Britain, America and Rearmament in the 1930s The Cost of Failure

by Price, Christopher

• ISBN13: 9780333922927
• ISBN10: 0333922921
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-12-07
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

This book is the first to challenge current orthodoxy that Chamberlain's appeasement policy before World War Two was justified by Britain's inability to pay for rearmament. The book shows that British war potential was actually massive, with a solid foundation in the existing Imperial economy. Using previously unconsidered and recently declassified documents from British and American archives, the author demonstrates that the deliberate and political rejection of rearmament in the hope of eventual American support proved catastrophic for Britain.

Author Biography

Christopher Price is Visiting Lecturer in American Studies at the University of Leeds, College of Ripon and York.

Table of Contents

The Fall of Sterling 1938-39 and International Events	ix
Preface	xii
Acknowledgements	xv
List of Abbreviations	xvi
New Rules for an Old Game: the Shaping of Fourth Arm Concepts in a Fluid Environment, 1919-31	1	(23)
Peace, war and a new concept of financial control	2	(10)
British attitudes to gold between war and crisis	12	(3)
American attitudes to gold and the onset of crisis	15	(2)
A chance to rebuild	17	(7)
`On the Upgrade': Britain's Unwelcome Recovery, 1931-36	24	(21)
The economic foundations of strategic strength	25	(5)
American problems	30	(6)
Limiting factors in the perception and consolidation of British strength	36	(9)
`The Destiny of Tomorrow': a Transatlantic Alliance Forms against Ottawa, 1936	45	(21)
Opening shots	46	(3)
A different tack	49	(9)
Morgenthau tips the scales	58	(3)
A decisive shift	61	(5)
The Devil in the Detail: a Necessary Case for Economic Danger and the Formulation of the Fourth Arm Policy, 1937--38	66	(26)
Breaches in the dam	67	(4)
The home front	71	(3)
Manoeuvres	74	(6)
Tying the knot	80	(4)
Available `weapons from the authoritarian armoury'	84	(2)
The starting gun	86	(6)
Between Hitler and Wall Street: Undeclared War versus Business as Usual, March--October 1938	92	(26)
Ideological constraints on policy	92	(2)
A sea change	94	(1)
The sterling crisis begins	95	(3)
The `Roosevelt recession' and the `billion-four'	98	(3)
Morgenthau's gold dilemma	101	(2)
Morgenthau's sterling dilemma	103	(4)
Morgenthau sees his way clear	107	(2)
`Business as usual' tested to the limit	109	(3)
Paralysis in Washington	112	(6)
`It Seems like Insanity': the Anglo-American Trade Agreement of 1938 and the Point of No Return	118	(14)
The trade agreement: an invisible assassin	119	(4)
The Cabinet falls hesitantly into line	123	(6)
Irrational hopes and fears	129	(3)
A `Maginot Line for the Pound': Profligacy in Defence of a Bankrupt Policy, November 1938-January 1939	132	(27)
Holding the line	132	(2)
Thinking the unthinkable: exchange control	134	(1)
American fears	135	(1)
British reassurances	136	(2)
Hard facts and righteous satisfaction in London	138	(1)
The bear squeeze fails	139	(5)
Desperate remedies: `absolutely shooting the works'	144	(3)
A parting of the ways	147	(1)
Defence pays the price	148	(7)
Policy consumes itself	155	(4)
`Not a Damned Bit Good': the Concealed Catastrophe, 1939	159	(23)
The `large blank spaces on the map'	159	(5)
The `time which we dare not regard as peace'	164	(5)
A minor revolt	169	(5)
The crunch: `a real bad day'	174	(5)
Preparations for war: `well into the 1917 stage'	179	(3)
Conclusion	182	(8)
Notes and References	190	(27)
Select Bibliography	217	(8)
Index	225