The Anglo-American 'special relationship' and the Middle East, 1945-1973

It is widely recognised that the Anglo-American ‘special relationship’ fluctuated following the Second World War. A “Persistent rivalry” was especially evident in policy towards the Middle East and its oil. Immediately after the war, the American attitude to Palestine seemed to complicate British policy. Events in Iran also reflected the clash between the British imperative to protect its national and imperial interests in the region on the one hand, and the American preoccupation with the Cold War and containment on the other. The subsequent differences over Egypt/ Nasser are a matter of public record as are the problems which arose over the British withdrawal from “East of Suez”. Perhaps the very closeness of the relationship between the UK and the US served to heighten expectations

Priests and politicians: Archbishop Michael Gonzi, Dom Mintoff, and the end of empire in Malta

The political contest in Malta at the end of empire involved not merely the British colonial authorities and emerging nationalists, but also the powerful Catholic Church. Under Archbishop Gonzi’s leadership, the Church took an overtly political stance over the leading issues of the day including integration with the United Kingdom, the declaration of an emergency in 1958, and Malta’s progress towards independence. Invariably, Gonzi and the Church found themselves at loggerheads with the Dom Mintoff and his Malta Labour Party. Despite his uncompromising image, Gonzi in fact demonstrated a flexible turn of mind, not least on the central issue of Maltese independence. Rather than seeking to stand in the way of Malta’s move towards constitutional separation from Britain, the Archbishop set about co-operating with the Nationalist Party of Giorgio Borg Olivier in the interests of securing the position of the Church within an independent Malta. For their part, the British came to accept by the early 1960s the desirability of Maltese self-determination and did not try to use the Church to impede progress towards independence. In the short-term, Gonzi succeeded in protecting the Church during the period of decolonization, but in the longer-term the papacy’s softening of its line on socialism, coupled with the return to power of Mintoff in 1971, saw a sharp decline in the fortunes of the Church and Archbishop Gonzi

Centurions and Chieftains : tank sales and British policy towards Israel in the aftermath of the Six Day War

Britain's attempt to distance itself from Israel as London sought to conciliate the Arab world in the aftermath of the Six-Day War has entered the historiography of Anglo-Israeli relations. A neglected aspect of the development of British policy towards Israel has been the intense debates among British decision-makers regarding the supply of tanks to Israel following the 1967 conflict. British reluctance to export the powerful Chieftain tank to Israel stemmed not only from an unwillingness to fuel an arms race in the Middle East, but also from a determination to protect ongoing and extensive British economic interests in the Arab world, especially oil supplies. In keeping with efforts to dissociate itself from Israel, Britain also sought to downplay, and even conceal from the Arab world, ongoing sales of the less sophisticated Centurion tank to Israel. In many ways, British policy towards Israel culminated in the decision during the 1973 Yom Kippur War to maintain an arms embargo to the region which, while not extending to all Arab countries, hit Israel especially hard as it desperately sought ammunition and spares for its Centurion tanks

Britain’s decision to withdraw from the Persian Gulf: a pattern not a puzzle

The reasons for the British decision to withdraw from the Gulf are highly contentious. While some scholars have focused on short-term considerations, especially the devaluation of sterling towards the end of 1967, in the British determination to quit the Gulf, others have concentrated on longer-term trends in British policy-making for the region. This article sides with the latter. Britain's Gulf role came under increasing scrutiny following the 1956 Suez crisis as part of an ongoing debate about the costs and benefits of Britain's Gulf presence. In this sense, British withdrawal fitted into a wider pattern of British decolonisation. By the 1960s, the Treasury, in particular, strongly questioned the necessity and cost-effectiveness of the maintenance of empire in the Gulf to safeguard British economic interests there. Recent interpretations which seek to disaggregate the British decision to leave Southeast Asia from the decision to depart from the Gulf are also questionable. By mid-1967, it had already been determined that Britain would leave both regions by the mid-1970s, the only difference being that this decision was formally announced with respect to Southeast Asia, but not with regard to the Gulf. The devaluation of sterling in November 1967, therefore, merely hastened and facilitated decisions which had already been taken. Despite the end of formal empire in the Gulf, Britain did seek, not always successfully, to preserve its interests into the 1970s and beyond

