Facing the Unavoidable — Great Britain, the Sterling Area and Japan: Economic and Trading Relations, 1950–1960

Abstract

In October 1948, for the benefit of the annual Conservative Party Conference, Winston Churchill spoke assuredly of the ‘Three Circles’ upon which Britain’s future as a world power was based. British links with each circle of Commonwealth and Empire; the English-speaking dominions, Great Britain and the United States; and a United Europe purportedly reinforced British might in the remaining two. Indeed, if one were to envision the three interlocking circles, it would become immediately apparent that Britain was ‘the only country which has a great part in every one of them’.¹ While not equal to the superpowers, the United Kingdom’s global interests would at least partially compensate for diminished capabilities. With Churchill’s return to power in 1951, this concept was installed as the basis of the Conservative government’s foreign policy and even used in the publicity of diplomatic missions.² Equally, given this almost celestial self-appointment as ‘the very point of junction’,³ it was inevitable that the impact of Japanese economic resurgence and trade would also have to be faced in each circle. The needs and direction of the recovering Japanese economy over the 1950s affected significantly British connections with Empire and Commonwealth (English-speaking or otherwise), the crucial relationship with the United States, and, naturally, relations between the British and Japanese home islands themselves.