If you think that there can't be much more to learn about Anglo-American naval relations in the 1920s, I would suggest you dip into Donald Lisio's book on the subject and be surprised at what there is in it.

Although British Naval Supremacy and Anglo-American Antagonisms allegedly covers the 1914–30 period, World War I is summarily dealt with in short order (5–8) and 1928–30 is only mentioned in the briefest fashion as part of the conclusion (311–15). This means that the overwhelming thrust of the book settles upon the period from the emotionally charged Versailles peace settlement to the deeply flawed Geneva Conference. It is a story of duplicity and double-dealing, arrogance and myopia, insularity and xenophobia, personal shortcomings and vainglorious ego. And that is only the British part of the story!

What evidence Professor Lisio has ferreted out of the primary records is fascinating for it shows how dysfunctional and manipulative politicians and military officers can be when they are brought together in pursuit of a particular objective. Different agendas – secret and clashing – help to create an element of distrust even within the same negotiating delegation, let alone between opposing sides who quickly become deplorable adversaries. What is truly staggering in the litany of complaints and falsehood that are generated between them at this time is the real lack of intelligence gleaned about the “other.” British views of the Americans in the immediate postwar decade are extraordinary. Royal Navy officers behaved as if the USN was beyond the pale and their political leaders were lacking in guile and intelligence. For their part, American statesmen, diplomats, and military officers saw ample evidence of perfidy and disingenuousness being alive and well in British government circles. It was not accidental that Franklin Delano Roosevelt observed in the following decade, “Every time we have taken the British into our confidence they have given us a trimming.” Professor Lisio may well understand the exasperation of the thirty-second President and his book loads the dice in quite a subtle way.Footnote ¹

After a very discursive chapter on clashing world interests, the emeritus professor from Coe College provides us with a very readable account of the Washington Conference and rehearses the substantive problems that it left in its wake. These issues – primarily of cruisers and bases – were to form so much of the dissension and suspicion that was to colour the next few years as far as the two transatlantic naval staffs were concerned. Just as the Americans felt that their delegates had been outmanoeuvred on capital-ship tonnage and ratios by the wily Balfour, the Admiralty sensed that the US had given too many concessions to the Japanese to secure their approval of the Washington treaty system. There was more than a grain of truth in both of these accusations, as his next chapters reveal.

First Sea Lord Admiral Sir David Beatty dominates these pages but doesn't emerge from this close study with distinction. Lisio paints him as being thoroughly untrustworthy, archly conceited and a vituperative individual. Convinced that Britain would be drawn into war with Japan and with a global empire to protect, Beatty was determined to retain a substantial lead in cruisers over all other navies. Unfortunately, the high hopes he and others in the Admiralty had invested in the 8-inch gun was not borne out by its tepid performance. This galling fact discovered in October 1926 dictated the Admiralty's policy with regard to cruisers in the months leading up to the Geneva Naval Conference of June–August 1927.

This rancorous Anglo-American-Japanese gathering is the core of Lisio's book and it makes fascinating reading. Ironically, given his baleful influence upon the proceedings, Beatty wasn't actually present in Switzerland. Neither, of course, was his bête noire Churchill, although both still tend to dominate from afar. Instead the cast of characters – well-meaning and dubious; earnest and conniving – thrust into prominence by the conference as delegates or lobbyists are exposed by the author with remarkable poise. One feels for Cecil, Gibson and Jones; deplores the antics of Shearer and Schofield; and can barely imagine the righteous ineptitude of Bridgeman and Field and the hapless cards they tried to play in these sessions. Geneva plumbs the depth in Anglo-American relations and Lisio provides plenty of documentary proof as to why that nadir was reached.

Although this wasn't the Admiralty's finest hour, the USN emerges fairly honourably from Professor Lisio's book. I'm not sure the distinction was quite so vast in reality. I'm also surprised by the existence of a few jarring typos that somehow got through the proofreading stage without alteration. Usually these can be overlooked in silence, but on this occasion I can only hope they aren't symptomatic of deeper problems with what is otherwise an impressive study of what was wrong with Anglo-American naval relations in the 1920s.