Queen of the World: Elizabeth II: Sovereign and Stateswoman

by Robert Hardman

  As for a proposed visit by the thirty-ninth US President, Jimmy Carter, it was decided not to make any firm plans until after the upcoming US presidential election. ‘Any visit by the President can always be arranged on an “ad hoc” basis,’ the committee concluded. Planning a US state visit would turn out to be somewhat more problematic by the time the forty-fifth President, Donald Trump, began his administration in 2017.

  Over the years, financial imperatives would start to be of greater importance when planning trips. Today, the Royal Visits Committee also includes the Keeper of the Privy Purse, with responsibility for royal finances, and the chief executive of UK Trade and Investment. Where possible, royal trips must pay their way – commercially as well as politically. ‘They are an important diplomatic asset, so therefore I saw it as my responsibility to make the best possible diplomatic use,’ says Sir Simon Fraser, who was head of the Diplomatic Service from 2010 to 2015. ‘In particular I was very keen to link it to the agenda of the time, which was about the post-economic crisis and international economic relationships. Clearly, for state visits, you have to look for things that are materially adding political and diplomatic value and not just maturing a friendship.’

  Following the economic crash of 2008, there was a heavy emphasis on the Gulf, China, Indonesia and Mexico. Once the Queen had decided to curtail long-haul travel, at the time of her 2012 Diamond Jubilee, it was a case of inviting long-haul heads of state from faraway countries to visit her in London. She would then make short-haul state visits to places like Germany, Italy and France, while other members of the family ensured a regular royal presence in realms like Australia, Canada and New Zealand. None of this happens without the closest consultation at the very top. The Queen would be constitutionally obliged to visit Timbuktu§, if her Prime Minister advised her to do so, but her governments have, with some exceptions, ensured that the Queen visits – or is visited by – people she actually wants to see.

  Every world leader, says David Cameron, is delighted to see her, especially if things are not going too well on the home front. He points to the way in which France’s President François Hollande arranged several events marking the seventieth anniversary of D-Day, in 2014, around the Queen, even hosting the main international ceremony in what had been the British sector in June 1944. ‘If you are suffering, like President Hollande was suffering, what is better than sitting with the Queen on Sword Beach? They did it very well.’ On those occasions, Cameron explains, the Royal Family are in much greater demand than UK politicians anyway. ‘God, they throw themselves into it. There were royals everywhere,’ he says. ‘I went home before they had finished.’

  THE INVITATION

  Before the Queen can go anywhere, she requires an invitation. She has never travelled anywhere unless asked. Acceptances would not always be straightforward, either. It was all very well saying that the Queen would be happy to visit Country A, but its neighbour, Country B, might be deeply offended that it was being overlooked. So the leader of Country B might require an invitation to visit London at a later date, perhaps, or an assurance of a visit by the Prince of Wales. When Kenya fell off the list of the Queen’s African destinations in 1979, it was no surprise that President Moi of Kenya found himself riding down the Mall in a carriage with the Queen a few months later. In 1996, according to a telegram from the British Ambassador in Bangkok, the King of Thailand was not only thrilled that the Queen was paying him a state visit in his fiftieth year on the Throne, but regarded it as a ‘special honour’ that she was not going anywhere else. Every detail of every visit would be scrutinised by protocol pathologists for the tiniest indication of either preferment or a snub.

  If the Queen was due to visit multiple countries on the same tour, there would be diplomatic jostling for position. Long before any formal announcement about the Queen’s 1968 tour of South America – the first there by any reigning monarch – there was turmoil in British embassies across the entire continent when confidential plans were circulated. The Queen, it transpired, would visit Brazil and Chile. Chile was a little upset to discover that it would not be the Queen’s only destination. As the British Ambassador, Frederick Mason, informed his bosses, President Frei ‘appeared to think that the visit would be Chile only’. If President Frei was miffed to learn that Brazil was also included, he was even more displeased to learn that Brazil would also be the first port of call. The Brazilian Foreign Minister had been adamant that his country had to come first or else the visit to Brazil would be seen as an ‘appendage’ to a visit to Chile.

