BRAIN STORMING EBC BLOGUE

1. 28ru INTTnNATIoNAL CnuRcntr-r- CoNprReNcr, LoNooN, ENGLaNo, Ocronrn 2011
Thr " Sp ecial Relationship" t
hdry andhmorrow
My thanks, too, to Allen Packrvood and
SIR DAVID MANNING Phil Reed for their help and support in preparing
for the Conference. Again, I know them both
from my previous incarnation and I am therefore
in no doubt as to how fortunate we are to have
should like to begin by thanking Randolph them in their current roles. And I cannot resist
Churchill for his generous introduction. It adding that my wife and I were lucky enough to
was my good fortune during my time in be in Tashington in2004 for the exhibition
flashington to get to know several very dis- "Churchill and the Great Republic," curated by
tingr-rished members of the Churchill family. It is Allen. It was opened by Lady Soames and the
a great pleasure to see some of them here today, President of the United States, and was a memo-
and to take part in this conference that celebrates rable celebration of the extraordinary Anglo-
Sir íinston Churchill's remarkable transatlantic American relationship that was forged by
vision. My only regret is that I have not been Churchill against the odds, and of which he was,
able to attend the whole event. of course, the incarnation.
Sir David Geoffrey Manning GCMG CVO was British Ambassador to the United States from 2003 to 2007 . He drafted the famous "Manning Memo"
summarizing the substance of a January 2003 meeting between President George'ïí. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair during the prelude to the invasion
of lraq. He has since been appointed to the Household of HRH The Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry of Wales. Sí'e hasten to explain (Churchill might
say "for the benefit ofany old Etonians present") that in the first two paragraphs opposite, Nell Gwynne (1650-1687) was the mistress ofKing Charles ÌI.
FINEST HOUR 15+ / 52

2. hurchill's Special Relationship has the overthrow of an egregiously vicious dictator.
been anallzed and discussed by the Bilateral intelligence ries are apparently âs srrong
best in the business in the past . as ever; trade and investment remain at the core
twenty-four hours, so I have m?ny of the relationship; and so do contacrs berween
hard acts to follow I am conscious, too, that a Britons and Americans at all levels and in all
degree of caution and humility is very
-ulh in walks of life. But despite these apparently en-
order: I left X/ashington and the Diplomatic couraging appearances, I worry that recent, high
Service some four years ago and no longer deal level political exchanges and military successes
with the U.S. relationship up close and personal. may mask a more troubling underlying trend.
And I was reminded just how easy it is to ger rhe For reasons I shall discuss, I think we risk a
perspective wrong when I was walking past Nell process of secular decline in the strength of the
Gwynne House in Chelsea recently. Standing in bilateral relationship in which, partly by design
front of it were rMo middle-aged American and partly by accident, rhere is a weakening of
ladies. I heard one challenge the other: the intimacy and reflex of cooperation tharwe
have enjoyed over the
past sixry years-with
"There is a corrosive crisis of confidence. consequences nor just
These are very rou7h times...but white the flïJïï:ï:'i.Y:::"
United States, Great Britain and our transatlantic relation-
European poltners are all in the same deep r
ship too. Let me list
some of the factors that
hole, there has been little a7reement on worry me.
what to do about it.There has been little First, there is a
confidence among Americans that Europeans
(whether in the Euro Zone or not) have the
;:ïilï:;',:*i:ït
tough,r;mes. -we are liv-
political will to dig their way out; and little ing throúgh the worst
recession since the
confid,ence ctmong Europeo.ns that the Great Depression of the
United States is up to the job eitherl' 1930s. Butwhile the
U.S., Great Britain and
our European partners
"Nell Gwynnç-d'ysu know who she was?" "oh hole, there has been ,rr,r.Xo3lnlï;iïi#:ï
sure," the other replied confidently, "She was a do about it. There has also been little confidence
good-works sort of person." (/ell perhaps, in a among Americans that Europeans (whether in
way, she was. the Euro Zone or not) have the political will to
So, with those important caveats, where dig their way our; and little .orrfid.n.. among
do I think the Special Relationship is today and Europeans that the U.S. is up to the challenge ei-
where might it be goingì ther. Americans look with dismay th. prol
On the face of it, the relationship seems "t
tracted problems of the Euro Zone,whiÀ they
to be in good shape. President Obama's State fear threaten the prospects for global e.orromi.