Subdegree growth rates of infinite primitive permutation groups

A transitive group $G$ of permutations of a set $\Omega$ is primitive if the only $G$-invariant equivalence relations on $\Omega$ are the trivial and universal relations. If $\alpha \in \Omega$, then the orbits of the stabiliser $G_\alpha$ on $\Omega$ are called the $\alpha$-suborbits of $G$; when $G$ acts transitively the cardinalities of these $\alpha$-suborbits are the subdegrees of $G$. If $G$ acts primitively on an infinite set $\Omega$, and all the suborbits of $G$ are finite, Adeleke and Neumann asked if, after enumerating the subdegrees of $G$ as a non-decreasing sequence $1 = m_0 \leq m_1 \leq ...$, the subdegree growth rates of infinite primitive groups that act distance-transitively on locally finite distance-transitive graphs are extremal, and conjecture there might exist a number $c$ which perhaps depends upon $G$, perhaps only on $m$, such that $m_r \leq c(m-2)^{r-1}$. In this paper it is shown that such an enumeration is not desirable, as there exist infinite primitive permutation groups possessing no infinite subdegree, in which two distinct subdegrees are each equal to the cardinality of infinitely many suborbits. The examples used to show this provide several novel methods for constructing infinite primitive graphs. A revised enumeration method is then proposed, and it is shown that, under this, Adeleke and Neumann's question may be answered, at least for groups exhibiting suitable rates of growth.Comment: 41 page

Recorded vignettes: a novel method for investigating documentation in the Electronic Healthcare Record (EHR)

Background: 360 million consultations documented annually in England1 Accurate descriptors required for secondary data functions: Computerised decision support; Financial reimbursement; Audit; Disease prevalence monitoring and research Coding is not explicitly taught within the GP curriculum How do you research how clinicians document? Previous studies: use real patients2/actors3 interacting with clinician studied; Lack standardisation; Expensive. Why Allergy? Growing clinical problem; 2014 NICE guidelines4: Poor clinical documentation is a major issue in allergy; EHR can’t distinguish between intolerance and allergy; Incorrect labelling of patients; Adverse impact on patient care? Little known about coding practices in non-incentivised condition such as allergy. Method: A novel method developed to standardize research of EHR use. Filmed 6 short vignettes (21-50 secs) Monologue of common allergic presentations as if in consultation with a doctor. Digital photographs were included to replicate rashes. Electronic distribution of study files Documented vignettes in their own EHR Returned screen-prints to the researcher for analysis - Codes, free text and EHR functions Questionnaire - Exploring decision-making and validation of method Initially piloted on 1 GP and 2 trainees leading to refinements. Results 7 GPs and 15 GP trainees were recruited All successfully completed Data was returned from 4 different EHRs SystmOne (6), EmisLV (2), EmisWeb (6) and Vision (8) Screen prints effectively captured data with minor technical difficulties reported by 2 participants The study took 1 - 2 hours to complete: longer than expected from the pilot study

Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries and Aquaculture: Implementing the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries

This publication provides guidance on how to implement the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries (CCRF) using an ecosystem approach to fisheries and aquaculture. The CCRF is a voluntary code covering all aspects of the management and development of fisheries and is designed to ensure sustainable development without adversely affecting the livelihoods of local communities that share the same resources as the fisheries. The authors outline the basic principles of the CCRF, describe concrete steps to be taken to use the ecosystem approach effectively, and recommend certain institutional changes and reforms that will be necessary if the potential of the ecosystem approach is to be realized in the Asia-Pacific region. The most significant reform needed is a paradigm shift in policy from one that is production oriented to one that is benefits oriented (social and economic). There is evidence that this is already being undertaken in the region with efforts being made to limit access, reduce the number of fishing vessels and introduce community-based rights systems. Stakeholder participation is essential and existing legal instruments and practices that interact with or impact fisheries may also need to be reconsidered, and adjustments made where necessary. In the future, it may even be necessary to regulate the inter-sectoral interactions and impacts through primary legislation. To promote broader adoption and implementation of the ecosystem approach by member countries, a wide range of regional activities is suggested by the authors including a media campaign, the building of fishery alliances among countries and capacity building in fishery agencies