Britain's ‘Vietnam syndrome’? Public opinion and British military intervention from Palestine to Yugoslavia

Abstract

There have been calls for policymakers to draw ‘lessons’ from Britain's experience of Empire and Northern Ireland to inform a new generation of post-Cold War interventions by the international community. This article emphasises the role that domestic public opinion, galvanized by the impact of casualties and the plight of military relatives, has played in shaping Britain's experience of ‘military intervention’ in the ‘civil wars’ of Palestine, Northern Ireland and the former Yugoslavia. Three principal arguments are put forward.