pact with Iraq, Turkey, and Pakistan as a bulwark of Western power in the Middle East, and Nasser rightly believed that the British were seeking to promote Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Said as the leading Arab statesman. The British invited Egypt to join the Baghdad Pact as well, but Nasser wanted regional power on his own terms. He viewed the Baghdad Pact as a means of institutionalizing British influence and weakening Arab nationalism. Nasser therefore targeted British-friendly regimes in Iraq, Jordan, and Kuwait. Jordan in particular became a sticking point, as Nasser covertly, and occasionally overtly, encouraged Arab nationalists to overthrow Faisal

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and Hussein, the Hashemite Kings of Iraq and Jordan respectively. While the Iraqis resisted Egyptian pressure, Hussein sought to curry favor with Nasser by expelling from Amman the head of the Arab legion, British general John Glubb, who nationalists claimed was the true ruler of Jordan. Glubb’s removal appeared to solidify claims that Nasser sought to control all the Middle East regimes, and Eden began comparing any further accord with Nasser to a second Munich.68 Yet Israel shared many of Egypt’s concerns about British power. Nasser and Ben-Gurion both saw their nations as potential hegemons and viewed British influence as a great hindrance. They further shared a common hostility to the Baghdad Pact as a weak attempt to maintain British imperial control. When the British offered to set up a military base in Israel in 1951, a suspicious Ben-Gurion turned them down.69 The Israeli Prime Minister instead had rather grandiose plans for Israeli expansion: annexation of the Straits of Tiran, the West Bank in Jordan, and Lebanese territory south of the Litani River.70 Though it is questionable whether Ben-Gurion really expected to accomplish his full range of plans, he definitely viewed Egypt and Britain as his two greatest impediments. The Egyptian threat became paramount, however, once Nasser negotiated an arms deal with Czechoslovakia that greatly augmented Egypt’s military capabilities. There is debate over whether the Israelis planned on launching a war against Egypt prior to the arms sale. Some argue that the Israelis believed their military superiority, in terms of both hardware and skill level, would be sufficient deterrence against a further joint Arab attack. However, Egypt’s acquisition of more modern Soviet weaponry tilted the military balance quantitatively and qualitatively in the Arabs’ favor. Only then did Israel opt for a more large-scale preventive war.71 Others claim that Israeli hawks, notably Ben-Gurion and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Moshe Dayan, were itching for a fight to quash the Arab threat once and for all and ensure Israeli security. Palestinian fedayeen incursions caused an escalating border conflict between Israel and Egypt, culminating in Operation Gaza, when Israel directly targeted Egyptian military installations instead of Palestinian fedayeen. In response, Nasser not only gave greater overt support to the Palestinians, but also signed a major arms deal with Czechoslovakia,

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claiming that Israel’s attacks demonstrated that Egypt was vulnerable. The Czech arms deal helped to sway or marginalize more moderate officials.72 Regardless, it is clear that following the arms sale, Israeli leaders were determined to strike a military blow against Egypt before it could capitalize on its new gains. Israel and Britain both virulently opposed the Nasser regime, but their conflicts with each other made collusion difficult. Ironically though, it also made buck-passing equally unappealing. Had the two rivals been more in accord, the British could have opted to arm the Israelis and let Israel carry the burden of fighting. This was in fact France’s original plan. The French were the first to call for Nasser’s head, blaming him (with rather dubious evidence) for the nationalist uprising in Algeria and suffering financial loss from the Suez nationalization. Though the British had controlling interest in the Suez Company, it was originally a French company and still had major French stockholders. Even more than the British, French officials obsessively pushed the Munich analogy and believed that intervention and removal were the only way to defeat Nasser.73 France had already begun supplying Israel with arms in 1954, hoping to maintain some influence in the Middle East, as the French too felt marginalized by the Baghdad Pact.74 The Israelis felt these arms sales were conditional on Israeli participation in an attack on Egypt, with which Dayan and Defense Director-General Shimon Peres were happy to oblige.75 Israel was amenable to a plan whereby it launched offensive operations alone, but they required aerial coverage against a possible Egyptian air attack and insisted on receipt of Sharm al-Sheik and the Straits of Tiran, giving Israel access to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba.76 The British were initially opposed to Israeli involvement for several reasons. First, they feared that any overt partnership between Great Britain and Israel would alienate Britain’s allies in the Middle East, who were already under great pressure from their nationalist populaces. They also feared opposition from the United States. President Dwight Eisenhower and Secretary of State John Foster Dulles shared their allies’ antipathy toward Nasser, cancelling aid to Egypt for the construction of the Aswan Dam. Still, the Americans opposed any direct moves to overturn him. They did not want to alienate other

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Third World countries and drive them into the Soviet camp. Finally, the British were deeply suspicious of Israeli intentions, particularly in regards to Jordan. The British were constantly concerned that Israel would attack Jordan and were not convinced until only a month before the Sinai invasion that Israel’s real target was Egypt, not Jordan.77 Furthermore, Britain preferred that Egypt serve as a counter-weight to Israeli strength. In the years preceding the Sinai War, Great Britain made sure to keep parity in its weapon sales to Israel and Egypt. The British wanted to be clear that despite their temporary alliance with Israel, they were intent on maintaining an even balance of power in the Middle East.78 Simply allowing Israel to attack Egypt alone posed too great a risk. The British were more comfortable with a joint Franco-Israeli operation, in which France would take responsibility for restraining an Israeli attack on Jordan.79 In essence, the British wanted to pass the buck of restraining Israel and deposing Nasser to France, but were unwilling to pass the buck of defeating Nasser to Israel alone. The British were much more confident about French goals than Israeli goals. However, the French would not proceed without active British participation. Though the French were willing to pass the buck to Israel, they would not accept the buck from the British.80 Moveover, Israel likewise refused to proceed without British participation. Israel was not concerned about British buck-passing, but rather British counter-intervention. Israeli leaders were largely confident they could defeat Egypt in a strictly bilateral war, but they feared outside intervention from Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union. They feared the British would directly intervene against them with military forces, the Americans would impose an economic embargo, and the Soviets would send “volunteers” to assist the Egyptian air force. The Israelis further believed that all these problems would be avoided if the British joined the coalition against Egypt. This would not only eliminate the threat of a British attack on Israel, but the Israelis also hoped that British involvement could garner at least tacit American support and that British Canberra planes could protect Israeli cities from aerial attack. Outside of aerial defense, the Israeli desire for a military alliance had little to do with military

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support or burden-sharing, but was largely about ensuring cooperation from potential adversaries.81 Admittedly, the British acceptance of Israeli involvement was motivated more by the need for an intervention pretext than by restraining Israel. According to the plan hatched at Sèvres, once Israel invaded the Sinai Peninsula, Britain and France would call for both sides to withdraw from the Sinai and allow Anglo-French forces to occupy the area and enforce the peace. Expecting Nasser to refuse, Anglo-French forces would then launch an attack with the ultimate aim of gaining control of the Suez Canal and removing Nasser from power. This pretext demonstrates that the long-standing mistrust between Great Britain and Israel did not hinder collaboration, but instead indirectly facilitated it. During the nine-day war in the Sinai Peninsula from 29 October to 6 November, the Sèvres coalition did experience a series of coordination problems, but these had little to do with the mistrust among the coalition members. Miscommunication and lack of coordination were rather due to the great secrecy of the coalition. Britain and France sought to deter a counter-intervention by pretending to launch a counter-intervention. This clearly required secrecy about any prior collusion. This secrecy, however, was extended to British, French, and Israeli commanders. Fearful about leaks, coalition leaders even kept their military commanders in the dark, which unsurprisingly had adverse effects on coordination.82 It was therefore not intra-coalition mistrust that weakened coordination, but rather fear of culpability and counter-intervention. This concern was well-placed, since a counter-intervention, albeit economic and diplomatic, did ultimately defeat the Sèvres coalition. On 2 November, Syria destroyed the pipelines of the Iraq Petroleum Company on its coast, and two days later, Egypt sank a number of ships in the Suez Canal, effectively blocking it. This cut off Middle East oil supplies to the Western nations, and their only back-up plan was to receive oil from the American-controlled NATO reserves. Not only did the United States refuse to resupply its allies with oil, but American officials also refused to loan Britain needed dollars to prevent the pound from plummeting. Financing such a major military operation was beyond Britain’s means, and the United States

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made any aid conditional on Allied withdrawal. Facing the real threat of a collapse of its economy, Britain convinced France to agree to a UN cease fire on 6 November, effectively ending coalition operations.83 Nevertheless, it should not be overlooked that prior to its ultimate defeat and despite the coordination problems, the Sèvres coalition actually achieved most of its military goals. Within those nine days, the Israelis conquered Gaza, the Sinai Peninsula, and Sharm al-Sheikh. Anglo-French forces captured Ports Said and Fuad, giving them control of the Suez Canal.84 Yet these latter Anglo-French achievements likely would not have occurred without Israel’s credible threat of withdrawal. Throughout much of the fighting, Israeli forces sought entry from Anglo-French troops, but Britain balked, not wanting their collusion exposed. However, once Israel was in control of Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula, the Israelis were satisfied and agreed to the United Nations’ demands for a cease-fire on 3 November. Even before the UN demand, Ben-Gurion and Dayan were reluctant to go into the Canal Zone and instead preferred to consolidate their gains in the Sinai. After having largely fought alone, Dayan bitterly remarked to his staff, “Israel will see to the Sinai; someone else will see to the canal.”85 Now however, since Israel agreed to a cease-fire, Britain and France lost their pretext for intervention, and they therefore pled with Israel to re-launch military operations. The Israelis agreed, but Dayan later commented that [w]hat pleas and remonstrations could not accomplish, this bold, merciless, and impartial diplomatic move did. The shameless British . . . were forced to bring their landing forward by a whole day, when they suddenly realized they needed Israel even after they thought they could drop it by the sidelines.86 The threat that Israel would make a separate peace with the United Nations was clearly a credible one, especially since Israel had already accomplished all its military goals. Though they shared the common goal of Nasser’s removal, the Israelis actually preferred for the Suez Canal to be under international control, and thus were content to leave it unconquered. Britain and France therefore could not depend on their

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ally independently to assure their interests. They needed their own forces to secure their aims in the Canal Zone. Israel consented once it became clear that a UN settlement would mean withdrawal from the Sinai and the return of Sharm el-Sheik to Egypt, who would then reinstate the blockade against Israeli access to the Red Sea.87 Israel rejected the United Nations’ proposal for a separate peace because Britain and France offered better terms. Unfortunately for the Sèvres coalition, Israel could not in turn provide Britain with needed oil or dollars, so Britain had to bow to American pressure to end its assault. Nevertheless, even within the rather convoluted dynamics of the Sèvres collusion, divergent interests strengthened coalition cohesion.

Conclusions An Anglo-Israeli coalition seemed quite unlikely in 1956, given the long-standing hostility between the two nations. Yet this very hostility was crucial to coalition formation, since it diminished the temptation to pass the buck and increased fears that their individual aims would not be accomplished. Because France enjoyed good relations with both Britain and Israel, it was both a target and perpetrator of buck-passing. France tried to convince Israel to fight Egypt alone, while Britain tried to convince France to fight with Israel, in order both to defeat Nasser and restrain Israel. However, the British would not support unilateral Israeli action, which they feared (perhaps correctly) would include an attack on Jordan. Conversely, the Israelis would not fight without active British participation, hoping this would preclude a British counter-intervention. Furthermore, the Israelis were unwilling to enmesh themselves in the international conflict over the Suez Canal. They were concerned primarily with securing and possibly expanding their own borders. The only resolution to these conflicting interests was to form a tripartite coalition, where each member could secure their interests and restrain their partners. Scholars have long recognized the problems of free-riding and buckpassing for coalition dynamics and have offered different explanations about how they can be overcome. These explanations, however, assume there is a confluence of preferences concerning both the target and the

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outcome, and therefore can only be overcome either by the inability of others to contain the threat or the provision of side payments. While these explanations are not without merit, they do not explain the formation of over-sized coalitions or cohesion once victory is in sight.88 Rather, a common target but divergent outcome preferences explain why states choose to form coalitions instead of buck-passing and remain together instead of splintering once victory appears assured. States fear that others will impose an unfavorable settlement, and therefore a military coalition is the price they must pay.

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CHAPTER 7 THE IMPOSSIBLE ALLIANCE: STR ATEGY AND R ELIABILIT Y IN THE TR IPLE ENTENTE NEGOTIATIONS OF 1939 Teddy J. Uldricks

During the 1920s Germany had been the most important diplomatic and trade partner of the USSR. The Rapallo Treaty of 1922, the parallel, but secret, Russo-German agreement on military cooperation, and the 1925 Berlin Treaty marked the progress of this quasi-alliance. Even though German adherence to the Locarno Accords and membership in the League of Nations seemed to weaken Berlin’s commitment to Moscow, the Kremlin leadership still saw Germany as an important buffer against the imperialist encirclement of their country sponsored by Great Britain and France. Though ties with Germany seemed to weaken somewhat in the second half of the decade, covert military collaboration between the Red Army and the Reichswehr continued into the early 1930s.1 Josef Stalin and his advisors hoped that the Rapallo spirit might survive even the appointment of Adolf Hitler as Reich Chancellor. Moscow asked for a renewal of the Berlin Treaty and turned a blind eye to the destruction of the German Communist Party. The Nazi government rebuffed Soviet approaches at every turn, however. It soon became clear that the menacing anti-communist and

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anti-Russian rhetoric of Mein Kampf actually had become Germany’s foreign policy. On that account, the Politburo took the decision in December 1933 to abandon the pro-German tilt that had characterized Soviet policy throughout the 1920s and instead to pursue Collective Security agreements with Britain and France as well as with Russia’s smaller neighbors. Soviet attempts in the 1930s to bolster League of Nations sanctions against possible German aggression, to negotiate alliances with the Western Powers, and to foster anti-German Popular Front governments throughout Europe are well known. It is at least possible that an alliance of the other three greatest powers in Europe might have forestalled German aggression without the necessity of war. Even if an Anglo-Franco-Soviet combination had not deterred Hitler from his monomaniacal path, it might well have intimidated the traditional German military, diplomatic, and government elites who, before 1937, were not yet fully under Nazi control. At this point a political combination of London, Paris, and Moscow, even though it was not a fullfledged war fighting alliance, might have preserved the peace and, perhaps, even toppled the Nazi regime. The situation changed dramatically after the German absorption of Austria and complete take-over of Czechoslovakia. The Wehrmacht’s rearmament program had revived German military power, Hitler had consolidated his control of the army and the government, and the Führer had begun to reveal his always present, but previously disguised, lust for war. By the spring of 1939 a European war seemed likely. In this new, more menacing environment, a mere diplomatic combination would no longer suffice. Moscow understood that an ironclad, war-fighting military alliance was essential to protect the USSR from conquest and ethnic cleansing. On April 18 the Soviet government had proposed such a triple entente to the British and French authorities – a binding mutual defense pact with an accompanying military convention.2 Under its terms, the allies would go to war with Germany automatically if Hitler were to attack any of them or any of the states bordering the Soviet Union. Also, each of the allies would pledge themselves not to sign a separate peace treaty with the enemy. The proposal was received positively in Paris, but not in London. Just a few days

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earlier, the Foreign Office had assured its ambassador to Turkey that “His Majesty’s Government have no intention of concluding a bilateral agreement of mutual assistance with the Soviet government.”3 The failure of the Collective Security campaign thus far had left the Soviet Union in a dangerously isolated position as Europe became increasingly unstable and a new threat emerged in the Far East, where fighting broke out between Soviet and Japanese troops in 1938 and again in 1939. Moscow also knew that Berlin and Tokyo were talking about upgrading their loose Anti-Comintern Pact connection to a real political-military alliance, an obvious target of which was the USSR. Yet, the pursuit of alliances with the western democracies had never been universally popular among the Kremlin leadership. Viacheslav Molotov, Stalin’s closest associate at that time, and Andrei Zhdanov, the powerful Leningrad party chief, harbored serious reservations about the policy.4 They continued to believe, as most Bolsheviks had thought throughout the 1920s, that Britain, implacably hostile to the communist experiment, could never be trusted as a Soviet ally. In their view, imperialist England was dedicated to destroying the USSR, not defending it. They and chief army political commissar Lev Mekhlis advocated an isolationist policy for the USSR, avoiding commitments to the western democracies or Germany.5 However, isolationism did not appeal to Stalin at this juncture, whose greatest fear was that the Anglo-French camp might ally with Hitler against Russia. Stalin’s speech at the 18th Party Congress, in which he warned that the western powers should not wait too long or expect the Soviet Union to “pull the chestnuts out of the fire,” signaled that the Kremlin dictator was growing anxious about the prolonged isolation of the USSR and willing to consider options from both the Anglo-French and German camps.6 The point was reemphasized by the subsequent firing of Commissar of Foreign Affairs Maksim Litvinov, the man most closely identified with the Collective Security campaign.7 An increasingly anxious Kremlin was broadening its options. A firm military commitment from London and Paris still offered the better value for Soviet national security, compared to a highly risky accommodation with Hitler, who was clearly bent not only on the destruction of the USSR, but also on the eradication and/or subjugation of the Eastern Slavs – but time was running out.

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It was in this crisis situation that the British and French governments, after spurning Soviet initiatives year after year, finally agreed in the late summer of 1939 to begin negotiations with Russia for a military alliance. The reluctant British government was driven to contemplate this distasteful course of action by a combination of Hitler’s increasing belligerence and a groundswell of public opinion at home. A Gallop poll in June had found 84 per cent of the respondents in favor of an alliance with the USSR. The negotiations were to prove unfruitful, however. After eleven frustrating days, those discussions ended in utter failure. Many historians, both western and Russian, have lamented the collapse of the “triple entente” talks among Britain, France, and the USSR in August 1939. Their rupture marked the failure of the nearly six-year-long Collective Security campaign in which Moscow attempted to rebuild Russia’s First World War alliance with London and Paris in order to forestall or, if necessary, defeat Nazi aggression. The breakdown of these negotiations led directly to the signing of the Nazi-Soviet Pact and cleared the way for a German attack on Poland, which, in turn, sparked a global conflict that ultimately claimed 55 million lives. Russian historian Roy Medvedev has argued that, the nonaggression pact between Germany and the Soviet Union was not the best solution for either the Soviet Union or the forces favoring peace in the world. A collective-security treaty among all the antifascist powers would have been far preferable.8 Aleksandr Chubarian contends that the triple alliance talks were the “best hope” for the Soviet Union.9 Similarly, Iurii Afanas’ev has charged Stalin with making a nearly fatal mistake in abandoning the alliance negotiations with the western democracies and opting instead for a deal with Hitler. It would have been much better for Russian national security, Afanas’ev contends, if Stalin had intensified his pursuit of a new triple alliance.10 Lev Bezymenskii, perhaps the best known Russian historian specializing in this period, also regards terminating discussions with the West and signing the MolotovRibbentrop Pact as a grave mistake, though an understandable error

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given the duplicity of Anglo-French diplomacy.11 Dmitri Volkogonov blames Stalin for breaking off the triple alliance negotiations prematurely due to his own paranoia and adds, “Stalin’s mistake was to exaggerate the possibility that England and France would form a bloc with Nazi Germany.”12 Western historians, too, have regretted that Russia and the West did not combine to contain Nazi aggression before it inflamed all of Europe. For example, Geoffrey Roberts characterizes the Soviet decision for a deal with Hitler as “a blind and desperate gamble.”13 Jonathan Haslam laments that, “[t]he deeply rooted mistrust between Britain and the USSR . . . had at least as much to do with the failure of both to reach agreement in 1939 as the missed opportunities and intelligence failures of that year.” In his judgment, “The Nazi-Soviet pact was unquestionably a second-best solution.”14 Michael Jabara Carley argues that “Stalin gravely miscalculated” in turning from the triple entente negotiations to the Nazi-Soviet Pact.15 In the spring of 1939, with war now clearly and rapidly approaching, Soviet diplomats escalated their pursuit of a triple entente with Britain and France. At the same time, Stalin appears to have had grave doubts about the intentions and capabilities of his prospective allies. Were they trying to drive Hitler toward a mutually destructive NaziSoviet war while they remained safely neutral? (In May London had asked Moscow to pledge itself to defend East Europe against a Nazi assault, but that suggestion was made without any hint of a reciprocal western commitment.)16 Did they intend to ally with Germany in a great imperialist crusade for the destruction of the Soviet experiment?17 Alternatively, even if they would ally with the USSR, would they shoulder their share of the military burden or would they expect the Red Army to bear the brunt of combat with the Wehrmacht? When negotiations opened at the beginning of August, Stalin had his generals question the western military representatives closely on this very point. What, exactly, would they contribute to this prospective alliance? This question is one that contemporary scholars also need to address in order to assess the origins of the Second World War more comprehensively. Were Britain and France actually worth having as Soviet allies in 1939? Were they Bundnisfahig?

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The Soviet campaign to obtain collective security agreements with the western great powers as well as with some of its smaller neighbors had been a long and mainly frustrating experience since its initiation at the end of 1933. Moscow had signed a mutual defense pact with Paris in May 1935, but the French had refused to conduct supplementary negotiations for a military convention which would spell out how each ally would support the other in case of war. A mutual assistance treaty had also been concluded with Czechoslovakia, but that arrangement was contingent on France fulfilling its treaty obligations to the Czechs. Moreover, the USSR had failed completely to draw Great Britain into an anti-German coalition. That failure undermined the whole Collective Security strategy, since Moscow regarded London as the lynchpin of the imperialist system and since Paris would do nothing without the cooperation of its cross-channel ally. The British government, under Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, strongly disliked and deeply distrusted the Soviet Union. Chamberlain suspected Stalin of wanting to provoke war among the great powers which would generate continent-wide suffering and destruction, facilitating the spread of revolution. The Prime Minister also badly misread Hitler, thinking him merely a cruder version of earlier Weimar statesmen who also wanted broad revision of the Versailles Treaty. Underlying the mounting crises of the 1930s was a deeper problem – what Paul Kennedy has termed “imperial overstretch.”18 The economies and societies of both Britain and France had been severely wounded by the First World War and were now ravaged by the Great Depression. Other powers (the United States, the USSR, Germany and Japan) were outstripping Britain and France in both population and industrial capacity. Neither London nor Paris was capable any longer of maintaining its preeminent position in world affairs or defending its global empire. Appeasement (mocked by the Manchester Guardian as “a clever plan of selling off your friends in order to buy off your enemies”) was rooted in this profound, but seldom admitted, sense of weakness.19 Both countries needed to avoid another major war at virtually any cost. Under these circumstances, the leaders in Paris and London hoped that some combination of artful diplomacy and giving Hitler other peoples’ real estate might yet preserve their own shaky empires.

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However, the German takeover of the remainder of Czechoslovakia just six months after the Munich conference, combined with Hitler’s growing threats to Poland, finally motivated the British and French leadership to consider an alliance with the USSR. Talks exploring the creation of a new triple entente began in Moscow on 12 August 1939. From the beginning, the omens were bad from the Soviet point of view. Moscow was represented by its Commissar of Defense, Marshal Kliment Voroshilov, and the chief of its army’s general staff, General Boris Shaposhnikov. In glaring contrast, the British delegation was headed by an obscure admiral, Sir Reginald Plunkett Ernle Erle Drax, who, at this moment of world crisis, had been sent to the conference by slow boat (whereas, at an earlier point of crisis, Chamberlain himself had flown immediately to see Hitler). The Soviets were shocked. Stalin told Molotov and NKVD chief Lavrenti Baria, “They’re not being serious. These people can’t have the proper authority. London and Paris are playing poker again, but we would like to know if they are capable of carrying out European maneuvers.”20 When the talks commenced Voroshilov demanded to know if the western representatives were actually empowered to sign a binding military alliance. General Joseph Doumenc, the lead French delegate, replied in the affirmative, but Admiral Drax responded that any substantive Soviet proposals would have to be taken back to the cabinet in London.21 In fact, the admiral had been dispatched to Moscow with no formal credentials whatsoever! The authorities in London quickly sent the embarrassed Drax written instructions, but they authorized him only to discuss and negotiate, not to sign any agreement. The Soviet side insisted on a mutual assistance pact with real reciprocity – that is, one in which Britain and France would defend the USSR immediately if it were attacked by Germany, rather than merely a one-sided Soviet promise to aid the western powers. Moscow also wanted its prospective allies to pledge themselves to a military alliance that was completely binding and thoroughly elaborated.22 As Voroshilov put it, we have not gathered here to adopt some general declaration, but rather to work out a concrete military convention fixing the number of divisions, guns, tanks, aircraft, naval squadrons, etc., to act jointly in the defence of the contracting Powers.23

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The Soviets insisted on a detailed enumeration of specific levels of military force to be committed according to clear timetables in various scenarios of German aggression. They also demanded similar guarantees in the event of “indirect” Nazi subversion in the East European states.24 The western powers resisted every one of these demands, prolonging the negotiations while declining to make such specific commitments. Chamberlain had virtually told Drax that he wanted no agreement with the USSR and that the talks should be dragged out as long as possible.25 Although the British Chiefs of Staff had already reached the conclusion that direct Soviet military participation would be essential on the Eastern Front, their political superiors had not.26 Unlike the British, however, the French actually wanted an alliance with Moscow. Doumenc had been instructed to secure Soviet cooperation “at any price” and to “make promises” to the Russians as needed, but he was given no detailed guidelines on the two most important issues – specific levels of French troop commitments and passage rights through Poland for the Red Army. Doumenc commented that he was going to Moscow “empty handed.”27 In contrast, the Soviet side began the negotiations with a written statement of the force levels they would employ at the onset of hostilities, including one hundred divisions for the defense of Poland.28 The French delegation chief wrote to his superior, General Maruice Gamelin, that the Soviets demonstrated “a clearly expressed intention not to stand aside but, on the contrary, to act in earnest.”29 Pressed by the Russians, Doumenc invented a scenario of projected French operations on the western front which may have overestimated his army’s operational capabilities and which certainly ran counter to the reigning strategic conceptions in Paris. Drax’s statement of the proposed, minimal British contribution to the initial allied war effort (six divisions) was both more honest and absolutely pathetic, and it drew only derision from Voroshilov.30 These western proposals fell far short of Soviet expectations. In preliminary planning the commissariats of defense and foreign affairs has estimated that [i]n the event of an attack on us by the chief aggressor [i.e., Germany] we must demand the deployment by Britain and France of 86 infantry regiments, their decisive advance by the

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sixteenth day of mobilization, the most active participation in the Polish war and equally the unrestricted passage of our troops and rolling stock through the territory of the Vilna corridor and Galicia.31 On this critical issue of passage rights for the Red Army across Poland and Rumania, Prime Minister Édouard Daladier had told his delegation to avoid any specific commitments, but Voroshilov bluntly demanded “a clear answer to my very clear question . . . [whether] Soviet land forces will be admitted to Polish territory.”32 This was a real barrier to any Soviet collaboration with the western powers against any further German aggression in Eastern Europe. There is some evidence that, in the earlier Sudetenland crisis of 1938, Rumanian authorities seriously considered allowing Soviet troops to pass through their territory, but the transit routes across Rumania for Russian forces were of secondary importance compared to those across Poland.33 The Polish government, in contrast, was adamant against the Red Army crossing its borders. Beyond their historic Russophobia and staunch anti-communism, Polish leaders feared that Soviet forces might reclaim the eastern Ukraine, which Poland had taken from a much weaker Soviet Russia in the Russo-Polish War of 1920. As one Polish official told French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet, “My government will never permit the Russians to occupy the territories we took from them in 1921.”34 Given this predisposition in Warsaw, it would have taken intense pressure by the most senior British and French officials to facilitate any sort of Soviet-Polish military cooperation. The resolve to apply such pressure was entirely lacking, particularly in London. Instead, during the alliance negotiations in Moscow, the western delegates sent a lowly captain, André Beaufre, to Warsaw to probe the passage rights issue. Belatedly and half-heartedly, the British and French ambassadors and the French military attaché in Warsaw joined the effort. They met a stone wall of resistance from the Poles. So, the western officers could only equivocate on this key issue and refer the matter back to their governments. Amazingly, a week later, with the talks at the point of collapse, Daladier instructed Doumenc to lie to the Russians and claim that passage of the Red

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Army across Poland was now “guaranteed.”35 Once again, wishful thinking substituted for hard policy choices in the western capitals. As historian Anita Praźmowska so bluntly put it, “The stark truth was that Britain and France had no concept of how the Eastern Front was to work.”36 That is not entirely surprising, because both western powers still clung to the delusion that Hitler could be deterred from war if they seemed resolute and if Soviet assistance seemed likely. They had not yet confronted the inevitability of war. To the Soviet side it appeared that the western powers wanted only talks about talks or perhaps were merely trying to create the impression in Hitler’s mind that a grand alliance might be forming against him, or, worst of all, that the West might be using these discussions in Moscow as leverage in secret alliance negotiations with Germany. The Kremlin knew that German ambassador Herbert von Dirksen was conducting secret talks in London with Sir Horace Wilson (representing the Prime Minister) and suspected that these negotiations were aimed at building a united imperialist front against the USSR. Moreover, while western leaders still hoped that war could be prevented, Soviet intelligence had reported to Moscow that German plans for an attack on Poland were far advanced.37 The crisis was coming to a head. The paranoid Soviet dictator was not the only one to harbor such suspicions of western duplicity. Ambassador Ivan Maiskii, who tended to be more optimistic about Anglo-Soviet relations, wrote that Chamberlain “does not need a tripartite pact, he needs negotiations on a pact, in order to sell more dearly this card to Hitler.”38 Even Litvinov, the living symbol of Collective Security, was pessimistic about the willingness of the western powers to forge a firm alliance with the USSR against Germany, though he did not share the apocalyptic fear of a united imperialist front destroying the Soviet Union.39 Although increasingly dubious about the outcome, the Soviet delegation continued to negotiate hard for a binding, detailed military alliance at least through 20 August. As numerous historians have already pointed out, the failure of these negotiations arose from a complex of motives on the Anglo-French side. First, in London (if not in Paris) hope persisted that war with Germany might still be avoided.40 Chamberlain and others who clung to such illusions believed that a

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strong military alliance with the USSR might be provocative to Hitler and, thus, make war more, rather than less, likely.41 Second, the Prime Minister and many Conservatives deeply distrusted the Kremlin, fearing that Stalin’s real objective was to provoke a mutually destructive war between the Third Reich and the western democracies which would pave the way for communist revolution throughout Europe. Third, if war did come, neither London nor Paris had much faith in the military prowess of the Red Army, ravaged, as its officer corps had been, by the Great Purges. In contrast, anti-appeasement elements in the British political elite, such as Winston Churchill and David Lloyd George, understood that Soviet cooperation was necessary to contain German aggression. As Lloyd George put it, “Without the help of Russia we are walking into a trap” in Eastern Europe.42 That opinion was not shared by the Prime Minister or the dominant wing of the Conservative Party. Under these circumstances, the western powers envisioned the Soviet Union functioning mainly as a supply base for Polish forces in the event of war with Germany. Also, the western powers readily seized the excuse that some of the states lying between the Soviet Union and Germany, particularly Poland, vehemently opposed the movement of Soviet troops across their territories. Moreover, the Soviet side insisted that the vague “guarantee” of the independence of Poland and other East European states, which Britain and France had issued in March of 1939, be transformed into specific military commitments to meet either a direct German attack on, or Nazi subversion of, those countries. Moscow understood that these “guarantees” were so vague and hedged with so many reservations that they committed Great Britain to no specific military actions.43 The western powers refused both to make such detailed commitments and to pressure reluctant East European states to grant passage to Soviet forces.44 Beyond these considerations, however, there is another factor, which has not been explored, that prevented Britain and France from allying with the USSR on terms acceptable to the Soviets – namely, the inability and unwillingness of the western powers to fight in 1939. Shortly before the triple entente negotiations began, Molotov had told the French that “the important point was to see how many divisions each party would contribute to the common cause”.45 Here was a real

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sticking point, because Britain and France were unwilling to commit any divisions to an assault on Germany in 1939 or at any time within the next two years. This fundamental impediment to Anglo-French military cooperation with the USSR had even earlier undermined the French alliances with Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Rumania. France and Britain dealt with this underlying contradiction between their diplomacy and their military strategy through obfuscation and prevarication.46 Although the British and French statesmen had worked energetically throughout the decade to prevent a war, their generals had planned a concerted strategy in case conflict could not be avoided. Allied planners assumed that Hitler would determine both when and where war would break out. They also believed (incorrectly) that initially the Reich would possess clear superiority in land and air forces. The real strength of the western powers, they thought, lay in their empires and in their close relationship with the United States. Therefore, any western offensive in the first months of the war would be premature. Anglo-French planners assumed that their forces would fight on the defensive for the first year or two of the war. Only after Nazi forces had been worn down by as much as two years of aggressive warfare and after the Allies had accumulated overwhelming quantities of men and equipment, thoroughly mobilized their global empires, knocked Hitler’s allies out of the war, mortally weakened Germany with prolonged strategic bombing, deprived the Reich of critical war materiel by naval blockade, and perhaps even procured American assistance – only then did the western powers contemplate going over to the offensive.47 At the beginning of the war, Allied forces would move forward into Belgium and perhaps Holland to meet the anticipated German invasion of the Low Countries, preventing a Nazi breakthrough into northeastern France. Along the common Franco-German border the impregnable Maginot line would hold Hitler’s legions at bay. A prolonged stalemate would ensue, giving time for the Allies to mobilize their resources, while German strength would dissipate. Pervading these considerations were painful memories of the First World War, in which one fruitless massive assault after another had led only to astronomical casualties, not to the hoped-for “breakthrough” and victory.

