American Ascendance and British Retreat in the Persian Gulf Region

American Ascendance and British Retreat in the Persian Gulf Region

American Ascendance and British Retreat in the Persian Gulf Region W. Taylor Fain

AMERICAN ASCENDANCE AND BRITISH RETREAT IN THE PERSIAN GULF REGION Copyright W. Taylor Fain, 2008. Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2008 978-0-230-60151-2 All rights reserved. Portions of Chapter 4 originally appeared in the articles Unfortunate Arabia : The United States, Great Britain, and Yemen, 1955 1963, Diplomacy and Statecraft 12, no. 2 (2001), and John F. Kennedy and Harold Macmillan: Managing the Special Relationship in the Persian Gulf Region, 1961 1963, Middle Eastern Studies 38, no. 4 (October 2002). http://www.informaworld.com First published in 2008 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 and Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, England RG21 6XS. Companies and representatives throughout the world. PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-37082-5 ISBN 978-0-230-61336-2 (ebook) DOI 10.1057/9780230613362 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Fain, W. Taylor (William Taylor). American ascendance and British retreat in the Persian Gulf Region/ W. Taylor Fain. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Persian Gulf Region Foreign relations United States. 2. United States Foreign relations Persian Gulf Region. 3. United States Foreign relations 1945-1989. 4. Great Britain Foreign relations United States. 5. United States Foreign relations Great Britain. 6. Persian Gulf Region Foreign relations Great Britain. 7. Great Britain Foreign relations Persian Gulf Region. 8. Persian Gulf Region Strategic aspects History 20th century. 9. Persian Gulf Region Economic conditions 20th century. 10. Security, International Persian Gulf Region History 20th century. I. Title. DS326.F25 2008 327.73053 dc22 2007050072 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Design by Macmillan India Ltd. First edition: July 2008 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Transferred to Digital Printing in 2013

Contents Acknowledgments Introduction 1 1 Toll-Gates of Empire : Britain, the United States, and the Persian Gulf Region before 1951 13 2 Anticolonialism, Revolutionary Nationalism, and Cold War: Anglo-American Relations in the Persian Gulf Region, 1950 1956 45 3 A Delicate Structure : Consolidation and Crisis in the Persian Gulf Region, 1957 1960 77 4 What a World It Is! : Kennedy, Macmillan, and the Persian Gulf Region, 1961 1963 111 5 For God s Sake, Act Like Britain! : Johnson, Wilson, and Britain s Decision to Withdraw from the Persian Gulf Region, 1964 1968 141 6 The Twilight of the Pax Britannica : The United States and Britain s Departure from the Persian Gulf Region, 1968 1972 169 Conclusion 201 Notes 209 Bibliography of Primary Sources 265 Index 275 vii

Acknowledgments A great many people made this book possible. I cannot adequately thank them all, but I wish to express my appreciation to those who have been most supportive during my years in Charlottesville and Wilmington. American Ascendance and British Retreat in the Persian Gulf Region began as my doctoral dissertation at the University of Virginia. Professor Melvyn P. Leffler was my dissertation director and mentor throughout graduate school. I am deeply grateful for his friendship and for the time he has devoted over the years both to me and to my research. His example as a scholar has been an inspiration. Other members of the University of Virginia s faculty gave me invaluable help and support as I undertook this study. I would like to thank Philip Zelikow, Brian Balogh, and William Quandt for their service on my dissertation committee. John Stagg and Nelson Lichtenstein, though not directly involved with my dissertation, taught me much about the joys and responsibilities of scholarship and spent countless hours discussing with me the finer points of American diplomatic and political history. This book benefited enormously from the insights and encouragement offered by my good friends and fellow graduate students Jill and Robert Ingram, Amy Murrell, Scott Taylor, Melissa and Steve Norris, Allyson Creasman, and Richard Samuelson. Additionally, I would be remiss if I did not thank two old friends from Georgetown University: Ambassador David Newsom was extremely generous with his time and has guided me through the intricacies of U.S. diplomacy in the Middle East and Persian Gulf during the period I examine in this study. Professor David Painter also deserves special mention as the man who turned me away from political science and toward a career in history. He gave me sound professional and scholarly counsel when I needed it most. The College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Virginia was generous in its support of my research. The Albert Gallatin University Fellowship in International Affairs and the Bankard Fellowship in Public Policy allowed me to travel throughout the United States and to London. Virginia s Miller Center of Public Affairs provided me with my first teaching and research position after completing my doctorate, and I am grateful to the faculty and staff of the center for providing me with the means to pursue my work. Further, the Eisenhower World Affairs Institute, the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation,

viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS and the Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation provided travel and research grants that allowed me to spend time in Abilene, Boston, and Austin and to do important research at the presidential libraries in those cities. The archival staffs at the Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson libraries, as well at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland, and the British National Archives in Kew, have provided invaluable assistance to me over the past few years. The Department of History at the University of North Carolina Wilmington has been my professional home for the last four years, and I could not have wished for a more supportive and congenial setting in which to complete this book. I am particularly thankful for the financial assistance afforded by the department and university in the form of a Moseley Award, a Charles L. Cahill Faculty Development Award, a Summer Research Initiative Grant, and an International Travel Grant. Kathleen Berkeley and Susan McCaffray, who have each chaired the department since my arrival in Wilmington, have been wonderful mentors. Laura Wittern-Keller, who found a home in the department at the same time I did, has my particular gratitude for her friendship and encouragement. I want to give special thanks to my mother, Clara Ann Fain, and father, William T. Fain Jr. (1932 1999), for their unwavering encouragement and support over the years. They instilled in me a love of history and learning and understood fully when I told them I was abandoning a secure job to return to graduate school. Finally, to my wife, Gao Bei, who came into my life and made it better in every way: this book is dedicated to you.