Description
The withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 was regarded in some quarters as a watershed moment in UK-US relations. For several senior British politicians, the lack of consultation and coordination between the two governments during the debacle signalled a “demise” in the partnership and the “biggest foreign policy disaster” since the Suez crisis of 1956. Yet, to paraphrase (or misquote) Mark Twain, rumours of the UK-US relationship’s death are greatly exaggerated. Despite the grim auguries made in 2021, the historic AUKUS defence pact was signed just a month later. The UK-US alliance has long been a story of episodic peaks and troughs. Those who have a “terminal” view of the relationship often overplay the significance of the latest crisis, betraying a degree of presentism or historical amnesia. Indeed, the UK-US alliance is arguably the closest in history considering the degree of institutional economic and security cooperation. The Afghanistan-to-AUKUS example underscores the need for deeper research about the nature and character of US-UK strategic relations over time. This panel will highlight hitherto undervalued case studies and interrogate the extent to which the institutional aspects of cooperation (notably nuclear, intelligence, mil-to-mil, and economic) are affected by such flashpoints. It brings together several papers which will ultimately form part of an edited volume on the UK-US alliance.