  Chilean rivalry with Brazil was the least of the Foreign Office’s worries. Internal documents show that there had also been considerable pressure on the Foreign Office to include Argentina in the trip, not least from the Duke of Edinburgh, who had recently been there himself. Though he had been a target of nationalist anger against British ownership of the Falkland Islands – shots had been fired at the British Embassy residence, and someone had tried to pelt him with fruit – he was still keen to return. The Queen’s Private Secretary, Martin Charteris, wrote to the head of the Diplomatic Service, Sir Paul Gore-Booth, saying that the Duke feared that omitting Buenos Aires from the tour ‘could be taken very much amiss by the Argentinians’. As Sir Michael Creswell, British Ambassador to Buenos Aires, put it, if the Queen did not go to Argentina, it would be regarded as ‘a gratuitous snub and evidence of ill-will’.

  No details of the tour had yet been made public. The Queen’s view was that sensitive travel plans should be under wraps for as long as possible, though Gore-Booth was wary of such a delay. ‘The risk of a leakage among some excited Latins would be considerable,’ he warned in an internal Foreign Office memo.

  When news of the tour was finally released in April 1968, there was a compromise over Argentina. A visit there was still a ‘possibility’. This, in turn, created new problems. The British Ambassador in Montevideo wrote to his masters warning that Uruguay was ‘deeply disappointed’ to learn of a possible visit to its larger neighbour, but not to Uruguay itself. The Foreign Office duly issued instructions to all the other British embassies in South America on what to say when affronted presidents and dictators started asking them why the Queen was not visiting their particular country.

  In May, John Beith, Assistant Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office, wrote to Creswell, the Ambassador in Buenos Aires, with word from the Palace. The Queen could not possibly go to Argentina without also visiting her British subjects in the Falkland Islands. Creswell was appalled. Out of the question, he harrumphed to London the following day. The Argentinians, he warned, would regard such a move as an ‘unbelievably clumsy step or else, more probably, as deliberately provocative’. If the Queen set foot on her islands, ‘it would have a lastingly harmful effect on our relations and trade with this country’. The files show that Creswell was already busy trying to negotiate a memorandum of understanding with Argentina, as the first step towards sharing or even surrendering British sovereignty of the Falkland Islands. Since he was doing so behind the backs of the islanders, he argued, they were bound to be furious when they found out. This would have the ‘most undesirable consequences’ for any visit by the Queen and would embroil her in a politically embarrassing situation. Writing to Gore-Booth on 22nd May, the Queen’s Private Secretary, Sir Michael Adeane, said that he had discussed it all with her and she had very clear views on the matter. It would be ‘inexpedient’ to visit the Falkland Islands, wrote Adeane, ‘without also going to the Argentine’. He went on: ‘From the point of view of opinion in this country, it would be even worse to visit [the] Argentine and not the Falkland Islands.’

  On top of all this, there were some serious practical problems, too. The islands lacked a runway suitable for a royal flight, which would mean ‘a good deal of probably rough sea travel’ in the Royal Yacht, and the Queen would not be home until 30th November. ‘This would create various administrative difficulties which, though not insurmountable, would be awkward,’ wrote Adeane, noting that the
biggest indoor event in the Palace calendar, the Diplomatic Reception, had already been arranged for 28th November. For all these reasons, Adeane concluded, ‘The Queen is not prepared to undertake a visit to the Falkland Islands by sea.’ In which case, Argentina was out of the question, too.

  The grumbling continued for weeks afterwards. ‘By advising the Queen not to visit the Falklands, the Government acts disgracefully,’ thundered the Daily Express, beneath the headline ‘Do Not Betray Them’. It went on: ‘There should be no thought of the Queen visiting that part of the world without receiving the homage of 2,000 Falkland Islanders. It matters not at all if the Argentinos [sic] object.’ In reality, the Queen had dodged an insoluble diplomatic problem by cleverly blaming logistical issues.

