Britain’S 'Mr X’

[Not final] Over four decades in the British foreign service, Sir Frank Roberts dealt with headline issues, including policy towards Germany during the years of appeasement, the Second World War alliance with the Soviet Union, the origins of the Cold War, NATO affairs, the Berlin and Cuban Missile Crises, European integration, and relations with the Federal Republic of Germany. Roberts made a difference. Collaborating with the renowned American diplomat, George F. Kennan (the cryptonymous author 'X' of an influential 1947 article), his despatches from Moscow in 1946 shaped Britain's Cold War strategy. In 1954 he played an integral part in the diplomacy behind the rearmament of the Federal Republic and her incorporation into NATO, helping to build an enduring structure of transatlantic security. Roberts' career, largely overlooked by historians, shows how officials can shape major events, and sheds new light on British foreign policy across an era in which Britain slipped from global pre-eminence to regional power status. Knowledge of his contributions matters in a world where Russia and NATO confront one another again. The product of meticulous archival research, Britain's 'Mr X' Sir Frank Roberts and the making of British foreign policy, 1930-68 explores the long and successful career of one of Britain's most important diplomats.