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The Nuclear Deterrent and the British Election of 1964

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2014

Leon D. Epstein
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Extract

There was little reason to have expected Britain's international policies to be of major concern to most voters in casting their ballots in the 1964 General Election. Party disagreement over entering the European Economic Community was at least temporarily in abeyance after de Gaulle's veto. No great imperial question remained to divide Conservatives from the Labour or Liberal Parties. Membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was firmly bipartisan (or tripartisan). Moreover, British power was now so limited, in relation to the rest of the world, as to provide little basis for Englishmen to think that their nation could make important international decisions. At the same time, there were domestic economic problems about which, it was widely thought, a British government could and should do something. In short, every likelihood existed for electoral attention to be fixed almost entirely on domestic affairs. This would hardly have been unusual. Democratic elections ordinarily seem so conducted. Even if it were clearly desirable to have sharp partisan disagreement over a substantive international question, it is doubtful whether genuine alternatives often exist except perhaps for the super-powers.

It is surprising, then, to find that a question of international policy was contested in the British General Election of 1964. The question was whether Britain should continue trying to have an independent nuclear deterrent. Labour (and the Liberals) proposed that the effort be abandoned. The governing Conservative Party was committed to its continuation. These divergent party policies did not, it is true, make the deterrent issue overwhelmingly important in the electoral decision.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of British Studies , Volume 5 , Issue 2 , May 1966 , pp. 139 - 163
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference of British Studies 1966

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to the National Security Studies program, sponsored at the University of Wisconsin by the Carnegie Corporation, for financial support, including travel to Britain in October 1964. This British visit provided an opportunity for informal interviews, attendance at public meetings, observation of broadcasts, and participation at press conferences.

I also want to thank David V. Griffiths, a graduate student and project assistant at the University of Wisconsin, for help in gathering documentary material, and Austin Ranney, Bernard Cohen, and Anthony King for critical readings of the first draft of the manuscript. L. D. E.

References

1. Report of the Liberal Party annual assembly, Times, 19 Sep., 1958Google Scholar.

2. Note the parliamentary comments of SirChurchill, Winston and Macmillan, Harold, 537 H. C. Deb. 1897, 1905 (1 Mar., 1955), and 2182–83Google Scholar (2 Mar., 1955).

3. The argument is described in , Leon D.Epstein, , “Britain and the H-Bomb, 1955-1958,” Review of Politics, XX (1959), 524-26, 527Google Scholar.

4. These doubts, previously based on rumors of technical problems, were magnified when the 1960 white paper itself noted that it “may be decided not to rely exclusively on fixed-site missiles.” Cmd. 952 (Feb. 1960), par. 36, Parliamentary Papers (H. C. 1959–1960), XXIV, 463.Google Scholar

5. He made the announcement during Parliament's Easter recess and discussed it in an important debate shortly afterward. 622 H. C. Deb. 211–346 (27 Apr., 1960)Google Scholar.

6. Ibid., 241.

7. 625 H. C. Deb. 197 (22 June, 1960)Google Scholar.

8. 632 H. C. Deb. 4 (12 Dec., 1960)Google Scholar, 640 H. C. Deb. 16 (8 May, 1961)Google Scholar, 657 H. C. Deb. 139 (11 Apr., 1962)Google Scholar, and 666 H. C. Deb. 9 (2 Nov., 1962)Google Scholar.

9. 670 H. C. Deb. 64 (23 Jan., 1963)Google Scholar.

10. Cmd. 2270 (Feb. 1964), par. 6. Not yet available in bound volumes of Parliamentary Papers.

11. One of the Conservative doubters was Aubrey Jones, a former minister. 655 H. C. Deb. 75–77 (5 Mar., 1962)Google Scholar.

12. 56th Annual Report of the Labour Party (London, 1957), p. 177Google Scholar.

13. The new position was taken jointly by the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party and the General Council of the Trades Union Congress in July 1960 and stated in the 59th Annual Report of the Labour Party (London, 1960), p. 14Google Scholar.

14. Gaitskell's fight against the unilateralists is reported in Epstein, Leon D., “Who Makes Party Policy: British Labour, 1960-61,” Midwest Journal of Political Science, VI (1962), 165–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

15. Ibid., VI, 177-79.

16. 655 H. C. Deb. 318 (6 Mar., 1962)Google Scholar.

