Political conflict flourishes in Britain. Yet for many reasons the government of the day and the opposition practice a basic bipartisanship on basic issues. To a considerable degree this is the result of the change in Britain's position over the last two decades. There is an unspoken recognition by the leaders of the two great parties that the present situation of the United Kingdom is too precarious for prolonged and violent differences on essentials. There are, of course, exceptions. Violent controversy does break out on essentials between party and party and within a party. Consider two essentials of British policy: the Anglo-American alliance and the decision to make the hydrogen bomb. The relations between the United States and Britain developed their contemporary form in World War II. Since 1945 they have been strengthened by the rise of an aggressive Soviet Union. There are other contributing factors, some of which are not particularly attractive to political or economic groups within each partner to the alliance. Moreover, there has never been a time when there were not powerful critics of various aspects of the alliance in both countries. Aneurin Bevan and his friends on the radical left of the Labor Party have often lambasted the United States and Britain's dependence on her. Similar criticisms could be heard in private from Tories. When the United States voted with the Soviet Union against Britain in the United Nations after the British and French had invaded Suez, the Conservatives were moved to put their protest into the form of a motion in the House of Commons. This was accompanied by much sharp criticism, which had a therapeutic effect in encouraging some realistic thinking about the alliance. A great deal of the anxiety about United States policy, of the jealousy of United States power, of the anger at Mr. Dulles's self-righteous sermons about colonialism was vented during this period. It did some harm, certainly. But from the standpoint of the honest expression of Conservative Party opinion and of American realism about the British attitude, it also did some good. The alliance is an essential. Even when indignant Conservatives--and a number of Socialists, too--were thinking up pet names for Mr. Dulles, the leaders of the party were doing their best to mollify their followers. They were themselves anxious and angry, but they never suggested defection from the alliance. It may be suggested that the British had nowhere else to go. This may be true, but even so it would be no bar to their departure. They are happy when they are on their own, and many on this little island would count the alliance well lost in exchange for a vigorous reassertion of independence.