Introduction

There are important parallels in the needs of the two occasions: to fashion a new security order; to deal with the 'defeated' nation; to generate economic reconstruction; to create a new relationship between the emerging European order and the wider international system. It is also important to note, as is implicit in the final chapter of this section written by Christoph Bluth, that the prestige of the armed forces rose after the successful conclusion of the Falklands conflict. One of the reasons for Britain's separateness from Europe, it is often argued, is that it is far too concerned with its relations with the United States. The security aspect of the special relationship which is surely its core is examined by Wyn Rees. British policy during the 1980s has been broadly the same as before, only more exaggerated in certain areas.