Originally Posted by
Melchett01
I was talking to a US DOD liaison officer a while back on the issue of ‘the special relationship’. I did suggest that from either side it could be viewed as being one sided ie the U.K. always begging, the U.S. always seeking to extract a high price. His view from the DOD seat was that the U.K. already paid its way, largely in kind through strategic access and basing and political support. We would do well to remember that in any discussions.
My understanding is that the whole point of the "special relationship" is that it isn't a treaty or commercial agreement - it's two countries who are joined at the hip in all sorts of way and who find it jointly beneficial to work closely together on a whole range of items.
Can you imagine any other country lending it's engineers to another (as the US Coast guard does to the RN currently) or having British officers and civil servants embedded in places like RAND who look at future US requirements (and hence strategy) - I don't think so.
It's not about money - it's about interests and outlook - and trust