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In the minds of the Anglo-French planners the lessons of the First World War seemed clear: rash offensives would bring disaster; coalition warfare and a war of attrition would bring victory. Thus, Allied military planning did not even consider the possibility of active cooperation with Soviet forces in dealing with German aggression. When war actually came, this was exactly the strategy that the Allies put into operation. They cut Germany’s overseas trade with a strong naval blockade, brought the British Expeditionary Force (initially, only four divisions) over to France, and fully manned the Maginot line defenses. Although the French supreme commander, General Maurice Gamelin, had previously promised the Poles that, in the event of a German attack on them, the French army would attack the Reich “with the majority of its forces” within fifteen days of mobilization, nothing of the sort occurred. Instead, on 7 September small French units began moving into the Saar region. Altogether, they overran some twenty deserted villages while pushing about five miles into German territory on a front sixteen miles wide. When the Polish army surrendered on 28 September, the French evacuated what little German soil they had taken and pulled back to the Maginot line. Fearing Luftwaffe retaliation against Paris and London, RAF Bomber Command also refrained from major attacks on German military and industrial targets. Thus, the “phony war” continued until Hitler ended it dramatically in May 1940. Under these circumstances, what did Britain and France have to offer the Soviet Union as alliance partners? Great Britain had only five regular army divisions available in the home islands, though the RAF could deploy well over 500 bombers and over 600 fighters in September 1939, and at sea the Royal Navy’s home fleet was unchallengeable. The French army mobilized 99 divisions, most of which enjoyed a full complement of men and equipment. These units were supported by more than 11,000 cannon and well over 3000 tanks (at least 80 per cent of them modern models). Given these numbers, the Allies should have been able to mount an overwhelming offensive on the western front against the eleven first line German infantry divisions, with virtually no armor, manning the uncompleted defenses of the Siegfried line. Combined with a massive assault by the Red Army

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on German positions in the East, this might well have defeated the Third Reich in the opening months of the war. Many of the German generals feared exactly that. However, western leaders greatly overestimated German military prowess while consistently underrating both their own strength and that of the Red Army. Moreover, they had made themselves prisoners of a mistaken military doctrine which dictated that fighting on the defensive was the more advantageous stance and that the war was likely to be a protracted conflict in which the advantage lay with the side which commanded the greater resources, however long those imperial assets might take to mobilize. Under this conception, a major western offensive in 1939 or 1940 was seen as fatally premature. It is possible, of course, that the successful negotiation of an alliance with the USSR might have led the western powers to revise their military strategy. But, given their low estimation of Soviet military capabilities and their strong preference for protracted war over decisive engagement, that seems unlikely. Although the French generals were beginning to express some doubts about this strategy as war approached, there is no indication that the ultimately fatal French tendency to follow British leadership had abated. Historian Talbot Imlay has suggested that the French were not “unconditionally wedded to the strategic defensive,” but there is little evidence for such a shift in French military doctrine before the beginning of 1940, and even then it was too little, too late.48 So, under these circumstances, what Britain and France seem to have been offering Stalin was the opportunity to engage the Wehrmacht in single combat while the western allies watched from their defensive positions. Stalin would later tell Georgi Dimitrov, We preferred agreements with the so-called democratic countries and therefore conducted negotiations. – But the English and the French wanted us for farmhands [v batrakakh] and at no cost! – We, of course, would not go for being farmhands, still less for getting nothing in return.49 Belatedly, even some western observers would grasp this point. British diplomat Fitzroy Maclean subsequently admitted that, “[w]e were

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offering him [Stalin] front line position in the nastiest war there had ever been. That didn’t appeal to him at all.”50 Michael Carley has offered an alternative interpretation. He contends that Stalin should have allied with Britain and France, even if they intended to remain passive, because “even a French army standing on the defensive would have been a far greater asset than no French army at all, as he would discover in June 1941.”51 There is some logic to this contention, but, given the deep-seated Kremlin paranoia about “imperialist encirclement” and Stalin’s desperate need to buy time to build up the Red Army and repair the awful damage done to it by his own purges, this option was virtually impossible for the Soviet leadership to contemplate. In hindsight, fighting Germany in 1939, even without allies, might have been better than facing the much larger, combat seasoned Wehrmacht in 1941, but Stalin could not have foreseen the stunningly rapid collapse of France or his own terrible blunders before and during Operation Barbarossa. One important question remains unanswered. How much did Stalin know about Anglo-French plans to fight only a defensive war for two years after the outbreak of hostilities? Framing this point in a broader context, Christopher Andrew has written, “[r]esearch on the making of Stalin’s foreign policy has, as yet, barely begun to take account of the large volume of Western diplomatic traffic which the Great Illegals [i.e., Soviet spies] and the code breakers were instrumental in providing.”52 Experts disagree about the quality of the Soviet foreign intelligence network in the era of the Great Purges. John Erickson claims that the GRU (Soviet military intelligence) was “smashed to pieces.”53 Andrew notes that, at the height of the purges, many NKVD (the later KGB) residencies were closed down while others, including London, were retained with only one or two intelligence officers.54 In contrast, Lev Bezymenskii judges that, although the Great Purges hit the NKVD and GRU just as they had the military officer corps, nonetheless Soviet intelligence capabilities were, on the whole, quite good.55 During the pre-war years the NKVD had already recruited the infamous “Cambridge five” (Anthony Blunt, Guy Burgess, John Cairncross, Donald Maclean, and Kim Philby), and they, in turn, had begun to infiltrate the British diplomatic and secret services. However,

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they apparently did not penetrate the defense establishment. Another Soviet spy, Leo Long, did manage to join British military intelligence, but not before 1940. Moreover, in Andrew’s judgment, “During the later 1930s the hunt for enemies of the people replaced intelligence collection as the main priority of NKVD foreign operations.”56 A number of studies of Soviet foreign intelligence appeared after the publication in the 1990s of numerous documents relating to NKVD and GRU activities.57 None of them, however, indicates whether Stalin had access to the details of Anglo-French war planning leading up to 1939. Evidence of Soviet appraisals of British and French military capabilities and intentions, based on Soviet publications in the 1930s and subsequently available documents, is mixed. In 1935 Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevskii publically criticized the French army for its passivity and lethargy.58 However, later that same year Aleksandr Sediakin, the Red Army’s military attaché in France, praised the Maginot line not only as a formidable defense bastion, but also as a springboard for an assault on Germany.59 Similarly, in his famous speech to the 18th party congress in March 1939, Stalin accused the western powers of lacking not the capacity, but the will to block Nazi aggression.60 So, the question remains open: did Stalin actually know (rather than merely suspect or fear) that Britain and France would have been unreliable allies in a war with Nazi Germany? Even if he did not know the details of secret, pre-war western military planning, Stalin was painfully aware that France, with enthusiastic British approval, had betrayed two allies, Czechoslovakia and Poland, whom Paris was treaty-bound to defend. The failure of the triple entente talks pushed the USSR into the Nazi-Soviet Pact and neutrality in the opening phase of the Second World War. That was not the best option for enhancing Soviet national security, for it led rapidly and dramatically to a great strengthening of German power, but in August 1939 Stalin saw no better alternatives.

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CHAPTER 8 THE EUROPEAN DEFENSE COMMUNIT Y: ASTONISHING ALLIANCE, PR EDICTABLE COLL APSE? Melissa P. Yeager

Introduction Perhaps the EDC was not primarily a true attempt to further integrate, and perhaps this is why the Paris cabinets of 1950– 1954 failed to present their parliament with the treaty. Perhaps the EDC did in fact fulfil its primary function and was thereafter left to its fate in the hands of a parliament in turmoil.1 The European Defense Community (EDC) is, in many ways, a mystifying topic of research. It has attracted extensive scholarship. Historians have probed its origins, the course of the negotiations that shaped it, the ratification of the resulting treaties, and the consequences of its failure, from transnational, national, and sub-national perspectives.2 It is a unique example of a stillborn alliance: although a treaty was signed, it failed ratification and so was never implemented. The father of EDC scholarship, Edward Fursdon, noted that at “first sight, the EDC was

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in essence an attempt by six participating West European countries (France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) to create a European Army for common defence of their territory against a Soviet threat,” but that each participant had different aims, complicating the shaping of the new alliance and contributing to its failure.3 Recent research makes it clear, however, that with the possible exception of the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), no participating government desired or anticipated success in creating the EDC. The revolutionary nature of the EDC and accompanying European Political Community (EPC), and particularly the sacrifice of national sovereignty over defense and military forces that they entailed, have led to the assumption that it was doomed from the outset: one “of the most difficult and intriguing questions of the EDC episode is why it took four years for the project to collapse.”4 This teleological approach suggests research questions: did the French, who proposed the EDC, actually intend it to result in the formation of a new European defense alliance? Did the participating and supporting states take the French proposal at face value? During the treaty ratification process, did the other five member states anticipate successful French ratification? If they did not, why did they go ahead and ratify the treaty themselves – in two cases, requiring constitutional amendments to do so? What were the intentions of the governments that signed the treaties?

The EDC: from proposal to failure The historical context: survival vs. sovereignty The failure of the EDC has been reduced to a simple assessment: it was too ambitious in its requirement for nation states to cede sovereignty to a supranational body.5 That judgement begs the question of why it was proposed in the first place. The answer is found in the Cold War context of the early 1950s. The fears, uncertainties, and precedents of this period formed the context for the original Pleven Plan and the EDC. They were powerful catalysts: the EDC Treaty was signed by all member states in 1952 and ratified by four of the six, with Italy pledged to ratify as soon as the French did. If the choice was between surviving as Western democratic states, albeit less than sovereign, or

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falling to the perceived expansionary plans of the Soviet Union, then a sacrifice of sovereignty was the preferred choice. The EDC was born amid multiple crises. The most pressing was the beginning of the Korean War in June 1950. A second derived from the Soviet-controlled build up of the “civilian” police force in East Germany, which seemed to many in the West to have threatening implications, especially in the immediate aftermath of Soviet clampdown in Czechoslovakia in 1948, and the Berlin blockade. A third, linked, crisis came in the military unpreparedness of NATO, which in 1950 had no physical existence. Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick, British High Commissioner in Germany, put the risk in strong terms: Nobody denies that the gap [in Western defenses] can only be filled by a German contribution. Unless the gap is filled the battle must be lost. Consequently the Americans cannot reasonably be expected to involve still more troops to an inevitable catastrophe. But if the Americans decline to commit more troops to Europe the gap will be still larger. In fact so large that the Western Powers will have to abandon any idea of effectively defending Western Europe.6 Federal German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer made clear that this threat perception was shared in West Germany.7 The expansion of the police force in Soviet Germany added to the urgency: as one Foreign Office official put it, there was a “danger that the Russians will use the Bereitschaften to stage a civil war in Germany for the avowed purpose of reuniting the country and freeing it from foreign occupation.”8 The British foreign secretary commented that he did “not believe that the Russians would have taken the trouble to reconstitute a German armed force except with the idea of using it to stage a movement in which the Western Powers, if they refused to abandon Germany, would be made to appear as fighting Germans to prevent the re-unification of the country and its liberation from occupation.”9 The negative French response to the resulting plan to create within the orbit of NATO a force capable of defending Western Europe, with the assistance of new West German forces, created a fourth crisis: the

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apparently urgent need to craft an alternative means of achieving dual containment. While most Western Europeans privately recognized the threat posed by the Soviet Union as greater than the threat posed by rearming Germany, and welcomed American suggestions to create an Atlantic force including German units, the French were hesitant, claiming that the question had been raised “prematurely,” and anxieties about Germany were never far from the surface.10 The determination of the other NATO powers meant, however, that France had no alternative but to come up with their own proposal for West German rearmament.11 The EDC was therefore created, if not in panic, in a highly pressured context. The need to create West German forces in 1950 made the situation unique. The post-war western defense institutions had been built in the face of a perceived threat from the east, from Germany or the Soviet Union or both. However, the participants in the Dunkirk Treaty (1947), the Brussels Treaty (1948), and the Washington Treaty (1949) had not had to contend with the notion of rearming a defeated enemy. These treaties involved victorious allies combining to guarantee one another’s security against any future threat. Moreover, West Germany was not a member of the Council of Europe or the United Nations. On the other hand, West Germany was a recipient of Marshall Aid and therefore a member of the Organisation for European Economic Cooperation, and as the Federal Republic of Germany it was a participant in negotiations for a European Coal and Steel Community beginning in 1950 with the Schuman Plan proposals. Western Europeans did, therefore, have some limited experience in interacting with West Germans in a collaborative fashion, creating an alternative path to follow in debates on defense. The EDC and the sovereignty issue The French chose to follow this existing precedent to deal with defense, reassembling the Schuman Plan team to produce the Pleven Plan for a single European army, including German soldiers, with a single chain of command and a single budget.12 The French Planning Commissioner Jean Monnet told Anthony Nutting, British

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Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, that the Six “no longer believe in national sovereignty as [the British] do because it has failed to protect and defend them in two world wars. So in desperation they seek safety in a unified state.”13 The issue of national sovereignty lay at the heart of the resulting debate, and Linda Risso asserts that it was a “determination to defend national sovereignty that caused the collapse of the EDC project.”14 The ability of a state to defend itself and to command its military forces in doing so is at the core of national sovereignty. Yet six national governments agreed to this plan and committed themselves to contributing to West German defense in doing so. The British and Americans, while not members, were to make extraordinary commitments to the proposed organization between 1952 and 1954 – commitments that went far beyond what either had promised to the continental countries in the past.15 It is of tremendous importance, therefore, to know whether the six governments signed the treaties in good faith: did they expect the treaties actually to lead to the formation of a European Defense Community? Similarly, did the four states that ratified do so in anticipation of finally creating the EDC, or for other purposes? If the treaties were signed and ratified with good intentions, then the stumbling block of national sovereignty was not insurmountable for those states between 1950 and 1954: the loss of sovereignty in defense was an acceptable cost given the stakes. Moreover, while the new communities “would have radically curbed the policy-making capabilities of the member governments,” Risso argues that their specific structures and processes would have allowed “national governments [to retain] the necessary instruments to protect their interests and prerogatives.”16 Of course, if the Soviets took over Western Europe the issue of national sovereignty would be moot in any case. Was success anticipated? Asking whether the participating states anticipated the success of the EDC requires a definition of “success”: it requires knowing the goals of participants. For whom was the concrete creation of a European army a goal? What other goals did participants have?

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The architect of the EDC, Jean Monnet, had mixed feelings about the idea of a European army from the start – and “no great interest” in it either.17 He recorded that, when the Korean War made some kind of West German contribution to defense necessary, he was “uncertain what to do. [He] had never believed that we should tackle the problem of Europe via defense.”18 Nevertheless, he became convinced that “[n]ew, powerful, and constructive” ideas were needed to defend Europe, and very quickly he proposed to Schuman that the only option was to “integrate Germany into Europe by means of a broader Schuman Plan, taking the necessary decisions within a European framework.”19 It was not Monnet’s preference to move to European federation so quickly but, as he put it, “events are in command.” Korea made it imperative to work out and secure acceptance for so fundamental a change, which touched on the core of national sovereignty and involved the oldest and most effective means yet found for conquering and defending it . . . .the army . . . had immemorial traditions. Its symbols were the flag and the uniform: both were regarded as sacred. I knew that it would be asking a great deal of Europeans to try to persuade them to merge these relics of past glory, the souvenirs of victories won and defeats suffered in mutual confrontations.20 Throughout, however, Monnet prioritized securing the Coal and Steel Community, which from his perspective was the most solid foundation on which to build a united Europe.21 Monnet’s half-heartedness was shared in France. Gavin argues that the French government backed Monnet’s proposal only because they had no other choice, citing the Minister of Justice, René Meyer, as reassuring colleagues that “[t]his will take two years. At that point the situation will be different” and, presumably, the plan could be dropped.22 Pastor-Castro adds that, with the exception of the Foreign Minister himself, Robert Schuman, the Quai d’Orsay was opposed to the Plan from the outset, with several key figures briefing against it.23 Arguably then, the French themselves never intended for the EDC to be built. Its proposal can be seen as a tactic in pursuit of a traditional

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French goal: that of preserving and maximizing French power in Europe and in the world. How could the apparently necessary German rearmament be used to French advantage? How could France retain the upper hand over Germany in any defense organisation? Commentators have suggested several different possible French aims. For some, the goal was not European federation or German rearmament for its own sake but retrieving French national greatness – perhaps “making Europe and calling it France.”24 One British observer reported “confused but vocal support for European Unity” in France, and that support was “reinforced by the conviction that only as leader of a united Europe can French prestige be fully restored and the French ‘mission’ and capacity for leadership be fully exercised.”25 A more cynical interpretation sees the entire Pleven Plan as a tactic to delay German rearmament – and as one that succeeded for four years.26 Certainly it was seen in that light in some circles in the United States.27 Adenauer, while viewing the Pleven Plan as a sincere proposal, suggested that one goal of focusing on Europe rather than NATO was “to secure a clear lead in armament to the French.”28 Aimaq puts a slightly different spin on this interpretation, arguing that the Pleven Plan was not designed to delay German rearmament, but instead was meant to buy the French both time and US support for their war in Indochina.29 Analyses of the Pleven Plan as tactical are not entirely convincing. Certainly, it had its share of French opponents, many of whom had fundamental objections that lasted through the entire duration of its discussion. Some Frenchmen objected to any possibility of arming any Germans. For the French President, Vincent Auriol, for example, “mistrust of Germany seemed the surest form of patriotism.”30 Others, illustrated by the avid rhetoric of once and future leader Charles de Gaulle, then leading the Rassemblement du Peuple Français, flatly rejected any loss of national sovereignty.31 On the other hand, the EDC also had passionate supporters in France. Dwan goes so far as to characterize French supporters of EDC as “slaves” to a “vision” – albeit an opaque one – of Europe.32 Ultimately, any interpretation that seeks to define “French goals” or “French national policy” is an oversimplification. As British ambassador in Paris Oliver Harvey noted, there “is of course no unanimity of opinion in the country; the Communist leaders are

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opposed to all idea of Western integration for obvious reasons, and the Gaullists have ideas of their own.”33 The shifts of Fourth Republic governance meant constant redefinitions of “French national interest.” The enthusiastic embracing of the Pleven Plan by France’s Schuman Plan partners, and the at-first reluctant but later determined support offered by the UK and USA, therefore put the French in a delightfully tricky situation, forced to discuss and develop a proposal that they had never wholeheartedly desired. It took four years to admit that “the country had never been ready for such a project.”34 The responses of the five Extensive negotiations led to the signing of the EDC Treaty in Paris on 17 May 1952, followed by two years of progress toward ratification. Did the signatory states accept the French proposal at face value? Did they have the same concerns about losing sovereignty as the French? It certainly appears that many Europeans welcomed the Pleven Plan: the project was enthusiastically supported by the federalists and the Christian Democrats, who, at the time, were leading most of the governments of the countries involved in the project. They believed that the creation of a supranational institution would offer a permanent solution to the economic problems of Europe, facilitate the reconstruction of the continent and normalise diplomatic relations between its member states. [But because] the EDC project put into question the definition of the nation-state and entailed the creation of a new international system, it awoke strong feelings. It would not be an exaggeration to state that the EDC produced one of the fiercest debates in post-war Europe.35 Not all commentators recognize this “enthusiastic support.” The Official Representative of the United Kingdom to the OEEC suggested that there was a deep malaise in France, Germany and Italy; the post-war Governments have been weak and divided and there is no

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outstanding leadership. This situation has led to a search for supra-national solutions to difficulties for which no immediate remedy seems possible on a national basis. These Governments grope with supra-national or even federal solutions, but they take this path reluctantly . . . .It is based on uncertainty and fear.36 Amongst the leaders of the Six, Chancellor Adenauer of the Federal Republic of Germany was most enthusiastic. Adenauer’s government approached the Pleven Plan from a different perspective to the other participating states: West Germany alone would gain sovereignty under the Pleven Plan. However, from the start Adenauer had concerns about how the FRG would be treated. Particularly, he said that he would “rejette catégoriquement l’hypothèse d’une participation a l’armée européenne en l’absence d’une totale égalité de droit et de traitement pour le contingent ouest-allemand.”37 Once it became clear that there was no alternative to the French proposal, he and the German negotiating team displayed “un zèle extraordinaire – zèle des convertis sans doute” in preparing the treaty, seeing a united Western Europe as a “dam against the red flood.”38 Adenauer embraced the idea of united Europe: [i]n my opinion the European nation states had a past but no future. This applied in the political and economic as well as in the social sphere. No single European country could guarantee a secure future to its people by its own strength. I regarded the Schuman Plan and the European Defence Community as preliminary steps to a political unification of Europe. While Adenauer had strict conditions of sovereignty and equality in the pursuit of the EDC, and while he acknowledged flaws in it, he continued to believe that “the unification of the free peoples of Europe had become a political necessity of the first order.”39 He was convinced of French sincerity from the start. He wrote that “France’s supreme goal, the unification of Europe, was a constant element” in their policy and that the Pleven Plan was intended to create “a permanent and lasting institution.”40 He saw the skepticism of others, like the Dutch, and as the negotiations proved “very difficult and slow,” he felt “the

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greatest anxiety” about providing for Federal German security.41 But he did not give up: “[e]very birth is accompanied by labour, and I was aware that the birth of the new Europe would bring labor and critical phases.”42 When the EDC Treaty was signed “We were no longer alone.”43 In comparison to the Federal Republic, the three Benelux states expressed hesitation and even hostility toward the Pleven Plan from the start. Luxembourg was most positive. Their minister of foreign affairs, Joseph Bech, was quick to welcome “cette nouvelle initiative française qui a le mérite d’être constructive, de venir à point et de faire entrevoir des possibilités de solution à certains problèmes qui, à l’heure actuelle, figurent à l’avant plan des préoccupations européennes.” Bech argued at the opening conference that a European army would reinforce, rather than undermine, the Atlantic Alliance. He did not think that it would be easy. “Il est dès maintenant certain que la réalisation de cette idée audacieuse rencontrera en cours de route des difficultés techniques, juridiques, et psychologiques très sérieuses. Tout dépendra de l’esprit dans lequel les discussions seront engagées et poursuivies.” Although he was aware of the weak contribution Luxembourg would make to any defense system, he was keen to start work.44 Luxembourg’s tiny size meant that special arrangements had to be negotiated, but they were willing.45 The Belgian government, on the other hand, was not willing to embrace a wholesale renunciation of national sovereignty. The Foreign Minister told the British Foreign Minister Anthony Eden that, while Belgium was prepared to join the EDC (and ECSC), they would only “entrust to the higher authorities just so much power as was strictly necessary. The object, in their view, should be to preserve the sovereign status of the individual nations, and to delegate only limited powers to the Higher Authorities.”46 The Plan “ne lui semble pas pratique et ses aspects supranationaux sont autant de pièges pour la souveraineté des petits pays.”47 The Belgian military establishment was convinced that a supranational EDC was not a good solution to the imperative of German rearmament, and was particularly keen that Belgian troops should be commanded by Belgian officers; to preserve national control over rank, promotion and Belgian military schools; and that a council of ministers be created to decide on the deployment of troops.48 They

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were concerned that their national identity would be eroded through membership in a supranational organization, and in late 1951 became the “enfant terrible at the Paris conference by adopting a critical, almost uncompromising attitude,” even suggesting that only the armies of France, West Germany, and Italy be integrated, leaving out the smaller countries.49 The Dutch were quick to recognize and accept the need to rearm Germany, with Foreign Minister Stikker a leading advocate of doing so in NATO. However, they had several reservations about the Pleven Plan. The Dutch feared French domination of a European army, and worried about NATO cohesion, the delay to German rearmament implied by the French proposal for the integration of small army units of different nationalities, and the extent of discrimination against Germany.50 Stikker even floated a short-lived alternative proposal, complaining to Eisenhower that a European army “could never be realised.”51 The Dutch attended initial talks only as an observer. Only from October 1951 did they (reluctantly) switch to full participant status and begin to press for the inclusion of their own interests in the EDC. This u-turn took place partly because of US pressure, partly because of progress in the talks, and partly because it was a way to “lend strong support to reliable and stable elements” in France, Germany, and Italy, “particularly the political parties in favour of European integration and co-operation . . . .[which] were indispensible elements in the struggle against communism.”52 Increasingly they worked with the Belgians and Luxembourgers to amend or even “torpedo” the proposals: as the French and German positions came closer together, the Benelux states formed a united front in defense of their interests.53 Strong American pressure was necessary to keep them on board. Benelux co-operation was successful: the final treaty reflected their preferences for, inter alia, a board of commissioners to lead the EDC rather than a single (French) figure, and for tight links with NATO. Even after the Treaty was signed, however, Dutch skepticism remained, with “widespread disappointment with many of the outcomes.”54 Collectively, therefore, and with the possible exception of Luxembourg, the Benelux states only grappled with the EDC because they had to, and were much less invested in its success than was the Federal Republic of Germany.

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Like everyone else – barring France – the Italians preferred German rearmament in NATO to the Pleven Plan. While some members of the government, including Foreign Minister Carlo Sforza and Alcide de Gasperi, welcomed the French proposal, others were concerned at the implied delay to German rearmament.55 Once talks began, the Italian delegation concentrated on defending national sovereignty, focusing on tactics similar to those used by Benelux, such as insisting on a committee of commissioners instead of a single figure, and on decision-making by unanimity wherever possible.56 Only in autumn 1951, after the Americans adopted a position of support and began to threaten a reduction of aid, did the Italian government adopt a more supportive and “active” position in the talks.57 De Gasperi would have preferred to begin with a customs union, but since the Pleven Plan was on the table, he did not think that the Italian Parliament will refuse to give its approval to the meritorious effort of those generous and clearsighted men who are striving to build a firm bridge between nations too often separated in the past by an abyss into which the whole of Europe has been plunged.58 Ratification Despite these hesitations, four of the six states that had signed the EDC Treaty in 1952 ratified it by the summer of 1954. Of those, two, the FRG and Belgium, had to amend their constitutions. Such action would seem to suggest a confidence in the likely implementation of the Treaty, and therefore in the chances of French ratification. However, it is clear that key policymakers in all EDC states doubted that the French would, in the last resort, accept the Treaty themselves. The question therefore remains: why go to the trouble of ratifying? One possible reason might have been to exert pressure on France. In early 1953, as the Treaty was making its slow progress through the German legislature, US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles pressed Adenauer to proceed, arguing that it “would mean such pressure on France that she would have to ratify herself.”59 An alternative motivation might

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have been to exhibit “good” behavior and therefore to scapegoat the French. The Dutch took pride in being the first sovereign state fully to ratify the Treaty, completing the procedure by January 1954. They did so for several reasons, including a moral imperative to fulfil the obligations of the Treaty the government had signed, fears that the French would try to amend the treaty, continued American pressure, the pro-federalist leanings of the Dutch parliament and the appointment of a pro-European Foreign Minister, Jan-Willem Beyen, in September 1952.60 Beyen also hoped to use the EDC/EPC structure to pursue his own ambitions for economic integration. However, many in The Hague were less sure. Many, including Prime Minister Drees, remained opposed in principle to the EDC. Furthermore, [w]atching developments in France after 1952 they came to the conclusion that the EDC treaty would never be accepted by the French Assemblée. Speeding up the ratification process in the Netherlands would thus . . . be harmless. In case of failure, France could be branded as the scapegoat and, at the same time, the Netherlands would not be blamed for having been an unreliable partner.61 Once the Meyer government in Paris began requesting the addition of “interpretive protocols” to the Treaty in January 1953, many in the Netherlands believed that the French were “looking for ways to back out of the EDC.”62 Some members of the Dutch political establishment, therefore, voted to ratify the Treaty safe in the knowledge that it would never be implemented: “many observers [were] aware of the fact that Paris would never seriously consider the treaty’s ratification.”63 As van der Harst put it, “it does not hurt to ratify first.”64 Others believed that ratifying would foster goodwill in the United States or, in a Machiavellian tactic, that it would prove the best way to incorporate West Germany into NATO.65 Even after the Dutch ratified, they remained pessimistic about the chances of success: only Beyen seemed to believe that the French would ratify themselves. Once MendèsFrance put forward his amendments to the treaty in the summer of 1954, even Beyen “preferred to drop the whole EDC project.”66

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The ratification debate in Germany was fierce: the SPD argued both that rearming Germany could provoke the USSR into invading, and also that the government had no mandate to take this decision.67 Still, Adenauer was confident, both that the Treaty (and accompanying Conventions abolishing the FRG’s status as an occupied state) was good for the FRG, and that it would be ratified.68 He secured the ratification of the Treaty in the Bundestag on 19 March 1953 only as the EDC was coming under increasing attack inside and outside the FRG.69 He viewed it as an important achievement: “By ratifying the EDC treaty we helped to lay the foundation, as a free people, for the political and economic unification of Europe and saved Europe from the decay and perdition that threatened it.”70 It took until March 1954, however, to amend Federal German Basic Law (the constitution) to allow rearmament. Although by then the government had the two-thirds majority necessary for an amendment, and passed it safely through both houses, it was not an easy process. Germany’s occupation status meant that the three high commissioners also had to approve the constitutional change. Predictably, the French tried to delay the amendment until all states had ratified the Treaty, only backing down under pressure from the United States and Britain.71 Adenauer’s determination to secure passage of the amendment suggests that his commitment to the EDC was sincere and that he believed it could be successful. Even after Schuman was replaced as French Foreign Minister by the rather less enthusiastic Bidault, Adenauer “had nevertheless a feeling that we would soon find a good solution.”72 In Belgium, Foreign Minister Van Zeeland linked the chances of ratification to the likelihood of the same thing in France. The debate in the lower legislative house reflected ongoing concern with the need to secure Europe rather than any attachment to the EDC itself. Ratification passed with a sizeable majority but without much enthusiasm, and a constituent assembly was called to amend the constitution.73 Finally, the Luxembourgers ratified in April 1954, the fourth state to do so: Luxemburg ist der vierte der sechs Vertragspartner, dessen Parlament sich für die Ratifizierung des Europaarmeevertrages ausspricht. Vor

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uns gaben die Bundesrepublik, Holland und Belgien ihre Zustimmung. Aussteht noch der Entscheid des italienischen und des französischen Parlamentes. In Italien scheint, soweit sich bis heute übersehen läßt, das Vertragsprojekt seine Mehrheit zu finden. Kritischer allerdings erscheinen die Dinge in Frankreich, wo zurzeit in dieser Beziehung noch alles in Fluß ist. Ratifiziert es nicht, so wird der Vertrag nicht in Kraft treten, und die freie Welt wird sich vor eine sehr zweifelhafte Lage gestellt sehen. Clearly there were worries in Luxembourg that “all is in flux” in France, and at the “very uncertain situation” that would result if France failed to ratify.74 European perceptions of French intentions changed between 1952 and 1954. In October 1952, a former Dutch Prime Minister and the first President of the Common Assembly of the ECSC, believed it was “odds on the French ratifying.”75 In the same year, however, the Belgian Foreign Minister, Van Zeeland, was so worried that the French would not ratify that he proposed moving talks to the Brussels Treaty Organization, so that Britain would be more intimately involved.76 Once Pierre Mendès-France took power in 1954, even the Germans began to doubt the chances of success.77 The Italians had similar doubts about French intentions – from the moment that the Treaty was signed in 1952. The Italian ambassador in Paris believed that the French government did not view signing the Treaty as a definite choice; the Pinay government on the contrary would have bound the ratification of the Paris agreement to further concessions on the part of the United States, in particular as far as Indochina and Northern Africa were concerned. Furthermore . . . in the National Assembly the attitude towards the European Army project was definitely hostile, while some political parties which formed the governmental coalition were split over the EDC issue.78 Although some Italians were more positive about the prospects of French ratification, Ambassador Quaroni continued to send pessimistic reports from Paris, urging caution on his government. Even as the

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French discussed amendments and protocols to the Treaty, Quaroni continued to believe that ratification was impossible: “while the opponents of the EDC [in France] pursued a coherent and effective policy, the supporters of the European Army were weak, ineffective, unable to influence the public opinion and lacked an outstanding leadership.”79 Risso confirms that certainly from early 1954, and perhaps even earlier, the Italian government was aware that the French were unlikely to ratify. The Italians did not ratify the EDC Treaty – even though they had the votes to do so – precisely because they did not expect the French to move forward.80 Neither the British nor the Americans rated highly the chances of French ratification.81 In sum, it is clear that four states ratified the Treaty while having little or no confidence that the French would do the same, while Italy declined to ratify for the same reason.