17. 670 H. C. Deb. 1139 (31 Jan., 1963)Google Scholar.

18. Times, 17 Jan., 1964.

19. 684 H. C. Deb. 50 (12 Nov., 1963)Google Scholar.

20. Times, 18 Nov., 1963.

21. Ibid., 5 Dec., 1963.

22. Observer, 16 Feb., 1964.

23. Times, 27 Feb., 1964.

24. Ibid.. 13 July, 1964.

25. 684 H. C. Deb. 195–96 (13 Nov., 1963)Google Scholar.

26. 687 H. C. Deb. 444 (16 Jan., 1964)Google Scholar.

27. Ibid., 444-46.

28. Times, 28 Jan., 1964.

29. The Manifesto of the Conservative and Unionist Party (London, 1964), p. 6Google Scholar.

30. Times, 18 Sep., 1964.

31. Guardian, 12 Oct., 1964.

32. Times, 6 Oct., 1964.

33. Ibid., 2 Oct., 1964.

34. Daily Telegraph, 14 Oct., 1964.

35. Times, 26 Sep., 1964.

36. Both broadcasts heard by the author.

37. Stated by Sir Alec at his press conference, quoted in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 Oct., 1964.

38. Times, 17 Sep., 1964.

39. In a speech at St. Marylebone, as stated in Conservative Party transcript #8898, 5 Oct., 1964.

40. Daily Express, 7 Oct., 1964.

41. Times, 8 Oct., 1964.

42. Conservative Party transcript #8955 of telecast, 9 Oct., 1964.

43. Daily Telegraph, 9 Oct., 1964.

44. At his press conference, 11 Oct., 1964, observed by the author.

45. Observer, 11 Oct., 1964.

46. Portions of the texts for speeches by Butler and Sandys were the same with respect to the deterrent. Conservative Party transcripts #8972 and #8982, 12 Oct., 1964.

47. Waller, Ian, Sunday Telegraph, 11 Oct., 1964Google Scholar.

48. Daily Express, 14 Oct., 1964.

49. Ibid., 15 Oct., 1964.

50. Daily Telegraph, 9, 12, and 15 Oct., 1964.

51. Butler, D. E. and King, Anthony, The British General Election of 1964 (London, 1965), p. 143CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The same work contains a constituency study in which the Conservative candidate's emphasis on defence is described. Ibid., pp. 261-62.

52. The Labour Party's Manifesto (London, 1964), p. 23Google Scholar. The Liberal Party Manifesto (London, 1964), p. 13Google Scholar, took a similar position.

53. Times, 24 Sep., 1964.

54. Ibid., 6 Oct., 1964.

55. Guardian, 13 Oct., 1964.

56. Daily Telegraph, 14 Oct., 1964.

57. Certainly it would have been difficult to explain in attractive terms what turned out to be the policy of the Labour Government in 1964-65: maintenance, at least temporarily, of both the V-bomber fleet and the portions of the Polaris program which had already been substantially started.

58. Sunday Telegraph, 11 Oct., 1964.

59. National Opinion Polls, Ltd., Political Bulletin (London), Mar. 1964, pp. 6–7Google Scholar, and Apr. 1964, pp. 7-8. Gallup data are similar, Sunday Telegraph, 11 Oct., 1964. Interestingly different responses on nuclear policy are shown by the British Electoral Survey conducted from Nuffield College, Oxford, under the direction of Donald Stokes, who has helpfully given this writer the relevant tabulations before their publication. These tabulations show no majority for a British deterrent. The alternatives had been posed in such a way that respondents could reject the independent nuclear policy without having to say (as they did in the National Opinion Polls shown in Table 2) that Britain should give up something in favor of reliance on the United States. But it was in the latter, less neutral form that the Conservatives presented the issue.

60. One of Sir Alec's senior colleagues has said: “Every Prime Minister has one issue he cares more about than anything else. Alec's is the bomb. He'd even be prepared to lose an election on it.” Quoted anonymously by Butler, and King, , The British General Election of 1964, p. 93Google Scholar.

61. Times, 7 Oct., 1964.