DREAM OF COMMONWEALTH,

Transcription

1 DREAM OF COMMONWEALTH,

2 Also ljy Max Beloff *BRITAIN'S LIBERAL EMPIRE, (Volume 1 ofimperial SUNSET) PUBLIC ORDER AND POPULAR DISTURBANCES, THE FOREIGN POLICY OF SOVIET RUSSIA (2 Volumes) THOMAS JEFFERSON AND AMERICAN DEMOCRACY SOVIET POLICY IN THE FAR EAST, THE AGE OF ABSOLUTISM, FOREIGN POLICY AND THE DEMOCRATIC PROCESS EUROPE AND THE EUROPEANS THE GREAT POWERS THE AMERICAN FEDERAL GOVERNMENT NEW DIMENSIONS IN FOREIGN POLICY THE UNITED STATES AND THE UNITY OF EUROPE THE BALANCE OF POWER THE FUTURE OF BRITISH FOREIGN POLICY THE INTELLECTUAL IN POLITICS THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED KINGDOM (with G.R. Peele) WARS AND WELFARE, Edited ljy Max Beloff THE FEDERALIST MANKIND AND HIS STORY THE DEBATE ON THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION ON THE TRACK OF TYRANNY LEUROPE DU XIXe ET DU XXe SIECLE (with P. Renovin, F. Schnabel and F. Valsecchi) *AMERICAN POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS IN THE 1970s (with V. Vale) *Also published Uy Palgrave Macmillan

3 DREAM OF COMMONWEALTH Volume 2 of IMPERIAL SUNSET MAX BELOFF Emeritus Professor of Government and Public Administration University of Oxford M MACMILLAN

4 Max Beloff 1989 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended), or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 33-4 Alfred Place, London WClE 7DP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First published 1989 Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Beloff, Max, Imperial sunset. Vol. 2 : Dream of Commonwealth British imperialism, I. Title 325~32'0941 ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI /

5 For Rupert, Natasha, Nicholas, Catherine and Jonathan

6 CONTENTS SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS EDITORIAL NOTE xi xiii XV PART I: THE ATTEMPT AT CONSOLIDATION: CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION CHAPTER 2: THE EMPIRE IN 1921: INTERNAL STRAINS AND EXTERNAL PRESSURES Democracy and Empire The British Empire: a Frenchman's view The British Empire: the insiders' view The Middle East and wider implications Ireland and imperial implications Differences between the Dominions 3 16 CHAPTER 3: BRITAIN AS A MIDDLE EASTERN POWER 34 PART I: The French Connection Anglo-French imperial interdependence Egypt Trans Jordan Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Persia PART II: Palestine Palestine The British l.jzbour Party and Zionism CHAPTER 4: EMPIRE INTO COMMONWEALTH : THE IRISH ANOMALY 75 The Empire and the Chanak affair Problems of a common Empire foreign policy l.jzbour and the Empire Channels of communication Secession, inter-se and Dominion independence CHAPTER 5: THE ECONOMIC ARGUMENT The nature of an 'imperial' economy The Empire Marketing Board India 105 vii

7 CONTENTS CHAPTER 6: IMPERIAL DEFENCE AND ARMS CONTROL: THE ROLE OF THE UNITED STATES PART I: Defence policy and arms control Military planning and Disarmament Anglo-American differences The prospects for Anglo-American collaboration Inter-imperial co-operation Anglo-American discord The London Naval Conference of 1930 PART II: Singapore CHAPTER 7: THE INDIAN AMBIGUITI The challenge to the Raj India's international status Indianisation and its impact upon recruitment in Britain The timing of Indian self-government The Raj and the threat from China The Round Table Conference of PART II: THE QUICKENING PACE, CHAPTER 8: THE EMPIRE AND THE WORLD DEPRESSION The Depression and the Ottawa Conference The demise of the Empire Marketing Board and other results of the Ottawa Conference The aftermath of Ottawa: a tendency towards imperial disunity The 'New Deal' and its imperial repercussions CHAPTER 9: TRUSTEESHIP, INDIRECT RULE AND COLONIAL DEVELOPMENT A pattern of diversity The Empire, Commonwealth and Race The financial control of the colonies The personnel of colonial administration India and Africa 'Closer union' and the destiny of East and South Africa Indirect rule in practice in Ceylon and Malaya Colonial development in the depression and after The defence of the colonies CHAPTER 10: THE EMPIRE AND REARMAMENT Imperial disunity and foreign policy Hankey's tour of the Empire, The Imperial Conference of 1937 and its aftermath The limitations of imperial defence co-operation viii

8 CONTENTS CHAPTER 11: CLEARING THE DECKS: IRELAND, INDIA, THE MIDDLE EAST Reducing the commitments Ireland India The Middle East Egypt Palestine CHAPTER 12: THE EMPIRE AND APPEASEMENT The role of the Dominions The question of the German ex-colonies The Dominions and Europe Canada Australia New Zealand India and the Japanese threat The Dominions and the challenge from Italy The Dominions, the German threat, and the Roosevelt initiative PART III: THE ACCOUNTING CHAPTER 13: THE EMPIRE GOES TO WAR Appeasement abandoned The prospects of the cooperation with the Dominions The problem of Irish neutrality The Dominions, the guarantees and the Nazi-Soviet Pact Australia: the last appeasers Australia and the co-ordination of the Imperial war effort Australia, Japan, the Middle East and defeat in Europe The Anglo-French Union proposal New Zealand: an antipodean contrast South Africa: the lukewarm belligerent Canada: the American pull America, Canada and a new world order India: confrontation, collaboration and stalemate Colonial Development and Welfare and the 1940 Act CHAPTER 14: DEFEAT AND THE SHADOW OF DISSOLUTION Britain a junior partner: the price of avoiding defeat Obstacles to imperial co-operation Irish neutrality and the war Securing Egyptian co-operation Syria and Lebanon: the French connection once again Iraq: coup and counter-coup Palestine: an unhappy balancing act South Africa: a dignified distance Mackenzie King fights the Canadian corner Australia: Menzies' ambitions and setbacks New Zealand: still the antipodean contrast India: the continuing search for a solution Pearl Harbour, Singapore and eclipse ix

