Documents on British Policy Overseas (DBPO)Contact:Prof. Dr. Patrick Salmon, Chief Historian (patrick.salmon AT fcdo.gov.uk) Principal Historian Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
FCDO Historians WH.1.146 Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office |
Documents on British Policy Overseas (DBPO) is the official record of post-war British foreign policy. In 1973 the Foreign Secretary, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, took the decision to extend the publication of British diplomatic documents into the post-war era. The resulting DBPO was originally envisaged as two sub-series, Series I and Series II, covering the periods 1945-50 and 1950-60 respectively. In February 1995 it was announced that future DBPO volumes would contain material from the ‘closed period’ (i.e. documents less than 30 years old and not in the public domain). As a result, Series III began covering 1960 onwards. The first volume was published in 1984 and new volumes continue to be published.
Documents on British Policy Overseas
SERIES I (1945-1950)
I. The Conference at Potsdam, July – August 1945 (1984).
II. Conferences and Conversations 1945: London, Washington and Moscow (1985).
III. Britain and America: Negotiation of the United States loan, August -December 1945 (1986).
IV. Britain and America: Atomic Energy, Bases and Food, December 1945 – July 1946 (1987).
V. Germany and Western Europe, August – December 1945 (1990).
VI. Eastern Europe, August 1945 – April 1946 (1991).
VII. The United Nations: Iran, Cold War and World Organisation, January 1946 – January 1947 (1995).
VIII. Britain and China, 1945-1950 (2002).
IX. The Nordic Countries: From War to Cold War, 1944-51 (2011).
X. The Brussels and North Atlantic Treaties, 1948-49
XI. European Recovery and the Search for Western Security, 1946-1948 (2016)
SERIES II (1950-1955)
I. The Schuman Plan, the Council of Europe and Western European Integration, May 1950 – December 1952 (1986).
II. The London Conferences, January – June 1950 (1987).
III. German Rearmament, September – December 1950 (1989).
IV. Korea, June 1950 – April 1951 (1991).
SERIES III (1960- )
I. Britain and the Soviet Union, 1968-1972 (1997).
II. The Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, 1972-1975 (1997).
III. Détente in Europe, 1972-1976 (2001).
IV. The Year of Europe: America, Europe and the Energy Crisis 1972- 1974 (2006).
V. The Southern Flank in Crisis, 1973-1976 (2006).
VI. Berlin in the Cold War, 1948-1990 (2009).
VII. German Unification, 1989-1990 (2009).
VIII. The Invasion of Afghanistan and UK-Soviet relations, 1979-82 (2012).
IX. The Challenge of Apartheid: UK-Soviet Relations, 1985-1986 (2016)
X. The Polish Crisis and Relations with Eastern Europe, 1979-1982 (2017)
XI. The Unwinding of Apartheid: UK-South-African Relations, 1986-1990 (2018)
XII. Britain and the Revolutions in Eastern Europe, 1989 (2019)
XIII. Britain and China, 1967-72 (2023)
Documents on British Foreign Policy 1919-1939
Description of scope: On 29 March 1944 the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Anthony Eden, informed the House of Commons of the Government's intention to publish a collection of the most important British documents on foreign policy between 1919 and 1939. Sixty-four volumes were published between 1946 and 1986.
DBFP: First Series 1919-1925
- Proceedings of the Supreme Council July-October 1919 (1947).
- Proceedings of the Supreme Council October 1919 – January 1920. Meetings in London and Paris of Allied Ministers December 1919 – January 1920 (1948).
- Withdrawal of German forces from the Baltic Provinces July-December 1919. Policy of H.M.G. with regard to Russia, May 1919 – March 1920. Eastern Galicia, June – December 1919 (1949).
- Adriatic and the Near East 1919 – February 1920 (1952).
- Western Europe, June 1919 – January 1920 and Viscount Grey’s mission to Washington, August – December 1919 (1954).
- Central Europe, June 1919 – January 1920 and HMG’s Relations with Japan, June 1919 – April 1920 (1956).
- First Conference of London, February – April 1920 (1958).
- Conversations and Conferences, 1920 (1958).
- German Affairs, 1920 (1960).
- German Affairs and Plebiscites, 1920 (1960).
- Plebiscite in Upper Silesia, January 1920 – March 1921, and Poland, Danzig and the Baltic States, January 1920 – March 1921 (1960).
- Western and Central Europe and the Balkan States, 1920; Transcaucasia and Russia, February 1920 – March 1921 (1962).
- Near East, February 1920 – March 1921 (1963).
- Far Eastern affairs 1920-22 (1966).
- International Conferences and Conversations 1921 (1967).
- Upper Silesia 1921-2 and Germany 1921 (1968).
- Greece and Turkey 1921-22 (1970).
- Greece and Turkey 1922-23 (1972).
- The Conferences of Cannes, Genoa and the Hague 1922 (1974).