Conclusion In August 1954 the French voted not to discuss the EDC and the Treaty was dead. Why had it failed? The short answer is that very few people desired its success. Of course, part of the reason why states were content to let EDC die may have been the easing of the crisis situation of the early 1950s. Stalin died in March 1953 and the Korean War ended in armistice just a few months later. On one hand, Adenauer stated clearly that Stalin’s death “had certainly not diminished the dangers of the world situation which threatened us Germans particularly. It had further increased instability and with it the danger in which we all found ourselves.”82 On the other hand, however, NATO had been transformed in the interim: an integrated defense system was put in place even as the EDC negotiations were underway. “US troops were sent, Eisenhower went over as the first NATO commander . . . and the NATO integrated command system was gradually set up.”83 By 1954, “American power had been built up to absolutely unprecedented levels . . . .it was much harder to think of West Germany posing a threat”.84 While the question of German rearmament still had to be addressed, therefore, it was much less contentious. While the French were most concerned about the dangers of rearming Germany, it is clear that all participating states had concerns

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about ceding sovereignty over their armed forces and defense policies to a supranational European body. There was no blanket veto on ceding sovereignty: the same states were prepared to put their forces under American command in time of war, to make binding defense commitments in NATO and especially Western European Union (the enlarged BTO), to give way to a European body in the production and sale of coal and steel – even to accept constraints on how they could act in commitments like the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The ratification by four states of the EDC Treaty seemed to suggest that they were willing to take even this much greater loss of sovereignty: however, that assumption only holds true if they anticipated French ratification and the implementation of the Treaty, and it is clear above that they did not. Risso asserts that In the days following the rejection of the EDC Treaty, its supporters – particularly the European federalists and the Christian Democrats – were traumatised by the failure of their most ambitious project. The trauma was not due to the fact that the failure of the EDC came as an unexpected blow, but because the policy-makers who had promoted the EDC and the EPC realised that the same opportunity would not present itself again: the economic recovery and the political stabilisation of Western Europe had pulled the rug out from under their feet. By 1954, the Western European nation-state had fully recovered its policy-making capabilities, its competencies, and its powers, making it impossible to repropose such ambitious projects as the EDC and the EPC. Thus, the EDC soon became synonymous with a missed opportunity, with a utopia which would never materialise.85 Certainly some supporters were traumatized: Adenauer lamented the EDC’s failure, asking how “many difficulties the free world would have been spared if the European Defense Community had become a reality.”86 However, it is evident that every party in every participating state was either divided or flatly opposed to the implementation

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of the EDC. Only fierce party discipline allowed ratification at all.87 The swift agreement and ratification of the enlarged Brussels Treaty, forming Western European Union, and the FRG’s rapidly following admission to NATO, suggests that all were ready to move forward in a different direction, despite – or perhaps because of – ongoing French insecurity.88 Moreover, with the possible exception of West Germany, the participating states do not appear to have ratified in good faith. That is, they expected the Treaty to fall at the last hurdle: “the rejection of the EDC Treaty did not come as an unexpected blow.”89 In that sense their ratifications (or professed intentions to ratify, in the case of Italy) were irresponsible: they did not anticipate the Treaty ever going into effect. In addition, ratification did not indicate a full embracing of the “European idea”: at least in Belgium and the Netherlands, “support for the broader project of European integration contributed very little to this outcome.”90 By ratifying, they could present themselves as good cooperative allies, especially in the eyes of the US administration. They could achieve domestic policy goals. They could blame France for everything – for vetoing a perfectly acceptable solution to the security problem in the first place, for proposing a complicated plan in its stead, and then for torpedoing their own plan themselves. This analysis leads to a rather obvious conclusion: alliances fail when their participants do not want them to succeed. Perhaps the League of Nations is the best point of comparison here. At the same time, however, key victories emerged from the EDC failure. The Soviet Union did not invade Western Europe. The line of causation is not clear in this respect: much Cold War scholarship suggests that the USSR never had a conventionally aggressive policy toward Western Europe – that is, that they never intended to invade – in which case the entire Western threat perception was wrong. Stalin contented himself with seeking to divide the Western allies through repeated proposals of German unification and neutrality.91 Nevertheless, the Soviet Union’s response to the eventual rearmament of the FRG in a multilateral context (WEU and NATO) was essentially defensive: the formation of the Warsaw Treaty Organisation. Clearly, those who feared that even discussions of rearming West Germany would provoke the USSR to

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invade were wrong, and it is at least plausible that the discussions surrounding EDC, confronting the USSR with the possibility of a united Western defense including West Germany, acted as a deterrent to a more aggressive Soviet policy. There were other positives to EDC in addition to the main goal of securing Western Europe. If it was their goal, the French, while accepting the principle of German rearmament, succeeded in delaying German rearmament for four years while they extricated themselves from Indochina. Crucially, Adenauer wrested the concession of West German equality and sovereignty from both the Occupying and other European powers, a concept initially vested in EDC but relatively easily transferred to WEU and NATO. The flipside of this victory was convincing West Germans that their state needed to be armed. Without EDC, as Adenauer put it, “I could not see how we could win over the German people to cooperate voluntarily in the defence of Europe,” to which many Germans remained opposed.92 In one development lying largely outside the discussion above, the continental states achieved the greatest ever commitments to the security of Western Europe from the United States and the United Kingdom, pledged in EDC and delivered in WEU and NATO.93 Even for federalists, the failure of EDC did not kill the idea of a supranational Europe, which was a rallying cry again in Messina in 1955. Perhaps simply the practice of negotiating and securing national interests in the EDC negotiations served the states of Europe well thereafter. When Adenauer called the failure “a black day for Europe”, and “un rêve brisé”, therefore, he was not speaking for many Europeans.94

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CHAPTER 9 CAIRO AND MOSCOW: THE FRUSTR ATING ALLIANCE (1956–1976) Yasser El-Shimy

Our relations with the Soviets are bizarre. They were, are still, and will always be . . . .We stand before an enigma of whose beginning and ending we are unaware.1 President Anwar Sadat When Israel swept through the Sinai Peninsula in 1956 and then again in 1967, Cairo became disillusioned with its aspirations for regional leadership. If Egypt could not protect its territories and citizens, she could not be expected to champion Arab causes, let alone lead other sovereign states. Cairo found itself, involuntarily, becoming increasingly dependent on the Soviet Union’s economic and military aid. As the United States, like France and Britain before it, supplied Israel with advanced weaponry, Egypt had no option but to turn to the other superpower for patronage. Yet, in 1972, and while the entire Sinai Peninsula was under Israeli occupation, President Anwar Sadat ordered Soviet military experts to be expelled out of Egypt. This step marked the beginning of the end of the Soviet-Egyptian alliance.2 This seemingly perplexing turn

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of events took many by surprise, particularly the Soviets. How could a country whose territories were occupied, and whose ambitions for regional leadership were unmet, seemingly arbitrarily start to disassociate itself from its main weapons supplier and diplomatic backer? This case stands as a paramount anomaly to traditional realist explanations regarding alliances. Kenneth Waltz’s “Structural Realism” predicts states would join alliances to balance against growing powers. In this case, Israel’s power was still growing vis-à-vis Egypt’s when Sadat opted to wind down the only hitherto feasible alliance to help Egypt counterbalance the Jewish state.3 Similarly, Stephen Walt’s “Balance of Threats” hypothesis does not sufficiently explain the case in question.4 The threat against Egyptian sovereignty and territorial integrity was present and constant. The source was Israel, and its great power ally, the United States. The question, then, remains: why did Egypt, a small power, elect to wean itself off its alliance with a great power at a time when it was gearing toward war with Israel? The answer lies in the diminishing utility of the alliance. Cairo was alarmed by Moscow’s unwillingness to reinforce the Egyptian military with the amount and kind of weapons it deemed necessary to win an all-out war against Israel. The Six Day War of 1967 had also demonstrated the strategic superiority of “Western” armaments as compared to “Eastern” ones. From an Egyptian perspective, the alliance with the Soviet Union was frustrating on two levels. First, at no point was the Soviet Union ready to help Cairo realize its objectives for regional hegemony. Moscow did not wish to upset the balance of power in the Middle East, a prospect which, it feared, would draw heavy American involvement in the region.5 Second, viewing the Arab-Israeli conflict from the prism of their relationship with the United States of America, the Soviets were consistently reluctant sufficiently to rearm Egypt after the crushing defeat of 1967. Moscow questioned the ability of the Egyptian military to mount a successful campaign against Israel, and, therefore, withheld many arms the Egyptians deemed necessary. The Soviets perceived the Egyptian-Israeli rivalry in accordance with George Liska’s contention that “when two or more states in a given region establish alliances with competing global camps, the region itself becomes part of the global

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system.”6 The Soviets seemed more interested in reaching an accord with the United States over the conflict than in helping Egypt with its war plans. In short, as an ally, the Soviet Union did not fulfil its anticipated obligations to build the forces of Egypt, as it confronted its most ominous era after the so-called “Setback,” or Naksa, of 1967. From an Egyptian perspective, the Soviet Union proved to be an unreliable ally and an unforthcoming patron. The Soviet behavior appears to violate Julian Friedman’s definition of an alliance as: 1. a pairing or collaboration with one another for a limited duration regarding a mutually perceived problem; 2. aggregation of their capabilities for participation in international affairs; 3. pursuit of national interests jointly or by parallel courses of action; 4. probability that assistance will be rendered by members to one another.7 Although the foregoing could equally describe other aspects of international cooperation and integration, alliances have some unique characteristics that distinguish them from other such forms: 1. existence of enemies, actual or anticipated; 2. contemplation of military engagement and the risk of war; 3. mutuality of interest in either the preservation of the status quo or aggrandizement in regard to territory, population, strategic resources and so forth.8 The perceived lack of Soviet commitment induced President Sadat slowly to disentangle his country from its unrewarding alliance with the Soviet Union, and replace it with an alliance with the United States. The Soviet Union, as Sadat reasoned, was needed to arm the Egyptian military in its run-up to war, but once the battlefield’s dust had settled the United States would hold the keys for a peaceful settlement. Washington might also offer Egypt consistent political,

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military, and economic support, as it does with Israel. Cairo, therefore, started sending conciliatory signals to the United States, beginning with the expulsion of the Soviet military experts. The flirtation with realignment away from the Soviet Union and toward the United States did not cease until President Jimmy Carter hosted the signing of the Camp David Peace Accords in 1979. In short, Egypt ended its alliance with the Soviet Union based on a cost-benefit analysis, where it judged the costs associated with the perpetuation of the alliance, even at a time of war, to outweigh the expected benefits. The conceptual framework of this chapter is based principally on the theory of Offensive Realism as well as other classical contributions to alliance theory, particularly Glenn Snyder’s concept of the “Alliance Dilemma.”9 The chapter then delves into the historical setting of the Egyptian-Soviet relationship. It first demonstrates Cairo’s arguably short-lived commitment to non-alignment following its independence from British occupation. The later creation of the pro-Western Baghdad Pact in 1955 and the unfolding of the Suez Crisis in 1956 drove the Egyptian leadership reluctantly to pursue an alignment with the USSR. To Egypt, the primary purpose of the alignment with the Soviets was to amplify its capability to play the role of regional leader. Egypt’s decision to thwart a communist coup in Damascus and establish a union with Syria ran counter to Soviet goals, nonetheless. A chilly relationship ensued. After Egypt failed to prove its qualifications for regional leadership in the Yemeni Civil War, Nasser suffered another debilitating blow when he lost the entire Sinai Peninsula to Israeli invasion in 1967. From then on, Cairo curtailed its strategic posture from a potential regional hegemon to a country interested only in regaining lost territories. Even then, the Soviet Union’s enthusiasm for Egyptian plans was lukewarm at best. The inter-war years from 1967 to 1973 as well as the October/Yom Kippur War itself drove Egypt away from its frustrating alliance with the Soviets, and induced a radical strategic reassessment of Cairo’s strategic orientation. It is imperative at this point to highlight that this chapter examines the Soviet-Egyptian alliance from Egypt’s perspective. Little attention is given to Moscow’s dynamics, deliberations, and other factors that

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may well have affected the relationship from the Soviet end. Instead, the chapter examines how Egypt perceived its alignment with the Soviet Union throughout the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, as well as the factors that prompted the termination of the alliance.

Theoretical framework States forge bilateral alliances for primarily geostrategic purposes. Defining an alliance as a “formal or informal relationship of security cooperation between two or more sovereign states,”10 all alliances more or less fall into two broad categories: defensive and/or offensive.11 Whilst the former is a coordination of national security policies of threatened countries to maintain a given balance of power, the latter aims to upset this very balance, and eventually achieve regional hegemony. Of particular relevance to the discussion is Mearsheimer’s definition of hegemony as a state’s “domination of the system.”12 The domination of the system occurs when no other state in the system has the wherewithal to challenge the preponderance of the hegemon. A hegemon, to put it differently, is the only great power in a particular system.13 This research rests on assumptions from the Realist school of international relations. In particular, it draws on Mearsheimer’s idea that states are inherently offensive and seek hegemony. It also draws upon the balance of power theory articulated principally by Hans J. Morgenthau and Kenneth Waltz.14 The fundamental theoretical assumptions are that, first, the international system is anarchic. It is a self-help system with no umpire to enforce rules. Second, states are rational and unitary actors. They make decisions based on a cost-benefit analysis. Third, great powers inherently possess offensive military capability. States are cognizant of the power distribution and they seek to alter it in their favor in order to lessen their vulnerability. Offense has a 60 per cent success rate (1815–1980).15 Fourth, states are never confident about other states’ intentions. Fifth, survival is the primary goal. Territorial integrity and autonomy of the domestic political order are paramount in this regard.16 The desire to survive dictates an offensive posture rather than a defensive one. Finally, despite great or regional powers’

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rationality, they do make miscalculations sometimes due to imperfect information. Also, states are never sure how their armies will perform on the battlefield. States, according to Offensive Realism, are inherently unsatisfied with the prevailing power distribution. In an anarchic world, nothing short of absolute hegemony guarantees survival and security. The first step toward the attainment of these goals is regional hegemony. But since not all states are created equal, some are more eligible to vie for hemispheric supremacy than others. The more populous, economically viable and militarily powerful states are labeled “potential hegemons.”17 These states are candidates for regional hegemony, but will not be hegemons until offensive action is utilized to secure a balance of power more reflective of their relatively stronger capabilities. Structural Realism, furthermore, posits alliances as an efficacious means of balancing against rising powers.18 When the balance of power in a given geostrategic context tilts disruptively toward one state, other regional actors are alarmed, and thus driven to aggregate their respective powers in a defensive alliance. Whilst Mearsheimer emphasizes the relative success of offense in international relations, this study suggests otherwise. In the modern Middle East, the offensive endeavors of potential regional hegemons are almost invariably thwarted.19 Hegemonization of the region is doomed to fail for two simple reasons: first, superpowers have a vested interest in maintaining a balance of power that ensures safe access throughout the region, and perpetuates the patronage of weak oil-producing states; and second, potential regional hegemons are militarily inferior to the robust defensive alliance erected by superpowers, and must, henceforth, search for a great-power patron of their own. Therein lies the foreign policy paradox: it is prohibitively difficult to attain regional hegemony without superpower patronage, but superpowers are disinclined to support bids for regional hegemony. This contradiction generates unrealized hopes for both parties to the alliance, and especially to the potential regional hegemon. The Soviet-Egyptian alliance was no exception. Broadly speaking, states like Iraq, Iran, and Egypt must enlist the support of states like Britain, the United States, and Russia, if

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they are to reconfigure the balance of power in their favor. London, Washington, and Moscow may either conditionally agree to such alliances, or counteract them with a defensive coalition. Superpowers are more likely to encourage balancing against rising power. Depending on the strategic context, superpowers might opt for offensive alliances, however. In that eventuality, they ensure that the alliance’s success and scope of goals is limited. This move, in turn, leads to the disintegration of that alliance, since potential regional hegemons fail to realize their hegemony objective. Potential regional hegemons, after failing to secure this objective, may well undergo a period of retrenchment and rebuilding. During this period, they often alter their strategic posture to be more conciliatory, and may even ally with erstwhile enemies. This period is vital for power reconstruction. This study, furthermore, benefits from Glenn Snyder’s concept of “alliance dilemma.” Snyder explains that alliances invariably suffer from two weakening phenomena that may well result in their dissolution. The first is that of “entrapment,” where a state feels driven, by its ally, into an unnecessary, avoidable, or costly conflict that it wishes otherwise to avoid. Fear of entrapment could explain the Soviet reluctance to build a military ready to go on the offense for Egypt after 1967. The Soviets instead pushed for a diplomatic settlement. The second, and more relevant, notion is that of “abandonment.”20 Abandonment occurs when a state embroiled in a decisive conflict feels insufficiently supported by its ally. The feeling of abandonment was certainly in no short supply in Cairo after 1967. Akin to the Prisoner’s Dilemma, allied policymakers confront the binary choice of cooperation or defection.21 Abandonment and entrapment often induce or exemplify a decision to defect.

The Cairo-Moscow alliance in the 1950s: the beginning Before delving into the intricacies of the Egyptian-Soviet relationship, it is useful at this stage to project the strategic context in which Egypt operated prior to its alignment with Moscow. This helps to explicate the foundations of this alliance from an Egyptian perspective, and illuminate its raison d’être. Egypt gained de facto independence from British

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occupation in 1954. After more than sixty years of uninterrupted British rule, the 1952 coup d’état, led by Gamal Abdul Nasser, hastened the withdrawal of Britain.22 At the time Egypt became independent, many other Arab countries were following suit or were still colonized by Western powers, particularly Britain and France.23 The occupation experience generated immense hostility toward imperial or Western designs for the region.24 Nasser’s foreign policy priority was to spearhead a regional effort to purge the Middle East of imperial influence and presence. Israel, the reasoning went, represented the most immediate menace to Egypt’s independence and territorial integrity.25 Egypt felt besieged, however. British influence continued in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Aden, French influence in Algeria, and American influence in Iran and Turkey. The sense of besiegement was directly present at Egypt’s borders, also. To the east, there were American military forces stationed in Libya. To the west, more importantly, there was the newly created state of Israel, which had humiliatingly defeated the Egyptian army (and other Arab armies) in 1948. In this tense strategic environment, and since the conclusion of the armistice agreement of 1949, Cairo backed some militant Palestinian attacks on Israel from Gaza. Israel, in turn, waged massive retaliatory raids on Egyptian installations in the Palestinian Strip, the most devastating of which took place in February 1955.26 Nasser recognized the Egyptian military’s comparative inferiority vis-à-vis its neighbor, and was determined to rectify it. Stephen Cohen argues that Nasser realized then that “[i]f Egypt was to ever become a regional leader as he hoped, it could not continue to suffer such defeats.”27 Nasser, thereafter, tried to forge a Pan-Arab alliance, led by Egypt, which included Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon. In reality, such an alliance was weak and lacking modern forces, equipments, and weapons. Egypt’s assertiveness was soon challenged by a rival alliance that seemed much more powerful. In its effort to contain the Soviet Union, the Eisenhower administration wished to bridge the Middle Eastern void between the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the South East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO). There came John Foster Dulles’ proposal for the Baghdad Pact.28 This alliance would include Britain, Turkey, Iran,

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Pakistan, and Iraq, and have a decidedly pro-Western orientation.29 Britain welcomed the pact as a means to reassert its position in its previous colony, Iraq. This plan ran counter to Egypt’s desire to rid the Middle East of Western influence, and to lead the region herself. More importantly, Nasser’s sense of encirclement grew even more acute. Condemning what he deemed as subservience to Western imperialism, Nasser sought to establish a third way. Nasser strongly campaigned for “positive neutralism,” where third world countries would ally neither with the Western Camp, nor the Eastern one, but rather maintain an autonomous course of action that best fit their interests. Initially, Egypt appeared to have gathered vigorous momentum, as manifest in the success of the Bandung Conference in the spring of 1955. Nasser of Egypt, Nehru of India, and Sukarno of Indonesia offered third world countries a third option amidst the ever-heating Cold War rivalry. Riding a wave of popularity and success, Nasser requested arms for his military from America, and financing from the International Monetary Fund for a grand project to preclude annual floods through the construction of a High Dam in Aswan. With Nasser blasting the Baghdad Pact as an “imperial alliance,” the Americans rejected his former request and foiled the latter.30 Yet, Moscow was lurking around the corner to offer Egypt what it needed. The Soviet Union sold Egypt arms through Czechoslovakia.31 The Soviets had decided to break the “Anglo-American arms monopoly” of the Middle East.32 The Czech Arms deal, in particular, served as further evidence of the growing power of Egypt, its independence from the West, and its increasing ambitions. It demonstrated Egypt’s ability to advance economically and militarily without the permission of the United States. The complete withdrawal of British troops from Egypt in April 1956 was the icing on the cake. Egypt’s euphoric moment of regional prowess, independence, and sovereignty came soon to be severely punished. Since Egypt could not afford to pay the steep $1 billion price tag of the dam, Cairo defiantly announced its nationalization of the Suez Canal in July 1956. The Canal, built by Egyptian forced labor and at the cost of thousands of lives, but operated by the French, was the “lifeline of the British Empire.”33 Three months later Britain, France, and Israel commenced a campaign

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known in Egypt as the “Tri-Partite Aggression,” and known in Western sources as the “Suez Crisis.” The militaries of the three countries waged a war aimed at wresting the Suez Canal away from Cairo. For London, the management of the Suez Canal was not to be entrusted to the autonomous Nasser. For Paris, the war aimed to end Egypt’s support for the Algerian resistance. For Tel Aviv, the war was about eliminating Egypt’s recent military gains, and an opportunity for territorial expansion. Fortunately for Egypt, both Moscow and Washington intervened to demand withdrawal from Egyptian territories. The Soviet position was even more pronounced, as it issued a veiled threat of launching rocket attacks on London, if the aggression was not reversed.34 The Suez Crisis convinced Cairo that its independent line and regional ambitions were not going to be tolerated by Western powers. The best means to counter such interventions in Egyptian sovereign affairs and to further the cause of regional unity (under Cairo’s leadership) was to procure power as much as possible. With France, Britain, Germany, and the United States unwilling to arm the Egyptian military, Moscow became the only plausible option. It was after Suez that the Soviet-Egyptian alliance came truly to be. The alliance was based on the simple, albeit implicit, understanding that the Soviet Union would supply Egypt with the arms it needs to resist external aggression and exert a dominant role in the region.35 In turn, Egypt would provide Moscow with a center of influence in the heart of the Middle East, a conspicuous failure for the Baghdad Pact. Additionally, Moscow would obtain naval access and stations in the Mediterranean and Red seas.36 Two years after the Suez Crisis, Cairo and Damascus declared the establishment of the United Arab Republic (UAR), a Pan-Arab Union reinforced by Soviet arms, and not shy to boast its influence against its neighbors, such as Lebanon and Iraq. As the 1950s drew to an end, it seemed as if Egypt was on its path to genuine regional leadership.

The 1960s: the setback(s) Whilst the 1950s were a decade of triumphs for Cairo (ending British occupation, thwarting a British, French and Israeli invasion, obtaining

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armaments and establishing strong bonds with Syria and the USSR), the 1960s were not as kind. In that decade, Egypt failed to secure its leadership position, as it moved from one setback to another. Not only did it face difficulties playing an influential role in the region, but it also suffered one of the gravest military defeats in its long history in 1967. The Soviet-Egyptian alliance proved to be as tumultuous as the decade was. Cairo constantly complained of Moscow’s unresponsiveness to Egyptian armament requests, while Moscow loathed Cairo’s refusal to march in lockstep with Soviet policies for the region. The two allies appeared invariably hesitant to respond to the demands of each other. In 1961, the Syrian army orchestrated a coup against what they viewed as heavy-handed Egyptian domination of Syria.37 The United Arab Republic, a polity opposed by both Moscow and Washington, ceased to exist in practice.38 The credibility of Egypt’s regional leadership became very much in doubt, and its alliance with the Soviet Union continued to suffer considerably.39 Then another crisis arose in the southern part of the Arabian Peninsula, when a pro-Nasser officer overthrew the autocratic monarch of Yemen in September 1962. This seemingly positive development turned into Egypt’s version of the Vietnam War. The royalists mounted a resistance campaign from Northern Yemen, where military and financial aid poured in from Riyadh. Cairo dispatched an expeditionary force as a gesture of power and support for the revolutionary regime. Soon after, what started as a civil war became a proxy war between Egypt, on the one hand, and Saudi Arabia, on the other.40 For more than four years, Egypt appeared to be bogged down in a fight it could not win, bearing heavy casualties, draining the Egyptian economy and achieving no discernible purpose. Prince Faisal of Saudi Arabia’s admonition that Yemen would turn into a “big grave” for the Egyptian military appeared to be materializing.41 But, there was, in fact, a purpose. Egypt’s project for regional hegemony was at stake. After the fall of the UAR, Egypt felt compelled to prove its seriousness about supporting revolutionary republican regimes and to extend its influence into the backyard of its fiercest Arab competitor at the time, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In doing

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so, Egypt came perilously too close to the oilfields of Arabia, an intolerable measure for Western powers.42 It paid a hefty price in blood and treasure. By paying approximately $100 million per year for its protracted engagement, the Egyptian economy started weakening significantly.43 Egypt’s power was gradually dissipating. In 1967, Egypt faced another credibility test, and then too, failed it resoundingly. Cairo’s relations, or lack thereof, with Israel were invariably precarious. Egypt, as a self-proscribed leader of Arabism, could not tolerate the establishment of a Jewish state on Arab lands. It also did not forget the pains of its army’s catastrophic defeat in 1948, or Israel’s unprovoked aggression in 1956. Nonetheless, Nasser was acutely aware of the disparity of power between his country and his Western-backed adversary. Nasser once said there was no military solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, at least not in his lifetime. His objectives were to be able to “defend Egypt’s borders and deter any [Israeli] adventure against any other Arab country’s borders.”44 This strategy, however, was compromised by Egypt’s costly Yemen adventure. Naturally, Cairo looked to Moscow to beef up its military and economy as the Yemeni quagmire endured. In 1964, Egypt decided to thaw the somewhat icy relations with the USSR caused by Egypt’s unsuccessful union with Syria and her persecution of domestic communists. The Soviets played along. Moscow agreed to supply Egypt with a list of arms it requested, and to reschedule the payment of previous loans over a ten-year period.45 Moscow, additionally, decided to send Egypt shipments of wheat, which Egypt reluctantly used to purchase from the United States.46 Soon after, Egypt came to know of two massive American arms deals with both Israel and Saudi Arabia.47 These deals tilted the balance of power decisively against Egypt. The Soviets, however, were unwilling to provide Egypt with any more than what they had already given them. Egypt’s leadership role became even more costly in 1967. When Cairo received faulty intelligence from Moscow and Damascus that Israel was amassing troops on the Syrian borders, Nasser responded by mobilizing the Egyptian military (the troops not serving in Yemen) into Sinai, expelling the UN peacekeeping mission on the borders, and closing the Straits of Tiran against Israeli navigation.48 These bold acts of swaggering

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were supposed to convey different messages to different people. First, they were aimed at the Arab system, both the republican revolutionary regimes, such as Syria’s and Iraq’s, and the conservative monarchies of the Persian Gulf, particularly Saudi Arabia. After the debacle in Yemen, Egypt wished to demonstrate its position as a dominant regional power, capable of defying the most powerful state in the region. The pro-Egypt demonstration sweeping through many Arab capitals appeared to reinforce that notion.49 Second, they aimed at urging the Soviets to rush to Egypt’s side and offer it diplomatic and military cover. Finally, it was hoped Israel would be deterred from attacking Syria. With news coming of Israel mobilizing its forces to its southern borders with Egypt, the Soviet ambassador to Egypt, Dmitry Pozhidaev, assured Nasser of Moscow’s support and readiness to issue a warning to Tel Aviv that the Soviet Union would take “appropriate measures” and stand by “its Arab friends in battle.”50 This answer did not assuage Cairo’s fears of abandonment, as it deemed the issuance of a verbal warning as an insufficient show of support, given the looming Israeli action. What is more, the Soviet leadership pressured Egypt to open the navigation routes to Israeli ships. And as the anticipated confrontation drew nearer, Moscow informed Shams Badran, then Egyptian Foreign Minister, that it would take an entire month to consider Egypt’s new weapons requests.51 On 5 June 1967, an Israeli air raid bombed all of Egypt’s fighter jets at their bases, followed by the ground invasion of Sinai. It took the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) no longer than six days to defeat comprehensively the armies of Egypt (which lacked air cover or support), Syria, and Jordan, as well as to capture the Sinai Peninsula, the Golan Heights, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Israel had called Egypt’s bluff and made her pay dearly for it. On the first day of the war, one question was raised more than any other among the military and political leadership in Egypt: “[w]here were the Soviets?!”52 The Soviet Union had failed Egypt on several critical levels. First, the Soviet Union had failed to generate diplomatic consensus against the escalation of tensions in the region. No serious attempts were made to reach a diplomatic resolution to the stand-off. Second, Moscow refused sufficiently to arm the Egyptian military either to win the Yemen war, or to be more

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powerful than its neighbor. A quantitative and qualitative gap persisted between Egypt’s military capabilities and those of Israel.53 This gap, in turn, ensured the impossibility of translating Egypt’s regional ambitions into actual strategic gains. Third, the intelligence sharing process was dubious. Not only did Moscow fail to inform Egypt of Israel’s surprise attack, but it had given Cairo inaccurate intelligence regarding an imminent Israeli assault on Syria. The latter act caused Nasser to embark on his ill-fated brinksmanship, according to Egyptian officials at the time.54 Finally, the Soviet reaction to the Israeli attack was rather underwhelming. Neither did Moscow directly intervene, nor did it send immediate reinforcements to the Arab militaries, as they had once promised. In particular, Moscow did not send fighter jets to fill the void of an Egyptian army fighting an all-out war without an air force.55 A thinly veiled threat from Moscow to Washington to curb Israel’s continued violations of the cease-fire agreement was answered by the deployment of the Sixth American Fleet along Israel’s shores. Moscow did nothing as it watched the fall of the Golan Heights to Israel.56 In the aftermath of the war, the Soviets continued to complain of Egypt’s unpaid debts.57 All these factors drove Egypt’s Minister of Defense, Abd al-Hakim Amr, to grill the Soviet ambassador over possible “Soviet-American complicity” in the attack.58 The Six-Day War had the paradoxical repercussion of making the Egyptian government cognizant of the limitations of its alliance with the Soviet Union, and also making it more dependent on Moscow for weaponry. The war had an even more profound impact on Egypt’s strategic posture. Egypt, having lost sizable territories to Israel, reoriented its purpose away from regional hegemony and into independence and territorial integrity. The first manifestation of this reorientation was the hasty withdrawal of troops from Yemen. Additionally, with the loss of the Suez Canal’s revenues and the Sinai oil fields, Egypt had to seek aid and loans from conservative Gulf monarchies, the very targets of Nasser’s attempts at dominance.59 No longer did Egypt attempt to destabilize those regimes or extend its influence in their backyard. In spite of the humiliating defeat of their most crucial ally in the Middle East, the Soviets still did not see the necessity to give the Egyptians all they needed. They insisted, for instance, that all Soviet

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military experts operating in Egypt must be paid by Cairo in hard currency (an additional burden on the paralyzed Egyptian economy).60 This, however, was not the most vexing dispute between Cairo and Moscow. The fundamental area of disagreement pertained to Egypt’s determination to reverse its dwindling fortunes by preparing for another round of armed conflict with Israel. The Soviet leadership viewed the Egyptian military as incompetent and incapable of winning a war, regardless of the number or type of weapons it possessed.61 This dispute caused a widening rupture in mutual trust. Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin warned Egyptian officials that we do not think a war is necessary to recapture your occupied lands. A complete chance must be given to a political settlement. In all cases, I urge you to recognize that we are not ready to enter a dangerous confrontation with the United States.62 He argued that peace could only be attained if there is a semblance of power parity between Egypt and Israel.63

The 1970s: the end In the period between 1967 and 1973, Egypt’s frustration with inadequate weapons’ supplies grew even deeper. To be sure, by agreeing to deploying and operating anti-aircraft SAM-3 missiles in 1970, the Soviets expanded their mission in Egypt to include safeguarding Egyptian aerial space. This came following a number of devastating Israeli assaults on civilian targets deep inside Egypt.64 But even then, this step was made only after repeated Egyptian requests as well as complaints of inadequate arms supplies and delays in shipments.65 The Soviets were arguably more interested in bolstering Egyptian defenses rather than buttressing their offensive capacities. General Muhammad Fahmy, chairman of the Aerial Defense division of the Egyptian military, complained once that he could not be expected to wage an offensive war with defensive weapons.66 They even exercised pressure on Cairo to halt its war of attrition against Israeli targets in Sinai. According to President Sadat, during the War of Attrition (1968–70), Egypt’s

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artillery ran out of ammunition due to consistently delayed Soviet supplies. “What I requested during the War of Attrition arrived after the onset of the October War in 1973 . . . I was compelled to obtain weapons from Syria and Iraq.”67 Furthermore, Moscow turned down Egypt’s request for “the deterrent weapon,” or the fighter jet capable of striking deep inside Israel.68 More ominously for Egypt, the USSR did not allow Egypt to reach a situation of power parity with Israel, let alone become more powerful.69 This was understandable from the prism of Cold War politics. Moscow sought a relaxation of tensions, or a détente, with Washington at the time. It would not permit the ArabIsraeli conflict to derail such a momentous process. In the records of a phone conversation, President Sadat bitterly blasted the Soviet paranoia of being involved in a clash with the United States over the EgyptianIsraeli conflict while America relentlessly aided Israel.70 Sadat appeared to add fuel to the fire by expelling a number of proSoviet ministers from his cabinet in 1971. Moscow had its doubts of Sadat’s loyalty to begin with. They quickly requested that he sign an alliance treaty, leading to the “Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation.”71 But Sadat saw advantages in reassuring the Americans that the treaty would not negatively affect the Egyptian attitude toward Washington, nor would it preclude a resumption of diplomatic ties following a potential Israeli withdrawal from occupied Egyptian lands.72 Egypt had come to the realization that while they needed the Soviets to prepare for war, they would rely even more on the Americans once the war ceased. Given Egypt’s inability to mount a total war against Israel, the strategy was to wage a limited-aims attack that would give incentives to all parties to the conflict to pursue an acceptable resolution. Heartened by the new treaty and by prospective weapons deliveries, Sadat infamously declared 1971 the “Year of Decisiveness,” implying a war with Israel. Typically, Moscow failed to provide Egypt with the arms it had hoped for, in part due to its commitment to India in the Pakistani-Indian war of 1971. Sadat thought it was a Soviet conspiracy to compromise his credibility with Egyptians, perhaps a punishment for the sacking of pro-Soviet members of government.73 In 1972, Sadat’s frustration continued to fester, as more and more delivery dates passed unmet. This drove him to wonder exasperatedly: “[w]hat is the

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point of devising a politico-military strategy based on promises and vows, when they are just words?! How can our strategy be guided by a mirage?!”74 His hopes were dashed when Brezhnev and Nixon issued a joint statement calling for the “creation of a military détente in the Middle East.”75 It was in this environment that Egypt declared the expulsion of Soviet military experts. As Sadat put it, “the Soviets needed an electric shock. They needed something to hit them and electrocute them that they may regain consciousness.”76 This unprecedented act of defiance indeed constituted a jolt to Soviet calculations. Fearing they might lose Egypt, they gave the green light to weapons shipments that were central to Egypt’s military campaign in 1973, including fighter jets such as MiG 23s and Soukhoi 20s, and R 17 E missiles.77 Above all, expelling the Soviet experts was a watershed event in the SovietEgyptian alliance. It epitomized Cairo’s impatience with inadequate Soviet support in the run-up to the most decisive war in the modern history of Egypt, the Yom Kippur war (or October War) of 1973. The bet paid off handsomely. Sadat sarcastically described it: “I took off my shoes and hit them on the head with it . . . [the Soviets] then returned to ‘kiss my hands.’”78 Egypt made considerable tactical and strategic gains against Israel in the October/Yom Kippur War of 1973. The modest losses of the Egyptian military when crossing the Suez Canal were surprising to the Soviets, who had forecasted the death of tens of thousands of Egyptian troops during the campaign. In this major event, analogous to 1967, Cairo was frustrated with its ally’s lagging and insufficient military support. In particular, Moscow did not supply Egypt with muchneeded tanks during the war or immediately after the first cease-fire. Sadat memorably lamented to the Soviet ambassador that had Moscow provided his army with 100 tanks, the “face of history would have changed.”79 Furthermore, the Soviets refused to replenish Egypt’s destroyed arms after the cease-fire, unlike what the United States did with Israel. Even more troubling was Moscow’s demand that Egypt start paying back its scheduled debts during the war.80 Although the Egyptian-Soviet relationship was marred with suspicion, mistrust, and disagreements, Egypt still needed the Soviets to

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solidify Cairo’s negotiating position. Meanwhile, Moscow continued to criticize Egypt’s increasing diplomatic dealings with Washington, and its newly liberalized economy. When Egypt insisted on pursuing those policies, Moscow denied Egypt new weapons as well as essential repairs to Egypt’s fighter jets. When Egypt turned to India for these repairs, the Soviets pressured New Delhi not to agree to the request. The Soviets were adamant, moreover, that Egypt make an annual $500 million in debt payments, a sum Egypt simply could not afford.81 In the meantime, Washington continued to arm Israel with some of the most advanced armaments at the time, thus widening the imbalance of power in the region.82 Then Egyptian Foreign Minister, Ismail Fahmy, soberly noted that “after twenty years of cooperation with the Soviet Union, Egypt is still incapable of confronting Israeli aggression, let alone liberate occupied Arab lands, despite its larger material and human resources.”83 The preceding line underscores the crux of the schism. The Soviet-Egyptian alliance prepared Egypt neither to undertake its erstwhile project of regional dominance, nor to properly defend its territories against Israel. Cairo’s main concern became territorial integrity rather than hegemony, and, even then, the alliance with Moscow proved futile. After the signing of the second cease-fire agreement, Egypt became even more certain of the indispensability of reaching an accommodation with Washington that would help recover occupied lands.84 On 27 May 1976, Sadat abrogated the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, thus heralding the de facto and de jure ends of the Soviet-Egyptian alliance. The frustrating alliance was no more.

