that the blockade was damaging Britain's image in the United States. Lothian wrote to Halifax that "we have to prove to the USA, which includes public opinion as well as the administration that any action we are taking is really necessary for the winning of the war". Lothian concluded: "The one fatal thing is for us to offer the United States advice as to what she ought to do. We have never listened to the advice of foreigners. Nor will the Americans". The issue was settled in February 1940 when Frank Ashton-Gwatkin of the Ministry of Economic Warfare was attached to the British embassy with orders to handle the American complaints against the blockade, which made it seem like the British were changing their polices when they were in fact not. On 10 May 1940, Anglo-American relations were changed when Churchill became prime minister. The half-American Churchill put far more emphasis on Anglo-American relations than Chamberlain had ever done, and Lothian found himself heading what was now the most important British embassy in the world. Moffat recorded Lothian as saying: "He [Lothian] said that nine days out of ten Churchill was magnificent, but the tenth day during a crisis he was apt to lose his head, close his ears and refuse to listen to reason. Despite this weakness, Lothian felt he had the exuberance, drive and leadership which England craved". During the Norway campaign and the Dunkirk evacuation, a number of Royal Navy destroyers were either sunk by the Luftwaffe or badly damaged, putting them into the repairs yards for months. It was in late May 1940 that Lothian first suggested what became the destroyers-for-bases deal under which the Royal Navy would receive 50 aging American destroyers in exchange for the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force giving up British naval and air bases in the British West Indies, Bermuda, British Guiana (modern Guyana) and Newfoundland to the US Navy and the United States Army Air Force on 99 year leases. Churchill was opposed to the destroyers-for-bases deal, arguing that Britain was giving up far more than what she was receiving. In response, Lothian argued that the deal would help resolve the Royal Navy's pressing shortage of destroyers and draw the United States closer to the United Kingdom by creating was in effect a joint Anglo-American defense of the New World with the US Navy and Army Air Force