- German Reparations and Allied Military Control 1922 and Russia, March 1921 – December 1922 (1976).
- German Reparations and Military Control 1923 (1978).
- Central Europe and the Balkans 1921 and Albania 1921-2 (1980).
- Poland and the Balkan states 1921-23 (1981).
- Anglo-Italian Conversations 1922 and Central Europe and the Balkans 1922-23 (1983).
- Russia 1923-25 and the Baltic States 1924-25 (1984).
- Central Europe and the Balkans; German Reparation and Allied Military Control, 1924 (1985).
- Germany 1925 and the Locarno Treaty (1986).
DBFP: Series 1a 1925-1930
- The Aftermath of Locarno 1925-26 (1966).
- The Termination of Military Control in Germany and Middle East and American Questions 1926-27 (1968).
- European and Naval Questions 1922 (1970).
- European and Security Questions 1927-28 (1971).
- European and Security Questions 1928 (1973).
- The Young Report and the Hague Conference: Security Questions 1928-29 (1975).
- German, Austrian and Middle East Questions 1929-30 (1975).
DBFP: Second Series 1929-1938
- London Naval Conference and European affairs 1929-31 (1946).
- Austrian and German affairs and the world monetary crisis 1931 (1947).
- Reparations and disarmament 1931-32 (1948).
- The disarmament conference and the internal situation in Germany 1932-33 (1950).
- European affairs and war debts March – October 1933 (1956).
- European affairs and war debts October 1933 – August 1934 (1957).
- Anglo-Soviet relations 1929-34 (1958).
- Chinese affairs and Japanese action in Manchuria 1929-31 (1960).
- The Far Eastern crisis 1931-32 (1965).
- Far Eastern affairs March – October 1932 (1969).
- Far Eastern affairs October 1932 – June 1933 (1970).
- European affairs August 1934 – April 1935 (1972).
- Naval policy and defence requirements July 1934 – March 1936 (1973).
- The Italo-Ethiopian dispute March 1934 – October 1935 (1976).
- The Italo-Ethiopian war and German affairs October 1935 – February 1936 (1976).
- The Rhineland crisis and the ending of sanctions March – July 1936 (1977).
- Western Pact Negotiations: Outbreak of Spanish Civil War, June 1936 – January 1937 (1979).
- European Affairs, January – June 1937 (1980).
- European Affairs, July 1937 – August 1938 (1982).
- Far Eastern Affairs, May 1933 – November 1936 (1984).
- Far Eastern Affairs, November 1936 – July 1938 (1984).
DBFP: Third Series 1938-1939
- The German invasion of Austria and the first phase of the Czechoslovak crisis, March – July 1938 (1949).
- The Development of the Czechoslovak crisis from the Runciman Mission to the Munich Conference, July – September 1938 (1949).
- Polish and Hungarian claims on Czechoslovak territory; the enforcement by Germany of the Munich Agreement; Anglo-Italian Relations: September 1938 – January 1939 (1950).
- Hopes of general European appeasement abandoned; attempts are made to form a ‘common front’ against further German aggression, January – April 1939 (1951).
- Increasing German threats to Poland and British efforts to create a common front against further German and Italian aggression, April – June 1939 (1952).
- An important phase in Anglo-Franco-Soviet negotiations; Anglo-Turkish negotiations; and the German menace to Poland, June – August 1939 (1953).
- Unsuccessful attempts to deter Germany from aggression against Poland; diplomatic exchanges immediately preceding the British declaration of war on Germany, August – September 1939 (1954).
- Policy in the Far East; attitude of H.M.G. towards the Sino-Japanese conflict; interaction of events in the Far East and Western Europe, August 1938 – April 1939 (1955).
- Policy in the Far East during the five months preceding the outbreak of war in Europe, April – September 1939 (1955).
- Index (1961)
British Documents on the Origins of the War 1898-1914
The decision to publish a selection of documents on the origins of the First World War was taken by the Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Ramsay MacDonald, in the summer of 1924. Eleven volumes were published between 1926 and 1938.
Editors: G. P. Gooch and Harold Temperley (vols. I-X), Sir James Headlam-Morley (vol. XI).
- The End of British Isolation (1927)
- The Anglo-Japanese Alliance and the Franco-British Entente (1927)
- The Testing of the Entente 1904-6 (1928)
- The Anglo-Russian Rapprochement 1903-7 (1929)
- The Macedonian Problem and the Annexation of Bosnia 1903-9 (1928)
- Anglo-German Tension 1907-12 (1930)
- The Agadir Crisis (1932)
- Arbitration, Neutrality and Security (1932)
- The Balkan Wars, Part I: The Prelude; the Tripoli War (1933)
The Balkan Wars, Part II: The League and Turkey (1934) - Part I: The Near and Middle East on the Eve of War (1936)
Part II: The Last Years of Peace (1938) - The Outbreak of War (1926)