ABSTRACT
In the early post-war period electoral politics in Britain was dominated by socio-economic factors – as one academic famously put it, ‘class is the basis of British party politics; all else is embellishment and detail’. With his eye on an impending election, Harold Macmillan had few reasons for satisfaction in the months after General de Gaulle’s veto, but some developments did seem to provide an element of personal vindication. Among his various charges against recent British governments, Dean Acheson had claimed that ‘Great Britain, attempting to be a broker between the United States and Russia, has seemed to conduct policy as weak as its military power’. In acting to preserve the value of sterling rather than consulting Britain’s long-term economic interests, Harold Wilson had effectively decided to cling to symbols of prestige at the risk of undermining the substance of power. Whatever their other uses, nuclear weapons could be regarded as another potent symbol of Britain’s continuing global relevance.