Visit to the UK in May was a reaffirmation of recovery; and also with polite, Lut I suspect deep-
des at the pinnacle of government; militarily
^
ening, skepticism th. UK', approaclrwhich
Britain and the United States worked hand in "t
they worry is all retrenchment growth.
glove in the successful Libya campaign. A-long ""a "o
For their part, the Europeans including many
rvith France, they can take much of the credit for Brirons, look at th. rt"t. of the U.S. economr,, tt
FÌNEST HOUR 154 / 53
&'

3. The "Speciol Relotionsh iP":Todoy and Tomorrow...
had a British government thar paraded its reluc-
tance to be closely identified with either the
and wonder whether the world's great engine of United States ar Europe, the twin pillars of
postwar growth can any longer power national, British foreign policy for more than fifty years.
let alone international, recovery. Vhat are we to There were various reasons for this
make of a U.S. that r,mr $ massive debts, flirts stance: in particular, the incoming government
dangerously with default, and whose.political sys- believed that the UK had become over-identified
tem now seems to many outsiders so polarized with American policies. Personally, I believe their
that effective government is parallzed? Tim Gei- concerns about "poodleism" were exaggerated
thner shakes his head over the Euro Zone; we but-also personally-I have no objection to the
shake our heads about a U.S. Congress that proposition that less should be said publicly
seems to confuse separation of powers with the about the Special Relationship. In my experience,
promotion of impotency, if not bankruptcy. Both official Tashington can become tired and per-
sides deplore the other's apparent penchant for plexed at constânt British references to it, and
near-death financial experiences. constant demands for reassurance about it. Con-
This mutual crisis of confidence across tent, not labelling, is what marters to American
the Atlantic is exacerbated by an accompanying Administrations: a "let's just do it" attitude. And
introversion. Not surprisingly we are preoccupied as far as the IJK is concerned, there can be too
with the scope and scale of our own immediate much analysis of, and agonizing abour, the Spe-
domestic problems: how to find some sort of po- cial Relationship, at the expense of thinking
litically acceptable solution to the debt and about foreign policy more broadly. It is no bad
deficit conundrum in the U.S.; how to save the thing, therefore, to get on with it, without con-
Euro and perhaps the EU itself. Added to our standy rehearsing its history and significance.
distraction is the political timetable. In the U.S., But this was not quite the set ofargu-
the Presidential election is a year away; in France, ments that the new British government ad-
only six months away. And Chancellor Merkel's vanced. Instead, we were told-or anyway left
re-election timetable also has an important bear- with the süong impression-that the UK was
ing on the handling of the Euro Zone crisis. consciously shifting its focus and priorities to old
The coincidence of struggling economies Commonwealth friends and new regional pow-
on both sides of the Atlantic, and fraught domes- ers. In my view, this sent a confused message
tic politics, consumes much of the oxygen, and, I about where the UK's key interests really lie. Old
suspect, leaves rather little time or energy for the Commonwealth friendships should indeed be
broader úansadantic relationship and, within it, carefully fostered-in the past the UK has often
the relationship between the United Kingdom been careless in this regard-but Australia,
and the United States. Canada and New Zealand are a long way away
and through no fault of their own are no substi-
tute for the relationship with the United States.
t is to the Anglo-American relationship Developing good relations with the so-
specifically that I want now to turn. The called BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India, China) and
present British government made.much other emerging powers is an entirely sensible-
when it came into offìce of its desire to put though in truth hardly novel-strategy in a
more distance between London and Tashington, world of shifting political and economic realities.
and to cool the rhetoric of the Blair/Clinton, But this is essentially a commercial as much as a
Blair/Bush, Brown/Bush years. At the same time, foreign policy calculation : we only have to look
the Conservative Party element of the new coali- at how those two prominent BRICs, Russia and
tion government câme to power skeptical about China, vote at the UN on Syria, or the approach
the European Union and Britain's role within it. of Brazil and Tirrkey to lran, to see the limita-
For the first time that I, anyway, can recall, we tions of this prescription.
-L,INEST IIOUR 151 / 54

4. The new British government's decision neither was-nor is-a viable proposition with-
to insist on greater distance from Washington out the United States. Apart from France, there is
probably troubled the incumbent U.S. President , little appetire in Europe for an interventionist
less than it would have done his recent predeces- foreign policy or an expeditionary defence capa-
sors. President Obama is not just a post-íorld biliry; and very little piospect of finding.rpúl.
War II president, he is
a post-Cold War plesi- paruners elsewhere.
