A few years back, I wrote in the Financial Times that the “special relationship” between the UK and the US was in serious jeopardy for the simple reason that the cornerstone of the relationship since its earliest days, shared “hard power”—military and intelligence—was in steep decline on the UK front. Sure there were other factors that went into the relationship—such as common language, shared history, democratic principles—but it was Britain’s ability to stand alongside the US with significant conventional and strategic forces that was the glue to those ties. Well, as Paul Cornish, British military analyst, points out in an essay written for AEI’s Hard Power series, the decline continues.
Nor does it seem likely that, whatever the outcome of the upcoming British elections, the special relationship will get any better. Current Prime Minister David Cameron came into office determined to distance himself from Tony Blair’s legacy and, with it, London’s “slavish” ties to Washington. And in the one significant instance of cooperation, removing Gadhafi from power in Libya, the resulting chaos caused by an Iraq-induced fear of “nation building” has been chalked up as Cameron’s biggest foreign policy mistake. Embarrassed as well by his loss within Parliament of a vote to assist with air strikes against Assad’s Syria for its use of chemical weapons, Cameron, if reelected, is not likely to want to venture further afield even if a Republican finds himself in the Oval Office in 2017.
Toss in the fact that to hold onto power, Cameron and the Tories will need to build a coalition with the Liberal Democrats as they did back in 2010. But even that stratagem might not be possible given current electoral prospects for the LDs. Cameron could find himself with a “hung parliament” in which the Tories attempt to govern as a minority. In either case, Cameron will be preoccupied with domestic fiscal issues—including possibly cutting defense spending further to make ends meet—a referendum on EU membership, and establishment of new constitutional structures to devolve more governing authorities to England, Wales and Scotland.
Should Ed Milibrand’s Labour Party win, the picture will not be any better. Despite pledges not to take a hatchet to the military, it is difficult to square Labour’s plans to expand domestic spending and programs. Plus, like Cameron in the run-up to the previous election, Milibrand has taken pride in his Hugh Grant-like impersonation from the movie “Love Actually” where the British PM stands up to the American president, declaring in Milibrand’s own words: my plan is to “work with our allies, never for them.” Or, as he boasted about his opposition to the prospective US-led airstrikes in Syria in 2013: “Standing up to the leader of the free world shows a certain amount of toughness.”
Milibrand has criticized Cameron as presiding “over the biggest loss of influence” for the UK “in a generation”—saying, in turn, “It is time to reject the small-minded isolationism that has characterized this government.” But this is the same Ed Milibrand who had virtually nothing to say about foreign or defense policy until the last few days of the campaign. Nor, given his own history, is it likely that the turn away from “small-minded isolationism” means a return to a forward-leaning, Tony Blair-like liberal interventionism. Instead, a Milibrand government would be busy rebuilding relations with Brussels and the European Union, pushing initiatives to address issues in globalization and raising the Jolly Roger for climate change. And, like Cameron, if Milibrand wins, he too will be dealing with the Scottish question—perhaps not in a coalition with the Scottish Nationalists, but almost certainly as a major political faction he would be hard pressed to ignore.
Of course, none of the above is written in stone. Events and ambitions once in office often have a way of overturning expectations. Lest we forget, even in the case of the US, Bill Clinton ran on a campaign slogan that “it was the economy, stupid” and ended his days in office with his secretary of state touting America as “the indispensable nation” globally. And, similarly, George W. Bush the candidate spoke of a more “humble” foreign policy and an aversion to nation building but he left office having spent a trillion dollars trying to do precisely that in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Nevertheless, from these shores, it’s difficult not to see, whoever wins on May 7, a Great Britain that will be less a player, less great, in the years ahead. And, as such, from Washington’s perspective, a special relationship that continues to drift towards being even less special.
Follow AEIdeas on Twitter at @AEIdeas.
from AEI » Latest Content http://ift.tt/1Edba52
0 التعليقات:
Post a Comment