uk nuclear program pitfalls

THE SPECIAL NUCLEAR RELATIONSHIP

A HISTORICAL CHRONOLOGY

JOHN SIMPSON AND JENIFER MA С К BY

During the past seven decades, the nuclear relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom has been both remarkable in its duration and unique in its nature.¹ It has been inherently atypical because the two countries have cooperated on what most observers regarded as the "ultimate weapon" of the second half of the twenti­eth century. In a little more than two years their secret joint venture produced two unique bomb designs that ultimately changed history. Although cooperation between the United States and the United King­dom began in the common struggle against Germany, it strengthened considerably under the threat presented by the Soviet Union. Yet its path was never preordained, and it has demanded continuous atten­tion by both states. The British started out ahead on the nuclear discov­ery path in 1939 and suppressed the U.S. requests to join their effort, yet the United States soon surpassed Britain and then almost closed the door on collaboration. It is only due to the quirks of circumstance, personalities, and historical events that the situation changed into one of reciprocal sharing, or symbiotic kinship embodied in the Mutual Defense Agreement (MDA) of 1958.² The agreement was most recent­ly extended in 2004 until 2014. This book is a testament to the MDAs

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50th anniversary as well as the future it holds.

When Winston Churchill came to power in 1940, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Britain's "warm-hearted friend," occupied the White House. Churchill invented the concept of a U.S.-UK "special relationship" in his "Iron Curtain" speech in Missouri on March 5, 1946, to argue for