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112. British nuclear weapons and NATO in the Cold War and beyond
- Author:
- Martin A Smith
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Institution:
- Chatham House
- Abstract:
- NATO has been a source of influence on British nuclear policy and strategy since the 1950s. The nature and extent of its influence has, however, been kept limited by successive British governments. This article considers how and why this has happened. It discusses evolving British attitudes towards NATO command and planning, and shows how these were reflected with regard to strategic nuclear issues from the late 1950s. The evolution of the key notion that the United Kingdom is a second centre of nuclear decision within NATO is traced, and both its utility and contradictions are examined. Overall it is argued that, both during and since the Cold War, NATO has neither been a central factor in shaping British nuclear strategy and policy, nor have British nuclear weapons been other than of limited importance and relevance for most NATO members.
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom
113. Friendship of the enemies: Twentieth century treaties of the United Kingdom and the USSR
- Author:
- Evgeny Roschchin
- Publication Date:
- 01-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- International Politics
- Institution:
- Palgrave Macmillan
- Abstract:
- This article focuses on the use of the concept of friendship in the treaties of friendship concluded by the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union in the twentieth century. The range of reference of friendship and its usage by these two political rivals display a number of commonalities, which indicate a key role this concept plays in maintaining the existing order of interstate relations. The concept is conventionally used in the treaties marking the changes in the global or regional political settings. In the texts of these treaties appeals to friendship are made together with the expression of respect for state sovereignty, independence, borders and so on. It also appears as an exclusive and contractual relationship. These conventions in diplomatic rhetoric, meant to reassert and legitimize the particularistic sovereign order, pose a challenge to the attempts to conceive of international relations in terms of friendship as an ethical, universal and benevolent phenomenon.
- Topic:
- Politics
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom and Soviet Union
114. The Falkland Islands and the UK v. Argentina Oil Dispute: Which Legal Regime?
- Author:
- Alice Ruzza
- Publication Date:
- 06-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- The Goettingen Journal of International Law
- Institution:
- The Goettingen Journal of International Law
- Abstract:
- Following Argentina's withdrawal from the 1995 Joint Declaration concluded with the UK for the common exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbons in the Falklands, the sovereignty dispute over the Islands has recently re-emerged as an economic 'struggle' for access to the North Falklands Basin's oil deposits. The pa per analyzes the states' pending sovereignty dispute and their present claims, from the perspective of the exploitation of the Island s' natural resources. The lawfulness of uncoupling the treatment of title to territory and to natural resources, particularly in an area where sovereignty is disputed has been examined in the present paper. By considering the UN practice on the Falklands' case, it is argued that a separate treatment is not per se unlawful, provided that all the parties having a legitimate sovereign claim over the territory are involved. The Joint Declaration is employed as a model to provide evidence in this regard. In addition, the paper discusses the unilateral conduct of the parties as a possible alternative to a cooperative agreement. As the UK is currently acting unilaterally with regard to the access to the oil deposits in the Islands, the implications of its conduct are also reviewed.
- Topic:
- United Nations
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom, Argentina, and Falkland Islands
115. The development of International Relations theory in the UK: traditions, contemporary perspectives, and trajectories
- Author:
- Chris Brown
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
- Institution:
- Japan Association of International Relations
- Abstract:
- British International Relations (IR) theory is distinguished by a concern with institutions and norms, and by an emphasis on history, philosophy, and law rather than the formal methods of the social sciences; in both respects, but especially the latter, it differs from American IR theory. The origins of British IR theory are traced, and the importance of the 'English School' (ES) is stressed, partly because of the work it stimulates, but also because of its role as a brand which helps to establish the independence of British IR from the otherwise dominant American profession. Along with ES scholarship (pluralist and solidarist), political theory and IR, and critical theory, including critical security studies, are the major areas where contemporary IR theory in Britain is located. This is likely to persist, but the generally critical approach taken to social scientific theorizing may be changing, with the increasing importance of historical sociology and critical realist work. It may also be the case that the privileged status of IR theory in British IR may be under challenge.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Development, and Political Theory
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom and America
116. International Issues & Slovak Foreign Policy Affairs Contents
- Publication Date:
- 01-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- International Issues: Slovak Foreign Policy Affairs
- Institution:
- Slovak Foreign Policy Association
- Abstract:
- The decade of 2000–2010 was the warmest decade in recent history. It was also a decade of climate extremes such as the 2003 heat wave in western Europe and 2010 heat wave in Russia, frequent major floods in Europe, Pakistan in 2010 or Australia in early 2011, devastating cyclones, or major cold snaps and snow blizzards as in the US, UK and China. Despite this reality, there persists a deep gap between the scientific evidence about the changing climate of the Earth, and political awareness about the reasons and consequences of global warming. Such a gap between physical reality and political thinking will be extremely costly. Recent scientific evidence suggests that measures considered to tackle global warming are gravely inadequate. It appears that the average global temperature by 2100 will increase by at least 3°C to 4°C. Such increase will have devastating effects on agricultural production and survival of hundreds of millions people. The purpose of this paper is to improve understanding of climate change science among policy makers and diplomats.