dent. The military alliance that bound Britain If Libya has reminded us how critical the
reÌationship with lash-
ington is in pursuit of
"What o.re we to make oJ a United States our foreign and security
policy goals, it should
that runs up mcrssive debtsrfl.irts Benerously also have reminded us
with default, and whose political syslgm now of another importanr
truth at the heart of the
seems to many outsiders so polarized that Special Relationship:
effictive Bovernment is paralyzed? Tim our willingness and ca-
Geithner shakes his head over the Euro paciqy to contribute real
capability to military
Zone; we shake our heads about U.S. a operations. The UK has
Congress that seems to confuse separation of consistently spent more
than 2o/o of GDP on
powers with the
promotion of impotency, iJ defence; and has consis-
not bankruptcy!' tently sustained land,
sea and air forces of
high-qualiry expedi-
and America together during the Second X/orld tionary capabiliry. This has made us valued part-
lar, the Korean Var, the Cold íar and the Gulf ners of the United States across the defence and
7ars, is not central either to his experience or to security specrrum. Our contribution has been
his view of foreign and securiry policy. Nor do relatively small alongside that of the United
his background and upbringing make it likely States which, it may be worth reminding our-
that his natural focus is the UK or Europe. íith selves, still spends seven hundred billion dollars a
a Kenyan father and an upbringing spent pardy year on defence-more than the next fourteen
in Hawaii and partly in Indonesia, he is not the countries combined. But, relatively small or nor,
child of containment and the Atlantic Alliance . It the UK contribution has been valued by succes-
is not surprising if his personal focus is Asia sive American administrarions as real, not token.
which, with the rise and challenge of China, is The UK has had a voice in the debate because we
also where United States interests are now pre- have been willing to have a dog in the fight.
dominantly engaged. flill this be true in the future?
Ayear and a half on, mI impression is The present British goyernment inherited
that the British government has found that stud- a severe budgetary crisis at the Ministry of De-
ied coolness about Anglo-American relations car- fence. Action was urgenr. But the scale of the
ries as many risks as over-hyped enthusiasm. The cuts that have been imposed on rhe armed forces
UK took the lead on Libya in close partnership raises questions about whether-despite the offì-
with France; and the Prime Minister recendy re- cial assurances-we will really retain a full-spec-
vived the doctrine of liberal interventionism trum capabiliry and an effective expeditionary
when addressing the United Nations General As- force, at the end of the rerrenchmerrt p.o..rr.'f.
sembly. You may or may not support those policy have chosen to cut defence ro the point where we
choices, but the point for our discussion is that may find it hard to demonstrare thar our >>
I-.INEST HOUR 154 / 55

5. T h e "Speci ol Relqtionsh ip" :To doy on d Tom o rrow...
problems, and Europe was not a problem. But he
acknowledged that a Europe crowded out of the
spending remains at 2o/o or more of GDB the agenda might easily presage declining U.S. en-
target that we urge our NÃTO partners to set gagement and investment in the special and
themselves. Cutting defence drastically is of transatlantic relationships. He also warned that,
course an absolutely legitilnate political choice. among a minoriry there was weariness in
But we should be conscious that wehave deliber- ^nyway,
the U.S. with seemingly intractable foreign pol-
ately made that choice-after all, the government icy entanglements-a romantic longing for an
has chosen to ring-fence
other departmental
budgets-and we Relationship not
"The Special is God-given.
should be conscious,
too, that there are con- We need to valueit, work at it,find timefor
sequences for us as far as it,find
new wa)ls of developing it; and
relations with the
United States and our
Britons
need to work harder at than
this
other allies are con- Americans because the truth that it
is
cerned. Security is, and
mo.tters more to us than them....If the UK
to
has been, at the heart of
the SpeciaÌ Relationship. does not remain
a capable security partne4
If the UK can no longer we risk irrelevance....The Special Relation-
play, or does not want
to play, more than a
ship cannot live
by sentiment alonel'
minor or token military
role, we should not be
surprised ifTashington views our importance in isolationist approach, however unrealistic this
the scheme of things accordingly. may be in a globalised world. He also said that
And already, I suspect, we have to work there was a growing fatigue with the idea that the
harder than used to be the case to make our voice hard-pressed American tâxpâyer should continue
heard in the X4rite House, and to persuade Con- to underwrite European security when European
gress ofour relevance. I recently asked an old governments and taxpayers were unwilling to
friend who is a former, very senior, U.S. diplo- fund serious defence budgets themselves. Until
mat what he thought the foreign policy issues recently, this is not a charge I would have ex-
were on President Obama's radar screen, when pected Americans to have laid against the UK. As
the latter had time to tear himself away from do- to the future, I am not so sure.