Conclusion The fateful decision to end the Egypt-USSR alliance was based on two major considerations. First, Cairo experienced a salient sense of abandonment from its superpower patron, the Soviet Union. Egypt did not reap the full benefits of allying with a superpower, the way Israel did and continues to do. This was particularly palpable not only in the late 1950s and early 1960s when Nasser’s Egypt was intent on expanding its regional influence and hegemony, but also when Egypt’s

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strategic posture turned toward independence and territorial integrity. In both cases, Moscow was not forthcoming with the assistance Egypt required either to dominate the region, or even liberate its occupied territories. The Soviets, not unlike the Americans, were more interested in maintaining the balance of power in the Middle East for fear of further escalation. Cairo’s military needs were for the most part unsatisfactorily met. In short, Egypt felt abandoned by the USSR. Second, when Egypt forewent its aspirations for regional supremacy or even strategic superiority vis-à-vis Israel, the alliance’s diminishing utility became difficult to overlook. Once Egypt had achieved its objective of pushing the negotiations process forward with the October/Yom Kippur war of 1973, the need for Moscow became much less than the need for Washington. Only Washington, as Egypt reasoned, could force a settlement on Israel. This was a period of strategic retrenchment for the Egyptians. Cairo desperately needed to address its debilitated economy and war-exhausted military. The association with Moscow, therefore, had the potential to complicate unnecessarily the foregoing strategic transformation, and pin America further on Israel’s side. The Soviet-Egyptian alliance had outlived its usefulness. Painfully, Egypt came to realize the illusiveness of its regional ambitions, and the reluctance of any superpower to back such destabilizing objectives. This alliance had to end.

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CONCLUSIONS Melissa P. Yeager and Michael McKoy

This volume (and the conference that gave birth to it) was organized around the theme of why alliances succeed or fail. In addition to the authors here, the conference saw three other contributors, whose work complements this volume. Evan Resnick used case studies of US “alliances of convenience” to test rival political theories on alliance formation drawn from Neo-Realist, Two-Level Games, and Neo-classical Realist schools of political thought. His investigations include US policy on the Iran-Iraq war, the first Gulf War, and the twenty-first century conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, contributing a wealth of empirical research.1 Joshua Su-Ya Wu and Xiaoyu Pu used the 2001 Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to assess why states enter into alliances in the twenty-first century. They examine the SCO’s effectiveness in facilitating cooperation in the military, in dealing with non-traditional security threats, and in the economic arena, concluding that it has not been particularly effective in any of these areas, so that an explanation for its continued existence must be sought elsewhere. They argue that it can be understood best as a mechanism for Chinese consolidation of international legitimacy and great power status. Their stance that the SCO demonstrates “the growing role of status signals and legitimization strategies of rising great powers” in alliance formation echoes Yeager’s suggestion that states may have hidden or ulterior motives in engaging in negotiations or signing alliance agreements.2 The book began with four main research questions. First, what are the common denominators shared by successful alliances? Second, why

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do pacts and alliances disintegrate? Third, is the eventual demise of pacts and alliances inevitable? Finally, what are the implications of these issues on pact and alliance making today? Perhaps ironically, the most consistent theme throughout all the chapters is the general reluctance of states to form alliances at all. Whether deemed successes or failures, most of the states examined here were decidedly unenthusiastic about making a strong commitment and would have much preferred to maintain freedom of action. On the other hand, they were just as likely to prefer their alliance partner(s) bear the costs of maintaining their security. All the alliances analyzed here demonstrated tension between a desire for freedom of action and the hope of free-riding on others’ security provision. For those alliances considered successes, how were they able to overcome these problems? For those considered failures, why could they not avoid succumbing to them? The successes William Stueck emphasizes the continued significance of traditional understandings of power politics over cultural dissonance. Both parties benefit tangibly from the alliance: South Korea’s security is guaranteed, and the United States is able to project power and secure its interests in a region containing present and future rivals. Moreover, Stueck’s scholarship buttresses Jean-Bertrand Ribat’s theory in the immediately following chapter: arguably, the United States plays the role of coordinator in its long-running alliance with South Korea. The bilateral, rather than multilateral, structure of the alliance should not obscure this dynamic. As with Britain in the Sixth Coalition, the US is able to play this role because of its vast resources and geographic invulnerability (at least with respect to North Korea). Yet the inverse is just as important in regards to South Korea. Its limited resources and vulnerability to North Korean aggression and Chinese dominance require a continued American presence, despite the occasional desire on both sides for an American drawdown. The most recent attacks by North Korea on South Korean islands in November 2010 again demonstrated the instability of the Korean Peninsula and the importance of the US-ROK alliance, as the US Navy went in to signal clearly

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its solidarity with its long-time ally, and also ensured that no further action was taken by either side.3 Jean-Bertrand Ribat, in his case studies of the alliances against Napoleon, provides perhaps the most compelling answer here to the question of how alliances overcome the problems of aversion to commitment and hope of free-riding. Ribat builds on the commonly held realist proposition that alliances form to check the rise of hegemons. However, he adds a new condition necessary for the success of such an alliance: the presence of a “coordinator,” a great power endowed with unique capacities of invulnerability and resources, enabling it to encourage other states to cooperate in an alliance. Britain played this role in the Sixth Coalition against Napoleon. Yet as Ribat clearly highlights, the British did not learn how to play this role overnight. Rather they had to learn through great trial and error about the competing and conflicting interests of their potential coalition partners. Every state had its own interests, and every state was just as willing to negotiate with Napoleon as they were with the British in order to achieve that goal. It was only when the British were willing essentially to outbid Napoleon that they were able to play the role of coordinator. Two of the remaining “success” chapters discuss perhaps the classic example of the United States serving as the alliance coordinator for vulnerable partners: NATO. The United States was a reluctant security provider to Western Europe, and was even more so in regard to Turkey. James C. Helicke details how the United States aided not only a vulnerable country, but a vulnerable regime. The Democrats came to power in Turkey in 1950 in part on a promise to strengthen ties to the West against a feared Soviet expansionism. The new government even took the bold step of being the second country to join the US-UN mission in South Korea. Yet such boldness apparently had little effect on persuading the United States to extend its security umbrella to Turkey. This reluctance, in turn, led many in Turkey to consider taking a more neutral stance and even to consider including Marxists in a broader coalition government. Only when the pro-Western government was threatened did NATO finally approve Turkish membership. This result also had the effect of helping to solidify the Democrats’ increasingly dictatorial control over Turkey, leading Helicke to deem it a “qualified success.”

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The willingness of alliance members to extend membership as a means of stabilizing the domestic politics of a non-member is an interesting motivation necessitating further study.4 Mark Rice goes beyond NATO’s creation to the “nuclear dilemma” of the 1960s. Rice shows the United States again playing the role of alliance coordinator, in perhaps the truest sense of the term. The Soviet launching of Sputnik put an apparent end to American invulnerability, as the Soviets demonstrated their new ability to target American cities with nuclear-armed missiles. America’s NATO allies feared the United States would abandon its nuclear-based defense of Europe, a fear further exacerbated by the Kennedy-McNamara plan to move toward “Flexible Response,” which de-emphasized Massive Retaliation as a response to Soviet aggression. The United States tried to fulfil its role as alliance leader by offering different plans for nuclear sharing while maintaining US control. These plans however were supported only by the West Germans, who saw the plans as an avenue to break out of their quasiostracism within the Western alliance. All other NATO partners were skeptical, with the French being downright hostile. According to Rice, the solution to this problem came about largely through happenstance, as McNamara brought together the NATO allies to talk out their differences and provide consistent consultation. The United States demonstrated its leadership by being a true alliance coordinator, not leading through diktat or decree but rather through genuine coordination based on distinct interests and concerns. Differences are a part of every alliance, but like the British before them, the Americans learned through trial and error how to lead a long-lasting alliance. In what ways, then, were these alliances “successful”? The answer to that question, of course, depends on how one defines “success.” Defeating a common threat, achievement of common or national goals, longevity, prestige: all might be counted as “successes.” The Republic of Korea survives as both an independent state and a marker of US power projection into the twenty-first century. The Sixth Coalition, anchored by Britain, was successful in defeating Napoleon: it was also the foundation for the Congress system that shaped Europe’s diplomatic politics until the First World War. Turkey won access to Western collective security, while its governing parties gained multiple domestic

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benefits at the same time. NATO members navigated a changing security environment while maintaining at least the appearance of collective governance and without losing members resistant to particular changes. The case studies here therefore suggest that alliance success is governed by factors more complicated than sharing a common enemy alone. Certainly it is a starting point, and the continued perception of such a common threat can sustain an alliance through periods of difficult relations caused by “mismatched” leaders (Bush and Roh in the US-ROK alliance) or policy differences (the US and UK over Vietnam), for example. However, other factors can both make alliances more cohesive, and allow them to survive the passing of a previous shared threat or adversary: inertia and vested interests must surely be considered here. Paradoxically, McKoy’s divergent preferred outcomes in the failed Sèvres Pact is one example; the continued existence of NATO after the end of the Cold War is another. The failures If alliance success is dependent on a resourceful, invulnerable alliance coordinator, does the absence of such a coordinator explain the cases provided here of alliance failure? The collective action problem is most directly taken up in Michael McKoy’s account of the formation of the Sèvres Pact. Yet McKoy’s emphasis is more on the improbability of the pact’s formation rather than its quick demise. Given this improbability, it could arguably be considered more of a success than a failure. Moreover, instead of claiming that a coordinator was necessary for formation, McKoy argues rather counter-intuitively that disparate, though not conflicting, interests actually facilitate coalition formation. Nevertheless, he does concede that the Sèvres coalition would not have been possible without French coordination. British and Israeli interests were too far apart for them to have come together without a mutually trusted ally. Trust therefore is another important component in the role of alliance coordinator. Returning to Ribat’s argument concerning the anti-Napoleon coalitions, it may have been that not only did Britain need multiple opportunities to learn how to play the role of alliance coordinator, but the British also needed to gain sufficient

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trust from its would-be allies. Bringing together Ribat and McKoy’s arguments then, both trust and mistrust have important roles to play in alliance formation, which makes the difficulty of alliance formation and cohesion all the more evident. In detailing the failed reunion of the Triple Entente in 1939, Teddy J. Uldricks considers the converse of the Sèvres Pact: a coalition that, at least in retrospect, should have formed but did not. One could argue that it once again fits the alliance coordinator model, that had Britain acted as a coordinator, the Entente would have been reborn. Yet Uldricks describes the British failure as more than one of coordination: Britain failed to be an attractive alliance partner at all. The Entente faced a commitment problem rather than a coordination problem. A coordination problem is one of planning and communication, while a commitment problem is more directly about whether actors will follow through on what they promise to do. Britain and France’s willingness to attack Germany if Germany attacked Poland or the Soviet Union was the central problem. Yet what of McKoy’s claim that mistrust can facilitate coalition formation? Certainly the Entente had mistrust in abundance. McKoy, however, states that all potential partners must agree on the same target. Uldricks describes how the British could never convince the Soviets that the USSR was not ultimately the real target, nor could the Soviets convince the British and the Poles that Soviet troops would leave Poland once the fighting was over (and as it turned out, the Soviets did not leave). While mistrust can help foster commitment, therefore, since neither side is convinced the other will have its interests at heart, it cannot facilitate agreement on the target. Without commitment there can be no coordination, and without either there can be no alliance. Melissa P. Yeager’s account of the attempt at and the failure of the European Defense Community (EDC) further demonstrates both the role of mistrust in alliance formation and the role of trust in alliance failure. The EDC would not have been necessary if the Western European states trusted an unconstrained, rearmed Western Germany. The destruction of the Second World War, however, made such a proposition impossible. In addition, most of the states who signed up saw a better alternative in the US-led NATO alliance. Indeed, the story

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of the failure of the EDC is in many ways the story of the success of NATO. According to Yeager, all of the states that ratified the EDC, save West Germany, did so largely to curry favor with the United States. They put much greater trust in US protection than in the strictly European alliance. NATO was also seen as a better solution to the aforementioned tension between the desire for personal autonomy and the desire to avoid the costs of security provision. Yeager states that the biggest apprehension concerning the EDC was the feared loss of sovereignty. NATO membership allowed European states to keep their own militaries while still benefiting from American protection. It is no wonder then that the United States was one of the leading proponents of the EDC. With the French taking the blame for sinking the EDC, the other European states could more confidently claim that they tried their best but now needed a US security guarantee. As with South Korea, European weakness led to a US commitment. The dissolution of the Moscow-Cairo alliance is perhaps the most straightforward of the “failure” accounts in this volume. Once it lost its usefulness to one of the partners, Cairo, it ended. However, as Yasser El-Shimy rightly points out, this outcome runs counter to realist balancing logic, which would suggest that alliances end once the unifying threat is no longer threatening: following the Six Day War, Israel was stronger than ever. In response, Egypt did in fact cling to the Soviet alliance even more, as a source of continued armament to fight for redemption. The Soviets, however, became more focused on restraining their ally, particularly after the disastrous War of Attrition, in which Egypt suffered another loss, and the Soviets nearly came into direct conflict with the Israelis.5 Ironically, this war also persuaded Sadat that Israel could not be defeated on the battlefield, which therefore reduced the usefulness of the Soviet alliance. The Soviets were helpful as arms suppliers, but once Sadat became convinced that victory could not be won completely through arms, the Soviet alliance became obsolete. Sadat instead sought to move toward the United States, hoping that the Americans could help to negotiate a return of the Sinai Peninsula. Getting American attention and respect, however, required a demonstration of battlefield prowess, hence the launching of the October War in 1973. Once the goal was accomplished, which in another irony was

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only possible through Soviet supplies, the Soviet alliance was officially abandoned. Once both sides agreed military engagement with Israel was futile, there was nothing left to hold the alliance together. Special relationship, special partners The unique quality of the Anglo-American alliance, which is frustratingly captured in the title of Kathleen Burk’s piece, required a category all its own: “the special relationship.” The special relationship as described by Burk brings to mind the “beautiful friendship” between Humphrey Bogart’s Rick and Claude Rains’ Captain Renault in Casablanca. Throughout the movie, Rick and Renault have a winking respect for each other, even as they stand as quasi-adversaries. Only at the end, when their interests are most explicitly aligned, does Rick state that “this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” The friendship existed from the beginning but was unacknowledged, for unclear reasons. So it is with the Anglo-American relationship. They served as quasi-adversaries for over a century, even as their common ancestry, culture, and interests suggested that there was also a common affection. Yet this affection did not become explicit until, like Rick and Renault, they stood together against the Nazi empire. In the context of this collected volume, this “special relationship” is also noteworthy in that Britain and the United States are the pivot point for every alliance chronicled here, albeit the latter more than the former. British and/or American ability or inability to serve as alliance coordinator often was the determining factor in the success or failure of an alliance. American and British efforts and consent were crucial in the four accounts of alliance “success” concerning the Korean-American alliance, the anti-Napoleon coalitions, Turkey’s accession into NATO, and the maintenance of the NATO nuclear deterrence in the 1960s. The two states’ effect on alliance failure is also felt, if not as explicitly stated. The Sèvres Pact was arguably the greatest test of the AngloAmerican relationship in the postwar era. The British depended on American neutrality for success, while also concealing their plans from their closest ally. The Americans were furious when they learned of the British duplicity and were uncompromising in demanding an end to all

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operations. The United States in a sense acted as the anti-coordinator, putting direct pressure on the British to withdraw, which in turn forced the French to withdraw, and finally, the Israelis. The failure of the second Triple Entente is explicitly attributed to the British, yet the United States was also absent. It too was (eventually) a member of the victorious the Second World War coalition, but it was absent from any discussions of containing the resurgent German threat. It is perhaps easy to blame the British for insufficient action, but the United States should likewise be held to account for taking no discernible action whatsoever. The American role in the failures of the EDC and the MoscowCairo alliance highlights a different dynamic of alliance creation and cohesion, often overlooked: the existence of an outside option.6 The EDC failed largely because all of its potential members, ultimately including a very reluctant France, saw the US-led NATO as a better option. The American security umbrella would mean greater security at a lower cost with greater maintenance of individual state autonomy. The Moscow-Cairo alliance failed once Sadat recognized that defeating Israel on the battlefield was a near impossible endeavor. This realization came in part because of American military support for Israel. Sadat instead recognized that the United States would be a better partner than the Soviet Union in achieving its goal of the return of the Sinai Peninsula and the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The two remaining research questions have been less explicitly treated here. First, is the eventual demise of pacts and alliances inevitable? The case studies here suggest that yes, no alliance or pact can last forever. Some, like the Sèvres Pact and Moscow-Cairo alliance, were short-lived. Two – the 1939 Triple Entente and EDC – were stillborn. Others, however, have been remarkably long-lived: the US-ROK alliance, NATO, and the Anglo-American pact/alliance/friendship. All three of these examples have survived dramatic upheavals in international relations. Nevertheless, it is straightforward to imagine (predict?) situations in which their demise could become more likely: the fall of the totalitarian regime in North Korea, for example, or an end to the American willingness to fund Europe’s defense. Finally, the implications of these issues on pact and alliance making today are both multifaceted and difficult to generalize. Governments,

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polities, and international relations are not stable: the game is changing all the time. However, understanding the varied motivations that governments have in making, maintaining, and breaking pacts and alliances must surely be an advantage in both daily diplomacy and also game-changing events such as the fall of the Warsaw Pact. In addition to the simple motivation of countering threats or checking a rising hegemon, negotiating for the sake of negotiating, or to be seen to be a team player, or to avoid being blamed for a failure, is clearly an important part of alliance politics. Participating for short term and/or domestic gain is also key: presenting one face at home and another in bilateral or multilateral fora is not at all unusual, as any British practice in any EU negotiation makes evident. Alliance creation and maintenance, it is suggested here, emerge from a delicate balance between trust and mistrust. One fact is clear: during the twentieth century the United States displaced Britain, in Madeline Albright’s words, as the “indispensible nation.”7 History compels the expectation that the baton of indispensibility will be passed on again. To whom?

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Introduction 1. According to Yale University political scientist Alastair Smith, alliances formed among bellicose nations make the probability of war greater, whereas the formation of defensive alliances diminishes the likelihood of war, at least among the nations in such alliances. See Alastair Smith, ‘Alliance formation and war’, International Studies Quarterly xxxix/4 (December 1995), pp.405–25. 2. Donald S. Detwiler, Germany: A Short History (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1999), pp.143–6; Lynn Abrams, Bismarck and the German Empire, 1871–1918 (New York: Routledge, 2006), pp.67–70. 3. James Joll, The Origins of the First World War (London: Longman, 1992), pp.42–68. 4. In 1795, the eminent German philosopher Immanuel Kant published an article called ‘Perpetual peace,’ in which he argued that the widespread adoption of constitutional democracy was the basis for any real longstanding peace. It was not until the 1970s, however, that social scientists began discussing “democratic peace theory.” An early champion was the political scientist R.J. Rummel. For further discussion, see his Understanding Conflict and War, Vols. 1–5 (Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1975–1981). 5. Paul Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics, 1763–1848 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1994); A.J.P. Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, 1848–1918 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1954). 6. L.P. Jacks, ‘The frailty of alliances’, Transactions of the Grotius Society xxiii (1937), pp.41–2. 7. Mancur Olson, Jr. and Richard Zeckhauser, ‘An economic theory of alliances’, Review of Economies and Statistics xliii/3 (August 1966), p.279.

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8. Emerson M. S. Niou and Peter C. Ordeshook, ‘Alliances in anarchic international systems’, International Studies Quarterly xxxviii/2 (June 1994), pp.167–91. 9. David G. Sirmon and Peter J. Lane, ‘A model of cultural differences and international alliance performance’, Journal of International Business Studies xxxv/4 (July 2004), p.306. 10. Two of the papers from this conference have been or will be published elsewhere. See Evan N. Resnick, ‘Strange bedfellows: US bargaining behavior with allies of convenience’, International Security xxxv/3 (Winter 2010/11), pp.144–84. For Joshua Su-Ya Wu and Xiaoyu Pu’s paper, ‘Much ado about nothing? The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and the puzzle of 21st century alliances’, please contact the authors at [email protected].

Chapter 1 Power and culture: the origins and durability of the Korean-American alliance 1. I wish to thank Frank Costigliola and Robert McMahon for valuable comments on an earlier draft of this chapter. I include credibility within the category of international stability because the United States has generally regarded outcomes in Korea, whether in terms of the survival of South Korea or the prevention of North Korea from becoming a nuclear power, as of considerable regional and even global significance. 2. Happily, I have plenty of company in this endeavor. For some examples of work by younger historians in the subfield of diplomatic history that integrates old and new approaches, see David Webster, ‘Regimes in motion: the Kennedy Administration and Indonesia’s New Frontier, 1960–1962’, Diplomatic History xxxiii/1 (January 2009), pp.95–123; Sarah Ellen Graham, ‘American propaganda, the Anglo-American alliance, and the “delicate question” of Indian self-determination’, Diplomatic History xxxiii/2 (April 2009), pp.223–59; Jeffrey James Byrne, ‘“Our own special brand of socialism”: Algeria and the contest of modernization in the 1960s’, Diplomatic History xxxiii/3 (June 2009), pp.427–47; and Ryan Irwin, ‘A wind of change? White redoubt and the postcolonial moment’, Diplomatic History xxxiii/5 (November 2009), pp.927–56. 3. William Stueck, The Road to Confrontation: US Policy toward China and Korea, 1947–1950 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1981), p.86, and James Irving Matray, The Reluctant Crusade: American Foreign Policy in Korea, 1941–1950 (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1984), pp.128–9. See also Secretary of Defense James Forrestal’s memo to Secretary of State George Marshall of 26 [29] September 1947, in US Department of

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5. 6.

7. 8. 9. 10.

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State, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1947, Vol. 6 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1972), pp.817–18 (henceforth volumes in this series will be cited as FRUS with the year and volume following. FRUS, 1947, Vol. 6, p.744. At a later point, the document did anticipate the reasoning of the Joint Chiefs in September: “this suspicion could quite possibly be dissipated and our prestige in these same western European countries enhanced if a survey of our resources indicated we could not afford to resist our ideological opponents on all fronts and we publicly announced abandonment of further aid to Korea in order to concentrate our aid in areas of greater strategic importance to us.” Stueck, Road to Confrontation, p.85. This point is made at greater length in William Stueck and Yi Boram, ‘“An alliance forged in blood”: the US occupation of Korea, the Korean War, and the Korean-American Alliance’, Journal of Strategic Studies xxxiii/2 (Spring 2010), pp.177–209. Stueck, Road to Confrontation, pp.102–9, 153–9. Ibid., pp.88–91, 95–8. FRUS, 1949, Vol. 7, pp.1010–21. Lieutenant General John R. Hodge, the commander of the US occupation, voiced extreme frustration with Koreans in an April 1946 message to Tokyo. Koreans were “the most difficult of all peoples I have ever encountered,” he declared. “Independence” was their “one common idea,” and to them it meant “that all should be freed from any distasteful work and from any and all restraint on actions or words.” “Stubborn . . . highly contentious among themselves . . . highly volatile and unpredictable . . . [possessing] low individual integrity . . . [and] low capacity for citizenship,” they were “pro self and anti most everything else.” “Their history as a corruptly governed hermit nation before Japanese domination,” he continued, “plus the years as a slave nation of Japan and the high illiteracy rate, operate[d] greatly against their capacity for competent self-rule in modern times.” Quoted in US Command in Korea, Historical Office, ‘History of US Army Forces in Korea’, Vol. 1, chapter 1, pp.143–4. This unpublished manuscript is available at the US Army Center for Military History, Ft. McNair, Washington, DC. Hodge’s feelings were neither universal nor uncommon among Americans who participated in the occupation. Young Ick Lew, Byong-kie Song, Ho-min Yang, and Hy-sop Lim, Korean Perceptions of the United States: A History of Their Origins and Formation, trans. Michael Finch (Seoul: Jimoondang, 2006), pp.315–18. Author interview with Muccio, 27 December 1973, Washington, DC. Allan R. Millett, The War for Korea, 1950–1951: They Came from the North (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2010), pp.26–8, 30–4. In

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fairness to Muccio, he did warn Washington that a dangerous imbalance had emerged in the strength of ROK and DPRK armed forces, to the advantage of the latter. I have analyzed this decision in several places, always with the same basic interpretation. See, for instance, Stueck, Road to Confrontation, pp.185–90. John Kie-chiang Oh, ‘The Forgotten Soldiers of the Korean War’, in M. F. Wilkinson (ed), The Korean War at Fifty: International Perspectives (Lexington, VA: Virginia Military Institute, 2004), pp.101–15. Jack Cox, who graduated from West Point in 1949 and served in the Korean War as an army lieutenant from October 1950 to February 1952, recalled recently that he heard all kinds of negative stories about Koreans before he went to the peninsula, including that they would constantly steal from Americans and would never truly be friends with foreigners. He took about three months to develop a positive attitude toward Koreans. The realization that South Koreans really cared about their country, were willing to fight and die for it, and were more often than not willing to police each other to contain pilfering from their foreign benefactors produced the change. Author interview with Cox, 26 November 2007, Fayetteville, North Carolina. A wealth of sources provide documentation on the gap in material conditions for Americans in Korea and the host population. See, for example, Howard A. Trammell, ‘Korean War Notes’, unpublished memoir, Matthew B. Ridgway Papers, Military History Institute, US Army War College, Carlisle, PA (henceforth papers in this repository will be referred to as MHI), and Stewart Yeo Papers, Box 2, MHI. Both Trammell and Yeo served in the US army in Korea during the war. For a poignant account of the implications of feeding KATUSAs, US army rations by the last UN commander during the war, see Mark W. Clark, From the Danube to the Yalu (New York: Harper & Row, 1954), pp.181–5. The standard account of the steel seizure episode is Maeva Marcus, Truman and the Steel Seizure Case: The Limits of Presidential Power (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977). For a brief, more recent account, see Alonzo L. Hamby, Man of the People: A Life of Harry S. Truman (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp.593–97. William Stueck, The Korean War: An International History (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), pp.277–8, 316–17. Keyes Beech, Tokyo and Points East (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1954), p.220. For coverage of the incident, see Stueck, Korean War, pp.330–9. NCS 118/2, approved by President Truman on 20 December 1952, stated that “abandonment of our commitment in Korea . . . would irreparably damage the position of the United States in Asia and throughout the world, signify

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the surrender of the often-proclaimed UN objectives for Korea, and shatter the prestige of the UN”, FRUS, 1952–1954, Vol. 7, p.1389. A planning paper produced during the first days of the Eisenhower administration stated that this assessment “remains valid, both in terms of the UN moral commitment to the ROK and the US strategic interest in the defense of Japan and the western Pacific area”: ‘Strategy in Korea’, Box 4297, Central Decimal Files, 1950–1954, RG59, National Archives II. General Mark Clark later recalled with reference to the crisis Rhee provoked on the eve of an armistice that the ROK leader understood that he possessed a “psychological whammy” on the United States, “that no matter what happened we could not, after three years of war, after all the blood and treasure we lost, let Korea go to the Reds by default because of a quarrel ‘in the family.’” Clark, Danube to the Yalu, p.272. President Dwight D. Eisenhower expressed similar sentiments in November 1953, at a point in which Rhee was threatening to disrupt the armistice. When it was suggested in a top secret meeting of Eisenhower’s advisers that the United States might consider threatening to withdraw from Korea, the president blurted out that “it was impossible to contemplate walking out of Korea. To do so would be to cross off three years of terrible sacrifice”, FRUS, 1952–1954, Vol. 15, p.1597. FRUS, 1952–1954, Vol. 15, p.1360. Ibid., pp.1331n, 1339–40, 1487–88. Ibid., p.1487. For the text of the treaty online, see www.avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/ korea001.asp. Concerns about entrapment and abandonment receive prominent attention in the political science literature on alliances. In a notable application of that literature to the international politics of Northeast Asia, see Victor Cha, Alignment Despite Antagonism: The US-Korea-Japan Security Triangle (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999). Cha also discusses the US concern about entrapment in Korea during the 1950s in his ‘“Rhee-straint”: the origins of the U.S.-ROK Alliance’, International Journal of Korean Studies, XV (Spring/Summer 2011), pp.1–15. See my ‘Reassessing US strategy in the aftermath of the Korean War’, Orbis liii (Fall 2009), pp.577–9, 584. Marc Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace: The Making of the European Settlement, 1945–1963 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999), pp.144–54. For three high-level statements along these lines, see FRUS, 1955–57, Vol. 23, pp.68–71, 108–10, 309–14; Vol. 15, pp.1804–6. I deal with this issue in greater depth in my ‘Ambivalent occupation: US armed forces in Korea, 1953 to the present’, in R. Wampler (ed), Trilateralism

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31. 32.

33.

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and Beyond (forthcoming with Kent State University Press, 2011). For an analysis of Eisenhower’s reassessment of US strategy, see Stueck, ‘Reassessing US strategy’. On South Korean elections during the 1960s, see Donald Stone Macdonald, ‘Korea and the ballot: the international dimension in Korean political development as seen in elections’ (PhD dissertation, George Washington University, 1978). On the settlement with Japan, see Chae-jin Lee and Hideo Sato, US Policy toward Japan and Korea: A Changing Influence Relationship (New York: Praeger, 1982). The most detailed treatment of the South Korean commitment to Vietnam is Kil J. Yi, ‘Alliance in the quagmire: the United States, South Korea, and the Vietnam War, 1964–1968’ (PhD dissertation, Rutgers University, 1997). On the negotiation of the first SOFA, see Yi Boram, ‘GIs and Koreans: the making of the first ROK-US Status of Forces Agreement, 1945–1966’, (PhD dissertation, University of Georgia, 2006). The author directed this dissertation and is now working with him as a co-author on an expanded treatment of the topic. The United States even bugged his office in the Blue House. See Don Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas (Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 1997), p.33. See Chae-jin Lee, A Troubled Peace: US Policy and the Two Koreas (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006), pp.56–63. The standard work on the Pueblo incident is Mitchell B. Lerner, The Pueblo Incident: A Spy Ship and the Failure of American Foreign Policy (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2002). For a 1200-page online collection of documents from several governments, many recently declassified and translated into English, see North Korea International Documentation Project, Crisis and Confrontation on the Korean Peninsula: 1968–1969: Document Reader, Cold War International History Project, www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=topics.home&topic_id. Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.64–111; Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, pp.47–138; JooHong Nam, America’s Commitment to South Korea: The First Decade of the Nixon Doctrine (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986). James V. Young (edited and with an introduction by William Stueck), Eye on Korea: An Insider Account of Korean-American Relations (College Station, TX: Texas A & M University Press, 2003), pp.39–49. See William Stueck, ‘Democratization in Korea: the United States role, 1980 and 1987’, International Journal of Korean Studies ii (Fall/Winter 1998), pp.1–26. Ibid. Hy-sop Lim, ‘The perception of the United States after liberation in 1945’, in Lew et al, Korean Perceptions of the US, pp.337–59; Gi-Wook Shin, ‘South Korean anti-Americanism’, Asian Survey iiivi/8 (1996), pp.787–803.

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38. ‘The Report of the Bush Administration on the Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim’, 19 April 1990. 39. Oberdorfer, Two Koreas, pp.197–280; Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.136–57. 40. ‘A Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim: Report to Congress 1992’, pp.3–4, 7. 41. ‘A Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim: Report to Congress 1992’, pp.5–6. 42. For a useful survey of conflicting claims and tensions regarding islands in the South China Sea, see Scott Snyder, ‘The South China Sea Dispute: Prospects for Preventive Diplomacy’, Special Report No. 18 (August 1996), United States Institute of Peace (www.usip.org). 43. ‘A Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim: Report to Congress 1992’, pp.7–8, 11–13, 22–5. 44. Chae-jin Lee notes US concerns that ROK normalization with Russia and China would undermine Washington’s influence in Seoul. An exchange of high-level visits during 1992 sought to ensure that the bilateral alliance did not suffer from the broadening of relationships with former adversaries. Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.152–3. 45. For an account by insiders on the US side, see Joel S. Wit, Daniel B. Poneman, and Robert L. Gallucci, Going Critical: The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2004). For authoritative secondary accounts, see Oberdorfer, Two Koreas, pp.271–368, and Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.158–209. 46. Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.192–209. 47. See Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.198–9, 210–19; Mike Chinoy, Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2008), pp.36–64. 48. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, ‘President delivers State of the Union address’, 29 January 2002. 49. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, ‘President delivers graduation speech at West Point’, 1 June 2002 (although this includes the text of the speech, it was actually delivered on 31 May 2002); The White House, ‘National Security Strategy of the United States Sept. 2002’. 50. See ‘Statement of General Thomas A. Schwartz, Commander in Chief, United Nations Command/Combined Forces Command and Commander, United States Forces Korea Before the 107th Congress, Senate Armed Services Committee’, 5 March 2002, www.shaps.hawaii.edu/security/us/schwartz_ 2002*html. 51. For recent accounts of the confrontation of a US delegation and the North Koreans in Pyongyang in October 2002, see Chinoy, Meltdown, pp.81–126,

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53.

54. 55.

56. 57. 58.

