Conflict and Conciliation: Kennedy, Macmillan and East-West Trade, 1961–63

Abstract

Relations between the United States and Britain over East-West trade controls had reached a low ebb by the end of the Eisenhower administration. During the late 1950s the two countries had clashed over the abandonment of the China ‘differential’ and fiercely debated the criteria for restricting goods in trade with the Soviet bloc. As a result, the 1960–61 CoCom review had been fraught with friction as Washington and London attempted to pull the multilateral export control programme in different directions. American officials had wanted to add more technologically advanced products to the international lists. Conversely the British negotiators had sought to reduce considerably the scope and size of the embargo, on the basis that the Soviet Union was a highly sophisticated industrial nation and therefore would not be affected by Western trade controls.