The theme of Britain's declining position in the world is also dealt with in conversations between Bond and Tanaka, Tanaka voicing Fleming's own concerns about the state of Britain in the 1950s and early 60s. Tanaka accuses Britain of throwing away the empire "with both hands"; this would have been a contentious situation for Fleming, as he wrote the novel as the Indonesia–Malaysia confrontation was breaking out in December 1962, a direct challenge to British interests in the region. Fleming's increasingly jaundiced views on America appear in the novel too, through Bond's responses to Tiger's comments, and they reflect on the declining relationship between Britain and America: this is in sharp contrast to the warm, co-operative relationship between Bond and Leiter in the earlier books.