  THE ‘RECCE’

  The next phase of any visit would be the reconnaissance or ‘recce’ mission by a small cross-section of the Royal Household. Leading the team would be one of the Queen’s three Private Secretaries, her trio of senior advisers, at least one of whom is in attendance every day of the year, anywhere in the world. Some might have been drawn from the Civil Service, the Foreign Office or business. Several have been promoted from within the Palace press office. It is a job that requires the skill set of a diplomat, a constitutional lawyer, a public-relations executive, a charity worker and a drill sergeant – plus a touch of Jeeves. ‘It is no use thinking you are a mandarin. You are also a nanny,’ Sir Michael Adeane, a former principal Private Secretary, once explained, with typical private-secretarial modesty. ‘One moment you may be writing to the PM. The next, you are carrying a small boy’s mac.’ The Private Secretary might be trying to work out the right blend of civic worthies, good causes and youth for the Queen’s away-day to Manchester, while also juggling fifteen different governments, in addition to the British one. It is the Private Secretary who is the direct conduit between the Queen and all her realms. If a government does something of which the Queen heartily disapproves – like Tony Blair’s attempt to abolish the position of Lord Chancellor in 2003 – it is the Private Secretary who will contact his or her opposite number in government and try to head off trouble. It will all be done as discreetly as possible. The Private Secretary’s ultimate role in all things is to be an unobtrusive lubricant.

  Ahead of each recce, the Private Secretary would already have received a suggested itinerary from the host government. If it was a state visit to a foreign country, the British Ambassador or High Commissioner¶ would have been closely involved. If it was a visit to a realm, things were rather more straightforward. The Palace could deal directly with the host government via the Queen’s representative, the Governor-General. This would usually involve officials whom the Queen’s staff knew well. Sir William ‘Bill’ Heseltine, who originally joined the Palace from the Australian Civil Service and became the Queen’s principal Private Secretary, recalls the very different atmosphere in somewhere like the Fijian capital, Suva, in the days when this was still a realm. ‘Fiji had begun to feel like home to me,’ he says, explaining that everyone from the long-serving Prime Minister, Ratu Mara, to the Lord Mayor and the editor of The Fiji Times had become old friends.

  Wherever the trip was heading, the Queen and the Duke would have a good look at the schedule in its early stages and make appropriate comments. So, for example, when the Queen and Prince Philip were planning their tour of Africa in 1979, the Zambian government had been keen to include an ambitious safari on the only ‘rest’ day on the entire itinerary. As the Private Secretary in charge of that particular trip, Bill Heseltine was deputed to pass on his boss’s hopes for a ‘rest’ day that was precisely that. ‘I said that neither Her Majesty nor His Royal Highness had any particular wish to go out in search of wildlife but would be content to spend a restful day in pleasant surroundings, without the attentions, however well intended, of their hosts,’ he says.

  As the years progressed and the Queen grew a little older, Heseltine would try to build more gaps into the schedule, though he found that she was not always keen on the idea. ‘I often tried in my latter days to make programmes a bit lighter,’ he explains. ‘But both the Queen and the Duke felt that it was preferable to go full steam ahead for however long was required, and get back to Windsor, or Sandringham or Balmoral for a few days off to relax and recover, than to try and do this in the middle of a long visit. We quite often did insert a day or two without engagements in the course of a long tour but I think both of the principals thought that it was better to press on and get home.’

  Along with a Private Secretary, the ‘recce’ team would also include a police officer and a press officer, who would need to map out every step of the itinerary from their own perspectives. The Queen’s equerry would often be asked to attend, too. A promising youngish officer chosen from one of the three Services in rotation, the equerry would be in uniform alongside the Queen throughout the visit, as an extra pair of eyes, ears and – more often – hands, receiving and logging gifts, checking on timings and clearing a path through the crowds. Sir Jock Slater, who would serve as equerry from 1968 to 1971, recalls being sent to check arrangements ahead of the Queen’s 1969 trip to Norway. She was due to travel there in the Royal Yacht, stopping off in the Shetland Isles, where she was to inspect an exhibition of local products. Scrupulously going over every detail, Slater asked about the arrangements for a gift presentation at which the Duke of Edinburgh was to be given a pair of shooting stockings. He was even introduced to the elderly woman who was still knitting the royal gift and who was anxious to know at which point she was supposed to present the results. Slater promised her that he would give her a wink at the appropriate moment, and duly made a note to do so. Come the day, he did exactly that. ‘Before I could stop her,’ he recalls, ‘she shuffled up to Prince Philip and, in a loud voice, said: “Here’s your socks!” ’

  If the Queen was likely to be entertaining, as she usually was, then the recce team would also include a senior member of the Master of the Royal Household’s department, if not the Queen’s chef, to check on everything from cooking facilities to crockery and the water supply. The Palace team would usually be welcomed with open arms by any ambassador nervously awaiting the arrival of the ultimate boss. ‘They were full of good ideas,’ says Sir Francis Richards, High Commissioner to Namibia when the Queen paid her first (and, thus far, only) visit to the country in 1991. What might seem a relatively straightforward event – like a garden party on the High Commission lawn – could suddenly morph into a protocol minefield when it included the Queen. Even crowd control could be an issue. ‘The Palace had lots of answers,’ Richards recalls, ‘like putting two lines of whitewashed stones through the grounds to create a pathway for the Queen. Brilliant.’

