The view that has persisted since the latter half of the twentieth century is that
Britain’s role as a global power ended following the costly victory in the Second World
War. The oft accompanying interpretation is that Britain was superseded by the United
States of America as the preeminent western hegemon, who eventually surpassed the
level of international influence enjoyed by the British Empire even at its height. These
are largely incorrect and have been the subject of revisionism in the twenty-first
century. Indeed, these are “rooted in an interpretation of hegemonic struggles as
almost entirely military in nature”, and do not take in consideration, to any great
extent, the socio-political dynamism of the post-war world1
. Though emerging
alongside the Soviet Union as a superpower whilst Britain fell into decline after the
Second World War, the United States relied on cooperation with Britain in the Middle
East, a region that was still unquestionably the prerogative of His Majesty’s
Government and not the White House. The United States entered the Middle East
commercially long before 1945, and indeed partook in a “British-American oil
struggle” in Mesopotamia and had small concessions around Mosul by 19202.
However, Britain was dominant in the region commercially, militarily, and politically.
In the Middle East – or ‘Near East’ as is often used in U.S. documents of the period –
“Palestine was the single most divisive issue between the United States and Britain” by
1945