COURTING A RELUCTANT ALLY - National Intelligence University

equest. 87 This policy of quid pro quo was, and continues to be, standard practicefor information exchanges between governments. As explained in Chapter6, British decisions to forego quid pro quo in technical information and intelligenceexchanges later became a major tool in their efforts to draw the U.S. intoa closer relationship.The Abortive London Naval Conference of 1935The growing Japanese threat drove closer cooperation between the U.S. andthe UK from 1931 to 1938. Japanese actions, such as the invasion of Manchuriain 1931, raised serious concerns in both countries, as many postulated that Japaneseexpansionism would eventually bring conflict between Japan and the Westernpowers in the Far East. 88 To further inflame the situation, the Japanese made itclear to the Americans and the British during the preliminary negotiations leadingup to the London Naval Conference of 1935 that they intended to withdraw fromtheir obligations under the various naval arms limitations treaties to which theywere a signatory. 89 Japanese withdrawal from the treaties, which had kept the sizeof the Japanese Navy inferior to the navies of the U.S. and the UK, would permitthe Japanese to build the fleet they needed to challenge U.S. and British navaldominance in the Pacific. Jeffery Dorwart writes that the events surrounding theLondon Naval Conference of 1935 were a watershed moment in the history of therelationship between the U.S. and Great Britain, marking the beginning of therapprochement between the two countries. 90 The present author’s independentanalysis of these events using the diplomatic correspondence from that period, asrelated below, demonstrates that Dorwart’s contention is correct.The U.S. sent its delegation for the London Naval Conference to the UK somesix months prior to the beginning of the conference in an attempt to lay a com-87 CAPT W. W. Galbraith, USN, Naval Attaché, Letter to Sir Oswyn A. R. Murray K.C.B., TheAdmiralty, 6 January 1930; Division of Naval Intelligence General Correspondence, 1929-1942,RG 38, National Archives Building, Washington, DC, cited hereafter as DNI Correspondence;CAPT W. W. Galbraith, USN, Naval Attaché, Letter to Sir Oswyn A. R. Murray K.C.B., The Admiralty,2 July 1930, DNI Correspondence; CAPT W. W. Galbraith, USN, Naval Attaché, Letter toSquadron Leader A. R. Boyle, Air Ministry, 2 July 1930, DNI Correspondence; CAPT W. W. Galbraith,USN, Naval Attaché, Letter to Sir Oswyn A. R. Murray K.C.B., The Admiralty, 2 July 1930,DNI Correspondence; CAPT W. W. Galbraith, USN, Naval Attaché, Letter to Sir Oswyn A. R. MurrayK.C.B., The Admiralty, 21 July 1931, DNI Correspondence; CAPT W. S. Anderson, USN,Naval Attaché, Letter to Sir Oswyn A. R. Murray, G.C.B., The Admiralty, 21 June 1934, DNI Correspondence;CAPT Herbert S. Howard, USN, Acting Naval Attaché, Letter to Sir Oswyn A. R.Murray, G.C.B., The Admiralty, 7 August 1935, DNI Correspondence.88 Morrison, Battle of the Atlantic, xl.89 Ingersoll Reminiscences, 68.90 Dorwart, Conflict of Duty, 138.27