mestic problems and his own re-election battles. The economic crisis; political preoccupa-
He listed the global economic crisis; two and a tions; the shifting American and indeed European
half wars (namelyAfghanistan, and the aftermath focus of attention to Asia; American weariness
of Iraq and Libya); China; the Middle East and with subsidizinga Europe unwilling to pay the
Iran; the Arab awakening; and the difficulty of going rate for defence; and UK and wider Euro-
modernizing international institutions and mak- pean doubts about American capability to tran-
ing them fit for purpose. scend divisive domestic politics and put the
You may or not may agree with this list, American economy and body politic on an even
or the priority he gave the different issues. 7hat keel-these are all issues that are in my opinion
seems significant to me is that neither the UK having an attritional efFect on the Special Rela-
nor Europe figure-unless smuggled in under tionship and the broader transatlantic relationship,
the global economic rubric. When I pointed this the halÊhidden reality below the surface of State
out, my friend countered that the list was one of Visits and Qaddafi's overthrow. I do not wânt to
L,ÌNEST HouR 1s4 / 5ó

6. exaggerate the extent or speed ofthe process. But Y/ar. Against the backdrop of a rapidly changing
neither do I think that we should ignore what is geopolitical landscape, we should susrain our
happening and the attendant ristr<s to a partnership tried and trusted alliances and friendships. If rhe
that has serued us so well for so long. United Kingdom does not remain a capable secu-
riry partner, we risk irrelevance . I do not mean by
o what should we do? The first tÈng, this that the United States will ignore us or be-
perhaps rather the Churchillian thing, is '. come indifferenr to us. But American Adminis-
keep our nerve. In my view, prophecies trations are going to spend their time talking to
about the inevitable decline of the West those who have the ability to contribute and
are overdone. Our political and economic system make a difference to the agenda that matters in
has brought us unparalleled peace and prosperiry. üTashington. The Special Relationship cannot
tWe may now
be Mrestling with enormous prob- live by sentiment alone.
lems but we should not conclude that our system I believe, incidentally, though it is not a
and values have somehow been wrong all along vi,eú'thar úilÌ find favour with all in this audi-
or that they have outlived their,püipose and been that the same argument applies to sustain-
'iènce,
overtaken by history. As Sir Max Ha*ings said ing Brìtain's rôle in Europe. And let me add in
,.
yesterday, the individual counts; leadership this conrext that, in my experience, Americans
countsl human destiny is the result of human i *"ni'ih. EU to bè strong
a and effective parrner
agency, nol iusr ill-defined currenrs oFhistory. in a àulti=pàlài world, believe this is much
Of course we musr accepr a world in "nã
more.'.iikely if thè UK is an energetic player in
which China is a great power and *qúiring a Europe. They do nor see the Special Relationship
new weighr in the inrernarional sysrem: of course as an alternative for the UK; and nor I believe
we must accepr rhar we are wirnessing rhe emer- shouid we . The more relevanr we are in Europe,
gence of a new multi-polar global system. The ' t'.,,. ,'thè,,,'rrr.gié
relevanr we are to the United Srares,
U.S. must-we all must-accomúodàqé.this',r'''
new realiry. But that is not the : ê',.,thini! as ac-
"âá'üiÁtrr.r'".
, l.,;l.'.'.Let me end with a specific proposal that I
cepring the argument rhar wqì:,âie ãéi!ãnêd to de- :havaìáiiéd elsewhere and that I believe would
.
cline, more or less gracefully,:p_laliàg sèôôrc.11:l1l;;1l1...l1::.:rir',l,,. 'strên$ihèn,lthe Special Relationship both symbol-
fi ddle in an Asian cenrury. t ak''.I!è.,op.ti!I}t.st!Ç.',,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, "',",,iç4lly,xnd,,,p,iâctically and give it new focus: an
perhaps minoriry view that the U.S. may recover idèa for,'a,tiiik of straitened circumsrances. In last
more strongly and more quicklÍ'thân,,,,ihè pes_ year's UK StÌàtegic Defence and Security Review,
simists predicr. The power of America to reinvenr the goVernment wondered aloud what it might
irself should not be underestimared-and it ofren do with the'riêcond of the rwo aircraft carriers
is in Europe. Ler's not talk ourselvês intó,.€.x4g; ,
:, that we ãid,,'nãw building, and which we mây not
gerating our problems. great rhough they are" or ,!ç,.ab,lè',,iã..,,âffird to bring into service. One possi-
exaggerating the strengths of China and úé1,,:b.ihét,ìì':,,,' :.,.,briliç';r,.16"1ât úp the carrier as soon as it is built;
,l,'..:',
emerging powers, great though they are . Let's {e:. . :'r,",âíother is to sellìit- I suggest that we should in-
sist the idea of inevitable decline; let's keep faiú stead look'.,ar. íg it a joint Anglo-American
with ourselves, our system and our values. ai-r,crâ&.:,,êâiriei',tô,,,bie deployed i n b o th b ilateral
But at the same time, let's recognize that and NAIO roles whether in the Atlantic, the
the exceptional quality of the Special Relation- Gul[, the Indian Ocean or in the Pacific,
ship is not God-given. fle need ro value it, work Here is something that would reafÊrm
at it, find time for it, find new ways of develop- our security links. Here is something that would
ing it; and Britons need to work harder at this very visibly reassert the potency of what has
than Americans because the truth is that it mat- been, and will I hope remain, a special relation-
ters mote to us than to thern. tWe live in a world ship of real benefit to Great Britain, to the
that is arguably more complex and more uncer- United States, and to the whole transatlantic
tain than at any time since the end of the Cold communiry. S
FINEST HOUR 15+ / 57