The Postwar Legacy of Appeasement

Focusing on the Cold War and the post-Cold War eras, R. Gerald Hughes explores the continuing influence of Appeasement on British foreign policy and re-evaluates the relationship between British society and Appeasement, both as historical memory and as a foreign policy process. The Postwar Legacy of Appeasement explores the reaction of British policy makers to the legacies of the era of Appeasement, the memory of Appeasement in public opinion and the media and the use of Appeasement as a motif in political debate regarding threats faced by Britain in the post-war era. Using many previously unpublished archival sources, this book clearly demonstrates that many of the core British beliefs and cultural norms that had underpinned the Chamberlainite Appeasement of the 1930s persisted in the postwar period.

R. Gerald Hughes is a Reader in the Department of International Politics at Aberystwyth University, UK.

List of figures Acknowledgements Foreword by Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield Introduction: Present histories and past follies: the legacy of appeasement and British foreign policy since 1945 1. In the footsteps of Cromwell: an empire against two evils, 1941-53 2. Churchill and Locarno, Eden and Geneva: the limits and possibilities of diplomacy 3. 'I have never thought Nasser a Hitler': Suez and the shadow of Munich 4. 'I will be no Mr. Chamberlain': Harold Macmillan and Berlin, 1958-62 5. Helsinki, 1975: Nuclear age Westphalia, Versailles or Munich? 6. 'We have ceased to be a nation in retreat': Margaret Thatcher, the Falklands War and the negation of Munich and Suez 7. In pursuit of a 'New World Order': liberating Kuwait, 1990-1 8. Appeasement and the politics of obstructionism: Britain and the dissolution of Bosnia 9. 'History will be my judge': Blair's wars and the moral case against appeasement Conclusion: Appeasement, British foreign policy and history Bibliography Index