Memory and Power in Post-War Europe: Studies in the Presence of ...

British imperial memories and Europe 105
derived largely from its past, and came to be echoed over time by both
Labour and Conservative leaders:
‘As I look out upon the future of our country in the changing scene of human
destiny I feel the existence of three great circles among the free nations and democracies.
The first for us is naturally the British Commonwealth and Empire with
all that that comprises. Then there is also the English speaking world, centring
upon the United States, in which we, Canada, and the other British Dominions
play so important a part. And finally there is a United Europe ...These three
majestic circles are co-existent, and if they are linked together there is no force
or combination which could overthrow them, or even challenge them effectively.
Now if you think of the three interlinked circles you will see that we are the only
country which has a great part in every one of them. We stand in fact at the very
point of junction, and here in this island at the centre of the seaways and perhaps
of the airways also, we have the opportunity of joining them all together ...Over
and above all special questions there rises before us the dread and solemn issue
of the survival of Great Britain and her Empire as a united power in the first rank
among nations.’ 11
Churchill captured the essential dilemma of a declining, but not defeated,
imperial power, but one whose history and pride now meant that
it was confronted with the quandary of either remaining a player in all
arenas or deliberately scaling down its operations. Churchill’s clear preference
was for Britain now to use all the advantages of its history in the
service of protecting the free world from the inroads of communism. But,
as he said in 1951, ‘I never thought that Britain or the British Commonwealth
should, either individually or collectively, become an integral part
of a European federation, and have never given the slightest support to
the idea ...We help, we dedicate, we play a part, but we are not merged
and do not forfeit our insular or Commonwealth-wide character. I should
resist any American pressure to treat Britain as on the same footing as the
European States, none of whom have the advantages of the Channel and
who were consequently conquered.’ 12 Neither Conservatives nor Labour
thinkers deviated far from this stricture until the pressures became too
great: the ‘founding myths’ of integration on the Continent were not
necessary for the British, given their different experience of empire and
11 W. S. Churchill, Europe Unites: Speeches, 1947 and 1948 (London: Cassell, 1950). The
Labour Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin also referred indirectly to the three circles concept
in 1948, when he called for a Western democratic system with the backing of the
Americas and the dominions to counter the communist threat. Likewise, Anthony Eden
was very much influenced by Winston Churchill’s aphorism, talking of the three unities.
12 Public Record Office, Kew, London: C(51), 32, CAB 129/48, quoted in Silke Skär,
The British Conservative Party and Supranational European Integration, 1948–1955, DPhil
thesis, University of Oxford, 2000, 211.