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and Yoichi Funabashi, The Peninsula Question: A Chronicle of the Second Korean Nuclear Crisis (Washington, DC: Brookings, 2007), pp.93–134. Gi-Wook Shin, One Alliance, Two Lenses: US-Korean Relations in a New Era (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010), pp.91–103; Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.225–7. The group is often referred to as the ‘386 generation’: people who were in their thirties when the phrase originated in the mid-1990s, who went to college in the 1980s, and who were born in the 1960s. See Chinoy, Meltdown, p.154. Charles L. Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2007), pp.76–8; Lee, Troubled Peace, pp.256–8; Funabashi, Peninsula Question, pp.240–1; Charles M. Perry, Jacquelyn K. Davis, James L. Schoff, and Toshi Yoshihara, Alliance Diversification and the Future of the US-Korean Security Relationship (Herndon, VA: Brassey’s, 2004), pp.16n1, 158–9. See table 7 in Lee, Troubled Peace, p.300. Funabashi, Peninsula Question, pp.243–7. As quoted in Soonbun Oh, ‘The strategic flexibility policy: prospects for the US-ROK Alliance’, MA Thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA, December 2006, p.25. Korea Herald, 27 March 2008, 10 January 2007; Korea Times, 8 April 2008, 4 and 5 December 2006. Chinoy, Meltdown, pp.305–306. As quoted in Funabashi, Peninsula Question, p.257. For excellent coverage of the developing economic relationship with China and increasing concerns in South Korea about its implications, see Scott Snyder, China’s Rise and the Two Koreas: Politics, Economics, and Security (London: Lynne Rienner, 2009), especially chapters 3 and 9. For a recent analysis of ROK defense spending and its connection to both the US alliance and the domestic economy, see John Feffer, ‘Ploughshares into swords: economic implications of South Korean defense spending’, Academic Paper Series on Korea 2010, Vol. 3 (Washington, DC: Korea Economic Institute, 2010), pp.1–22. In 2000 I attended the annual conference of the American Studies Association of Korea, which is funded by the US State Department. The last paper presented, Hye-Joon Yoon’s ‘Alien superego: Koreans reading Korea in Time, 1999–2000’, ended with the following sentence: ‘Reading Time, or seeing CNN, or viewing Hollywood films, even in the remotest corners of the earth, the inmates of the global panopticon have effectively forgotten a world without, a world outside this self-addicted, self-praising, self-loving

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garrulous super-power.’ The overwhelmingly Korean audience broke into spontaneous applause. Shin, One Alliance, Two Lenses, p.195. For a superb analysis of the origins and nature of ethnic nationalism in Korea, see Gi-Wook Shin, Ethnic Nationalism in Korea: Genealogy, Politics, and Legacy (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2006. Shin, One Alliance, Two Lenses, p.205. Ibid., pp.204–5. For the Walt essay, see Stephen M. Walt, ‘Why alliances endure or collapse’, Survival xxxix/1, 1(Spring 1997), pp.156–79. Shin, One Alliance, Two Lenses, p.205. If the recent buildup by the ROK and Japan of their air and naval forces continues, we can imagine at some point that they would consider as unnecessary and undesirable the permanent stationing of US forces on their territories, and that the United States would agree. Just as we should not assume that regime-change in North Korea would bring reunification, however, neither should we assume that an end of US bases in the ROK and Japan would result in termination of the bilateral alliances. For a broad assessment of China’s rise and its implications for US strategy, see Robert D. Kaplan, ‘The geography of Chinese power: how far can Beijing reach on land and at sea?’ Foreign Affairs lxxxix/3 (May/June 2010), pp.22–41.

Chapter 2 Do we need a coordinating state to build a successful alliance? The case of the wars of the French Revolution and Empire 1. Balance of power is a central element in international relations from the post-Second World War works of classical realists. See Hans Morgenthau’s seminal book, Politics Among Nations: the Struggle for Power and Peace (New York: Knopf, 1973); the work of neorealists, led by Kenneth Waltz’s, Man, the State and War: a Theoretical Analysis (New York: Columbia University Press, 1954); and the publications of neo-classical realists including Stephen M. Walt’s The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987) and Randall L. Schweller’s Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006). 2. Mearsheimer observes that it is very difficult for a coalition to operate harmoniously due to the lack of trust and the competing interests of the participants. Yet, he does not address the puzzle of why these potentially weak coalitions have been victorious. John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Powers Politics (New York: Norton and Co., 2001), p.156. Some scholars take this tension into consideration, including Kaufman, Little, and Wohlforth, who offer that states opposing “rising hegemons were rival powers which

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usually tried a balancing strategy and uniformly failed. The obstacles they faced, due to the collective action problem, were formidable.” S. Kaufman, R. Little, and W. C. Wohlforth (eds), The Balance of Power in World History (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2007), p.238. Robert Gilpin is a notable exception: see his hegemonic transition theory in War and Change in World Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981); John Mearsheimer’s offensive realism put an emphasis on the role of the search for regional hegemony in international relations and consequently downplays the role of balance of power theory: Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Powers Politics. Haas distinguishes eight meanings attached to “balance of power”: Ernst Haas, ‘The balance of power: prescription, concept or propaganda?’ World Politics v (July 1953), pp.442–77. Jack S. Levy and William R. Thompson, ‘Balancing on land and at sea: do states ally against the leading global power?’ International Security xxxv/1 (Summer 2010), p.12. In the same page, footnote 21, the authors offer to “define balance of power theory broadly to include both balance of power theory per se and balance of threat theory.” In the present paper the author adopts the same attitude in relation to the division found in the International Relations field between balancing against the strongest power, as supported in Waltz’s work, and balancing against the greatest threat, a variation of balance of power theory promoted by Walt: Waltz, Man, the State and War; Walt, The Origins of Alliances. Waltz explains that a state is free not to ally in opposition to a threat to its security but that the desire to survive is so overwhelming that balancing is “the quasi-automatic reaction” of states confronted with “the drive for ascendency of other states.” Waltz, Man, the State and War, p.208. Waltz writes that the “[b]alance of power is a theory about the results produced by the uncoordinated actions of states” but does not explain why it is not possible for a powerful would-be hegemon to overcome opponents facing it with “uncoordinated actions.” Waltz, Man, the State and War, p.122, emphasis added. Levy and Thompson, ‘Balancing on land and at sea’, p.14. Hans Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: the Struggle for Power and Peace, p.194–195; Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics (New York: McGraw Hill. 1979), p.118. Waltz acknowledges this problem. He says that great powers find it difficult to cooperate; they try to increase their own power and fear that cooperation will end up providing relative gains for the other great powers, including the ones with which they are allied: Waltz, Theory of International Politics, pp.165–6.

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Oneal writes: “[t]he theory of collective action has been used to explain a wide variety of social behavior, but one of its most frequent applications has been the study of cooperation among nations. The association of sovereign states in alliances intended to deter war seems to fit closely the assumptions of the theory.” John R. Oneal, ‘The theory of collective action and burden sharing in NATO’, International Organization xliv/3 (Summer 1990), p.380. Leaders who commit their country to an alliance may have other motivations besides coordination or cooperation. For example, they may want to share in the spoils or to control alliance partners. Yet at the origin of an alliance formed to stop the rise of a potential hegemon, there is the desire to find partners willing to stop the challenger. On the role played by the Low Countries in Britain’s foreign policy see Christopher Hall, British Strategy in the Napoleonic War 1803–1815 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992), pp.83–5; and Michael Broers, Europe Under Napoleon 1799–1815 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996). For Wight, there are “the wars which modified only the particular order, the status quo (such as the wars between 1713 and 1792, and between 1815 and 1914) were distinguished from the wars which endangered international order at large, by threatening to destroy the balance altogether (such as the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars).” Martin Wight, ‘The balance of power and international order’, in J. Alan (ed), The Base of International Order: Essays in Honor of Manning (London: Oxford University Press, 1973), p.103. Black suggests that “the Sixth Coalition invasion of 1813–14 only happened as a result of unprecedented efforts and an unusual degree of international cooperation.” Jeremy Black, ‘British strategy and the struggle with France 1793– 1815’, The Journal of Strategic Studies xxxi/4 (August 2008), p.566, emphasis added. See Charles Webster, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh 1812–1815: Britain and the Reconstruction of Europe (London: G. Bell and Sons, 1950). The Anglo-Dutch wars and most wars with France were the logical result of such a policy. See Karen A. Rasler and William R. Thompson, ‘Global wars, public debts, and the long cycle’, World Politics xxxv/4 (July 1983), pp.494–5, and Michael D. Bordo and Eugene N. White, ‘A tale of two currencies: British and French finance during the Napoleonic wars’, The Journal of Economic History xliv/2 (June 1991), pp.303–16. Throughout the eighteenth-century France had “two to three times the natural wealth of England.” Rasler and Thompson, ‘Global wars, public debts, and the long cycle’, p.496.

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19. Pitt was so concerned with the public debt that his foreign policy during the first years of the war cannot be understood without keeping in mind this obsession which affected Britain’s subsidy policy. 20. Crouzet argues that Britain’s relative position, in economic terms, was stronger during and after the war. François Crouzet, L’économie Britannique et le blocus continental (Paris: Economia, 1987). 21. See Jacques Droz, Histoire diplomatique de 1648 à 1919 (Paris: Dalloz, 2005), p.225. 22. On 17 January 1794, Grenville wrote to Malmesbury that “German Princes . . . think England is a pretty good milch cow.” Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, The Manuscripts of J. B. Fortescue, Esq., preserved at Dropmore, Vol. II, p.497, http://books.google.com/. 23. For details on the way successive British leaders attempted to measure this cost and to distribute subsidies fairly between members of the alliance, see John M. Sherwig, Guineas and Gunpowder: British Foreign Aid in the Wars with France, 1793–1815 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969). 24. Napoleon is reputed to have said ‘England is a nation of shopkeepers’ (author’s translation). 25. Joshua S. Goldstein and David P. Rapkin, ‘After insularity: hegemony and the future world order’, Futures xxiii/9 (November 1991), p.938. 26. Piers Mackesy, ‘Strategic problems of the British war effort’, in H. T. Dickinson (ed), Britain and the French Revolution 1789–1815 (St Martin’s Press: New York, 1989), p.153. 27. After 1795 France had nominal access to the 76 Spanish ships of the line as well as the 49 Dutch ships (though it lost 13 ships – added to the British Navy – in the fall of Toulon). 28. The financial crisis of 1797, which affected Britain’s capacity to send the sums promised to the Austrians, owed much to the fear of invasion. 29. The defeats of Spain at Cape Saint Vincent and Duncan and of Holland at Camperdown allowed the British Navy to re-enter the Mediterranean and to fight and win the battle of the Nile. 30. Richard Glover, Britain at Bay: Defence against Bonaparte, 1803–14 (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1973), p.17. 31. “Je trouve ici des finances dans un état incomparablement plus florissant que je ne m’y attendais et qu’on ne le suppose au dehors. Les recettes du fisc sont, à peu de chose près; trois fois plus considérables que ne le dit B[onaparte] dans un manifeste semi-officiel qu’on vient de trouver”, in Otto Kamiin, ‘Les finances russes en 1812 et la mission de Sir Francis d’Ivernois à Saint-Pétersbourg’, Revue historique de la Révolution française viii (juillet/décembre 1915), p.67. 32. Kamiin, ‘Les finances russes’, p.17.

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33. “At the outset, Castlereagh lacked, like all British statesmen any real knowledge of the statesmen of other countries. He and his colleagues had been cut off from the continent, and the new men that were now rising to power were known to them only by gossip and very imperfect reports.” Such a statement could have been applied to Pitt, twenty years earlier. C.K. Webster, ‘The pacification of Europe, 1813–1815’, in A. W. Ward and G. P. Gooch (eds), The Cambridge History of British Foreign Policy, 1783–1919, Vol. 1, 1783–1815 (New York: Octagon Books, 1970), p.396. 34. Michael Duffy, The Younger Pitt (Edinburgh: Pearson Education Limited, 2000), p.183. 35. Goldstein and Rapkin, ‘After insularity’, p.938. 36. These political choices were: first, the refusal to finance a permanent army out of fear that it would be used by the executive power to impose an absolute monarchy and second, the decision to finance a powerful navy that could not be used against the people and the Parliament and that had the capacity to prevent invasion and protect international trade. 37. Hattendorf offers an interesting analysis of the durable elements at the heart of major conflicts opposing Britain and France. J. B. Hattendorf, England in the War of the Spanish Succession: A Study of the English View and Conduct of Grand Strategy, 1701–1712 (New York: Garland, 1987). 38. Black, ‘British strategy and the struggle with France 1793–1815’, p.554. 39. For why Britain could only muster relatively small armies, see Mackesy, ‘Strategic problems of the British war effort’, pp.156–7. 40. The treaty signed with Sardinia in 1793 was the only treaty to include the promise of a yearly subsidy. 41. Duffy, The Younger Pitt, pp.190–6. 42. “Europe, in its present crisis, can be saved only by the union of the Great Powers.” Grenville to Haugwitz, enclosed in Grenville’s letter to de Luc, 14 January 1798. The manuscripts of J.B. Fortescue, Esq., preserved at Dropmore, Vol. IV, p.58. http://www.archive.org/details/manufortescue03greauoft (henceforth Royal Commission: Dropmore, Vol. IV), author’s translation. 43. “England and Prussia, concerting together and establishing (if it is still possible) a real and sincere agreement with the two other Major Courts would put the four of them in the position to present to France in an imposing manner the bases of the future tranquility of Europe . . . On the other hand, by staying in reserve and by distrusting each other, one takes the risk of always being separately attacked”, Royal Commission: Dropmore, Vol. IV, p.59, author’s translation. 44. Jeremy Gregory and John Stevenson, Britain in the Eighteenth Century, 1688– 1820 (New York, Longman, 2000), p.140.

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45. Paul W. Schroeder, ‘An unnatural “natural alliance”: Castlereagh, Metternich, and Aberdeen in 1813’, International History Review x (1988), p.526. 46. Schroeder, ‘An unnatural “natural alliance”‘, p.525. 47. For Prussia’s interest in the Polish partition and its lack of concern with the war against France, see Philip G. Dwyer, ‘The politics of Prussian neutrality, 1795–1805’, German History xii/3 (October 1994), pp.351–73 and K. J. Holzapfel, ‘La Prusse avant le traité de Bâle’, Annales historiques de la Révolution française lvi (1984), pp.229–39. 48. “The Pitt ministry never understood the Polish problem. . . . Pitt and Grenville never accepted the Austro-Prussian contention that the French revolution had destabilized eastern European politics and that Poland was therefore as important a battleground as Flanders.” Jennifer Mori, William Pitt and the French Revolution 1785–1795 (New York: St Martin Press, 1997), p.210. Schroeder is far more sanguine than Mori on this subject: Schroeder, ‘An unnatural “natural alliance”, p.525. 49. Glover, Britain at Bay, p.22. 50. John Sherwig writes that Grenville “intensely disliked Prussia and her unexpected belligerency”, Sherwig, Guineas and Gunpowder, p.176. 51. Sherwig, Guineas and Gunpowder, p.182. 52. In 1806 Britain was marginally involved in Sicily and Portugal. 53. Cited in Webster, ‘The pacification of Europe, 1813–1815’, p.332. 54. Sherwig, Guineas and Gunpowder, pp.365–8. 55. Paul Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics 1763–1848 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994), p.497. 56. Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics, p.497. 57. Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics, p.501. 58. “It should be recalled that even after the allies had entered French territory at the beginning of 1814, the eastern powers had been pursuing different foreign political goals, and that there was always the risk, however slight at this stage, of one power signing a separate peace with Napoleon and withdrawing from the coalition. The Treaty of Chaumont, signed on 9 March 1814, changed all that. It proved to be the fire through which allied unity was finally forged and it was Castlereagh, not Metternich, who was at the bellows, keeping the furnace at just the right temperature to build a determined alliance based upon a practical notion of a Europe made of independent sovereign states.” Philip G. Dwyer, ‘Self-Interest versus the common cause: Austria, Prussia and Russia against Napoleon’, The Journal of Strategic Studies xxxi/4 (August 2008), p.629, emphasis added. 59. Schroeder gives a detailed description of Britain’s crucial role in 1813 and of Castlereagh’s unique qualities as a diplomat: Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics, pp.457–5.

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60. Dwyer, ‘Self-Interest versus the common cause’, p.613. 61. At the end of 1814 Castlereagh even considered an alliance with Austria and France against Russia and Prussia. Dwyer, ‘Self-Interest versus the common cause’, p.630. 62. Webster, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh, pp.195–7. 63. Sherwig, Guineas and Gunpowder, p.115. It may be more in the financing of medium powers that Britain influenced the level of coordination existing between the states opposed to Napoleon. Britain spent a hefty amount of money to bring Sweden in the alliance and until 1814, subsidies sent to Portuguese and Spanish armies reached amounts surpassing the subsidies given to the great powers. 64. Webster, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh, p.199. Webster quotes Lord Ripon. 65. Ibid. 66. “The effect of Vittoria on Austrian policy was, no doubt, considerable.” Webster, ‘The pacification of Europe’, pp.406–7. 67. See the example offered by Kaufman et al, The Balance of Power in World History, p.37.

Chapter 3 Turkey’s accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, 1945–52: a qualified success? 1. Selim Deringil, Turkish Foreign Policy During the Second World War: An “Active” Neutrality (Cambridge and New York, 1989). 2. Office of Strategic Services, ‘Soviet denunciation of neutrality with Turkey’, April 1945, http://www.foia.cia.gov. 3. Kemal Karpat, Turkey’s Politics: The Transition to a Multi-Party System (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959), pp.172–3. 4. George McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection: How the Truman Doctrine Contained the Soviets in the Middle East (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1990), p.44. 5. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection, p.36. 6. Cemil Koçak, ‘Çok-partili düzene geçişte dış etmenlerin araştırıldığı bir doktora tezi üzerine’, Tarih ve Toplum xxiii (2000), pp.62–4. 7. Quoted in Karpat, Turkey’s Politics, p.141. 8. Ahmed Emin Yalman, Turkey in My Time (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1956), pp.221–2. 9. Yalman, Turkey in My Time, pp.240–5. 10. Nilgün Gürkan, Turkiye’de Demokrasiye Geçiste Basın, 1945–50 (Istanbul: Baskı Mart, 1998), pp.13–21.

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11. For instance, the Islamic-oriented publication, Sebilürreşad, closed by Turkish authorities more than two decades earlier, was revived in 1948 and sought to redefine Turkish national identity in religious terms rather than according to official state secularism. See Eşref Edib, ‘Allahın ınayet ile Sebilürreşad’a başlıyoruz’, Sebilürreşad i (May 1948). 12. Gavin Brockett, ‘Betwixt and between: Turkish print culture and the emergence of a national identity 1945–1954’ (PhD dissertation, University of Chicago 2003). 13. Yalman, Turkey in My Time, p.235. 14. See Karpat, Turkey’s Politics and George S. Harris, The Origins of Communism in Turkey (Stanford: Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, 1967). 15. See, for instance, Yalman, Turkey in My Time. 16. Ekavi Athanassopoulou, Turkey-Anglo-American Security Interests 1945–1952, The First Enlargement of NATO (London and Portland: Frank Cass, 1999), p.53. 17. Athanassopoulou, Turkey-Anglo-American Security Interests, p.72. 18. Ibid. pp.63–4. 19. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO-Middle East Connection, p.59. 20. Athanassopoulou, Turkey-Anglo-American Security Interests, pp.85–121. 21. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO-Middle East Connection, p.59. 22. Ibid, p.60. 23. Hüseyin Bağcı, Demokrat Parti Dönemi Dış Politikası (Ankara: Image Publishing House, 1990), pp.17–18. 24. Athanassopoulou, Turkey-Anglo-American Security Interests, p.74. 25. ‘Albert Coolidge’ and ‘US role in Turk “revolution” an answer to Reds’, The Washington Post (9 July 1950). The article states that “Albert Coolidge” is an “Anglicized byline which is a phonetic approximation of his Turkish name” and the author is a “Turkish newspaperman who accompanied Celal Bayar on many campaign tours.” The author of this perceptive opinion piece is unknown, although it is clear that he is a supporter of the Democrat Party. 26. ‘No change in Turkish foreign policy’, The Times (26 May 1950); ‘New Turkish statecraft, political life on a broader basis’, The Times (5 June 1950). 27. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection, p.70. 28. ‘Arapça ezan meselesi geniş akisler uyandırdı’, Milliyet (7 June 1950). 29. ‘Ordu komutanlarının hepsi deşiştiriliyor’, Milliyet (7 June 1950); ‘Şimdilik dokuz vali emekliye ayrıldı’ (11 June 1950); ‘Bazı elçiler de değiştiriliyor’ (12 June 1950), ‘Ordudan 22 general emekliye ayrılıyor’ (7 July 1950). 30. Cumhuriyet (1 June 1950). Quoted in Feroz Ahmad, The Turkish Experiment in Democracy (London: Westview Press, for the Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1977), p.390, emphasis added.

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31. ‘İstanbulda Kore için gönüllüler’, Milliyet (3 July 1950). 32. ‘Koreye Türk yardımı’, Milliyet (1 August 1950). 33. For instance, an article in the Islamist journal Sebilüreşad expressed strong support for the fight against communism in Korea, but questioned Truman’s sincerity, suggesting he was part of a broader conspiracy involving Zionists and Freemasons that aimed to protect the new state of Israel. Nonetheless, the journal published a number of articles supporting the involvement of Turkish troops in the fight against communism in Korea, praising their bravery (and, of course, their loyalty to Islam) and criticizing the opposition Republicans for failing to back the Turkish troops. See ‘Mister Truman ve Ziyonizm’, Sebilüreşad iv (October 1950). 34. ‘Muhalif çevreler kararı beğenmiyor’, Milliyet (27 July 1950). 35. ‘Limitations on security: Turkish reactions to Korea’, The Times (7 August 1950). The Times states that İnönü’s remarks were originally published in the Hürriyet newspaper. 36. Ali Naci Karacan, ‘Başbakan Adnan Menderes’in ‘Milliyet’e çok mühim beyanatı’, Milliyet (7 August 1950). 37. Ali Naci Karacan, ‘Atlantik Paktina girmemiz meselesi’, Milliyet (6 August 1950). 38. US Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States 1950, Vol. 5, The Near East, South Asia, and Africa (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1978), p.1307 (hereafter FRUS with year and volume). 39. FRUS, 1950, Vol. 5, p.1307. 40. FRUS, 1950, Vol. 5, pp.1312–13. 41. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection, p.73. 42. ‘Turkey and the Atlantic Pact’, The Times (28 June 1951). 43. ‘Turkey and Atlantic Pact, refusal of application reported’, The Times (19 September 1950). 44. ‘Bayar, iç, dış politika mevzuunda fevkalade mühim bir nutuk verdi’, Milliyet (2 November 1950). 45. Bağcı: Demokrat Parti Dönemi Dış Politakası, pp.31–3. 46. Milliyet (22 November 1950). 47. John M. Vander Lippe, ‘Forgotten brigade of the forgotten war: Turkey’s participation in the Korean War’, Middle Eastern Studies xxxvi (2000), pp.97–8. 48. CIA, ‘Turkey’s place in the East West struggle’, 26 February 1951, http:// www.foia.cia.gov. 49. ‘Turkey and Atlantic Pact countries, closer relations desired’, The Times (17 April 1951). 50. ‘Turkish diplomats’ conference, disappointment with Atlantic Powers’, The Times (14 May 1951).

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51. Radio Moscow Transcript, 20 July 1951, Republic of Turkey, Prime Ministry State Archives 030.01.00.00.133.864.1.1–3; Cabinet Decision, 25 July 1951, Prime Ministry State Archives 030.18.1.2.126.56.11; Selcan Hacaoglu, ‘Turkey Restores Citizenship of Celebrated Poet’, Associated Press (5 January 2009). 52. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection, p.84. 53. Ibid. pp.86–7. 54. Athanassopoulou, Turkey-Anglo-American Security Interests, pp.196–201. 55. ‘Turkish part in defence’, The Times (21 July 21 1951). 56. ‘Stability in Turkey’, The Times (19 September 1951). 57. ‘Shaping NATO policy, coordination plans at Ottawa’, The Times (20 September 1951). 58. İsmail Soysal, Soğuk Savaş Dönemi ve Türkiye: Olaylar Kronolojisi, 1945–1975 (Istanbul: Isis Press, 1997), p.125. 59. ‘Uçlerin Orta Doğuya dair verdikleri mühim karar’, Milliyet (22 September 1951). 60. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection, p.54. 61. C.L. Sulzberger, ‘Turkey demanding Atlantic equality’, The New York Times (9 January 1952). 62. ‘NATO plan backed on Greece, Turkey’, The New York Times (11 February 1952). 63. Telefon pavyonu sual ve cevaplar, undated, Prime Minister State Archives, 030.01.00.00.35.216.26.1–7. 64. McGhee, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection, pp.91–2. 65. Yalman, Turkey in My Time, p.260.

Chapter 4 Leading from the middle: maintaining the NATO deterrent in the 1960s 1. Quoted in Geir Lundestad, The United States and Western Europe since 1945: From “Empire” by Invitation to Transatlantic Drift (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), p.82. 2. ‘The United States Deputy Representative on the North Atlantic Council (Spofford) to the Secretary of State’, 8 November 1950, Foreign Relations of the United States 1950, Vol. 3, Western Europe, p.436 (hereafter FRUS with year and volume). 3. David Clay Large, Germans to the Front: West German Rearmament in the Adenauer Era (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), p.205. 4. Ibid, p.122.

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5. Statement by the Secretary of State to the North Atlantic Council, 14 December 1953, FRUS, 1952–1954, Vol. 5, Pt. 1, Western European Security, p.463. 6. For further discussion, see Melissa P. Yeager in this volume. 7. Marc Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace: The Making of the European Settlement 1945–1963 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999), p.176. 8. MC 48/2, Measures to Implement the Strategic Concept, 23 May 1957, http://www.nato.int/archives/strategy.htm, p.4. 9. MC 14/2, Overall Strategic Concept for the Defense of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Area, 23 May 1957, http://www.nato.int/archives/ strategy.htm, p.9. 10. Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace, p.160. 11. MC 14/2, p.7. 12. Ibid, p.11, emphasis added. 13. Lawrence Freedman, The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), p.146. 14. Frédéric Bozo, Two Strategies for Europe: De Gaulle, the United States, and the Atlantic Alliance (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001), p.4. 15. Quoted in Gregory W. Pedlow, NATO Strategy Documents, 1949–1969, XXI. De Gaulle liked to use this example, also questioning whether the United States was prepared to act “by trading New York for Paris.” Memorandum of Conversation with the President and the Congressional Leadership, 6 June 1961, National Security Archive #BC02083, p.1. 16. The United States Delegation at the North Atlantic Council Meeting to the Department of State, 18 December 1954, FRUS, 1952–1954, Vol. 5, Pt. 1, pp.557–9. 17. John S. Duffield, Power Rules: The Evolution of NATO’s Conventional Force Posture (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995), p.144. 18. United States Department of State, ‘The Department of State bulletin’, Vol. 38, No. 967 (6 January 1958), p.14. 19. NSAM 160, ‘Permissive Links for Nuclear Weapons in NATO’, 6 June 1962, http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nsam-jfk/nsam160.htm, p1. 20. US Policy on IRBMs for NATO, 24 November 1958; folder 12. IRBMs – 2nd Generation; Bureau of European Affairs, Office of European Regional Affairs, Records of the NATO Advisor, 1957–1961 Box 1, TS Master File 1957–1961 to 28a NSC-NATO; RG 59 General Records of the Department of State; United States National Archives [hereafter USNA], p.1 21. Talking Paper: Summary of Rationale for MRBM Proposal, 17 November 1960, p.3, folder 19a. MRBM Force & Expanded Stockpile Proposals, Vol. I; Box 1, TS Master File 1957–1961 to 28a NSC-NATO; Bureau of European Affairs, Office of European Regional Affairs, Records of the NATO Advisor, 1957–1961; RG 59 General Records of the Department of State.

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22. Beatrice Heuser, NATO, Britain, France, and the FRG: Nuclear Strategies and Forces for Europe, 1949–2000 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997), p.42. 23. Robert S. Jordan, Norstad: Cold War NATO Supreme Commander: Airman, Strategist, Diplomat (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000), p.104. 24. Lawrence S. Kaplan, NATO and the United States: The Enduring Alliance (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1994), p.92. 25. Memorandum to The Secretary of State-designate re. NATO MRBM Force Concept, 12 January 1961; folder 19a. MRBM Force & Expanded Stockpile Proposals, Vol. II; Bureau of European Affairs, Office of European Regional Affairs, Records of the NATO Advisor, 1957–1961 Box 1, TS Master File 1957–1961 to 28a NSC-NATO; RG 59 General Records of the Department of State; USNA, p.2. Heuser, NATO, Britain, France, and the FRG, p.43. 26. Large, Germans to the front, pp.51–2. 27. Telegram from the Embassy in Germany to the Department of State, 24 March 1959, FRUS, 1958–1960, Vol. 8, Berlin Crisis, 1958–1959, p.531. 28. Telegram from the Department of State to the Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and European Regional Organizations, 9 July 1961, FRUS, 1961–1963, Vol. 14, Berlin Crisis 1961–1962, p180. 29. Stephen Robert Twigge and L. V. Scott, Planning Armageddon: Britain, the United States and the Command of Western Nuclear Forces 1945–1964 (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic, 2000), p.155. 30. Kaplan, NATO and the United States, p.88. 31. Bozo, Two Strategies for Europe, p.4. 32. Discussions . . . , 26 March 1959; folder 400th Meeting of NSC, 26 March 1959; Papers as President (Ann Whitman File) Box 11; Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, p.1. 33. ‘The North Atlantic Nations Tasks for the 1960s: A Report to the Secretary of State [Bowie Report]’, Report, August 1960, NSA, #NP00661, p.19, emphasis added. 34. Ibid, p.42. 35. Ibid, p.41. 36. Bowie defined expanded attack as “any hostile local action which is broadened or prolonged by the Soviets and which would therefore warrant use of nuclear weapons under existing strategy.” Ibid, p.38n. 37. Ibid, p.42. 38. Ibid, p.45. 39. DPC/D(67)23, ‘Decisions of Defence Planning Committee in Ministerial Session’, 11.5.1967, http://www.nato.int/archives/strategy.htm.

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40. See, for example, Berlin Military Planning, Private Session: 23 February 1962, Briefing by General Norstad, undated, DEFE 7 2255, United Kingdom National Archive, pp.9–10. 41. The United States had already begun to move in that direction before Athens, for example by substantially increasing the size of their conventional forces in Europe in mid-1961, and calling on their NATO allies to do likewise. 42. ‘Address by Secretary of Defense McNamara at the Ministerial Meeting of the North Atlantic Council’, 5 May 1962, FRUS, 1961–1963, Vol. 8, National Security Policy, p.275. 43. Ibid, p.276. 44. Ibid, p.278. 45. Lawrence S. Kaplan, ‘McNamara, Vietnam, and the defense of Europe’, in V. Mastny, S. Holtsmark, and A. Wenger (eds), War Plans and Alliances in the Cold War: Threat Perceptions in the East and West (London and New York: Routledge, 2006), p.287. 46. Circular Telegram from the Department of State to Certain Missions, 9 May 1962, FRUS, 1961–1963, Vol. 13, Western Europe and Canada, pp.392–3. 47. The most detailed interpretation of the Skybolt-Polaris issue is in Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace, pp.360–3. 48. Jane E. Stromseth, The Origins of Flexible Response: NATO’s Debate Over Strategy in the 1960s (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1988), pp.75–6. 49. Bowie Report, pp.20–1. 50. Address before the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa, 17 May 1961, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy: Containing the Public Messages, Speeches, and Statements of the President, 1961–1963 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1962, 1964), p.385. David N. Schwartz, NATO’s Nuclear Dilemmas (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1983), p.88. 51. Quoted in Schwartz, NATO’s Nuclear Dilemmas, p.94. 52. Memorandum of Discussion of the MLF at the White House, Friday, 10 April 1964, FRUS, 1964–1968, Vol. 13, Western Europe Region, p.35. 53. Kaplan, NATO and the United States, p.94. 54. Paul Buteux, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation in NATO, 1965–1980 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983), p.28. 55. Memorandum of Conversation, 15 December 1958; folder 1169 – NATO Meeting, Paris, Memos of Conv., Dec. 1958; Executive Secretariat, Conference Files 1945–1963; CF 1164 (folder 1 of 2) to CF 117; Box 163B; RG59 General Records of the Department of State, USNA, p.2.

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56. Dirk U. Stikker, Men of Responsibility: A Memoir (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), p.375. 57. Schwartz, NATO’s Nuclear Dilemmas, pp.121–2. 58. Buteux, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation, p.19. 59. Schwartz, NATO’s Nuclear Dilemmas, pp.180–1. 60. Helga Haftendorn, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution: A Crisis of Credibility, 1966–1967 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), p.15. 61. Telegram from the Embassy in Germany to the Department of State, 2 July 1966, FRUS, 1964–1968, Vol. 13, Western Europe Region, p.430. 62. Quoted in Buteux, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation, p.60. 63. Buteux, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation, p.10. 64. Thomas A. Schwartz, ‘The de Gaulle challenge: the Johnson administration and the NATO crisis of 1966–1967’, in H. Haftendorn (ed), The Strategic Triangle: France, Germany, and the United States in the Shaping of the New Europe (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2006), p.141. 65. Haftendorn, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution, pp.47–8. 66. Buteux, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation, p.14. 67. Frédéric Bozo, ‘The NATO crisis of 1966–1967: a French perspective’, in Haftendorn, ed., Strategic Triangle, p.117; Buteux, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation, p.61. 68. Stromseth, The Origins of Flexible Response, pp.149–50.

Chapter 5 Is there an Anglo-American alliance? Or a pact? Or an agreement? Or anything? 1. Sir Nevile Bland (ed), Satow’s Guide to Diplomatic Practice (London: Longmans, 1964). It was first published as Sir Ernest Satow, Guide to Diplomatic Practice, in 1917. According to T.G. Otte in his review of the 6th edition for H-Diplo, “[s]ince its first appearance it has enjoyed a unique status as one of the classics in the canon of diplomatic literature, so much so that it is now usually referred to simply as Satow. It remains the most widely used guide to diplomacy, used in embassies of all nations around the globe.” http://www.h-net.org/~diplo/essays/PDF/ Otte-Roberts.pdf. 2. Sir Ivor Roberts (ed), Satow’s Diplomatic Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp.559–60. 3. Satow, A Guide to Diplomatic Practice, 4th edition, pp.335–6, quote on 336; Roberts, Satow’s Diplomatic Practice, 6th edition, p.546.