- Political Geography:
- Pakistan, Russia, United States, China, United Kingdom, Europe, and Australia
117. His Dark Materials Trilogy
- Author:
- C.A. Wolski
- Publication Date:
- 06-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- The Objective Standard
- Institution:
- The Objective Standard
- Abstract:
- While religious leaders want to establish the kingdom of heaven on Earth, the heroes of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass) seek to overthrow the oppressive “kingdom” of heaven and establish a “republic” in its stead. This is the driving action in Pullman's “young adult” fantasy series. And although the books are marketed to teens, the stories will, like all good literature, reward readers with more years and a few gray hairs as well. The first novel, The Golden Compass (originally published in the United Kingdom as The Northern Lights) opens on a parallel Earth where humans and their daemons—the physical manifestations of their souls—live under the suffocating control of the Church and its security apparatus, the Magisterium. But oppression is furthest from the mind of twelve-year-old Lyra Belacqua and her daemon (pronounced “demon”) Pan: They're too busy getting into trouble and having adolescent adventures in and around Oxford, in particular hassling the children of the Gyptians, wanderers who visit yearly on their barges. The Oxford kids and the Gyptian youngsters engage in a good-natured conflict in which they “gobble” each other, “Gobblers” being this Earth's bogeymen. But things take a decidedly more grown-up turn when Lyra gets wrapped up in the machinations of her uncle, Lord Asriel, an explorer and iconoclast. After saving Asriel from an assassination attempt and learning from him and his colleagues a bit about the mysterious “Dust,” a subject that the other adults avoid discussing at all costs, Lyra is introduced to the malevolent Mrs. Coulter and is subsequently sent to live with her. Before she leaves Oxford, Lyra is given a truth-telling device called an altheiometer—the golden compass of the title. Powered by Dust, it can discern what's hidden in the heart of any man, woman, or beast. While living with Mrs. Coulter—who, naturally, covets the altheiometer—Lyra discovers that Gobblers actually exist and have been kidnapping children for a dark purpose related to Dust. Eventually, Lyra goes north to rescue a kidnapped friend and makes the acquaintance of aeronaut Lee Scoresby and his rabbit daemon Hester, as well as witches and militaristic armored polar bears. The novel ends on a cliffhanger—and a dark revelation about the nature of Lord Asriel's work. .