9 CONTENTS CHAPTER 15: SIGNPOSTS TO THE FUTURE Singapore, the turning point The British and 'imperial overstretch' Inter-imperial strains The Empire and Anglo-American relations A lack of commitment The Empire, Asia and Europe: conflicts of interest Canada: between two powers India, the Middle East and Africa: contrasts in imperial decline CHRONOLOGY BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES INDEX X

10 SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In the first volume of the present work, I acknowledged the help I had received from many individuals and institutions, including access to and the right to quote from copyright material. I should like to repeat my thanks to all those individuals there named. In the twenty years that have elapsed since that volume appeared I have incurred further debts of gratitude which it is now my pleasure to record. Access to the papers of the first Lord Lloyd at Churchill College, Cambridge was accorded to me by the late Lord Lloyd. I am grateful to Lady Lloyd, Dr John Charmley and the Archivist of Churchill College for permission to quote from them. I must also thank the University of Newcastle upon Tyne for allowing me to quote from the Papers of Walter Runciman, the 1st Viscount Runciman. I am grateful to the Marquess of Salisbury for permission to quote from the papers of the fourth Marquess, at Hatfield House, and to Viscount Caldecote for permission to quote from the papers of the first Viscount Caldecote, deposited at Churchill College, Cambridge. I must thank the Rt. Hon. Julian Amery M.P. for access to his father's diaries and for permission to quote from them here. A letter of Joseph Chamberlain's is quoted by permission ofmr John Sparrow. Extracts from Crown-copyright records in the Public Record Office and the India Office Library and Records appear by permission of the Controller of Her Majesty's Stationery Office. Extracts from the Halifax and Reading papers on permanent loan to the India Office Library and Records appear by permission of the Marquess of Reading and the Earl of Halifax. The Australian Government Publishing Service gave permission for the quotation of material from Documents on Australian Foreign Policy. I should like to record my thanks to the librarians and library staffs of the libraries in which I have worked during the preparation of both volumes: in Oxford, the Bodleian Library and Rhodes House Library, xi

11 SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS the Codrington Library, All Souls College and St Antony's College Library; in London, the London Library and the Library of the House of Lords; in Cambridge, Churchill College. For financial assistance, I must thank the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Social Science Research Council (now the Economic and Social Research Council) and the Leverhulme Trust. The funds thus made available enabled me to call upon the services of successive research assistants: Mrs Margaret Croft, Mrs Mary Brown, Miss J.F. Maitland-Jones and Dr Richard Oliver; all provided indispensable assistance, but I am particularly indebted to Dr Oliver, without whose careful and well-organised labours my own original typescript would never have assumed a shape suitable for publication. I also wish to thank Dr Oliver for compiling the index. Some of the ideas in this work were tried out in seminars at the Institute of Historical Research and at the London University Institute of Commonwealth Studies; for making this possible, I am indebted to Dr Alice Prochaska, Dr Kathleen Burk, Professor W.H. Morris-Jones and Dr Peter Lyon. A number of fellow workers in this field of study or related subjects have answered individual queries or offered other advice; I should like to thank Dr C.M. Andrews, Dr David Carlton, Professor Isaiah Freidman, Dr Martin Gilbert, Professor Barry M. Gough, Dr. D. Harkness, Professor Elie Kedourie, Professor Paul Kennedy, Dr A.F.Madden, Dr G.C.Peden, Professor Kenneth Robinson, Mr Richard Symonds and Professor David Vital. Finally, I should wish to thank the Earl of Stockton, Mr T.M. Farmiloe and Ms Beverly Smith for having arranged for Macmillan to republish the first volume and undertake the publication of its successor, and for much help and encouragement in the process. xii

12 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AJPH BL C. I. D. C.I.G.S. DAFP DBFP DCER DDF DGFP FRUS H.C. Deb. HJ H.L. Deb. H.M.S.O. I.C.S. I. D.C. IORL ]CH ]CPS ]ICH PRO R.A.F. Australian Journal of Politics and History British Library, Department of Manuscripts Committee of Imperial Defence Chief of the Imperial General Staff Documents on Australian Foreign Policy Documents on British Foreign Policy Documents on Canadian External Relations Documents Diplomatiques Fram;ais Documents on German Foreign Policy Foreign Relations of the United States House of Commons Official Report (Hansard) Historical Journal House of Lords Official Report (Hansard) His/Her Majesty's Stationery Office Indian Civil Service Imperial Defence College India Office Library and Records Journal of Contemporary History Journal of Commonwealth Political Studies Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History Public Record Office (London) Royal Air Force xiii

13 EDITORIAL NOTE An asterisk following a name indicates that a short biographical note will be found on pages below. xiv