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Matti Roitto, MA, doctoral student, associate member
In my doctoral thesis, I am studying the Anglo-American collaboration in the field of atomic energy and related questions in 1945-1946. More than often the presentation of the “special relationship” has been written to include also the problematic years of 1945-1946. The possible intra-western competition or the idea of the atomic diplomacy inside the western bloc are less studied elements.
This idea of the possibility of the atomic diplomacy inside the “west” is one of the key hypotheses. Another is to estimate how the British saw the Anglo-American co-operation, tried to secure and strengthen it via the means of foreign policy. Did this pursue of closer collaboration also affect the British foreign policy, and if so, how? The working hypothesis is that, during the two hectic years of 1945 and 1946, the British aim to gain the status of an atomic power was one of the main goals of the foreign policy. In the attempt to secure future co-operation by almost any means, the British policy actually changed from active to reactive and from idealistic to realistic and Britain lost the initiative in Anglo-American relationship. New elements are for example the role and effect of Parliament, and to some amount the press, in this, and the change of the ideas and activities in British foreign policy from the end of war to the official end of co-operation and passing of their law concerning the domestic control of atomic energy.
Concerning Parliament, it is not so much question of how the debate was conducted, or how the opinions were argued, than to what actually was talked about and to what extent. What were the issues raised in the House of Commons and the House of Lords, when it came to the topics related to foreign policy, and under this heading, the sub-cluster of foreign policy related to the questions of atomic energy, or atomic energy in general? Who raised these issues, what were the topics under the scope, and more importantly, how did the government answer? Final and most important question is, was Parliament as mute and ignorant as has been claimed? If not, to what means did the pressure and interest of Parliament on these matters effect the Government?
Contact me via email:
matti . roitto _at_ jyu.fi
[Direct link to Matti´s information presented in Department´s website.]