Anthony Eden, Anglo-American Relations and the 1954 Indochina Crisis
In the spring of 1954, after eight years of bitter fighting, the war in Vietnam between the French and the communist-led Vietminh came to a head. With French forces reeling, the United States planned to intervene militarily to shore-up the anti-communist position. Turning to its allies for support, first and foremost Great Britain, the US administration of Dwight D. Eisenhower sought to create what Secretary of State John Foster Dulles called a “united action” coalition. In the event, Winston Churchill's Conservative government refused to back the plan. Fearing that US-led intervention could trigger a wider war in which the United Kingdom would be the first target for Soviet nuclear attack, the British Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden, was determined to act as Indochina peacemaker – even at the cost of damage to the Anglo-American “special relationship”.

In this important study, Kevin Ruane and Matthew Jones revisit a Cold War episode in which British diplomacy played a vital role in settling a crucial question of international war and peace. Eden's diplomatic triumph at the 1954 Geneva Conference on Indochina is often overshadowed by the 1956 Suez Crisis which led to his political downfall. This book, however, recalls an earlier Eden: a skilled and experienced international diplomatist at the height of his powers who may well have prevented a localised Cold War crisis escalating into a general Third World War.
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Anthony Eden, Anglo-American Relations and the 1954 Indochina Crisis
In the spring of 1954, after eight years of bitter fighting, the war in Vietnam between the French and the communist-led Vietminh came to a head. With French forces reeling, the United States planned to intervene militarily to shore-up the anti-communist position. Turning to its allies for support, first and foremost Great Britain, the US administration of Dwight D. Eisenhower sought to create what Secretary of State John Foster Dulles called a “united action” coalition. In the event, Winston Churchill's Conservative government refused to back the plan. Fearing that US-led intervention could trigger a wider war in which the United Kingdom would be the first target for Soviet nuclear attack, the British Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden, was determined to act as Indochina peacemaker – even at the cost of damage to the Anglo-American “special relationship”.

In this important study, Kevin Ruane and Matthew Jones revisit a Cold War episode in which British diplomacy played a vital role in settling a crucial question of international war and peace. Eden's diplomatic triumph at the 1954 Geneva Conference on Indochina is often overshadowed by the 1956 Suez Crisis which led to his political downfall. This book, however, recalls an earlier Eden: a skilled and experienced international diplomatist at the height of his powers who may well have prevented a localised Cold War crisis escalating into a general Third World War.
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Anthony Eden, Anglo-American Relations and the 1954 Indochina Crisis

Anthony Eden, Anglo-American Relations and the 1954 Indochina Crisis

Anthony Eden, Anglo-American Relations and the 1954 Indochina Crisis

Anthony Eden, Anglo-American Relations and the 1954 Indochina Crisis

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Overview

In the spring of 1954, after eight years of bitter fighting, the war in Vietnam between the French and the communist-led Vietminh came to a head. With French forces reeling, the United States planned to intervene militarily to shore-up the anti-communist position. Turning to its allies for support, first and foremost Great Britain, the US administration of Dwight D. Eisenhower sought to create what Secretary of State John Foster Dulles called a “united action” coalition. In the event, Winston Churchill's Conservative government refused to back the plan. Fearing that US-led intervention could trigger a wider war in which the United Kingdom would be the first target for Soviet nuclear attack, the British Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden, was determined to act as Indochina peacemaker – even at the cost of damage to the Anglo-American “special relationship”.

In this important study, Kevin Ruane and Matthew Jones revisit a Cold War episode in which British diplomacy played a vital role in settling a crucial question of international war and peace. Eden's diplomatic triumph at the 1954 Geneva Conference on Indochina is often overshadowed by the 1956 Suez Crisis which led to his political downfall. This book, however, recalls an earlier Eden: a skilled and experienced international diplomatist at the height of his powers who may well have prevented a localised Cold War crisis escalating into a general Third World War.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781350021181
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date: 07/25/2019
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 352
File size: 722 KB

About the Author

Kevin Ruane is Professor of Modern History at Canterbury Christ Church University, UK.

Matthew Jones is Professor of International History at the London School of Economics and Political Science, UK

Table of Contents

1. Introduction: Fallen Idol - Anthony Eden and the Verdict of History

PART I: THE ROAD TO 1954
2. Britain, the United States, and the Asian Cold War, 1945-1951
3. Containing China: The Cold War Defence of South-East Asia, 1951-1953
4. Backing France: Britain and the Vietnam War, 1951-1953

PART II: THE CRISIS BREAKS

5. Korea Wanes, Vietnam Waxes, 1953
6. Countdown to Crisis, January-March 1954
7. From United Action to Disunited Inaction: April 1954


PART III: THE CRISIS RESOLVED
8. The Fall of Dien Bien Phu and the Geneva Conference, May 1954
9. Special no More ...: The Breakdown of the Anglo-American Relationship in Asia, May-June 1954
10. Eden and the Settlement of the First Vietnam War, July 1954.


PART IV: REFLECTIONS
11. Saving the Peace, 1954-1956.
12. The Shadow of Suez
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