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4. Quoted in Wendy Hinde, George Canning (London: Collins, 1973), p.345. 5. Kathleen Burk, Old World, New World: The Story of Britain and America (London: Little, Brown, 2007), pp.248–9; Richard Rush, Memoranda of a Residence at the Court of London, Comprising Incidents Official and Personal from 1819 to 1825. Including Negotiations on the Oregon Question, and Other Unsettled Questions between the United States and Great Britain (Philadelphia: Lea & Blanchard, 1845), pp.400–1. 6. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.250–1; C. F. Adams (ed), Memoirs of John Quincy Adams: Comprising Portions of His Diary from 1795 to 1848, 12 volumes (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1874–7), Vol. IV, p.438 (16 November 1819). 7. Rush to Adams, 19 August 1823, No. 323, Despatches from US Ministers to Great Britain, 1791–1906, Record Group 59 (State Department Papers), United States National Archive [USNA], Washington, DC and Maryland, Microfilm Series 30, Roll 25 [hereafter M30/25], pp.3–4. 8. Rush to Adams, 2 October 1823, No. 334, M30/25; Rush to Adams, 10 October 1823, No. 336, M30/25; Adams, (ed), Memoirs, Vol. VI, p.191 (19 November 1823). 9. P. L. Ford (ed), The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, 10 volumes (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1892–9), Vol. X, pp.277–8 (24 October 1823); G. Hunt (ed), The Writings of James Madison. Comprising His Public Papers and His Private Correspondence, Including Numerous Letters and Documents Now For the First Time Printed (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1900–10), Vol. IX, pp.157–8 (30 October 1823). 10. Adams (ed), Memoirs, Vol. VI, pp.177–9. 11. J. F. Watts and F. L. Israel (eds), Presidential Documents: The Speeches, Proclamations, and Policies that Have Shaped a Nation from Washington to Clinton (London: Routledge, 2000), pp.55–6. 12. Bradford Perkins, The Cambridge History of American Foreign Relations. Volume I: The Creation of a Republican Empire, 1776–1865 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p.211. 13. Chatfield, First Sea Lord, to Sir Warren Fisher, Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, 4 June 1934, CHT/3/1, 62, Chatfield Papers, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. 14. Kenneth Bourne, Britain and the Balance of Power in North America 1815– 1908 (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1967), p.362. 15. Frederick C. de Sumichrast, Americans and the Britons (New York: D. Appleton, 1914), p.277. De Sumichrast was an Englishman who had lived in the USA for some years. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.383–5.

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16. David H. Burton, British-American Diplomacy 1895–1917: Early Years of the Special Relationship (Malabar, FL: Krieger, 1999), p.20. 17. www.rms-gs.de/phileng/history/kap02.html; Bradford Perkins, The Great Rapprochement: England and the United States, 1895–1914 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968), p.47. 18. Henry Cabot Lodge, The War with Spain (New York/London: Harper & Brothers, 1899). 19. Quoted in Perkins, The Great Rapprochement, p.47. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.411–18. 20. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.430–5; D. G. Boyce (ed), The Crisis of British Power: The Imperial and Naval Papers of the Second Earl of Selborne, 1895–1910 (London: The Historians’ Press, 1990), pp.184–90. Selborne was First Lord of the Admiralty. The decision was also taken in December 1903 to withdraw from the Halifax and Esquimalt naval bases, thereby handing over the defense of Canada to the Canadians themselves. Bourne, Balance of Power in North America, pp.364–5. 21. For details and hundreds of references, see Kathleen Burk, Britain, America and the Sinews of War 1914–1918 (London/Boston: George Allen & Unwin, 1985); David R. Woodward, Trial By Friendship: Anglo-American Relations, 1917–1918 (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2003). 22. Diary of Sir William Slim, Slim Papers, 5/2/2, Churchill College, Cambridge. This is found in a draft chapter of his unpublished memoirs, with no specific date given. Thanks to Sandra Marsh of the Churchill College Archives Centre. 23. Or as President Calvin Coolidge reputedly said, “They hired the money, didn’t they?” 24. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.464–73; Stephen Roskill, Naval Policy Between the Wars. Volume I: The Period of Anglo-American Antagonism 1919– 1929 (New York: Walker, 1968), passim; Phillips Payson O’Brien, British and American Naval Power: Politics and Policy, 1900–1936 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1998), pp.5, 187–215. 25. ‘Outstanding problems affecting Anglo-American relations’, 12 November 1928, FO 371/12812, Foreign Office Papers, The UK National Archive UKNA), Kew, London. 26. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.472–3; O’Brien, British and American Naval Power, pp.210–15. 27. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.473–85. 28. Christopher Andrew, For the President’s Eyes Only: Secret Intelligence and the American Presidency from Washington to Bush (London: HarperCollins, 1995), p.78.

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29. Christopher Andrew, ‘Anglo-American-Soviet intelligence relations’, in A. Lane and H. Temperley (eds), The Rise and Fall of the Grand Alliance, 1941–45 (London: Macmillan, 1995), p.109. 30. Andrew, ‘Anglo-American-Soviet intelligence relations’, p.112. In late 1942, GCCS was re-named Government Communications Headquarters or GCHQ, the name by which the organization, now at Cheltenham, is known today. 31. For details on BRUSA and UKUSA, see Jeffrey T. Richelson and Desmond Ball, The Ties That Bind (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990). For an outline of the intelligence relationship 1917–48, see Burk, Old World, New World, pp.451–4, 509–11. 32. Mark A. Stoler, Allies at War: Britain and America Against the Axis Powers 1940–1945 (London: Hoddard Arnold, 2005), pp.20–1. 33. Quoted in Stoler, Allies at War, p.21. 34. Peter Lowe, ‘The war against Japan and Allied relations’, in Lane and Temperley (eds), The Rise and Fall of the Grand Alliance, pp.191–2; Stoler, Allies in War, pp.20–1. 35. Kathleen Burk, ‘The diplomacy of finance: British financial missions to the United States 1914–1918’, Historical Journal xx/2 (1979), pp.351–72. 36. Quoted in Kathleen Burk, ‘American foreign economic policy and LendLease’, in Lane and Temperley (eds), The Rise and Fall of the Grand Alliance, p.51. 37. Sir John Colville, The Fringes of Power: Downing Street Diaries 1939– 1955 (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1985), pp.291–2 (12 November 1940); Colville was one of Churchill’s Private Secretaries. See also Henry Morgenthau Presidential Diary, Vol. 3, fol. 740, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, Hyde Park, New York; Burk, ‘Lend-Lease’, pp.43–55. 38. Henry Morgenthau Presidential Diary, 7 April 1941, Vol. 386, fol. 231, quoted in David Reynolds, The Creation of the Anglo-American Alliance 1937– 1941: A Study in Competitive Co-operation (London: Europa Publications, 1981), p.274. 39. General B. Somerville, ‘Lend-Lease policy after the defeat of Germany’, 7 September 1944, Box 335, Harry Hopkins Papers, Roosevelt Presidential Library. 40. Anne Orde, The Eclipse of Great Britain: The United States and British Imperial Decline, 1895–1956 (London: Macmillan, 1996), p.143. 41. Somerville, ‘Lend-Lease policy after the defeat of Germany’. 42. Burk, ‘Lend-Lease’, pp.51–68. 43. Rudolf Peierls, Bird of Passage: Recollections of a Physicist (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985), pp.152–5; Otto Frisch, What Little I

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44. 45. 46. 47.

48.

49. 50.

51.

52.

53.

54.

55.

56. 57.

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Remember (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), pp.123–32; Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), pp.305–17. For the text of the agreement, see Margaret Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy 1939–1945 (London: Macmillan, 1964), pp.439–40. Printed in Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, Appendix 3, p.136. For an outline of the nuclear events and relationship during the war, see Burk, Old World, New World, pp.511–14. For a true period piece, see Henry V. Morton, Atlantic Meeting: An Account of Mr Churchill’s Voyage in HMS Prince of Wales, in August, 1941, and the Conference with President Roosevelt which Resulted in the Atlantic Charter (London: Methuen, 1943); Reynolds, Creation of the Anglo-American Alliance, pp.258–61. Stoler, Allies at War, pp.42–3, quote on p.43; H. Duncan Hall, History of the Second World War: North American Supply (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office and Longmans, Green, 1955), p.60; Paul Gore-Booth, With Great Truth and Respect (London: Constable, 1974), p.121. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.497–9 plus references for other details. Christopher Throne, Allies of a Kind: The United States, Britain, and the War Against Japan, 1941–1945 (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1978), p.725. ‘Policy towards Europe’, 5 January 1949, Sir Richard Clarke, Anglo-American Economic Collaboration in War and Peace 1942–1949 edited by Sir Alec Cairncross (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982), p.208. ‘Department of State Policy Statement: Great Britain’, 11 June 1948, Foreign Relations of the United States 1948, Vol. 3, p.1091 (hereafter FRUS with year and volume). Richard J. Aldrich, The Hidden Hand: Britain, America and Cold War Secret Intelligence (London: John Murray, 2001), p.305, quoting from the spy Kim Philby’s memoirs, Secret War, p.117. Martin H. Folly, ‘Breaking the vicious circle: Britain, the United States, and the genesis of the North Atlantic Treaty’, Diplomatic History xii/1 (1988), pp.59–77; Burk, Old World, New World, pp.587–94. Geir Lundestad, The American “Empire” and Other Studies of US Foreign Policy in a Comparative Perspective (Oslo: Oslo University Press and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), pp.54–62. Kathleen Burk, ‘Britain and the Marshall Plan’, in C. Wrigley (ed), Warfare, Diplomacy and Politics: Essays in Honour of A. J. P. Taylor (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1986), pp.210–230. Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, 437 H.C. Deb, col. 1965. Francis Williams, Twilight of Empire: Memoirs of Prime Minister Clement Attlee, as Set Down by Francis Williams (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1978), p.119; Margaret Gowing, Independence and Deterrence. Britain and Atomic

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58. 59.

60. 61.

62.

63.

64. 65. 66.

67.

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Energy, Volume I: Policy Making (London: UK Atomic Energy Authority and Macmillan, 1974), p.174. Confidential Annex, Minute 1, Research in Atomic Weapons, GEN. 163/1st meet, CAB 130/16, UKNA, 8 January 1947, p.1. Ian Clark and Nicolas J. Wheeler, The British Origins of Nuclear Strategy, 1945–1955 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), Salisbury’s quote on p.215, the Chief of Staff’s on p.214. For Calder Hall, see I.G.C. Dryden (ed), The Efficient Use of Energy (Guildford: IPC Science and Technology Press, 1975), p.319. Harold Macmillan, Riding the Storm 1956–1959 (New York: Harper & Row, 1971), p.324. Dean Acheson, the former Secretary of State, wrote in his memoirs that “During the winter of 1945–46 I learned about a matter that was to disturb me for some years to come, for with knowledge came belief that our Government, having made an agreement from which it had gained immeasurably, was not keeping its word and performing its obligations. Like all great issues it was not simple. Grave consequences might follow upon keeping our word, but the idea of not keeping it was repulsive to me. The analogy of a nation to a person is not sound in all matters of moral conduct; in this case, however, it seemed to me pretty close. Even in realpolitik a reputation for probity carries its own pragmatic awards.” Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (New York: W.W. Norton, 1969), p.324. Stuart J. Ball, ‘Military nuclear relations between the United States and Great Britain under the terms of the McMahon Act, 1946–1958’, Historical Journal xxxviii/2 (1995), pp.448–9. Richard E. Neustadt, Alliance Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), p.26. This is the published version of Neustadt’s earlier report. See also the essay by Michael K. McKoy in this volume. Percy Craddock, Know Your Enemy: How the Joint Intelligence Committee Saw the World (London: John Murray, 2002), p.279. Peter Golden, Quiet Diplomat: A Biography of Max M. Fisher (New York: Cornwall Books, 1992), p.xviii. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.606–15 and refs. The reconciliation between interdependence and independence was set out in the Statement on Nuclear Defense Systems, referred to by George Ball, then the Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs, as “a monument of contrived ambiguity”: George Ball, The Past Has Another Pattern: Memoirs (New York: W.W. Norton, 1982), p.267. Paper prepared for the Department of State, 19 April 1950, FRUS, 1950, Vol. 3, pp.870–9; James Baker, The Politics of Diplomacy: Revolution, War and

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68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73.

74. 75.

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Peace 1989–1992 (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1995), p.279; Christopher Meyer, DC Confidential: The Controversial Memoirs of Britain’s Ambassador at the Time of 9/11 and the Iraq War (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2005), p.250. Duncan Hall, North American Supply, p.60. Burk, Old World, New World, pp.645–6. Winston Churchill, News of the World, 22 May 1938. Acheson was referring to the late 1940s. Acheson, Present at the Creation, p.387. Raymond Seitz, Over Here (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1998), p.323. They were Dr Jeane Kirkpatrick and Sir Anthony Parsons. See Jeane Kirkpatrick’s evidence in ‘Falklands Roundtable’, Presidential Oral History Program, Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia, 15–16 May 2003, http://millercenter.virginia.edu/index.php/academic/oralhistory/ projects/special/falklands. Cited in Harold Wilson, The Labour Government 1964–70 (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974), p.341. Cited in Louis Heren, No Hail, No Farewell (London: Harper & Row, 1970), p.230.

Chapter 6 Coalition dynamics and the Sèvres Pact: do opposites attract? 1. Eric Grove, ‘Who to fight in 1956, Egypt or Israel? Operation Musketeer versus Operation Cordage’ in S. Smith (ed), Reassessing Suez 1956: New Perspectives on the Crisis and Its Aftermath (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2008), pp.79–85. 2. Thomas Christensen and Jack Snyder, ‘Chained gangs and passed bucks: predicting alliance patterns in multipolarity’, International Organization xliv/2 (1990), pp.137–68; John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton & Co, 2002); Mancur Olson and Richard Zeckhauser, ‘An economic theory of alliances’, The Review of Economics and Statistics xlviii/3 (1966), pp.266–79; Richard Rosecrance, ‘Is there a balance of power?’ in J. Vasquez and C. Elman (eds), Realism and the Balancing of Power: A New Debate (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2003). 3. Zach Levey, ‘Anglo-Israeli strategic relations, 1952–56’, Middle Eastern Studies xxxi/4 (1995), pp.772–802. 4. George Liska, Nations in Alliance (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Press, 1962); Glenn H. Snyder, Alliance Politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University

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5. 6. 7. 8.

9. 10.

11. 12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

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Press, 1997); Stephen M. Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987). Mancur Olson, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1965). Patricia A. Weitsman, ‘Alliance cohesion and coalition warfare: the Central Powers and the Triple Entente’, Security Studies xii/3 (2003), pp.79–113. Eric Labs, ‘Beyond victory: offensive realism and expansion of war aims’, Security Studies vi/4 (1997), pp.1–49. Marc Trachtenberg, The Craft of International History: A Guide to Method (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006), p.33, emphasis in original. Liska, Nations in Alliance, p.116. E.g., Gordon A. Craig, ‘The World War I alliance of the Central Powers in retrospect: the military cohesion of the alliance’, Journal of Military History xxxvii/3 (1965), pp.336–34; and Weitsman, ‘Alliance cohesion and coalition warfare’. Liska also at times slips coordination into his evaluation of cohesion level. See Liska, Nations in Alliance, pp.69–89. James D. Morrow, ‘Alliances: why write them down?’, Annual Review of Political Science iii/1 (2000), pp.63–83. William R. Thompson, and David P. Rapkin, ‘Collaboration, consensus, and détente: the external threat-bloc cohesion hypothesis’, Journal of Conflict Resolution xxv/4 (1981), p.622. John R. Oneal, ‘The theory of collective action and burden sharing in NATO’, International Organization xliv/3 (1990), pp.379–402; John R. Oneal, ‘Testing the theory of collective action: NATO defense burdens, 1950–1984’, Journal of Conflict Resolution xxxiv/3 (1990), pp.426–48; Glenn Palmer, ‘Corralling the free rider: deterrence and the western alliance’, International Studies Quarterly xxxiv/1 (1990), pp.147–64; Todd Sandler and Keith Hartley, ‘Economics of alliances: the lessons of collective action’, Journal of Economic Literature xxxix/3 (2001), pp.869–96. Quoted in Keith Neilson and Roy A. Prete, ‘Preface’ in K. Neilson and R. Prete (eds), Coalition Warfare: An Uneasy Accord (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1983), p.vii. Carl von Clausewitz, ‘Notes on history and politics (1803–1807)’ in P. Paret and D. Moran (eds), Carl von Clausewitz, Historical and Political Writings (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992), p.241. John A. C. Conybeare, ‘Arms versus alliances: the capital structure of military enterprises’, Journal of Conflict Resolution xxxviii/2 (1994), pp.215–35; James D. Morrow, ‘Alliances and asymmetry: an alternative to the capability aggregation model’, American Journal of Political Science xxxv/4 (1991),

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17.

18.

19.

20.

21.

22.

23. 24. 25.

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pp.904–33; James D. Morrow, ‘Arms versus allies: trade-offs in the search for security’, International Organization xlvii/2 (1993), pp.207–33; Gerald L. Sorokin, ‘Arms, alliances, and security tradeoffs in enduring rivalries’, International Studies Quarterly xxxviii/3 (1994), pp.421–46. Craig, ‘The World War I alliance of the Central Powers’; Elizabeth Greenhalgh, Victory Through Coalition: Britain and France During the First World War (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005); Jehuda L. Wallach, Uneasy Coalition: The Entente Experience in World War I (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1993). Christensen and Snyder, ‘Chained gangs and passed bucks’; Alastair Smith, ‘Alliance formation and war’, International Studies Quarterly xxxix/4 (1995), pp.405–25; Glenn H. Snyder, ‘The security dilemma in alliance politics’, World Politics xxxvi/4 (1984), pp.461–95. See e.g., Sarah Kreps, ‘When does the mission determine the coalition? The logic of multilateral intervention and the case of Afghanistan’, Security Studies xvii/3 (2008), pp.531–67. Time horizons are another important factor. Internal mobilization can take time, and if a threat is immediate, forming or joining a coalition may be the more preferable option. See Paul Kennedy, ‘Military coalitions and coalition warfare over the past century’ in Neilson and Prete (eds), Coalition Warfare: An Uneasy Accord, pp.4–6; and Morrow, ‘Arms versus allies’, pp.215–6. Brett Ashley Leeds, ‘Alliance reliability in times of war: explaining state decisions to violate treaties’, International Organization lvii/4 (2003), pp.801–27; Liska, Nations in Alliance; Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics; Morrow, ‘Alliances: why write them down?’; Alastair Smith, ‘Extended deterrence and alliance formation’, International Interactions xxiv/4 (1998), pp.405–425; Snyder, Alliance Politics; Walt, The Origins of Alliances. Weitsman, ‘Alliance cohesion and coalition warfare’, p.81. For this view, see Stephen M. Walt, ‘Why alliances endure or collapse’, Survival xxxix/1 (1997), pp.156–79. For earlier reviews and critiques of this argument, see Arthur Stein, ‘Conflict and cohesion: A review of the literature’, Journal of Conflict Resolution xx/1 (1976), pp.143–72; and Thompson and Rapkin, ‘Collaboration, consensus, and détente’. J.P. Riley, Napoleon and the World War of 1813: Lessons in Coalition Warfighting (Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 2000), p.436. Walt, The Origins of Alliances. This statement stands in contrast to Glenn Snyder’s claim that a state’s most preferred option is to form a coalition while their adversaries do not. His own analysis of the dangers of either allied abandonment or entrapment, however, demonstrates why mutual coalition abstention would be most preferable.

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26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33.

34. 35. 36.

37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42.

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See Snyder, ‘The security dilemma in alliance politics’. For a similar critique of Snyder, see Randall L. Schweller, Deadly Imbalances: Tripolarity and Hitler’s Strategy of World Conquest (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998), p.50. Olson, The Logic of Collective Action; Rosecrance, ‘Is there a balance of power?’ Christensen and Snyder, ‘Chained gangs and passed bucks’; Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, pp.157–9. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, Ch. 8. Randall L. Schweller, ‘Bandwagoning for profit: bringing the revisionist state back in’, International Security xix19/1 (1994), pp.88–96. Riley, Napoleon and the World War of 1813. David Stevenson, Cataclysm: The First World War as Political Tragedy (New York: Basic Books, 2004), p.93. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, pp.253–4. McKoy, Michael K., ‘Going over there: the American decision to enter World War I’ (Presented at Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, 29 March 2007). Nevertheless, the setbacks the Entente suffered in 1917, notably the French mutiny in May and the Russian Bolshevik Revolution, likely accelerated American deployment. Otherwise, the United States could have engaged in offensive buck-passing, providing nominal troops while the Entente finished the job. Mark A. Stoler, ‘The “second front” and American fear of Soviet expansion, 1941–1943’, Military Affairs xxxix/3 (1975), pp.136–41. Gerhard L.Weinberg, A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p.889. Schweller focuses his criticism solely on neorealism, but it can be applied to international relations theory in general. See Randall L. Schweller, ‘Neorealism’s status quo bias: what security dilemma?’, Security Studies v/2 (1996), pp.90–121. Schweller, ‘Bandwagoning for profit’; Schweller, Deadly Imbalances. Robert Jervis, ‘Cooperation under the security dilemma’, World Politics xxx/2 (1978), pp.204–5. Gerhard L.Weinberg, World in the Balance: Behind the Scenes of World War II (Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1981), p.17. “The Italian and Spanish dictators both wanted to join Hitler’s victorious war – after the fighting but before the division of the loot.” Ibid., p.16. Schweller, ‘Bandwagoning for profit’, pp.93–5. See also Jason W. Davidson, The Origins of Revisionist and Status-Quo States (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2006); and Kevin Sweeney and Paul Fritz,

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43. 44. 45. 46. 47.

48. 49.

50.

51.

52.

53.

54.

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‘Jumping on the bandwagon: an interest-based explanation for great power alliances’, Journal of Politics lxvi/2 (2004), pp.428–49. Schweller, Deadly Imbalances, pp.62–3. Glenn H. Snyder, ‘Alliances, balance, and stability’, International Organization xlv/1 (1991), p.125. Tasker H. Bliss, ‘Evolution of unified command’, Foreign Affairs i/2 (1922), pp.1–30. Stephen E. Gent, ‘Strange bedfellows: the strategic dynamics of major power military interventions’, Journal of Politics lxix/4 (2007), pp.1089–1102. This pattern of course assumes that in the former case the intervener can be deterred, and in the latter that the protector’s intention to counter-intervene was genuine. Gent, ‘Strange bedfellows’, pp.1093–4. Schweller rightly notes that a state can only be considered buck-passing if its participation is not necessary to effectively balance against the threat. Otherwise, it should more accurately be considered distancing or shirking. Schweller, Deadly Imbalances, p.73. Jerzy Lukowski and Hubert Zawadski, A Concise History of Poland (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp.120–32. The same was true of the Nazi-Soviet partition of Poland in 1939. The Soviets hastened their entry into the war once it became clear that Germany would defeat Poland much more quickly than expected. See Weinberg, A World at Arms, pp.55–7. Daniel Brumberg, ‘From strategic surprise to strategic gain: Egypt’s role in the Gulf coalition’ in A. Bennett, J. Lepgold, and D. Unger (eds), Friends in Need: Burden-Sharing in the Persian Gulf War (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997)’; Raymond A. Hinnebusch, ‘Syria’s role in the Gulf War coalition’ in Bennett, Lepgold, and Unger (eds), Friends in Need. Lawrence Freedman and Efraim Karsh, ‘How Kuwait was won: strategy in the Gulf War’, International Security, xvi/2 (1991), pp.5–41; Kreps, ‘When does the mission determine the coalition?’. On the importance of gaining international approval for foreign interventions, see Eric Voeten, ‘The political origins of the UN Security Council’s ability to legitimize the use of force’, International Organization lix/3 (2005), pp.527–57. Paul W. Schroeder, ‘Alliances, 1815–1945: weapons of power and tools of management’ in K. Knorr (ed), Historical Dimensions of National Security (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1976). On binding as a grand strategy, see G. John Ikenberry, After Victory: Institutions, Strategic Restraint, and the Rebuilding of Order After Major Wars (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001); and Daniel M. Kliman, ‘Eclipsed: how democracies navigate the rise of new powers’ (Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University,

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55. 56. 57.

58.

59.

60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65.

66. 67. 68. 69. 70.

71.

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Department of Politics, 2010). On binding in peacetime alliances, see Patricia A. Weitsman, Dangerous Alliances: Proponents of Peace, Weapons of War (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003); and David Bearce, Kristen Flanagan, and Katharine Floros, ‘Alliances, internal information, and military conflict among member-states’, International Organization xl/3 (2006), pp.595–625. Robert Powell, ‘Bargaining theory and international conflict’, Annual Review of Political Science v/1 (2002), pp.1–30. Snyder, Alliance Politics, pp.111–12. Brumberg, ‘From strategic surprise to strategic gain’, p.94; Galia Golan, ‘Gorbachev’s difficult time in the Gulf’, Political Science Quarterly cvii/2 (1992), pp.213–30. Robbin F. Laird, ‘The Soviet Union and the western alliance: elements of an anticoalition strategy’, Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science xxxvi/4 (1987), pp.116–18. Christensen and Snyder, ‘Chained gangs and passed bucks’; Greenhalgh, Victory Through Coalition; Vojtech Mastny, ‘Stalin and the prospects of a separate peace in World War II’, American Historical Review xxvii/5 (1972), pp.1365–88. Heins Goemans, War and Punishment: The Causes of War Termination and the First World War (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000). Weitsman, ‘Alliance cohesion and coalition warfare’. In this instance, states may increase their war aims due to greed rather than fear of defection. See Labs, ‘Beyond victory’. Liska, Nations in Alliance, pp.44–5. Keith Kyle, ‘Britain’s slow march to Suez’ in D. Tal (ed), The 1956 War: Collusion and Rivalry in the Middle East (Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 2001), p.95. Wm. Roger Louis, ‘The tragedy of the Anglo-Egyptian settlement of 1954’ in Wm. R. Louis and R. Owen (eds), Suez 1956: The Crisis and Its Consequences (New York: Clarendon Press, 1989), pp.44–5. Michael B. Oren, ‘Escalation to Suez: the Egypt-Israel border war, 1949–56’, Journal of Contemporary History xxiv/2 (1989), pp.352–3. Kyle, ‘Britain’s slow march to Suez’, p.97. Keith Kyle, Suez (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1991), pp.94–6. Zach Levey, ‘Anglo-Israeli strategic relations, 1952–56’, Middle Eastern Studies xxxi/4 (1995), p.773. Avi Shlaim, ‘The Protocol of Sèvres, 1956: anatomy of a war plot’, International Affairs lxxiii/3 (1997), p.515. Even Ben-Gurion referred to his plan as “fantastic”. Mordechai Bar-On, The Gates of Gaza: Israel’s Road to Suez and Back, 1955– 1957 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994); Kyle, Suez, pp.62–67, 78–80;

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72.

73. 74. 75.

76. 77. 78. 79. 80. 81. 82. 83. 84. 85. 86. 87. 88.

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Jack S. Levy and Joseph R. Gochal, ‘Democracy and preventive war: Israel and the 1956 Sinai campaign’, Security Studies xi/2 (2001–2), pp.1–49; Oren, ‘Escalation to Suez: the Egypt-Israel border war, 1949–56’; and David Tal, ‘Israel’s road to the 1956 War’, International Journal of Middle East Studies xxviii/1 (1996), pp.65, 70. Motti Golani, ‘The historical place of the Czech-Egyptian arms deal, fall 1955’, Middle Eastern Studies xxxi/4 (1995), pp.803–27; and Avi Shlaim, ‘Conflicting approaches to Israel’s relations with the Arabs: Ben Gurion and Sharett, 1953–1956’, Middle East Journal xxxvii/2 (1983), pp.180–201. Golani in fact argues that the Czech arms deal actually hindered Israeli plans for war, as the military balance no longer favored Israel. Maurice Vaisse, ‘France and the Suez Crisis’ in Louis and Owen (eds), Suez 1956. “This pact had an exceptional array of enemies – Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia, France, and the Soviet Union.” Kyle, ‘Britain’s slow march to Suez’, p.98. Avi Shlaim notes, “In essence, the alliance between Israel and France which developed during this period was an alliance between the defense ministries of the two countries, bypassing both foreign ministries.” Shlaim, ‘Conflicting approaches to Israel’s relations with the Arabs’, p.197. Howard M. Sachar, Israel and Europe (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1999), pp.87–8. Grove, ‘Who to fight in 1956, Egypt or Israel?’ Levey, ‘Anglo-Israeli strategic relations, 1952–56’. Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, Israel, the Superpowers, and War in the Middle East (New York: Praeger Publishing, 1987), p.31. Kyle, Suez. Ibid., pp.35–49. Motti Golani, ‘The Sinai War, 1956: Three Partners, Three Wars’ in Tal (ed), The 1956 War: Collusion and Rivalry in the Middle East. Diane B. Kunz, The Economic Diplomacy of the Suez Crisis (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1991). Kenneth Pollack, Arabs at War: Military Effectiveness, 1948–1991 (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2002), pp.32–9. Quoted in Bar-On, The Gates of Gaza, p.266. Quoted in Golani, ‘The Sinai War, 1956: three partners, three wars’, pp.187–8. Bar-Siman-Tov, Israel, the Superpowers, and War in the Middle East, p.56. The issue of side payments seems more applicable when coalition building is more about legitimacy than capability aggregation. See Voeten, ‘The political origins of the UN Security Council’s ability to legitimize the use of force’.

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Chapter 7 The impossible alliance: strategy and reliability in the Triple Entente negotiations of 1939 1. These matters are well discussed by Iuliia Kantor, Zakliataia druzhba: Sekretnoe sotrudnichestvo SSR i Germanii v 1920–1930-e gody (Moscow: Piter, 2009), who utilizes recently available Soviet archival documentation. See also Yuri Dyakov and Tatyana Bushuyeva, The Red Army and the Wehrmacht (Amherst, NJ: Prometheus Books, 1995). 2. V. M. Falin, A. Gromyko, M. Kharlamov, V. Khvostov, S.Kozyrev (eds), Soviet Peace Efforts on the Eve of World War II (Moscow: Novosti, 1973), part 1, pp.346–7. 3. Quoted in Robert A.C. Parker, Chamberlain and Appeasement (New York: St. Martin’s, 1993), p.223. 4. For debates and disagreements over foreign policy issues within the Kremlin elite, see Paul D. Raymond, ‘Conflict and consensus in Soviet foreign policy, 1933–1939’ (PhD dissertation, Pennsylvania State University, 1979); V. Kulish, ‘U poroga voiny’, Komsomolskaia Pravda, 24 August 1988, p.3; and Jonathan Haslam, The Soviet Union and the Struggle for Collective Security in Europe, 1933–39 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1984), pp.5, 7, 22–3, 30, 33, 154–6, 158, 201. 5. Krasnaia zvezda, 6 April 1939. On isolationist and pro-German currents of thought within the Soviet elite see also Jonathan Haslam, ‘Litvinov, Stalin and the road not taken’, in G. Gorodetsky (ed), Soviet Foreign Policy, 1917– 1991: A Retrospective (London: Frank Cass, 1994), pp.55–62; and Silvio Pons, Stalin and the Inevitable War, 1936–1941 (London: Frank Cass, 2002). 6. Joseph V. Stalin, Problems of Leninism (Moscow: Foreign Language Publishing House, 1953), pp.746–59. 7. The significance of Litvinov’s dismissal has been variously interpreted. Geoffrey Roberts sees the appointment of Molotov as the new foreign affairs commissar as an indication that Stalin wanted more direct control over Soviet diplomacy in order to intensify the pursuit of an alliance with the West. Roberts, ‘The fall of Litvinov: a revisionist view’, Journal of Contemporary History xxvii/4 (1992), pp.639–57. Albert Resis interprets Litvinov’s dismissal as an attempt to broaden the Kremlin’s options – toward an arrangement with the democracies or with the Third Reich. Resis, ‘The fall of Litvinov: harbinger of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact’, Europe-Asia Studies lii/1 (January 2000), pp.33–56. Others have seen the firing of Litvinov, who was Jewish and thus objectionable to Hitler, as a signal that Moscow wanted a deal with Berlin in order to foster its supposed revolutionary and/or imperialist aims. E.g., Robert Tucker, Stalin in Power: The Revolution from Above

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11. 12. 13.

14. 15.

16.

17.

18. 19. 20. 21.

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(New York: Norton, 1990), p.593 and passim. Tucker dismisses the triple entente talks as a mere strategy to pressure Hitler into a deal with Stalin. Roy Medvedev, Let History Judge (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989), p.727. Aleksandr O. Chubarian, ‘The failure of the Moscow Talks’, in D. W. Pike (ed), The Opening of the Second World War (New York: Peter Lang, 1991), p.41. Afanas’ev’s 1988 speech in Tallinn is quoted in Wolfgang Leonhard, Betrayal: The Hitler-Stalin Pact of 1939 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1989), p.xiv. See also M. Semiriaga, ‘23 avgusta 1939 goda: Sovetsko-Germanskii dogovor o nenapadenii: Byla li alternativa?’, Literaturnaia gazeta, 5 October 1988, p.14; Semiriaga, ‘Sovetskii Soiuz i predvoennyi politicheskii krizis’, Voprosy istorii, 1990/ ix, pp.49–64; and ‘Kruglyi stol: Vtoraia mirovaia voina, istoki i prichiny’, Voprosy istorii, 1988/xii, pp.3–46. Lev Bezymenskii, Gitler i Stalin pered skhvatkoi: Voennye tainy XX veka (Moscow: Veche, 2000), p.277. Dmitri Volkogonov, Stalin: Triumph & Tragedy (New York: Grove Weidenfeld, 1988), p.353. Geoffrey Roberts, The Soviet Union and the Origins of the Second World War: Russo-German Relations and the Road to War, 1933–1941 (Houndmills: Macmillan, 1995), p.149. Haslam, The Soviet Union and the Struggle for Collective Security, pp.228–9 and 231–2. Michael Jabara Carley, ‘End of the “low, dishonest decade”: failure of the Anglo-Franco-Soviet alliance in 1939’, Europe-Asia Studies xlv/2 (1993), p.332. Molotov subsequently commented to Iakov Suritz, Soviet ambassador in Paris, “As you see, the English and the French are demanding of us unilateral and gratuitous assistance with no intention of rendering us equivalent assistance”, Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, pp.27–8. Much later Stalin admitted to Winston Churchill his fear of a deal between the western powers and Germany. Notes of this conversation were recorded by the translator, A.H. Birse, Averell Harriman Papers, container 162, chronological file 14–15, August 1942 (Library of Congress Manuscript Division). Cf., Winston Churchill, The Second World War, Vol. I, The Gathering Storm (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1948), p.391. Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (New York: Vintage, 1989), chapters 5 and 6. Manchester Guardian, 25 February 1939. Quoted in Volkogonov, Stalin, p.349. A. Gromyko (ed), SSSR v bor’be za mir nakanune vtroi mirovoi voiny (Moscow: Politizdat., 1971), pp.543–9.

