Winding up the British Empire in the Pacific Islands Winding Up the British Empire in the Pacific Islands is the first detailed account based on recently opened archives of when how and why the British Government changed its mind about giving independence to the Pacific Islands. As Britain began to dissolve the Empire in Asia in the aftermath of the Second World War it announced that there were some countries that were so small remote and lacking in resources that they could never become independent states. However between 1970 and 1980 there was a rapid about turn. Accelerated decolonization suddenly became the order of the day. Here was the death warrant of the Empire and hastily arranged independence ceremonies were performed for six new states Tonga Fiji Solomon Islands Tuvalu Kiribati and Vanuatu. The rise of anti imperialist pressures in the United Nations had a major role in this change in policy as did the pioneering examples marked by the release of Western Samoa by New Zealand in 1962 and Nauru by Australia in 1968. The tenacity of Pacific Islanders in maintaining their cultures was in contrast to more strident Afro Asia nationalisms. The closing of the Colonial Office by merger with the Commonwealth Relations Office in 1966 followed by the joining of the Commonwealth and Foreign Offices in 1968 became a major turning point in Britains relations with the Islands. In place of long nurtured traditions of trusteeship for indigenous populations that had evolved in the Colonial Office the new Foreign & Commonwealth Office concentrated on fostering British interests which came to mean reducing distant commitments and focussing on the Atlantic world and Europe. Publishers website