ISLAND DREAMING December 19, 2006
Posted by wmmbb in Modern History.trackback
Britain was once great, to the extent it had an empire that stretched around the globe, and in its comparative majesty overshadowed the Roman Empire. It was even larger than those once commanded by the French, the Dutch, the Belgians, the Spanish and the Portuguese. The British Isles were once ruled from one city. Times change. For example, in 1776 some of the American colonies became independent, and started constructing their own contiguous, transcontinental empire. But sometimes people are fixed on the phantasmagoria of the past, which may often mean that they make bad choices.
So it seems this has happened to the present, long lingering, and decreasingly relevant, British Prime Minister. Britain was once a great power, and the delusion of greatness should have been brought to their attention fifty years ago. Blair thought he could influence Bush. This delusion, according to Paul Reynolds at BBC News, was “a terrible mistake”, or more exactly the decision to support the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Britain can be a player in Europe, which is not wholly monolithic, but which has the collective gravitas to stand up to the American imperium should it decide, or at least the major players within the European orbit decide on a common stance. Instead, fuelled by delusions, it seems to me that Britain and Blair have sought to undermine Europe. The Europeans, including the British, might get it into their heads that “the union makes us strong.” After all, over one million Britons chose to live on the continent.
“It was even larger than those once commanded by the French, the Dutch, the Belgians, the Spanish and the Portuguese. ”
That gets claimed a lot but isn’t accurate. In terms of pure population/land area measures, Spain exceeded Britain at its highest extent (Spain controlled Portugal for a period and thus held Brazil as well as Spain’s own domains). Outside of Europe, the medieval Islamic empires and the Mongol Empires were bigger in extent. Besides, about half of the land in the “25% of the world” that’s often cited for Britain’s empire was in Canada/Australia– uninhabitable and not really craved by anyone else. Also people tend to put all of India under Britain’s control, but only a fraction of what’s now India was actually within the Raj– British control in India is greatly exaggerated, which is why modern India was never remotely Anglicized (indigenous Indian religion, arts, language predominate– English is about 15th on the list of Indian languages) in comparison to the way e.g. Chile was Hispanicized.
IOW the British Empire gets exaggerated in its extent and power. Which is also another way of saying– I get annoyed when people always try to blame the British Empire for today’s modern ills, which are more the fault of the people in their own countries, where the British were never as powerful as people try to claim. (Though I’ll admit the Opium Wars and the genocides in Australia e.g. were nasty affairs.)
BTW, as far as the most “influential and successful” empire in history, IMHO I give that award to the Chinese. Enormous in land area, extremely durable, transforming into a modern nation over 2,500 years or so– now that’s impressive.
Thank you Danny.
I stand corrected. The thought crossed my mind in relation to the size of the Spanish empire. I was really compared the British expereince to other European countries, and not blaming the British Empire for modern ills.
Still the world has changed in the last sixty years. For example, the permanent membership on the UN Security Council of Britain and France reflects then not now. Of cource, many of the changes occurred fifty to sixty years ago – I referred to the Suez Crisis.
There is a lag in human affairs as we catch up with changed realities. I seem to remember somebody else said something like that.