  THE LOGISTICS

  Ask any ambassador or high commissioner who has hosted the monarch about the trickier aspects of the visit, and guest lists always feature prominently. Having served in various capacities from Moscow to Gibraltar (where he was Governor), Sir Francis Richards is a firm believer in what he calls ‘Richards’s law’ of royal visits. ‘It’s very simple. The number of people you offend is always double the number of those you invite to things,’ he explains, ‘so you try not to invite the wrong people.’

  Ahead of that state visit to Namibia, Richards would have to explain, as diplomatically as possible, that the Queen did not like to travel in the same way as some other heads of state. The Namibian President, Sam Nujoma, and his staff had already ordered a ring of anti-aircraft defences to be installed around the capital, Windhoek, for the Queen’s seventy-two-hour stay. The Namibians had also assumed that speed was of the essence, when it came to royal travel. ‘Their plan was to have the Queen brought in to town at 100 mph with outriders zigzagging in front. I had to explain that the Queen wouldn’t like that,’ says Richards. ‘So I went with them to the racecourse to agree the right sort of convoy speed.’ On most tours, the Queen would make a point of asking the police escorts to stay fore and aft, but not alongside her car, on the basis that any
crowds lining the street were probably there to catch a glimpse of her and not to look at motorbikes.

  Of greater importance was the way in which the Queen would travel from Britain to the host country. As the only G7 head of state without her own dedicated aircraft, the Queen has relied on the Royal Air Force or the charter market for most of her overseas trips. In recent years, until David Cameron designated a multi-purpose RAF Voyager aircraft for government and royal VIP use in 2014, the Palace would charter a variety of British Airways airliners, depending on the distance and the size of the royal party. Throughout the reign the entourage has been around thirty-five for a typical state visit, including the Foreign Secretary, two ladies-in-waiting, two Private Secretaries, an equerry, a doctor, a press office team, four police officers, the Queen’s dresser, the Duke of Edinburgh’s valet, a hairdresser, several secretaries (previously known as ‘lady clerks’), plus a page or two and a handful of luggage orderlies. That might rise if the Queen was going to be entertaining on a major scale, as she might at a Commonwealth summit, and did not have the Royal Yacht at her disposal. In which case, the entourage might top fifty, with footmen and chefs at the back of the plane, too.

  Even a chartered airliner with room for 150 could look full, by the time uniforms, gifts and commemorative poppy wreaths had started to fill the seats. As well as reconfiguring the layout to give the Queen and the Duke some extra space, any chartered plane would require two extra items: a full-length mirror and a St Christopher’s medallion. The Queen is famously stoical about the inherent dangers of royal life—keeping motorcades to a minimum; refusing to budge from Buckingham Palace when informed of a possible terrorist mortar attack; nonchalantly responding to a lump of concrete, being dropped on her car with the remark: ‘It’s a strong car’. However, she has never been a great fan of air travel. If St Christopher, the patron saint of travellers, can afford any extra protection, then so much the better. The photographer, Reginald Davis, who covered many of the Queen’s tours in the earlier years of her reign, well remembers discussing it with her at a reception. ‘I’m never relaxed flying,’ she told him. She has always been particularly wary of helicopters, despite the fact that two sons and two grandsons (Princes Charles, Andrew, William and Harry) have all served as professional helicopter pilots. It was only after twenty-five years on the Throne that she finally climbed into a helicopter and, even then, without any great enthusiasm. Security considerations during her Silver Jubilee meant that it was the safest way of getting to and from Northern Ireland at a time when the terrorist threat was grave. Today, she is a regular user of the Sikorsky helicopter leased by the Royal Household for general royal use. Even so, she tries not to use it between October and March when fog, mist and bad light are more common. The monarch who stole the show and wowed billions at the opening of the 2012 London Olympics by ‘jumping’ out of a helicopter with James Bond much prefers fixed-wing aviation.