"A valuable contribution to the existing literature on Anglo-American relations in general and on the International Relations of the Middle East in the 1950s in particular. The `special relationship' between Britain and the United States has been a persistent theme in public discourse since the Second World War but it is rarely treated with analytical rigour. It is refreshing therefore to come across a critical and unsentimental account of how this relationship works out in practice." Avi Shlaim, St. Antony's, Oxford --