- Topic:
- Security
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom
118. Operation Mincemeat: How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory
- Author:
- Daniel Wahl
- Publication Date:
- 06-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- The Objective Standard
- Institution:
- The Objective Standard
- Abstract:
- In 1943, on the coast of Andalusia in southwest Spain, a dead man “washed ashore wearing a fake uniform and the underwear of a dead Oxford don, with a love letter from a girl he had never known pressed to his long-dead heart” (pp. 323–24). It was near the high point of the Third Reich's reign, with Europe effectively under Nazi control; but, owing in part to this dead man, Hitler's days were numbered. Ben Macintyre tells the story of this fantastic ruse in Operation Mincemeat: How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory. The book may read like fiction, but remarkably, the story is completely true. It begins during World War II when the Nazi war machine “was at last beginning to stutter and misfire.” The British Eighth Army under Montgomery had vanquished Rommel's invincible Afrika Korps at El Alamein. The Allied invasion of Morocco and Tunisia had fatally weakened Germany's grip, and with the liberation of Tunis, the Allies would control the coast of North Africa, its ports and airfields, from Casablanca to Alexandria. The time had come to lay siege to Hitler's Fortress [across Europe]. But where? Sicily was the logical place from which to deliver the gut punch into what Churchill famously called the soft “underbelly of the Axis.” The island at the toe of Italy's boot commanded the channel linking the two sides of the Mediterranean, just eighty miles from the Tunisian coast. . . . The British in Malta and Allied convoys had been pummeled by Luftwaffe bombers taking off from the island, and . . . “no major operation could be launched, maintained, or supplied until the enemy airfields and other bases in Sicily had been obliterated so as to allow free passage through the Mediterranean.” An invasion of Sicily would open the road to Rome . . . allow for preparations to invade France, and perhaps knock a tottering Italy out of the war. . . . [Thus]: Sicily would be the target, the precursor to the invasion of mainland Europe. (pp. 36–37) There was a major problem, however. Macintyre points out that the strategic importance of Sicily was as clear to the Nazis as it was to the Allies and that, if the Nazis were prepared for it, an invasion would be a bloodbath. So how could the Allies catch their enemy off guard? The solution was to launch what Macintyre calls one of the most extraordinary deception operations ever attempted. The British Secret Service would take a dead man and plant on him fake documents that suggested that the Allies were planning to bomb Sicily only as an initial feint preceding an attack on Nazi forces in Greece and Sardinia. They would then float their man near the Spanish coastline, making it appear as though he drowned at sea, and hope that one of the many Nazi spies in Spain discovered him and the documents and passed their content along to his superiors—convincing them to weaken Sicily by moving forces to Greece and Sardinia. . . .
- Topic:
- War
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom, Europe, Germany, Tunisia, Rome, and Alexandria
119. Shoah: Turkey, the US, and the UK
- Author:
- Sylvia Tiryaki
- Publication Date:
- 07-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Insight Turkey
- Institution:
- SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
- Abstract:
- T“I was alive only because I had a Turkish passport,” tells Lazar Russo in Arnold Reisman's Shoah: Turkey, the US and the UK. Lazar Russo was living in France when the Nazis occupied it. As with the other Jews, it was impossible for him to leave the country. However, remaining meant certain extermination. Only after the Turkish Consulate in Paris offered him a passport could he escape. He went to Turkey. It was an unusual move from a foreign country those days. But according to the Raoul Wallenberg Foundation, France was only “one of the countries where Turkish diplomats worked to save Jews.”
- Political Geography:
- United States, United Kingdom, and Turkey
120. Entangling alliances? The UK's complicity in torture in the global war on terrorism
- Author:
- Jamie Gaskarth
- Publication Date:
- 07-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Institution:
- Chatham House
- Abstract:
- The global war on terrorism gives rise to a range of legal, political and ethical problems. One major concern for UK policy-makers is the extent to which the government may be held responsible for the illegal and/or unethical behaviour of allies in intelligence gathering—the subject of the forthcoming Gibson inquiry. The UK government has been criticized by NGOs, parliamentary committees and the media for cooperating with states that are alleged to use cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment (CIDT) or torture to gain information about possible terrorist threats. Many commentators argue that the UK's intelligence sharing arrangements leave it open to charges of complicity with such behaviour. Some even suggest the UK should refuse to share intelligence with countries that torture. This article refutes this latter view by exploring the legal understanding of complicity in the common law system and comparing its more limited view of responsibility—especially the 'merchant's defence'—with the wider definition implied in political commentary. The legal view, it is argued, offers a more practical guide for policy-makers seeking to discourage torture while still protecting their citizens from terrorist threats. It also provides a fuller framework for assessing the complicity of policy-makers and officials. Legal commentary considers complicity in relation to five key points: identifying blame; weighing the contribution made; evaluating the level of intent; establishing knowledge; or, where the latter is uncertain, positing recklessness. Using this schema, the article indicates ways in which the UK has arguably been complicit in torture, or at least CIDT, based on the information publicly available. However, it concludes that the UK was justified in maintaining intelligence cooperation with transgressing states due to the overriding public interest in preventing terrorist attacks.
- Topic:
- Terrorism
- Political Geography:
- United Kingdom