Post war- save the UK

[BigDestiny]

Also note that West Germany and Japan had the advantage of not being allowed an army after 1945. They could spend stuff more usefully.

Could the US get away with more loans to the UK in exchange for massive cuts to the British Navy? Maybe an impossible pill to swallow, but that might help the jet and computers markets too.

How?

I mean, the knowledge was there, but the culture and organisation wasn't. Nor, come to think of it, the money.

 

[jsb]

Could the US get away with more loans to the UK in exchange for massive cuts to the British Navy? Maybe an impossible pill to swallow, but that might help the jet and computers markets too.

Why Would The US want cuts to UK forces post WWII ?

Pre WWII (WNT/LNT) they considered the UK a rival (not as serious as IJN) but post WWII isn't it just US v USSR with both sides wanting as much help as possible ? (even in the 45-50 period was RN ever considered a threat rather than a positive asset ?)

 

[BigDestiny]

Why Would The US want cuts to UK forces post WWII ?

Pre WWII (WNT/LNT) they considered the UK a rival (not as serious as IJN) but post WWII isn't it just US v USSR with both sides wanting as much help as possible ? (even in the 45-50 period was RN ever considered a threat rather than a positive asset ?)

A smaller Royal Navy focuses Britain's attention on Europe, her air, and her ground forces. Which is good for America. I'm thinking more a cash for ships agreement which gives the US sole naval authority and less need to be entangled in European affairs.

 

[Maeglin]

But if the economy performs much better in the 1950's and 1960's there won't be Thatcherism, which was a backlash by the right against the failure of the Post War Consensus. No economic stagnation means no backlash.

Thatcherism in the form it took was an accident (it is amazingly easy to invent PODs to stop it). Insofar as it was a backlash, it was Tory revenge for the unions bringing down Heath in 1974, combined with Labour's apparent powerlessness during the winter of 1978-1979. This wasn't really about underperformance in the 1950s and 1960s (indeed that era saw better economic performance than the Thatcher era) - it was about a Tory Party hell-bent on crushing unions after their 1970s experience, and they only got away with it because of Labour's internal civil war.

In broader terms, what brought neoliberal ideas into the mainstream was the Oil Crisis of 1973 and the resulting stagflation. Between 1945 and 1973, Thatcherite ideas simply weren't viable anywhere, as the western world had entered something of an economic golden age.

IIRC the total Northern Ireland budget is around £25 billion, UK government spending is around £742 billion. Hardly a massive drain!

I'm thinking in terms of combined security expenditure over the years too. Stationing troops there long term can't have been cheap.

 

[Tyr]

With regards to the unions...I don't think the problem is so much that the unions had too much power, but rather the power was misdirected.
British socialism tends to have a rather toxic 'us against them' mentality; a natural outgrowth of the class system really.
Compare this however to other north european countries, the Dutch and Germans and you see there they have a much more co-operative outlook.
Even to this day in Sweden you don't have minimum wage laws for instance, instead agreements are reached by compromise between the unions, employers and government,.

It is certainly true that it will be hard to change classism over night. But I wonder how it may be reduced quicker; somehow continue the war 'all in this together' attitude.

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

What is ROBOT?

 

[Admiral Beez]

Prevent British unions from having so much political power. British firms were managed poorly as a result of so much union influence. .

In Germany unions served on the board of companies, and still do today. Thus Germany avoided the adversarial union-mgmt. relationship of Britain.

 

[celt]

In short, Britain consumed too much and invested too little. It also had some especially self-destructive and toxic leaders in the unions that harmed British industry.

Avoid nationalization of most industries. There may be a few - say railroads or the NHS - where government control could be justified, or at least not endanger the economy.

Abandon the pretense of being a great power at least temporarily. Britain cannot afford the expenditure and the results on its balance of payment. To get foreign currency to compensate temporarily, Britain did things that ate its seed corn and impaired its future economy.

Spend American aid to get new machine tooling and other capital plant like the Germans did instead of consumer goods or paying for overseas deployment (given British Cold War commitments, this will be hard to do). The aging capital tooling of British manufacture greatly impaired British quality and competitiveness once West Germany and others were rebuilt.

Prevent British unions from having so much political power. British firms were managed poorly as a result of so much union influence. Managers were making decisions based on politics (what the government wanted them to do) rather than the marketplace (reinvest in their industries to ensure future competitiveness). The industrial strife caused by British unions was just toxic.

Recognize the future is with Europe and not the Commonwealth. Join the ECSC (forerunner of the EU) early on. If they were original members, they'd be more likely to fashion EC policy in ways more favorable to it than waiting until 1973.

The problems of the 1970s were simply the fruits that arose from the seeds planted in the 1940s. Britain's problems were hidden because the temporary decline of its continental European competitors allowed Britain to appear strong. Once those countries recovered and began competing, the failure of British industries became apparent. Atlee's government was very successful in accomplishing its goals - many of those goals were not the right thing to do though. The Tories failed to provide a rival vision and didn't reverse enough Labor policies. Labor then proceeded with more follies in the 1960s and 1970s with their pursuit of industrial planning.

I can't believe there are people here who think the problem was Thatcherism. Note to people - what Thatcher did in the 1980s does not explain the decline of Britain from 1945 to 1979. By the time Thatcher came into power, the British economy had become a joke. Its technical lead had disappeared. British quality was an oxymoron. Once great British companies were pitiful shells of what they once were. British economy went from largest to Europe to falling behind Germany (early sixties), then France (mid sixties), and briefly by Italy (in 1987) before Thatcherite policies finally reversed the decline (just as it takes time for bad policies to become noticeable, it also takes time for reforms to achieve their effect). Manipulate statistics all you want - you can't hide from that.

At the time of the Steel and Coal community Britain still produced half the production of both in Western Europe, it is a big ask for Britain to surrender control to a foreign body at this time. Europe was always the the lowest priority of the three circles foreign policy and at the time British policy makers did not think that much would come from "dodgy" European schemes for integration. They just did not take it seriously until at least the Messina debacle.

 

[Simon]

What is ROBOT?

Operation ROBOT, basically a mooted plan to withdraw sterling from the Bretton Woods system and allow it to float against other currencies.

Recognize the future is with Europe and not the Commonwealth. Join the ECSC (forerunner of the EU) early on. If they were original members, they'd be more likely to fashion EC policy in ways more favourable to it than waiting until 1973.

Signing the Treaty of Paris to join the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) is I think a little too early but other agreements such as the Treaty of Dunkirk, Treaty of Brussels, the London and Paris Conferences show that the UK wasn't completely divorced from dealing with Europe. One idea I've wondered about is if the UK became involved with the idea of the European Economic Community (EEC) and sent representatives to the preceding conferences, Messina and Venice, and bilaterally to the concerned governments to try to negotiate and influence things somewhat to their liking - if things work out they sign on to the Treaty of Rome but if not then they can politely decline and wish the other participants the best of luck with no hard feelings. The main stumbling block that I can see is the UK's trade links with the Commonwealth, joining the EEC's customs union means blocking them out. France still had her colonial commitments so the best I could think of was some sort of agreement to allow them to continue to trade with them without the common external tariff provided a system was in place to keep them from being shipped onwards into other EEC members states, although I'm not sure they could get an agreement for that.