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22. Molotov had long been “insisting that the military pact is an inseparable part of a military-political agreement . . . .that without an absolutely concrete military agreement, as an integral part of the whole treaty, it will be nothing but an empty declaration, and this is something we cannot accept.” Gromyko, SSSR v bor’be za mir, p.496. 23. Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, p.234. 24. Dokumenty vneshnei politiki 1939 (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye Otnosheniia, 1992) (henceforth DVP), Vol. XXII, book 1, p.584; and Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, pp.185–190. 25. Michael Jabara Carley, 1939: The Alliance that Never Was and the Coming of World War II (Chicago, IL: Ivan Dee, 1999), p.184. 26. Talbot C. Imlay, Facing the Second World War: Strategy, Politics, and Economics in Britain and France, 1938–1940 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), p.97. 27. Documents Diplomatiques Français 1932–1939, 2nd series (Paris: Impr. Nationale, 1986) (henceforth DDF), Vol. XVIII, p.608; and Carley, 1939, pp.185–6. 28. DVP, Vol. XXII, book 1, pp.573–8. 29. Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, p.250. 30. André Beaufre, Le Drame de 1940 (Paris: Plon, 1965), pp.135–9; Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919–1939 (London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office, 1946ff.) (henceforth DBFP), series 3, Vol. VII, pp.588–614. 31. Quoted from the Soviet foreign policy archives in Volkogonov, Stalin, p.350. 32. Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, p.205. 33. Hugh Ragsdale, ‘The Munich Crisis and the issue of Red Army transit across Romania’, Russian Review lvii/4 (1998), pp.614–17; and Ragsdale, The Soviets, the Munich Crisis, and the Coming of World War II (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). 34. Georges Bonnet, Défense de la paix, Vol. II, Fin d’une Europe (Geneva: Éditions du Cheval Ailé, 1948), p.277. 35. Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, p.205 and 261ff.; Julian Jackson, The Fall of France: The Nazi Invasion of 1940 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), p.74; Carley, 1939, p.195; DDF, 2nd series, Vol. XVIII, p.182; and God krizisa, 1938–39: Dokumenty i materialy, (Moscow: Izd-vo. Polit. Lit., 1990), Vol. II, pp.307–11. 36. Anita J Praźmowska, Eastern Europe and the Origins of the Second World War (New York: St. Martin’s, 2000), p.65. 37. See, for example, the secret GRU report of 19 August 1939 to Stalin on German plans cited in Gabriel Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion: Stalin and the German Invasion of Russia (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), p.7.

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38. DVP, XXII, book 1, pp.580–1. Though Maiskii did hold out some hope that rapidly shifting British public opinion might force the Chamberlain to ally with Russia. God krizisa, Vol. I, pp.322–3. 39. God krizisa, Vol. I, p.298. 40. In contrast, Voroshilov told Drax and Doumenc that a major European war was “well-neigh inevitable” in the near future. Falin et al, Soviet Peace Efforts, part 2, p.243. 41. DBFP, series 3, Vol. 5, no. 2, pp.12–13. 42. Quoted in Parker, Chamberlain and Appeasement, p.219. 43. Parker, Chamberlain and Appeasement, chapter X and pp.216–19. Government inspired leaks to The Times and other newspapers made it clear that the guarantee committed London only to “fair and free negotiation” and not to the defense of any particular territorial status quo: The Times, 1 April 1939. 44. Cf. Donald C. Watt, How War Came: The Immediate Origins of the Second World War, 1938–1939 (New York: Pantheon, 1989), pp.452–3. 45. DDF, Vol. XVII, p.539. 46. Robert J. Young, ‘“La guerre de longue durée”: some reflections on French strategy and diplomacy’, in P. Preston (ed), General Staffs and Diplomacy Before the Second World War (Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield, 1978), p.53. 47. On Allied strategy see Norman H. Gibbs, Grand Strategy, Vol. I, Rearmament Policy (London: H.M. Stationary Office, 1976), pp.657–684; and James R.M. Butler, Grand Strategy, Vol. II, September 1939-June 1941 (London: H.M. Stationary Office, 1957). See also Young, ‘“La Guerre de longue durée”‘, pp.41–64. 48. Imlay, Facing the Second World War, p.8. 49. Ivo Banac (ed), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933–1949 (New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 2003), p.116. 50. Quoted from the video program Stalin, Vol. III, Generalissimo, Thames Television and WGBH Educational Foundation, 1990. 51. Carley, ‘End of the Low, Dishonest Decade’, p.332. 52. Christopher Andrew, The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB (New York: Basic Books, 1999), p.43. 53. John Erickson, ‘Threat identification and strategic appraisal by the Soviet Union, 1930–1941’, in Ernest R. May (ed), Knowing One’s Enemies: Intelligence Assessment Before the Two World Wars (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), p.403. 54. Andrew, Sword and the Shield, p.78. 55. Lev A. Bezymenskii, ‘Sovetskaia razvedka pered voinoi’, Voprosy istorii, 1996, no. 9, pp.78–90. 56. Andrew, Sword and the Shield, p.85.

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57. E.g., Ocherki istorii rossiskoi vneshnei razvedki (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnaia otnosheniia, 1999). 58. Pravda, 31 March 1935; reprinted in Jane Degras (ed), Soviet Documents on Foreign Policy, Vol. III, 1933–1941 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1953), p.125. 59. Izvestiia, 2 September 1935. 60. Stalin, Problems of Leninism, pp.746–59.

Chapter 8

The European Defense Community: astonishing alliance, predictable collapse?

1. Jasmine Aimaq, ‘Rethinking the EDC: failed attempt at integration or strategic leverage’, in M. Dumoulin (ed), La Communauté Européenne de Défense, leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000), p.92. 2. See for example Edward Fursdon, The European Defence Community, a History (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1980); Dumoulin, La Communauté Européenne, Kevin Ruane, The rise and fall of the European Defence Community, AngloAmerican relations and the crisis of European defence, 1950–1955 (London: Macmillan, 2000); Linda Risso, Divided we stand: the French and Italian political parties and the rearmament of West Germany, 1949–1955, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007). 3. Fursdon, The European Defence Community, pp.340–1. 4. Renata Dwan, ‘The European Defence Community and the role of FrenchAmerican elite relations, 1950–1954’, in Dumoulin, La Communauté Européenne, p.63. The EPC is not addressed in this paper. 5. For example, Desmond Dinan, Ever Closer Union? An Introduction to the European Community (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994), pp.25–30. 6. Sir I. Kirkpatrick (Wahnerheide) to Mr. Bevin, 15 October 1950, No 1499 [WU 1198/553], in Documents on British Policy Overseas Series II, Vol. III [henceforth DBPO II:III], German Rearmament September–December 1950, (London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office [HMSO], 1989) p.169. For the British role in EDC, see especially Anne Deighton, ‘The last piece of the jigsaw: Britain and the creation of the Western European Union, 1954’, Contemporary European History vii/2 (1998), pp.181–96; Ruane, The Rise and Fall. 7. Konrad Adenauer, Memoirs 1945–53 (Chicago, IL: Henry Regnery Company, 1965) (tr. Beate Ruhm von Oppen), pp.293–4. 8. Minute by Mr Mallet, 12 September 1950, C6004/3333/18, in DBPO II:III, p.32.

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9. Mr Bevin to Sir O. Harvey (Paris), 5 September 1950, No 921 [C5541/27/18], in DBPO II:III, p.9. 10. Sir O. Harvey (Paris) to Mr. Bevin, 11 October 1950, No 268 [WU 1198/488], in DBPO II:III, p.156. 11. B.J.S.M. (Washington) to Ministry of Defence, 12 October 1950, AWT 68 [CAB 21/1897], in DBPO II:III, p.160. 12. For a detailed exposition of the Pleven Plan, see Fursdon, The European Defence Community. 13. Letter from Mr. Nutting (Strasbourg) to Sir R. Makins, 23 September 1952 [WU10733/282], Documents on British Policy Overseas, Series II, Vol. I (henceforth DBPO II:I), The Schuman Plan, the Council of Europe and Western European Integration, May 1950-December 1952 (London: HMSO, 1986), p.967. 14. Linda Risso, ‘Similar, yet so different: why the European Defence Community was not a forerunner of the ESDP’, in A. Deighton and G. Bossuat (eds), L’Union européenne, acteur de la sécurité mondiale (Paris: Soleb, 2007), p.267. 15. Ruane, The Rise and Fall, Parts II and III. 16. Risso, Divided we stand, p.2 and ‘Similar, yet so different’, pp.268–70. 17. Renata Dwan, ‘Monnet and the European Defence Community’, Cold War History i/1 (2000), p.155. 18. Jean Monnet, Memoirs (New York: Doubleday & Company, 1978), p.338. 19. Ibid., pp.340, 343. 20. Ibid., pp.343–4. 21. Ibid., p.346. 22. Victor Gavin, ‘Power through Europe: the case of the European Defence Community in France (1950–1954)’, French History xxiii/1 (2009), pp.69–87, 77. 23. Rogelia Pastor-Castro, ‘The Quai d’Orsay and the European Defence Community Crisis of 1954’, History xci/303 (2006), pp.386–400 and especially pp.391–9. 24. This brilliant characterization came from a student of the author at the University of Plymouth. 25. Sir O. Harvey to Mr. Morrison, 4 May 1951, No 234 [ZP 18/8], DBPO II:I, pp.527–8. 26. Gavin, ‘Power through Europe?’, pp.69–87. See also George-Henri Soutou, ‘France and the German Rearmament problem, 1945–1955’, in R. Ahmann and M. Howard (eds), The Quest for Stability: Problems of West European Security, 1918–1957 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), pp.487–512; Marc Trachtenberg, A constructed peace: the making of the European settlement, 1945–1963 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999), p.111. 27. Sir O. Franks to Mr. Morrison, 23 July 1951, No 441 [ZP18/17], DBPO II:I, p.668. 28. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.345.

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258 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35.

36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44.

45.

46. 47. 48. 49.

50.

51. 52. 53.

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Aimaq, ‘Rethinking the EDC’, pp.124–134. Monnet, Memoirs, p.369. Ibid., p.366. Dwan, ‘EDC and the role of French-American elite relations’, p.89. Sir O. Harvey to Mr. Morrison, op.cit., p.529. Gavin, ‘Power through Europe?’, p.84. Linda Risso, ‘Against rearmament or against integration? The PCI and PCF’s opposition to the European Defence Community and the Western European Union, 1950–1955’, Journal of European Integration History xiii/2 (2007), p.12. Sir E. Hall-Patch (Paris) to Mr. Eden, 8 July 1952, No 32 [M551/88], DBPO II:I, p.899. Florence Gauzy, ‘Le réarmement de la République fédérale d’Allemagne et la CED (1951–1954)’, in Dumoulin, La Communauté Européenne, p.35. Gauzy, ‘Le réarmement de la République’, pp.39 and 41; Adenauer, Memoirs p.298. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.416. Ibid., p.346. Ibid., pp.347–8, 350–1. Ibid., p.407. Ibid., p.418. Archives Nationales du Luxembourg, Luxembourg. Affaires étrangères. Communauté européenne de la défense. Comité intérimaire de la Conférence pour l’organisation de la CED. Négociations 1950–51, AE 11720, at www.ena.lu. Archives Nationales du Luxembourg, Luxembourg. Affaires étrangères. Communauté européenne de la défense. Comité intérimaire de la Conférence pour l’organisation de la CED. Protocole spécial sur le Luxembourg 1952–53, AE 11727, at www.ena.lu. Mr. Eden to Sir C. Warner (Brussels), 17 October 1952, No 435 [WU10734/16], DBPO II:I, p.987. Pascal Deloge, ‘L’armée belge et la CED’, in Dumoulin (ed), La Communauté Européenne, p.163. Ibid., pp.167–8. Jan van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority: Dutch Defence Policy at the Time of the European Defence Community (Florence: European Press Academic Publishing, 2003), pp.155–6. Anjo G. Harryvan and Jan van der Harst, ‘The Netherlands and the European Defence Community’, in Dumoulin, La Communauté Européenne, pp.169–177; van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, pp.136–40. Van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, pp.142–4. Ibid., pp.147–51. Ibid., p.157.

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54. Harryvan and van der Harst, ‘The Netherlands and the European Defence Community’, pp.169–177; van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, pp.158–66. 55. Risso, Divided we stand, pp.43–4. 56. Ibid., pp.48–9. 57. Ibid., pp.56–7. 58. Speech by Alcide De Gasperi in the Council of Europe – Consultative Assembly. Reports. Third session. 26 November – 11 December 1951. Part VII. Sittings 37 to 41. 1951, pp.88–91, at www.ena.lu. 59. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.433. 60. Harryvan and van der Harst, ‘The Netherlands and the European Defence Community’, pp.177–80; van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, pp.166–71 and 176–7. 61. Van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, p.170. 62. Ibid., p.171. 63. Harryvan and van der Harst, ‘The Netherlands and the European Defence Community’, pp.177–180. 64. Van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, p.304. 65. Ibid., pp.172–3 66. Ibid., pp.181–7. 67. Adenauer, Memoirs, pp.321–8. 68. Ibid., pp.420–7. 69. Gauzy, ‘Le réarmement de la République’, pp.42–3. 70. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.436. 71. David Clay Large, Germans to the Front: West German rearmament in the Adenauer era (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), chapter 5. 72. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.443. 73. A. Mauritz van der Veen, Defending integration or integrating defence? Ratifying the EDC in Belgium and the Netherlands, January 2009, unpublished manuscript cited with the permission of the author, available at http://maurits. myweb.uga.edu/Research/EDC_B_NL.pdf, pp.19–22; Richard T. Griffiths, Socialist parties and the question of Europe in the 1950s (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 1993), pp.149–54. 74. ‘Wir und die Europäische Verteidigungsgemeinschaft’, in Luxemburger Wort, 8 April 1954, p.1, at www.ena.lu. 75. Minute from Mr. Macmillan to Mr. Eden, 25 October 1952 [WU10733/338], DBPO II:I, p.997. 76. Van der Harst, The Atlantic Priority, p.169. 77. Gauzy, ‘Le réarmement de la République’, p.45.

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78. Antonio Varsori, ‘Italian Diplomacy and the “querelle de la CED”‘, in Dumoulin, La Communauté Européenne, p.185. 79. Ibid., pp.186–201. 80. Risso, Divided we stand, p.265. 81. Fursdon, The European Defence Community, pp.230–2. 82. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.434. 83. Trachtenberg, A constructed peace, p.113. 84. Ibid., p.123. 85. Risso, Divided we stand, pp.256–7. 86. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.437. 87. Van der Veen, Defending integration, p.10. 88. Risso, Divided we stand, pp.224–253. 89. Ibid., p.222. 90. Van der Veen, Defending integration, p.10. 91. See for example John Lewis Gaddis, The United States and the origins of the Cold War (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000). 92. Adenauer, Memoirs, p.302. 93. Ruane, The Rise and Fall, Parts I and II. 94. Cited in Gauzy, ‘Le réarmement de la République’, pp.46 and 49.

Chapter 9 Cairo and Moscow: the frustrating alliance (1956–1976) 1. Anees Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat (Cairo: Dar El-Ma’aref, 2009), p.45. 2. The alliance ended, for all intents and purposes, in March 1976, when Sadat unilaterally declared Egypt’s withdrawal from the Treaty of Cooperation and Friendship. 3. Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1979). 4. Stephen M. Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987). 5. This calculation may have been faulty, however, as it allowed Israel, backed by Western powers, to emerge victorious and dominant following the Six Day War. The balance of power did indeed shift, but not in Moscow’s favor. 6. J. R. Friedman, C. Bladen and S. Rosen (eds), Alliance in International Politics (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1970), p.106. 7. Friedman et al, Alliance, p.5, emphasis added. The Egyptian perception of the looming Israeli threat was not equally shared by the Soviets, who had their own Cold War reasons to ally with Egypt. Soviet assistance was sporadic,

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11.

12.

13. 14.

15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23.

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limited and conditional. More often than not, Egypt had to pay the full amount with interest of its arms purchases, albeit on a long-term repayment plan. Israel, conversely, received some of its more advanced weaponry through direct aid from the United States, such as the Phantom air jets. Friedman et al, Alliance, p.5, italics added. Glenn H. Snyder, ‘The security dilemma in alliance politics’, World Politics xxxvi/4, 1984, pp.461–495. Walt, The Origins of Alliances, p.1. The scope of the study would be unnecessarily, and possibly counterproductively, limited, should we examine formal alliance treaties only. Formal alliances are infrequent in world politics due to the long-term and specific obligations they entail. Walt, The Origins of Alliances. The terms alliance, alignment, coalition and pact are deployed interchangeably. This permits a greater ability to capture the operational strategic dynamics in a region where formal alliance treaties are scarce, but where alignment is ever-recurring. John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2003), p.40. Robert Gilpin similarly defines hegemony as “control of the system by a single powerful state.” Robert Gilpin, War and Change in World Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981), p.29. The system can be either international or regional. Hans Morgenthau correctly notes that alliances are “a necessary function of the balance of power.” He adds “states enter into alliance . . . to supplement each other’s capabilities.” Morgenthau, cited in Friedman et al, Alliances in International Politics, p.77; Waltz, Theory of International Politics. The rate Mearsheimer lists is that of superpowers’ wars. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p.39. The notion of regime security coincides well with the latter part of this assumption. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p.21. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, p.126. Modern here refers to the post World War I Middle East. Snyder, ‘The Security Dilemma in Alliance Politics’. Glenn H. Snyder, Alliance politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997). William L. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 2004) p.291. During some of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Britain had occupied Egypt, Sudan, Palestine, Iraq, Yemen, and Persian Gulf countries, while France had occupied Algeria, Morocco, Syria, and Lebanon. Libya had been occupied by Italy.

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24. To be sure, this hostility was not based on anti-Western ideology. The leaders of the Coup, the Free Officers, were pragmatist nationalists. 25. At the time, not only did Egypt share a border with the Jewish State in Sinai, but it also enjoyed administrative authority over the Gaza Strip. 26. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, p.292. 27. Stephen P. Cohen, Beyond America’s Grasp: a Century of Failed Diplomacy in the Middle East (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009), p.41, emphasis added. 28. Cohen, Beyond America’s Grasp, p.42. 29. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, p.291. 30. Ibid. p.291. 31. Cohen, Beyond America’s Grasp, p.43. 32. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.35. 33. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, p.292. 34. Ibid. p.294. 35. Ibid. p.297. 36. To be sure, Egypt continued to pursue its policy of positive neutralism, though not as vehemently as before the Suez Crisis. 37. Alan R. Taylor, The Arab Balance of Power (New York: Syracuse University Press, 1982), p.37. 38. Nasser stubbornly continued to label Egypt as the United Arab Republic, even after the disintegration of his union with Syria. 39. According to President Sadat, the Soviets were firmly against Arab nationalism, the very ideology that brought Syria and Egypt together. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.39. 40. Taylor, The Arab Balance of Power, p.39. 41. Muhammad H. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967 (Cairo: Markaz al-Ahram lil-Tarjamah wa-al-Nashr, Al-Ahram Center for Translation and Publishing, 1988) p.67. 42. According to Haykal, the US was coordinating the activities of an “army of foreign mercenaries” in Yemen to fight the Egyptian army, and that Israel and Iran were directly involved in the fighting. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.130. 43. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.206. 44. Ibid. p.72. 45. Ibid. pp.104–6. 46. Ibid. p.203. 47. Ibid. pp.160–88, 270. 48. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, p.318. 49. Ibid. p.318.

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NOTES 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68. 69.

70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. 79. 80. 81. 82. 83. 84.

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Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, pp.585–6. Ibid. p.694. Ibid. p.804. Ibid. p.807. Ibid. pp.485–502. Ibid. p.809. Ibid. pp.841–2. Ibid. p.864. Ibid. p.807. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, p.319. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.876. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.72. Cited in Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.67. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.129. Ibid. p.81. Ibid. p.87. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, pp.79 and 248. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.102. Ibid. p.130. In a meeting with President Brezhnev and Primier Kosygin Sadat complained that he expected to be on par with Israel, but that the Soviet Union kept him “two steps behind.” Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.253. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.173. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.146. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.229. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, pp.165–6. Ibid. p.205. Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.257. Cited in Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.206. Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.219; Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.259. Cited in Haykal, Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967, p.259. Cited in Mansour, Min Awraq El-Sadat, p.249. Isamil Fahmy, Al-Tafawodd Min Ajl Al-Salam Fil Sharq Al-Awssat (Cairo: Dar El-Shorouk, 2006) p.165. Ibid. p.171. Ibid. p.193. Cited in ibid. p.164. Ibid. p.210.

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Conclusions 1. Evan Resnick, ‘Strange bedfellows: US bargaining behavior with allies of convenience’, International Security xxxv/3 (Winter 2010/2011), pp.144–84. 2. This work is forthcoming. Please contact the authors at [email protected] for a copy of their paper. 3. Anna Mulrine, ‘With US-South Korea war games, a signal to North Korea’, The Christian Science Monitor (26 November 2010). 4. Greek membership of the European Union is another such case. See for example P. Kazakos and P. C. Iakomidis, Greece and EC Membership Evaluated (London: Pinter Publishers Ltd), 1994. 5. Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, Israel, the Superpowers, and War in the Middle East (New York: Praeger Publishing, 1987). 6. Eric Voeten considers this dynamic in the context of multilateral action, though not in the exact same way as considered here. See Eric Voeten, ‘Outside options and the logic of Security Council action’, American Political Science Review xcv/4 (2001), pp.845–58. 7. Derek Chollet and James Goldgeier, America Between the Wars, From 11/9 to 9/11: The Misunderstood Years Between the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the State of the War on Terror (New York: PublicAffairs, 2008), pp.147–8. The failure of the Sèvres Pact was in fact the moment the British unofficially accepted their subordinate role to the United States.

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Introduction Abrams, Lynn, Bismarck and the German Empire, 1871–1918 (New York: Routledge, 2006). Detwiler, Donald S., Germany: A Short History (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1999). Jacks, L.P., ‘The frailty of alliances’, Transactions of the Grotius Society xxiii (1937), pp.41–2. Joll, James, The Origins of the First World War (London: Longman, 1992). Olson, Mancur and Richard Zeckhauser, ‘An economic theory of alliances’, Review of Economies and Statistics xliii/3 (August 1966), pp.266–79. Niou, Emerson M. S. and Peter C. Ordeshook, ‘Alliances in anarchic international systems’, International Studies Quarterly xxxviii/2 (June 1994), pp.167–91. Rummel, R.J., Understanding Conflict and War, Vols. 1–5 (Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1975–1981). Schroeder, Paul, The Transformation of European Politics, 1763–1848 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1994). Sirmon, David G. and Peter J. Lane, ‘A model of cultural differences and international alliance performance’, Journal of International Business Studies xxxv/4 (July 2004), p.306. Smith, Alastair, ‘Alliance formation and war’, International Studies Quarterly xxxix/4 (December 1995), pp.405–25. Taylor, A.J.P., The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, 1848–1918 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1954).

Chapter 1 Power and culture: the origins and durability of the Korean-American alliance Archival, unpublished and documentary: ‘A Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim: Report to Congress 1992’.

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Boram, Yi, ‘GIs and Koreans: the making of the first ROK-US Status of Forces Agreement, 1945–1966’ (PhD dissertation, University of Georgia, 2006). Central Decimal Files, National Archives II. Cha, Victor, ‘“Rhee-straint”: the origins of the U.S.-ROK Alliance’, paper delivered at conference on the ‘Legacy and Lessons of the Korean War After Sixty Years in the Context of the U.S.-Korean Security Alliance’, June 2010, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA. Foreign Relations of the United States. Korea Herald. Korea Times. Macdonald, Donald Stone, ‘Korea and the ballot: the international dimension in Korean political development as seen in elections’ (PhD dissertation, George Washington University, 1978). Matthew B. Ridgway Papers, Military History Institute, US Army War College, Carlisle, PA. Oh, Soonbun, ‘The strategic flexibility policy: prospects for the US-ROK alliance’, MA Thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA, December 2006. North Korea International Documentation Project, Crisis and Confrontation on the Korean Peninsula: 1968–1969: Document Reader, Cold War International History Project, www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=topics.home& topic_id. Snyder, Scott, ‘The South China Sea dispute: prospects for preventive diplomacy,’ Special Report No. 18 (August 1996), United States Institute of Peace, www.usip.org. ‘Statement of General Thomas A. Schwartz, Commander in Chief, United Nations Command/Combined Forces Command and Commander, United States Forces Korea Before the 107th Congress, Senate Armed Services Committee’, 5 March 2002, http://www.shaps.hawaii.edu/security/us/ schwartz_2002*html. Stewart Yeo Papers, Military History Institute, US Army War College, Carlisle, PA. ‘The Report of the Bush Administration on the Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim,’ April 19, 1990. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, ‘President delivers State of the Union address,’ 29 January 2002. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, ‘President delivers graduation speech at West Point,’ 1 June 2002. The White House, ‘National Security Strategy of the United States Sept. 2002’. Trammell. Howard A., ‘Korean War Notes’, unpublished memoir. US Command in Korea, Historical Office, ‘History of U.S. Army Forces in Korea,’ vol. 1, at the US Army Center for Military History, Ft. McNair, Washington, D.C. Yi, Kil J., ‘Alliance in the quagmire: the United States, South Korea, and the Vietnam War, 1964–1968’ (PhD dissertation, Rutgers University, 1997).

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Yoon, Hye-Joon, ‘Alien superego: Koreans reading Korea in Time, 1999– 2000’, paper presented at the annual conference of the American Studies Association of Korea, 2000.

Books and articles: Beech, Keyes, Tokyo and Points East (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1954). Byrne, Jeffrey James, ‘“Own special brand of socialism”: Algeria and the contest of modernization in the 1960s’, Diplomatic History xxiii/3 (June 2009), pp.427–47. Cha, Victor, Alignment Despite Antagonism: The US-Korea-Japan Security Triangle (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999). Chinoy, Mike, Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2008). Clark, Mark W., From the Danube to the Yalu (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1954). Costigliola, Frank, ‘After Roosevelt’s death: dangerous emotions, divisive discourses, and the abandoned alliance’, Diplomatic History xxxiv/1 (January 2010), pp.1–23. Feffer, John, ‘Ploughshares into swords: economic implications of South Korean defense spending’, Academic Paper Series on Korea 2010, Vol. 3 (Washington, DC: Korea Economic Institute, 2010). Funabashi, Yoichi, The Peninsula Question: A Chronicle of the Second Korean Nuclear Crisis (Washington, DC: Brookings, 2007). Graham, Sarah Ellen, ‘American propaganda, the Anglo-American alliance, and the “delicate question” of Indian self-determination’, Diplomatic History xxxiii/2 (April 2009), pp.223–59. Hamby, Alonzo L., Man of the People: A Life of Harry S. Truman (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995). Irwin, Ryan, ‘A wind of change? White redoubt and the postcolonial moment’, Diplomatic History xxxiii/5 (November 2009), pp.927–56. Kaplan, Robert D., ‘The geography of Chinese power: how far can Beijing reach on land and at sea?’ Foreign Affairs lxxxix/3 (May/June 2010), pp.22–41. Lim, Hy-sop, ‘The perception of the United States after liberation in 1945’, in Lew, Ick Young, Byong-kie Song, Ho-min Yang, and Hy-sop Lim, Korean Perceptions of the United States: A History of Their Origins and Formation, translated by Michael Finch (Seoul: Jimoondang, 2006). Lee, Chae-jin, A Troubled Peace: U.S. Policy and the Two Koreas (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006). Lee, Chae-jin and Hideo Sato, US Policy toward Japan and Korea: A Changing Influence Relationship (New York: Praeger, 1982). Lerner, Mitchell B., The Pueblo Incident: A Spy Ship and the Failure of American Foreign Policy (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2002).

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Lew, Ick Young, Byong-kie Song, Ho-min Yang, and Hy-sop Lim, Korean Perceptions of the United States: A History of Their Origins and Formation, translated by Michael Finch (Seoul: Jimoondang, 2006). Lim Hy-sop, ‘The perception of the United States after liberation in 1945’, in Ick Young Lew, Byong-kie Song, Ho-min Yang, and Hy-sop Lim, Korean Perceptions of the United States: A History of Their Origins and Formation, translated by Michael Finch (Seoul: Jimoondang, 2006). Marcus, Maeva, Truman and the Steel Seizure Case: The Limits of Presidential Power (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977). Matray, James Irving, The Reluctant Crusade: American Foreign Policy in Korea, 1941–1950 (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1984). Millett, Allan R., The War for Korea, 1950–1951: They Came from the North (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2010). Nam, Joo-Hong, America’s Commitment to South Korea: The First Decade of the Nixon Doctrine (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986). Oberdorfer, Don, The Two Koreas (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1997). Oh, John Kie-chiang, ‘The forgotten soldiers of the Korean War,’ in M. F. Wilkinson (ed), The Korean War at Fifty: International Perspectives (Lexington, VA: Virginia Military Institute, 2004). Perry, Charles M., Jacquelyn K. Davis, James L. Schoff, and Toshi Yoshihara, Alliance Diversification and the Future of the US-Korean Security Relationship (Herndon, VA: Brassey’s, 2004). Pritchard, Charles, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2007). Shin, Gi-Wook, ‘South Korean anti-Americanism’, Asian Survey xxxvi/8 (1996), pp.787–803. Shin, Gi-Wook, One Alliance, Two Lenses: US-Korean Relations in a New Era (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010). Snyder, Scott, China’s Rise and the Two Koreas: Politics, Economics, Security (London: Lynne Rienner, 2009). Stueck, William, ‘Ambivalent occupation: U.S. armed forces in Korea, 1953 to the present,’ in R. Wampler (ed), Trilateralism and Beyond (forthcoming Kent State University Press, 2011). Stueck, William, The Road to Confrontation: American Policy Toward China and Korea, 1947–1950 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1981). Stueck, William, ‘Democratization in Korea: The United States role, 1980 and 1987’, International Journal of Korea Studies ii (Fall/Winter 1998), pp.1–26. Stueck, William, ‘Reassessing US strategy in the aftermath of the Korean War’, Orbis liii (Fall 2009), pp.571–90. Stueck, William and Yi Boram, ‘“An alliance forged in blood”: The U.S. Occupation of Korea, the Korean War, and the Korean-American Alliance’, Journal of Strategic Studies xxxiii/2 (Spring 2010), pp.177–209.

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Trachtenberg, Marc, A Constructed Peace: The Making of the European Settlement 1945–1963 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999). Walt, Stephen M., ‘Why alliances endure or collapse’, Survival xxxix/1(Spring 1997), pp.156–79. Wampler, R. (ed), Trilateralism and Beyond (forthcoming Kent State University Press). Webster, David, ‘Regimes in motion: the Kennedy administration and Indonesia’s new frontier, 1960–1962’, Diplomatic History xxiii/1 (January 2009), pp.95–123. Wilkinson, M. F. (ed), The Korean War at Fifty: International Perspectives (Lexington, VA: Virginia Military Institute, 2004). Wit, Joel S., Daniel B. Poneman, and Robert L. Gallucci, Going Critical: The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2004). Young, James V., Eye on Korea: An Insider Account of Korean-American Relations (College Station, TX: Texas A & M University Press, 2003).

Chapter 2 Do we need a coordinating state to build a successful alliance? The case of the wars of the French Revolution and Empire Archival, unpublished and documentary: Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, The Manuscripts of J. B. Fortescue, Esq., preserved at Dropmore, Vol. II, p.497, http://books.google.com/. The manuscripts of J.B. Fortescue, Esq., preserved at Dropmore, Vol. IV, http://www. archive.org/details/manufortescue03greauoft.

Books and articles: Alan, J. (ed), The Base of International Order: Essays in Honor of Manning, (London: Oxford University Press, 1973). Black, Jeremy, ‘British Strategy and the Struggle with France 1793–1815’, The Journal of Strategic Studies xxxi/4 (August 2008), pp.553–69. Bordo, Michael D. and Eugene N. White, ‘A tale of two currencies: British and French finance during the Napoleonic wars’, The Journal of Economic History li/2 (June 1991), pp.303–16. Broers, Michael, Europe Under Napoleon 1799–1815 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996). Crouzet, François, L’économie Britannique et le blocus continental (Paris: Economia, 1987). Dickinson, H. T. (ed), Britain and the French Revolution 1789–1815 (St Martin Press: New York, 1989).

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Droz, Jacques, Histoire diplomatique de 1648 à 1919 (Paris: Dalloz, 2005). Dwyer, Philip G, ‘The Politics of Prussian Neutrality, 1795–1805’, German History xxi/3 (Oct. 1994), pp.351–73. Dwyer, Philip G. ‘Self-Interest versus the common cause: Austria, Prussia and Russia against Napoleon’, The Journal of Strategic Studies xxxi/4 (August 2008), pp.605–32. Duffy, Michael, The Younger Pitt (Edinburgh: Pearson Education Limited, 2000). Gilpin, Robert, War and Change in World Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981). Glover, Richard, Britain at Bay: Defence against Bonaparte, 1803–14 (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1973). Goldstein, Joshua S. and David P. Rapkin, ‘After insularity: hegemony and the future world order’, Futures xxiii/9 (November 1991), pp.935–59. Gregory, Jeremy and John Stevenson, Britain in the Eighteenth Century, 1688–1820 (New York, Longman, 2000). Haas, Ernst, ‘The balance of power: prescription, concept or propaganda?’ World Politics v (July 1953), pp.442–77. Hall, Christopher, British Strategy in the Napoleonic War 1803–1815 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992). Hattendorf, J. B., England in the War of the Spanish Succession: A Study of the English View and Conduct of Grand Strategy, 1701–1712 (New York: Garland, 1987). Holzapfel, K. J., ‘La Prusse avant le traité de Bâle’, Annales historiques de la Révolution française lvi (1984), pp.229–39. Kamiin, Otto, ‘Les finances russes en 1812 et la mission de Sir Francis d’Ivernois à Saint-Pétersbourg’, Revue historique de la Révolution française viii (juillet/décembre 1915), pp.5–71. Kaufman, Stuart, Richard Little, and William C. Wohlforth (eds), The Balance of Power in World History (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2007). Levy Jack S. and William R. Thompson, ‘Balancing on land and at sea: do states ally against the leading global power?’ International Security xxxv/1 (Summer 2010), pp.7–43. Mackesy, Piers, ‘Strategic problems of the British war effort’, in H. T. Dickinson (ed), Britain and the French Revolution 1789–1815 (St Martin’s Press: New York, 1989). Mearsheimer, John, The Tragedy of Great Powers Politics (New York: Norton and Co., 2001). Morgenthau, Hans, Politics Among Nations: the Struggle for Power and Peace (New York: Knopf, 1973). Mori, Jennifer, William Pitt and the French Revolution 1785–1795 (New York: St Martin Press, 1997). Oneal, John R., ‘The theory of collective action and burden sharing in NATO’, International Organization xliv/3 (Summer 1990), pp.379– 402.

