Unspoken Allies: Anglo-Dutch Relations since 1780

293 Pages·2002·2.44 MB·English

by  Nigel Ashton

Nigel Ashton and Duco Hellema (eds.)
Unspoken Allies

Unspoken Allies
ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS SINCE 1780
Nigel Ashton and Duco Hellema (eds.)
Amsterdam Universiry Press
Deze uitgave werd mede moge!ijk gemaakt door het Ministerie van Buiten
landse Zaken.
Cover illustration:
Cover design: Sabine Manne! / NAP, Amsterdam
Lay-out: JAPES, Amsterdam
ISBN 9053564713
© Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, 2001
Allrightsreserved. Withoutlimitingtherightsundercopyright reserved above,
nopartofthis bookmay be reproduced, stored in orintroduced into a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical,
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PREFACE
This bookisthe happyresultofanexerciseinAnglo-Dutchco-operationwhich
had its origins in 1993, when, by coincidence, articles by the two editors
looking at aspects of the Suez crisis of 1956, the one from the Dutch and the
other from the British perspective, were published in the same issue of journal
Diplomacy andStatecraft. Subsequentdiscussions confirmed the editors in the
opinion that considerable scope existed to pursue comparative archival
research in the history ofAnglo-Dutch relations. Their work was aided during
1996 by a generous grant from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific
Research (NWO). Thereafter, during the preparations for the international
conference on Anglo-Dutch Relations in the Nineteenth and Twentieth
Centuries held in the Institute of History at the University of Utrecht during
March 1999, the editors incurred a number of further debts of gratitude.
Firstly, they would like to thank both the European Affairs Departmentofthe
Netherlands Foreign Ministry and the Research Institute for Culture and
History in the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Utrecht for their
generous sponsorship of the conference and of the publication of this book.
Secondly, thanks mustgotothe InstituteofHistory attheUniversity ofUtrecht
for its generosity in providinga suitable venue for the March 1999 conference.
Finally, the editors would like to thank all of the participants in the March
1999 conference, and the contributors to this book. This volume is a tribute to
theirenthusiasmandexpertise,and totheirwillingness toworktothe thematic
guidelines laid down by the editors. In all cases their work illuminates
important new perspectives on bilateral relations between Britain and the
Netherlands, based on detailed research in British and Dutch archives. Their
efforts as a whole are a fine example ofwhat can be achieved through interna
tional collaboration between individual academics and institutions. While
acknowledging these many debts ofgratitude, the editors themselves ofcourse
take full responsibility for the final shape ofthis volume.
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CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION 9
THE COLONIAL FACTOR IN ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS, 1780-1820 17
Jur van Goor
THE DUTCH AND THE BRITISH UMBRELLA 1813-1870 33
N.C.F. van Sas
RELATED BUT UNEQUAL PARTNERS IN IMPERIALISM, 187°-1914 43
Maarten Kuitenbrouwer
ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS DURING THE FIRST WORLD WAR 59
Marc Frey
ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS AND THE KAISER QUESTION, 1918-1920 85
Nigel]. Ashton and Duco Hellema
THE 'TOMMIES' OR THE ']ERRIES': DUTCH TRADE PROBLEMS IN
THE INTER-WAR PERIOD Ior
Hein A.M. Klemann
'A CERTAIN LiAISON IN PEACE': BRITAIN AND DUTCH SECURITY POLICY,
1933-1938 121
Remco van Diepen
BRITISH PERCEPTIONS OF THE NETHERLANDS AND THE THREAT OF WAR,
1938-1940 137
Bob Moore
'GOODBYE, MR. CHURCHILL': ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS DURING THE
SECOND WORLD WAR 155
Albert E. Kersten and Marijke van Faassen
7
THE NETHERLANDS, GREAT BRITAIN AND THE INDONESIAN REVOLUTION,
1945-1950 179
J.J.P. deJong
DUTCH-BRITISH COMMERCIAL RELATIONS IN A EUROPEAN CONTEXT,
1945-1960 2°3
Wendy Asbeek Brusse
Too CLOSE A FRIEND?: THE NETHERLANDS AND THE FIRST BRITISH
ApPLICATION TO THE EEC, 1961-1963 223
P. Ludlow
'THE SECOND TRY': THE NETHERLANDS IN BRITAIN'S STRATEGY FOR EEC
ENTRY, 1966-1967 241
John Young
ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS DURING THE EARLY 1970S: THE OIL CRISIS 255
Duco Hellema
POSTSCRIPT 273
CV'S 279
INDEX 283
8
INTRODUCTION
During a conversation in May 1962 with Under-Secretary ofState George Ball
- the 'Mr Europe' ofthe United States- the French Minister ofForeign Affairs
Maurice Couve de Murville offered a fascinating assessment ofthe underlying
similarities between the Netherlands and Great Britain. Considering the
existing European Economic Community ofthe Six, he argued that
...as now constituted the Community was relatively homogenous. It
consistedofContinentalpowersexceptfor one nationthatwas notso much
a Europeanas amaritime nation. The Netherlands wasan islandin thesame
sense that the United Kingdom was an island. The Dutch had never really
been interestedin Europe; theyhad always been looking out over thewaters
at other areas of the world.
The Dutch, Couvewenton toexplain, 'were not Europeans- atleasttheywere
not Continental Europeans - as were the French and the Germans'. The
addition of another power of the same character to the EEC in the shape of
Great Britain, therefore, 'was a point that bothered the French very much...'.'
Ofcourse, the French Foreign Minister had a vested interest in his version of
the shared national characteristics of the Dutch and the British. His conversa
tion with George Ball took place against the background of President de
Gaulle's attempts to block the first British effort to negotiate entry into the
EEC. Still,there was a kernel oftruth in Couvede Murville's description ofthe
Netherlands and Britain as European 'islands', looking outwards from the
Continent to the rest of the world. This sense of a shared underlying geo
strategic perspective is a useful starting point for any study of Anglo-Dutch
relations over the course of the past two centuries.
To draw out the strands of this shared national perspective further, and to
playsomewhatironicallyonthe Frenchtheme hinted atin Couvede Murville's
comments, one might contend that Anglo-Dutch relations during the period
covered by this volume can be characterised as a study in 'inequality', 'frater
nity' and 'liberty'. Inequality was the corollary of what was in essence a great
power - small power relationship. Great Britain loomed far larger in Dutch
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