An independent Bermuda would have difficulty conducting negotiations with large countries if the negotiations over the transfer of US bases in the 1990s are any guide, says Don Grearson, author of the newly published "USS Bermuda: The Rise and Fall of an American Base"

In March 2004, the PLP government told Bermudians it was time to consider independence for Bermuda. No timetable for a vote was put forward, but it was clear the government wanted to move the country towards a decision to cut ties with the United Kingdom.

Bermuda's experience with its US military base closure is relevant to the ongoing independence debate in one respect: it provides insight into what Bermuda can expect when the island tries to negotiate bilateral or multilateral deals as an independent country.

Would Bermuda be more able to advance its national interest as an independent country? Bermuda's base-closure experience indicates the answer would be no, at least in terms of getting something from another country. The fact that successive Bermuda governments on their own over a period of years could not budge the United States – with whom the island enjoys its most important economic relationship – into cutting a deal on an issue of "national" importance, merits consideration in any decision on independence for Bermuda.

When the PLP government recognised in the second half of 1999 it had hit a wall in its dealings with the United States, it turned to the UK for help. The difference in the US attitude once UK government representatives began pushing the right buttons was noticed by virtually every Bermuda official involved in the talks.

As one senior government official said: "The moment that decision was taken [to secure UK government help], the Americans changed their attitude immediately from a really rude approach to the 'special relationship is important to us.'"

Another official said: "Everyone agrees bringing [the UK] back was super-productive and important. It has made all the difference. Since the Brits came aboard, they've been very active and we've seen a completely different attitude from the Americans."

The disquieting reality of the base talks was that Bermuda, in the eyes of the United States, was ignorable. It had no "weight" or leverage that might have caused the US to reconsider its implacable handling of the issue. There was simply no downside to leaving Bermuda's claims unmet. The island could not come back to hurt the United States on other matters. Bermuda was powerless to do anything but appeal to the US on moral grounds. That tack resonated with some US politicians, but led to nothing conclusive.

All that changed with the arrival of the British, who immediately began leveraging their "special relationship" with the Americans to push the US into taking another look at Bermuda. Operatives up and down the line of contact with the US government, particularly within the Ministry of Defence, raised Bermuda first as an issue to be settled and later as something that could become a sore point.

The British got the attention of the Americans and then raised the stakes by introducing Diego Garcia and other overseas bases into the mix. Only then, did the Americans actively begin to work out a deal to settle the issue. British diplomacy demonstrated the play of give and take in country-to-country relations. Diego Garcia may not have been put on the table as a quid pro quo in the Bermuda talks, but the point was pretty clear to the Americans: "You scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours."

Bermudians pondering independence from Britain should consider how much 'give' Bermuda can put on the table before it can 'take' in dealings with other countries, particularly its major "trading" partners: the United Kingdom, Canada and, massively so, the United States. Carl Musson, who observed Bermuda's representatives struggling to make headway against the US, came to question Bermuda's ability to get what it wanted in the talks: "In negotiations, you say you've got something I want and I've got something you want. But what does Bermuda have that the US would want?"

Bermuda does not trade anything of consequence. In the 1980s, as part of the deal that gave it the US-Bermuda tax treaty, Bermuda agreed to set up protocols to provide the United States with access to some banking information, but it is hard to imagine Bermuda trading much more on the secrecy that remains one of its core business attributes. For Ken Stubbings, the hard truth of the bases negotiations was that Bermuda had no weight to get what it wanted. "We gave it our best crack," he said. "It's just that we didn't have any leverage, any power. We weren't France or Germany."

Bermuda's powerlessness was not lost on Arthur Hodgson either: "Bermuda just wasn't big enough to get anyone's attention. No one was concerned about a puddle of oil in Bermuda. But if England could allow [the US] to extend the runway in Diego Garcia, it would have happened the next day."

When British diplomats took up Bermuda's case, they placed it on the UK-US agenda and then leveraged their close working relationship to get the Americans to deal with it. One US negotiator provided a glimpse of how that leverage translated into a deal for Bermuda. "We never like to have issues in our relations with the United Kingdom that are irritants. Our activating concern over Bermuda was to set things right with the UK."

Tom Ledvina, when asked to comment on the British factor in the US settlement, mirrored his colleague's thoughts: "We always had an extra close relationship with Britain and I think it was negotiated in that context."

Critics will argue the $11-million settlement negotiated by the British was inadequate. But the British maintained the deal was the best that could be got – certainly better than no deal at all-and that it did give Bermuda closure on key issues such as clear title to the land which the PLP government had said was holding up redevelopment of the former baselands. The truth of the matter is, Bermuda would have got nothing from the Americans without British diplomacy. It gave Bermuda weight where, on its own, it had none, and helped achieve a result which, in Bermuda's request for UK help, was thought to be beyond its own reach.

Tomorrow: Negotiating with the West Group.