Date of Graduation

5-2014

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in History (MA)

Degree Level

Graduate

Department

History

Advisor/Mentor

Alessandro Brogi

Committee Member

Randall B. Woods

Second Committee Member

Benjamin Grob-Fitzgibbon

Keywords

European Integration, Foreign Policy, Heath, Kissinger, Nixon, Special Relationship

Abstract

The special relationship has long been a topic of interest to historians of US foreign relations. The general consensus has been that the years 1969-1973 were a low point for Anglo-American relations, and have therefore been dismissed as largely insignificant. Rejecting this interpretation, this thesis contends that while certainly one of the lowest moments in the history of the special relationship, the Heath-Nixon relationship reveals much about the nature of the special relationship and America's relations with its allies more broadly. Focusing on the question of European integration (and the corresponding British entry into the European Community in 1973) and its impact on the special relationship, this thesis contends that when European integration brought geopolitics and personality together in a totalizing question of the future of each state in the global Cold War, Anglo-American relations rapidly deteriorated. Yet, despite reaching a troubled state, the special relationship survived and now serves to illustrate a fundamental paradigm in American management of relations with its allies.

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