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Rasler, Karen A. and William R. Thompson, ‘Global wars, public debts, and the long cycle’, World Politics xxxv/4 (July 1983), pp.489–516. Schroeder, Paul W., ‘The Collapse of the Second Coalition’, The Journal of Modern History lix/2 (June 1987), pp.244–90. Schroeder, Paul W., ‘An Unnatural “Natural Alliance”: Castlereagh, Metternich, and Aberdeen in 1813,’ International History Review x (1988), pp.517–40. Schroeder, Paul W., The Transformation of European Politics 1763–1848 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994). Schweller, Randall L., Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006). Sherwig, John M., Guineas and Gunpowder: British Foreign Aid in the Wars with France, 1793–1815 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969). Walt, Stephen M., The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987). Waltz, Kenneth, Man, the State and War: a Theoretical Analysis (New York: Columbia University Press, 1954). Waltz, Kenneth, Theory of International Politics (New York: MacGraw Hill, 1979). Ward, A. W. and G. P. Gooch (eds), The Cambridge History of British Foreign Policy, 1783–1919, Vol. 1, 1783–1815 (New York: Octagon Books, 1970). Webster, Charles, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh 1812–1815: Britain and the Reconstruction of Europe (London: G. Bell and Sons, 1950). Webster, Charles, ‘The pacification of Europe, 1813–1815’, in A. W. Ward and G. P. Gooch (eds), The Cambridge History of British Foreign Policy, 1783–1919, Vol. 1, 1783–1815 (New York: Octagon Books, 1970). Wight, Martin, ‘The balance of power and international order’, in J. Alan (ed), The Base of International Order: Essays in Honor of Manning (London: Oxford University Press, 1973).

Chapter 3 Turkey’s accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, 1945–52: a qualified success? Archival, unpublished and documentary: Associated Press. Brockett, Gavin, ‘Betwixt and between: Turkish print culture and the emergence of a national identity 1945–1954’ (PhD dissertation, University of Chicago, 2003). CIA, ‘Turkey’s place in the East West struggle’, 26 February 1951, http://www. foia.cia.gov. Foreign Relations of the United States. Milliyet.

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Office of Strategic Services, ‘Soviet denunciation of neutrality with Turkey’ April 1945, http://www.foia.cia.gov. Republic of Turkey, Prime Ministry State Archives. The New York Times. The Times. The Washington Post.

Books and articles: Ahmad, Feroz, The Turkish Experiment in Democracy (London: Westview Press, for the Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1977). Athanassopoulou, Ekavi, Turkey-Anglo-American Security Interests 1945–1952, The First Enlargement of NATO (London and Portland: Frank Cass, 1999). Bağcı, Hüseyin, Demokrat Parti Dönemi Dış Politikası (Ankara: Image Publishing House, 1990). Deringil, Selim, Turkish Foreign Policy During the Second World War: An “Active” Neutrality (Cambridge and New York, 1989). Edib, Eşref, ‘Allahın ınayet ile Sebilürreşad’a başlıyoruz’, Sebilürreşad i (May 1948). Gürkan, Nilgün, Turkiye’de Demokrasiye Geçiste Basın, 1945–50 (Istanbul: Baskı Mart, 1998). Harris, George S., The Origins of Communism in Turkey (Stanford: Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, 1967).

Karpat, Kemal, Turkey’s Politics: The Transition to a Multi-Party System (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959).

Koçak, Cemil, ‘Çok-partili düzene geçişte dış etmenlerin araştırıldığı bir doktora tezi üzerine’, Tarih ve Toplum xxxiii (2000), pp.62–4. Lippe, John M. Vander, ‘Forgotten brigade of the forgotten war: Turkey’s participation in the Korean War’, Middle Eastern Studies xxxvi (2000), pp.92–102. McGhee, George, The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection: How the Truman Doctrine Contained the Soviets in the Middle East (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1990). ‘Mister Truman ve Ziyonizm’, Sebilüreşad iv (October 1950). Soysal, İsmail, Soğuk Savaş Dönemi ve Türkiye: Olaylar Kronolojisi, 1945–1975 (Istanbul: Isis Press, 1997). Yalman, Ahmed Emin, Turkey in My Time (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1956).

Chapter 4 Leading from the middle: maintaining the NATO deterrent in the 1960s Archival, unpublished and documentary: Dwight D Eisenhower Library: Papers as President. Foreign Relations of the United States.

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Books and articles: Bozo, Frédéric, Two Strategies for Europe: De Gaulle, the United States, and the Atlantic Alliance (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001). Bozo, Frédéric, ‘The NATO crisis of 1966–1967: a French perspective’, in H. Haftendorn (ed), The Strategic Triangle: France, Germany, and the United States in the Shaping of the New Europe (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2006). Buteux, Paul, The Politics of Nuclear Consultation in NATO, 1965–1980 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983). Duffield, John S., Power Rules: The Evolution of NATO’s Conventional Force Posture (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995). Freedman, Lawrence, The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). Haftendorn, Helga, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution: A Crisis of Credibility, 1966–1967 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996). Heuser, Beatrice, NATO, Britain, France, and the FRG: Nuclear Strategies and Forces for Europe, 1949–2000 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997). Jordan, Robert S., Norstad: Cold War NATO Supreme Commander: Airman, Strategist, Diplomat (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000). Kaplan, Lawrence S., NATO and the United States: The Enduring Alliance (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1994). Kaplan, Lawrence S., ‘McNamara, Vietnam, and the Defense of Europe’, in V. Mastny, S. Holtsmark, and A. Wenger (eds), War Plans and Alliances in the Cold War: Threat Perceptions in the East and West (London: Routledge, 2006). Large, David Clay, Germans to the Front: West German Rearmament in the Adenauer Era (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1996). Lundestad, Geir, The United States and Western Europe since 1945: From “Empire” by Invitation to Transatlantic Drift (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003). Schwartz, David N., NATO’s Nuclear Dilemmas (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1983).

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Chapter 5

Is there an Anglo-American alliance? Or a pact? Or an agreement? Or anything?

Archival, unpublished and documentary: Chatfield Papers, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. Diary of Sir William Slim, Slim Papers, 5/2/2. Churchill College, Cambridge. ‘Falklands Roundtable’, Presidential Oral History Program, Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia, 15–16 May 2003, http://millercenter.virginia.edu/index.php/academic/oralhistory/projects/special/ falklands. Foreign Relations of the United States. Hansard, Parliamentary Debates. Harry Hopkins Papers, Roosevelt Presidential Library. Henry Morgenthau Presidential Diary, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, Hyde Park, New York. The UK National Archive: Cabinet Papers, Foreign Office Papers. United States National Archive: State Department Papers. www.rms-gs.de/phileng/history/kap02.html

Books and articles: Acheson, Dean, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (New York: W.W. Norton, 1969). Adams, C. F. (ed), Memoirs of John Quincy Adams: Comprising Portions of His Diary from 1795 to 1848, 12 volumes (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1874–7). Aldrich, Richard J., The Hidden Hand: Britain, America and Cold War Secret Intelligence (London: John Murray, 2001).

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Chapter 6 Coalition dynamics and the Sèvres Pact: do opposites attract? Archival, unpublished and documentary: Kliman, Daniel M., ‘Eclipsed: how democracies navigate the rise of new powers’ (PhD dissertation, Princeton University, Department of Politics, 2010).

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Chapter 7 The impossible alliance: strategy and reliability in the Triple Entente negotiations of 1939 Archival, unpublished and documentary: Averell Harriman Papers, (Library of Congress Manuscript Division). Documents Diplomatiques Français 1932–1939, 2nd series (Paris: Impr. Nationale, 1986). Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919–1939 (London: H.M Stationary Office, 1946ff.). Dokumenty vneshnei politiki 1939 (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye Otnosheniia, 1992). God krizisa, 1938–39: Dokumenty i materialy, (Moscow: Izd-vo. Polit. Lit., 1990). Komsomolskaia Pravda. Krasnaia zvezda. Literaturnaia gazeta. Raymond, Paul D., ‘Conflict and consensus in Soviet foreign policy, 1933–1939’ (PhD dissertation, Pennsylvania State University, 1979). Stalin, vol. III, Generalissimo, Thames Television and WGBH Educational Foundation, 1990.

Books and articles: Banac, I. (ed), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933–1949 (New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 2003). Beaufre, André, Le Drame de 1940 (Paris: Plon, 1965). Bezymenskii, Lev, Gitler i Stalin pered skhvatkoi: Voennye tainy XX veka (Moscow: Veche, 2000). Bonnet, Georges, Défense de la paix, vol. II, Fin d’une Europe (Geneva: Éditions du Cheval Ailé, 1948). Butler, James R.M., Grand Strategy, Vol. II, September 1939-June 1941 (London: H.M. Stationary Office, 1957).

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Chapter 8 The European Defense Community: astonishing alliance, predictable collapse? Archival, unpublished and documentary: www.ena.lu. Documents on British Policy Overseas, Series II, Volume I, The Schuman Plan, the Council of Europe and Western European Integration, May 1950-December 1952 (London: HMSO, 1986). Documents on British Policy Overseas, Series II, Volume III, German Rearmament September–December 1950, (London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office (HMSO), 1989). Veen, A. Mauritz van der, Defending integration or integrating defence? Ratifying the EDC in Belgium and the Netherlands, January 2009, unpublished manuscript cited with the permission of the author, available at http://maurits.myweb. uga.edu/Research/EDC_B_NL.pdf.

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Books and articles: Adenauer, Konrad, Memoirs 1945–53 (Chicago, IL: Henry Regnery Company, 1965) (tr. Beate Ruhm von Oppen). Aimaq, Jasmine, ‘Rethinking the EDC: failed attempt at integration or strategic leverage’, in M. Dumoulin (ed), La communauté européenne de défense, leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000). Deighton, Anne, ‘The last piece of the jigsaw: Britain and the creation of the Western European Union, 1954’, Contemporary European History vii/2 (1998), pp.181–96. Deighton, Anne and Gérard Bossuat (eds), L’Union européenne, acteur de la sécurité mondiale (Paris: Soleb, 2007). Pascal Deloge, ‘L’armée belge et la CED’, in M. Dumoulin (ed), La Communauté Européenne de défense, leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000). Dinan, Desmond, Ever Closer Union? An Introduction to the European Community (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994). Dumoulin, M. (ed), La communauté européenne de défense, leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000). Dwan, Renata, ‘The European Defence Community and the role of FrenchAmerican elite relations, 1950–1954’, in M. Dumoulin (ed), La communauté européenne de défense, leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000). Dwan, Renata, ‘Monnet and the European Defence Community’, Cold War History i/1 (2000), pp141–60. Fursdon, Edward, The European Defence Community, a History (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1980). Gaddis, John Lewis, The United States and the Origins of the Cold War (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000). Gavin, Victor, ‘Power through Europe: the case of the European Defence Community in France (1950–1954)’, French History xxiii/1 (2009), pp.69–87. Gauzy, Florence, ‘Le réarmement de la République fédérale d’Allemagne et la CED (1951–1954)’, in M. Dumoulin (ed), La communauté européenne de défense, leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000). Griffiths, Richard T, Socialist Parties and the Question of Europe in the 1950s (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 1993). Harryvan, Anjo G. and Jan van der Harst, ‘The Netherlands and the European Defence Community’, in M. Dumoulin (ed), La Communauté Européenne de Défence leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000).

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Harst, Jan van der, The Atlantic Priority: Dutch Defence Policy at the Time of the European Defence Community (Florence: European Press Academic Publishing, 2003). Large, David Clay, Germans to the Front: West German Rearmament in the Adenauer Era (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996). Monnet, Jean, Memoirs (New York: Doubleday & Company, 1978). Pastor-Castro, Rogelia, ‘The Quai d’Orsay and the European Defence Community Crisis of 1954’, History xci/303 (2006), pp.386–400. Risso, Linda, Divided We Stand: the French and Italian Political Parties and the Rearmament of West Germany, 1949–1955, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007). Risso, Linda, ‘Similar, yet so different: why the European Defence Community was not a forerunner of the ESDP’, in A. Deighton and G. Bossuat (eds), L’Union européenne, acteur de la sécurité mondiale (Paris: Soleb, 2007). Risso, Linda, ‘Against rearmament or against integration? The PCI and PCF’s opposition to the European Defence Community and the Western European Union, 1950–1955’, Journal of European Integration History xiii/2 (2007), pp.11–32. Ruane, Kevin, The Rise and Fall of the European Defence Community, Anglo-American Relations and the Crisis of European Defence, 1950–1955 (London: Macmillan, 2000). Soutou, George-Henri, ‘France and the German Rearmament problem, 1945– 1955’, in R. Ahmann and M. Howard (eds), The Quest for Stability: Problems of West European Security, 1918–1957 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993). Trachtenberg, Marc, A Constructed Peace: the Making of the European Settlement, 1945–1963 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999). Varsori, Antonio, ‘Italian Diplomacy and the “querelle de la CED”’, in M. Dumoulin, La Communauté Européenne de Défence leçons pour demain? The European defence community, lessons for the future? (Bruxelles, New York: P.I.E.-P. Lang, 2000).

Chapter 9 Cairo and Moscow: the frustrating alliance (1956–1976) Cleveland, William L., A History of the Modern Middle East (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004). Cohen, Stephen P., Beyond America’s Grasp : a Century of Failed Diplomacy in the Middle East (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009). Fahmy, Isamil, Al-Tafawodd Min Ajl Al-Salam Fil Sharq Al-Awssat (Cairo: Dar El-Shorouk, 2009). Friedman, J. R., C. Bladen, & S. Rosen (eds), Alliance in International Politics (Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon, 1970).

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Gilpin, Robert, War and Change in World Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981). Haykal, Muhammad H., Harb Al-Thalathin Sanah: 1967 (al-*Tab*ah 1. ed.) (Cairo: Markaz al-Ahram lil-Tarjamah wa-al-Nashr, Al-Ahram Center for Translation and Publishing, 1988). Haykal, Muhammad H., October 73: Al-Silah wal Siyasah (Cairo: Markaz alAhram lil-Tarjamah wa-al-Nashr, Al-Ahram Center for Translation and Publication, 1993). Mansour, Anees, Min Awraq El-Sadat (Cairo: Dar El-Ma’aref, 2009). Mearsheimer, John J., The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc, 2003). Morgenthau, Hans J., Politics Among Nations; the Struggle for Power and Peace (New York: Knopf, distributed by Random House, 1972). Snyder, Glenn H., ‘The security dilemma in alliance politics’, World Politics xxxvi/4 (1984), pp.461–95. Snyder, Glenn H., Alliance Politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997). Taylor, Alan R., The Arab Balance of Power (New York: Syracuse University Press, 1982). Walt, Stephen M., The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987). Waltz, Kenneth N., Theory of International Politics (New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc, 1979).

Conclusions Bar-Siman-Tov, Yaacov, Israel, the Superpowers, and War in the Middle East (New York: Praeger Publishing, 1987). Chollet, Derek and James Goldgeier, America Between the Wars, From 11/9 to 9/11: The Misunderstood Years Between the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the State of the War on Terror (New York: PublicAffairs, 2008). Christian Science Monitor. Kazakos, P. and P. C. Iakomidis, Greece and EC Membership Evaluated (London: Pinter Publishers Ltd), 1994. Resnick, Evan, ‘Strange bedfellows: US bargaining behavior with allies of convenience’, International Security xxxv/3 (Winter 2010/2011), pp.144–84. Voeten, Eric, ‘Outside options and the logic of Security Council action’, American Political Science Review xcv/4 (2001), pp.845–58.

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INDEX

Acheson, Dean 75–6, 119, 128, 244n61, 255n71 Adams, John Quincy 108–9 Adenauer, Konrad 91, 176, 178, 183, 185–6, 188 Albright, Madeleine 27 alliance see individual alliances “alliance dilemma” 192, 195 common goal 55, 57, 60–3, 151 defection 138, 144–5, 195, 250n62 divergent interests 134, 140, 144–5, 152 failure 4, 6, 126, 209, 212–13, 215 formation 4, 6–8, 39, 82, 208, 213 maintenance 6–8, 19, 36, 83, 215, 217 military 123, 145, 149, 157, 160, 163 national interests 5–6, 32, 35, 191 nuclear 101, 126 role of mistrust 7, 150, 176, 205, 213, 217 role of trust 19, 59, 61, 128, 213 role of trust (theory) 7, 38, 57, 64, 212–13, 217, 226n2 shared interests 7, 191, 197, 210, 212–13 success 209 Anglo-American 117, 215

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anti-Napoleonic 48 EDC 174, 180, 185 Korean-American 215 NATO 86, 104–5, 214 theory 4, 6, 39, 210–12 American War of Independence 6, 48, 109 Anglo-American alliance 6, 79, 92, 106–30, 138, 215–16 see also USA and UK shared interests 111–12, 115, 215 Anglo-American treaties 107–8, 123 Arab-Israeli Conflict 190, 200, 204, 251n72 Arab-Israeli War of 1967 (Six Day War) 201–2 Arab-Israeli War of 1973 (War of Attrition) 190–1, 204–5, 214 Atlantic Charter 120–1 atomic bomb see nuclear weapons Austria 47, 51–3, 57–62, 143, 232n61 Baghdad Pact 146–8, 196–8 balance of power 52, 227–8, 249, 260n5, 261n14 challenger 6, 37–8, 40–3, 47, 60, 63–4, 228n11 Europe 117 Korea 26

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INDEX Middle East 190, 195, 200, 207 Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 43, 50 theory 37–9, 190, 193–4 Ball, George 98, 244n66 Bayar, Celal 75–8 Bech, Joseph 179 Ben-Gurion, David 147, 151 Benelux states 179–80 Bevin, Ernest 123–4 Blunt, Anthony 168 Bowie, Robert 93–4, 96–7, 237n36 Brussels Treaty 173 buck-catching 137, 142 buck-passing 133, 137–9, 142–3, 148–9, 152–3, 249n49 Bush, George H. W. 23–5 Bush, George W. 12, 27–30, 36, 128 Cairncross, John 168 Cairo-Moscow alliance 195 Cairo-Moscow treaty 204 Canning, George 43, 45, 48, 54–5, 59, 63, 108 Carter, Jimmy 22 Castlereagh, Robert Stewart, Viscount 43, 45, 48, 55–63, 230n33, 231n58, 232n61 Central Powers 138 Chamberlain, Neville 159–61, 163, 255n38 China 25, 110, 224n44 and Korea 5, 15, 24, 28, 33–4 and the USA 21 Christian Democrats 177, 186 Churchill, Winston 87, 116–18, 120–1, 164, 253n17 Clausewitz, Carl von 136 Clinton, William J. 26–7 coalition 231, 247, 261n11 see also individual coalitions cohesion 60, 134–8, 140, 143, 153, 213, 216 defensive 137, 139, 141–2, 195

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289

dynamics 135, 152 formation 152, 171, 174, 187, 212, 218n1 formation (theory) 39, 64, 133–44, 153, 212–13 military 134–5, 143–5, 153, 247n20 offensive 135, 138–9, 142 role of mistrust 7 targeted states 134–5, 144 theory 40, 42, 60, 63, 136–45 threat of separate peace 121, 134, 144–5, 151–2, 155, 231n58 Cold War 142, 144, 260n7 and the EDC 171 and Egypt 8, 204 end 23–5, 34 and NATO 84–9, 95, 98, 105, 212 and ROK 12, 23 and Turkey 65–6, 76, 78, 81 collective action 138, 141–2, 228n10 collective security 66–7, 74, 77, 80, 155–6, 159, 163 Communists 13–15, 20, 66, 68, 82–3, 180, 234n33 coordinator 5–6, 40–64, 68, 210, 212–13 invulnerability 40–3, 46–8, 63, 210 resources 39–42, 44–7, 62–4, 80, 140, 209–10 Czechoslovakia and Egypt 147, 197 and the Second World War 155, 159–60, 165, 169 and the USSR 3, 172 Declaration of the United Nations 121 Democrat People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) 14–15, 28, 30, 32–3, 221n13 deterrence 12, 124, 147 and NATO 86, 88, 95–6, 100, 103 Doumenc, Joseph 160–2, 255n40 Dulles, John Foster 18, 87, 148, 181

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PACTS

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A LLIANCES

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HISTORY

Eden, Anthony 125, 147 Egypt 79, 251, 260n7, 262n24, n36, n39 and the Baghdad Pact 146 economy 199–200 and Israel 146, 190, 204 military 134, 190–1, 196, 198–201, 203, 205, 262n42 and the Sèvres Pact 125, 133–4, 144–5, 147–9, 198 and the Suez Canal 197 and the United Arab Republic 198 and the USA 191–2, 200 and the USSR 8, 189–207, 214 and wars with Israel see specific conflicts Eisenhower, Dwight 19, 85, 93, 125–6, 180, 185 administration 93–4, 196, 222n20 EPC (European Political Community) 171, 186 European Army 171, 174–5, 179–80, 184–5 European Defense Community (EDC) 7–8, 87–8, 98–9, 103–4, 170– 88, 213–14, 216 ratification 52, 88, 170–1, 177, 181–7 Treaty 7, 170–1, 174, 178–87 European Political Community see EPC European states system 38, 40

and Germany 91 and Turkey 67 and the UK 111–12, 118 and the USA 113 France 251n75, 253n16, 261n23 coalitions against 43, 47–9, 51–2, 54–60, 62–3, 138, 144, 210 economy 44 and EDC 171, 173, 175–8, 180–5, 187, 214, 216 and Egypt 198 and Empire 108, 110 and the First World War 113, 118 and German rearmament 173, 188 and Germany 3 and Israel 189 military 57, 166, 168–9 and NATO 100–4, 211 and nuclear weapons 92, 96, 99 and the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 37–63, 228n16, 229n27, 230n43, 231n47, 232n61 and Russia 144 and the Second World War 7 and the Sèvres Pact 126, 133–52, 197, 216 and the Suez Canal 197 and the Triple Entente 155–69 Franco-Russian alliance 2, 144 French War in Indochina 176

Farouk, King of Egypt 146 Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) 92, 185 and the Cold War 172, 188 and EDC 171, 173, 178, 180–1, 183, 214 and NATO 91–2, 98, 102, 182, 187, 211 rearmament 87, 104, 176, 179–81, 185, 187–8 First World War 2, 141, 159, 165–6 and France 136

Gaulle, Charles de 89, 92, 99–100, 102–3, 176, 236n15 German Empire 110–12, 218 Germany 126, 249, 253 see also FRG and the Cold War 172–3 and EDC 171, 175–7, 180, 183–5, 188 and Egypt 198 and France 3 and NATO 91, 98, 101 navy 110 and the Reinsurance Treaty 144

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INDEX and the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 47 and the Second World War 7, 117–18, 139, 155–61, 163–5, 169, 213 and the USSR 154–5 Great Britain see United Kingdom Greece 68, 70–1, 118 and NATO 65, 75, 78–80, 82 Grenville, George 45, 50, 53, 229n22, 231n50 Gulf War 127, 143 hegemons 190, 193, 199, 202, 206, 226n2, 227n3, 261n12 potential 38–9, 42, 48–9, 63–4, 147, 194–5, 228n11 and theory 37–42, 141, 193–5, 210, 217 Hitler, Adolf 2, 140, 144, 155–60, 163–6, 252n7 Hull, Cordell 119 Humphrey, George 125 intelligence 116–17, 123, 202 Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM) 85, 89, 126 international state system 2, 43, 56, 74, 261n13 and theory 38–40, 63, 142, 193 Iraq 33, 146, 194, 197, 261n23 and 1991 War 144 and 2003 War 29, 31, 208 and Axis of Evil 27 and Baghdad Pact 146 and Egypt 201, 204 Iraq War 2003 29, 31 Israel 151, 234n33, 251n74, 260n5, 261n7, 262n42, 263n69 and Egypt 8, 190, 196, 200–7, 214–15 Israel Defense Forces (IDF) 147, 201 leaders 145, 148–9 and the Sèvres Pact 133–4, 145–52, 197, 216

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291

and the USA 192, 216 Italy 261n23 and EDC 171, 177, 180–1, 184–5, 187 and the First World War 113, 118 and NATO 71, 75 and the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 50, 52–3, 61 and the Second World War 117, 139 Japan 159 and Korea 12, 15, 20, 33, 220n10, 222n20, 226n68 and the Second World War 115, 117, 120–1, 138–9 and security 18, 25 Jefferson, Thomas 109, 122 Joint Chiefs 13–14, 16, 18 Jong-il, Kim 27 Jordan 146–7, 149, 152, 196, 201 Kennedy, John F. 85, 94 Korea see ROK Korean-American Alliance 5, 11, 215 Korean Augmentation to the US Army (KATUSA) 17 Korean Military Advisory Group (KMAG) 17 Korean peace treaty 18–19 Korean War 17–19, 29, 175, 185, 221n15, n16, 222n20 armistice 12, 18–20, 185, 222n20 and EDC 175 and Turkey 73–4, 81 Latin America 108, 110 Lend-Lease 119, 128 Lloyd George, David 164 Long, Leo 169 Luxembourg 171, 179–80, 184 Maclean, Donald 168 Macmillan, Harold 125 Madison, James 109

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292

PACTS

AND

A LLIANCES

Massive Retaliation 86, 89, 93–4, 99–100 McNamara, Robert 94–5, 101–2, 211 medium-range ballistic missiles see MRBM Mendès-France, Pierre 182, 184 Metternich, Prince Klemens von 58–9, 61, 231n51 Middle East 130, 144, 205 and the Baghdad Pact 146 balance of power 134, 149, 190, 207 and Egypt 147 and the USSR 197–8, 202 western involvement in 78, 82, 148 MLF 96–101, 103–5 Molotov, Vyacheslav 164, 252n7, 253n16, 254n22 Monnet, Jean 175 Monroe Doctrine 109 Moscow-Cairo alliance 8, 214, 216 MRBM 85, 90–2, 104–5 Multi-Lateral Force see MLF Napoleon 136, 229n24, 231n58, 232n63 and the Continental System 44 impact on Europe 59 and Russia 47, 54 Nasser, Gamal Abdul 146–8, 192, 196–7, 200, 202, 262n38 national sovereignty 189, 228n10 and EDC 171–2, 174–6, 178–9, 181, 186, 214 Egypt 8, 197 German 188 and theory 135, 193 NATO 3, 105, 124, 210, 212, 216 and Anglo-American alliance 121, 123, 128 deterrent 84–105, 215 and EDC 172, 176, 179–80, 185–8, 214 European allies 86–7, 90, 93, 97–9, 101

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IN

HISTORY

Flexible Response 6, 86–7, 94, 99, 102–4, 211 and German rearmament 172, 180–2, 187 leaders 75, 78–9 membership 83, 92, 98, 103, 211–12, 214 membership and strategy debates 90, 92–3, 96 and the Middle East 196 military structure 84, 103 North Atlantic Council (NAC) 100–1 Nuclear Planning Group 102–5 nuclear strategy 88, 92–4, 96, 99, 101–5 Strategic Concept 88–90, 93 and Turkey 6, 66, 76, 78, 82–3 Nazi-Soviet Pact 157–8, 169 Netherlands 44, 53, 171, 182, 187 Neustadt, Richard E. 125 Nixon, Richard 126, 205 NKVD 168–9 Norstad, General Lawris 90–1, 96 North Atlantic (Washington) Treaty 71, 75 North Atlantic Treaty Organisation see NATO North Korea 21–7, 29–31, 33–4, 209, 216, 219, 226n68 nuclear weapons 90, 120, 124–5 deterrent 85–7, 89–90, 93–4, 96–7, 99–101, 103, 188 dilemma 84, 101–4, 211 tactical 90, 94–5 veto over use 90, 96, 99, 102 Ottoman Empire 59, 67, 70 pacts 107, 251n74, 261n11 Baghdad 197 NATO 71 and theory 3 Triple Entente 163

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INDEX Turkey and NATO 74, 76, 79 USA-ROK 12 Park, Chung Hee 20–2 People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs see NKVD Philby, Kim 168 Pitt, William (the Younger) 43–5, 48, 51, 53–5, 63, 229n19, 230n33 Pleven Plan 171, 173, 176–81 Poland 3, 52, 143–4, 160–5, 169, 213, 231n48 Powell, Colin 27 Prince Faisal of Saudi Arabia 199 Prussia 2, 47, 50–3, 57–61, 143, 230n43, 232n61 Quadruple Alliance (against Napoleon) 2 Red Army 154, 158, 161–2, 164, 167–9 Reinsurance Treaty 2, 144 Republic of Korea see ROK Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 5, 38–63, 108, 229n20 treaties 51, 55 ROK 5, 11–36, 211, 220n13, 234n33 army 17–18 leaders 14–16, 26, 30 and USA 5, 11–36, 209, 219n1, 220n4, n10, 221n15, n20, 226n68 Roosevelt, Franklin D 116–18, 120 Rush, Richard 108 Russia 47, 157, 224n44, 232n61, 255n38 see also USSR and the Cold War 172 and the First World War 113, 118 and the Holy Alliance 2 and Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 47, 51, 53, 57–62 and ROK 25 and the Second World War 155–8, 161–2, 164 and Turkey 70 and the Western Hemisphere 108–10

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293

SACEUR 97 Sadat, Anwar 190–1, 204–6, 214, 216, 260n2 Saudi Arabia 199–201, 251n74 Schuman, Robert 175, 183 Second coalition (against Napoleon) 61 Second World War 249 and Anglo-American cooperation 116–17, 119–22 and German rearmament 213 and the Triple Entente 155, 158–9, 163–7, 169, 254n22 and Turkey 67–9 and the UK 113 Sèvres Pact 7, 212–13, 215, 264n7 coalition 133, 135, 145, 150–2, 212 Sinai Peninsula 150–2, 189, 200–1, 214, 216 Sinai War 134–5, 149 Sixth Coalition (against Napoleon) 144, 209–11, 228n14 South East Asia Treaty Organization 196 South Korea, see ROK Soviet-Egyptian alliance 189, 192, 194, 198–9, 205–6, 214–15 Soviet Union see USSR Spain 44, 61, 108, 229n29 and Empire 108 and Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 46, 51, 54, 61 and Spanish-American War 111–12 Spanish-American War 108, 111–12 special relationship 98, 122, 127, 215 Speranski, Michel 47 Stalin 7, 156–60, 164, 167–9, 185, 187, 252n7, 253n17 Stark, Admiral Harold R. 117 Stikker, Dirk U. 180 Suez 125–6, 198 Suez Canal 134, 146, 150–2, 198, 202, 205 Suez Crisis 125, 146–7, 192, 198, 262n36

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294

PACTS

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A LLIANCES

superpowers 122, 142, 189, 194–5, 206–7 Supreme Allied Commander in Europe see SACEUR Syria 150, 192, 196, 199–201, 204, 261n23, 262n38, n39 threat as a motive for alliance cohesion 135, 137–9, 142, 212 as a motive for alliance failure 35 as a motive for alliance formation 211, 227n6, 247n20, 249n49 Anglo-American alliance 110 Cairo-Moscow alliance 190 EDC 173 Sèvres Pact 133 theory 35, 38, 143, 153 Treaty of Berlin 154 triple alliance 2, 157 Triple Entente 113, 138, 140–1, 213, 248n33 Truman Doctrine 67, 70–1 Turkey 65–82, 146, 156, 196, 210–11 Democrat Party 69, 71–2, 77–8, 81–2, 210, 233n25 government 70–1, 75–8, 80 leaders 66–7, 71, 76–7, 79 NATO accession 6, 65–6, 72, 75, 78–82, 210, 215 parliament 78, 80 Republican Party 69–73, 81 UAR 198–9, 262n38 UK 109, 152, 194, 231n52, 261n23 and the Baghdad Pact 196–7 Cabinet 109, 111, 114, 118, 124 and EDC 177, 183–4, 188 and Egypt 198 Foreign Office 115, 129, 172 and Israel 189 and NATO 92 navy 43, 229n29 and nuclear weapons 96, 124–6

Yeager_Index.indd Sec1:294

IN

HISTORY

and the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 38–63, 209–12, 229n20, 232n63 and the Sèvres Pact 133–52, 196–7, 213 and the Triple Entente 7, 155–69, 213 and Turkey 70, 77–9 and the USA 106–30, 212, 215 UN 73, 129, 173, 222n20 and ROK 14, 24 and the Sèvres Pact 151–2 and Turkey 67–8, 74, 76 United Arab Republic see UAR United Kingdom see UK United Nations see UN United Socialist Soviet Republics see USSR United States of America, see USA USA 159, 217, 264n7 and the Cold War 142, 191, 236n15, 238n41 Congress 13–14, 22, 24, 26–7, 109, 114, 118 and deterrent 89, 95–6 and EDC 87, 172, 174, 177, 181–5, 188, 214 and Egypt 192, 197–8, 200, 204, 214, 216, 261n7, 262n42 and the First Iraq War 143 and the First World War 138, 165, 216, 248n33 forces 23–4, 26, 28, 31–2, 36, 226n68 and France 92 government 108, 114–15, 128 and Israel 189–90, 204–5 and Japan 33 and MLF 98–100, 102 and NATO 86, 92–3, 104–5, 210–11 Navy 111–12, 114, 117, 209 nuclear deterrent 20, 85, 87–8, 90–1, 96–7, 99, 101 policy 26–7, 34–5, 208

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INDEX and ROK 5, 11–36, 209, 219n1, 220n10, 221n15, 222n20, 223n31, 224n44, 226n68 and Russia 194 and the Second World War 133, 138, 216 and the Sèvres Pact 133, 148–50, 215–16 State Department 14, 129 and Turkey 70–1, 73, 75–7, 80–1, 210 and UK 6, 79, 92, 106–30, 138, 212, 215–16 and West Germany 100 USSR 3, 190, 196, 251n74, and the 1991 Iraq War 144 and the Cold War 124, 127, 142, 172–4, 187, 196, 237n36 and Egypt 189–207, 214, 216, 260n7, 262n39, 263n69 and German rearmament 87, 183, 187–8 government 155–6 intelligence 168–9 and Korea 12–14, 23–4 leaders 67, 168, 201, 203 and NATO 84, 93, 211 and nuclear weapons 85, 89, 94–5, 99–100 and the Second World War 7, 138, 144, 213, 249n50 and the Sèvres Pact 149 and the Triple Entente 154–69 and Turkey 66–7, 70, 76, 78, 81

Yeager_Index.indd Sec1:295

295

Voroshilov, Klimint 160–2, 255n40 war 2–3, 108, 133, 218n1, 251n72 see also individual conflicts Anglo-French 108 nuclear 85–6, 88, 93, 95, 100, 142 and nuclear weapons 87–9, 95, 100 and theory 41–2, 63, 135, 137–8, 140–1, 143–5, 228n10, n13 War of 1812 107 War of Spanish Succession 49 War on Terror 28 Western Alliance 92, 211 Western European Union see WEU western powers 196, 253n17, 260n5 and the Baghdad Pact 146 and EDC 172 and Egypt 198, 200 and Turkey 71, 77 and the USSR 155–6, 160–5, 167, 169 WEU 186–8 Wilds, Walter 68 Wilson, Woodrow 113, 138 Wisner, Frank 123 World War I see First World War World War II see Second World War Yalman, Ahmed Emin 70, 81 Yemen 199–202, 262n42

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