Britain’s United Kingdom & America’s United States: The Special Relationship

This is likely to be a very brief and hurriedly thrown together blog posting. I think a good number of very long and serious books could stand to be written about this subject and many good books touch on its themes and questions.  What is the nature of the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom?  How much does this relationship matter?  What should the relationship be like? I want to discuss that however inadequately in this blog.

1. What are some common geopolitical interests of the UK and the USA?

WELL, THEY ARE SERVING IN THE SAME AVOWED CAUSE AND FIGHTING AND DYING TOGETHER IN IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN.  THEY ARE BOTH MEMBERS OF NATO. BOTH ARE PERMANENT VETO-WIELDING MEMBERS OF THE UNITED NATIONS SECURITY COUNCIL. BOTH COUNTRIES FOUGHT ON THE SAME SIDE IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR AND THE SECOND WORLD WAR. THE QUEEN OF THE UNITED KINGDOM IS HEAD OF STATE OF THE COUNTRY WITH THE LONGEST BORDER WITH THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 

2. What is the history and nature of our relationship with the UK, here in the USA?

EXCEPT FOR SOME UNSURVEYED, UNSUPPORTED LINES RUNNING DUE WEST FROM THE ORIGINAL THIRTEEEN COLONIES OF THE EASTERN SEABOARD MOST OF THE UNITED STATES WAS NEVER UNDER BRITISH RULE. FRANCE HAD REAL TREATIES WITH AMERICAN INDIAN NATIONS AND GEOGRAPHICAL BOUNDARIES FOR THE MIDDDLE SECTION OF THE COUNTRY INCLUDED IN THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE .  THEY ALSO HAD SOME SETTLEMENTS AND EXTENSIVE TRADE RELATIONS WITH THESE GROUPS AND IN NEW ORLEANS THEY HAD A CITY AS GREAT AS ANY THAT EXISTED IN THE UNITED STATES WHEN THE CITY ENTERED THE UNION. MOST OF THE WEST CAME IN DIRECTLY FROM SPAIN OR THROUGH MEXICO AS DID FLORIDA AND ALASKA CAME FROM RUSSIA. HAWAII WAS A BRITISH PROTECTORATE BUT AN INDEPENDENT POLYNESIAN KINGDOM AS WELL.  THOSE SETTLING THESE LANDS WERE AMERICAN ABORIGINAL PEOPLES, SPANIARDS, GALLIC AND LATIN PEOPLES, ALL BRITISH GROUPS INCLUDING THOSE NOW ASSOCIATED WITH THE REPUBLIC OF IRELAND, SCANDINAVIANS, GERMANS AND SLAVS AS WELL AS AFRICANS, MEXICAN MESTIZOS, CHINESE AND JAPANESE AND A VARIETY OF PEOPLES FROM THE MIDDLE EAST.  FURTHER THE BRITS IN THE THIRTEEN COLONIES FOUGHT TWO BLOODY WARS TO DISTANCE THEMSELVES FROM THE UNITED KINGDOM AND   THE OLD COUNTRY UK BRITS ARE STILL THE ONLY POWER TO HAVE BURNT OUR CAPITAL CITY AND BUILDINGS.  THE OVERWHELMING PRE-EMINENCE OF THE UNITED KINGDOM AS OUR NATIONAL PROGENITOR IN HISTORY AND EDUCATION IS FALSE, DESTRUCTIVE AND DISEMPOWERING.

In addition to these two ( and for me pre-eminent) questions to consider Americans must recognize that, with both the Commonwealth and the European Union to concern itself, with the UK cannot place American interest very high on its priority lists.  The United States has long been a soft target for every cultural agent type of statecraft and espionage but no country has benefitted more and more cheaply from America’s arrested cultural and social development than has the United Kingdom.  I believe that America has reasons to develop good relations with the UK.  However, if our country survives our downward spiral and finds a future it will need to be a future in which we are really ourselves growing and developing as we ought to and building on what we do have in common with and stand to gain from the UK.  Then we can also offer them the hand of friendship when that is desirable.