In the view of her political guardians in the mid-1940s Britain needed to marry and for the most worldly of reasons. She had lost approximately one quarter (£7,300 million) of her prewar wealth (£30,000 million) during the war. She had been forced to undertake a total disinvestment of more than £4,000 million and although she had gold and dollar reserves valued at $1,800 million in July 1945, she also had overseas liabilities of approximately $13,000 million. She had managed to hold imports to 62% of the prewar total but had seen exports fall to 46%. To quote H. G. Nicholas, ‘It was as if all the resources and treasures which in the days of her pre-eminence had been built up by Victorian thrift and enterprise had now been flung, with a kind of calculated prodigality, upon the pyre of total war.’ Recognising the wasting process in which the nation was caught, its leaders sought a partnership that might bring to Britain something of a restoration not just of treasure but of influence.

Furthermore, it was clear during the war that, besides the drain of its assets, Britain faced a ‘manpower famine’. This boded ill for the future if great power status would require her to maintain armed forces on the scale of World War II or to provide major contingents to police the peace of the world. Britain's major deficiency was in ground forces with their high manpower component.