What led to the decline of the British Empire??

[jackwei]

What are main factors and causes to the decline of Empire??

. Country during the late 19th century through an economic depression made worst by Industrial competition from Germany and the United States who surprassed Britannia in terms on Industrial Power, Economic Wealth and started to dominate trade.

. Costly Imperial Wars like the Boer War cost the Empire over £200 Million pounds

. WWI:- The United Kingdom was almost on the verge of bankruptacy and luckily Wall Street kept us in the war, but mainly the entry of the United States helped too with huge loans to sustain the war even more and manpower issues.

. Dominions of Canada, New Zealand, Austrialia and South Africa regarded themselves not as subjects by people's of their land and they started to move further apart from the Mothercountry.

. WWII competely exhausted the UK and there was not enough manpower, money to be able to sustain the other parts of the Empire, plus with pressure of the dominant Superpower in the World after 1945 the United States had give Independence to some its colonies.

.Independence movements became very common in the Empire after WWI and after WWII.

. The citizens and subjected of the Empire no longer truly believed in it as they, which main people left the UK after WWII and Dominions like Austrailia and New Zealand started to rely on the United States instead of Britannia.

. UK Economic Decline could no longer sustain the Empire or wars just like WWI and WWII proved that too much relied on American Money and supplies to help us.

Anything else i've missed or i am wrong about??

[Eric]

Mostly, it was two world wars, plus Britain voluntarily establishing independence for it's colonies, basically peaceably dismantling it's own Empire. One of the more graceful falls, as empires go.

Another major factor would be the naval treaties drafted after the First World War. Britain was well situated to continue it's history of naval dominance, with 50 some dreadnought battleships compared to... 19 battleships from it's nearest rival, the United States. However, after the naval treaties, Britain voluntarily reduced it's battlefleet to parity with the other leading powers. And those other rivals, like Germany and Japan, were busily lying about their ship and gun sizes, with things like the Bismarck and Yamatos. Even the Iowas in the US. Look at the British ship of that era, the King George V. Britain honoured the treaties, and naturally expected the others to do so. They didn't, leaving Britain, the traditional giant at sea, disadvantaged compared to the Axis Powers, even disadvantaged when compared to it's primary ally, the States. I think that Britain's empire died when Britain lost command of the seas. All because Britain honoured a treaty that no one else did.

[Farnan]

The Pacific War in WWII also showed the British colonists that Britain was not invincible as they had been defeated by a non-European military there.

[Eric]

Personally, i'd call that a non-factor, except possibly in India given the independence movement there. It might've been a factor if Australia rebelled or something, but they didn't, and are in fact still a realm of the Commonwealth.

[Farnan]

Personally, i'd call that a non-factor, except possibly in India given the independence movement there. It might've been a factor if Australia rebelled or something, but they didn't, and are in fact still a realm of the Commonwealth.

But Malaya rebelled right, Burma was forced to be given independence, Australia became closer to the US, and India became more demanding for independence.

WWII smashed the myth of British invincibility.

[Каие]

The Labour Party.
The Liberal Party.

They seriously undermined the concept of empire and worked furiously to undo it in the most appropriate way possible. Eventually it just imploded though, it was simple too big.

[Stavroforos]

Amerikuh.

[Eric]

If it was ever a myth at that time. I think the Great War that preceded it smashed the myth of all European military superiority, British included.

I don't blame the British in the Pacific for losing a great deal of battles to the Japanese. So did just about everyone in Asia and the South Pacific. The Imperial Japanese Army was one of the hardest trained and most fanatically devoted fighting forces in human history, just fighting them on remotely equal terms takes some serious stones. No shame in a loss to them, as long as you gave the utmost effort to resist your foe, as I believe the British and Commonwealth forces did.

[Farnan]

If it was ever a myth at that time. I think the Great War that preceded it smashed the myth of all European military superiority, British included.

Naa... Germany is European. Japan was not.

And I don't blame them either, its just it took away the myth that the British were invincible in the eyes of the natives.

[Arjun]

Another important factor that many fail to consider is the backfiring of the British educational system(in its colonies)

If one looks at the vast majority of the leaders calling for the British to leave south Asia, one would find an astonishingly high number of British Educated natives. The British were of the view that a solid educational system in the colonies (with its promising students continuing on with their higher studies at prestigious institution in England) would become an influential group that would serve as a bedrock for the British Raj.


What really happened was that a lot of such Cambridge and oxford educated people saw the British Empire for what it is...a colonial power siphoning off the resources of its colonies. These people, for example made up the top rung of the Indian national Congress. They were well versed in the intricacies of law and were aware of how the British mind worked. Gandhi was one, so was Nehru and a host of others.


as an aside; The first two Asians to be knighted(Ceylonese Tamils) were also the ones who started the first party in Ceylon that advocated independence.Ironically one of them was called "The most Accomplished orator in all of the British Raj" by Queen Victoria...the same person later used his oratorical skills to advocate freedom.

[jackwei]

One factor too was that in WWI the British Empire could fight in more than one theatre of war and WWII showed that it couldn't, since it was the Asian theatre of war was lost by the royal navy and wouldn't be recovered until the Americans arrived on the Eastern theatre.

I agree the treaty after WWI did cost the British, however we also have to look at it from economic terms too lots of money borrowed from the United States, which cancelled some of the payments back to them for it. Another can be after WWI how long do you think we'd be able to sustain those ships and more with the revial of Germany and United States's economy and industrial growing even stronger.

Some can say WWI shouldn't of happen Bishmarck warned it will be blasted thing the balkans that will bring forth a Great War and he was right.

World War I also proved we couldn't sustain or pay for such a Great War on our own anymore without borrowing from allies and neighbours, compared the Napoleonic Wars when we were fine doing rather well.

[Babur]

Another important factor that many fail to consider is the backfiring of the British educational system(in its colonies)

If one looks at the vast majority of the leaders calling for the British to leave south Asia, one would find an astonishingly high number of British Educated natives. The British were of the view that a solid educational system in the colonies (with its promising students continuing on with their higher studies at prestigious institution in England) would become an influential group that would serve as a bedrock for the British Raj.


What really happened was that a lot of such Cambridge and oxford educated people saw the British Empire for what it is...a colonial power siphoning off the resources of its colonies. These people, for example made up the top rung of the Indian national Congress. They were well versed in the intricacies of law and were aware of how the British mind worked. Gandhi was one, so was Nehru and a host of others.


as an aside; The first two Asians to be knighted(Ceylonese Tamils) were also the ones who started the first party in Ceylon that advocated independence.Ironically one of them was called "The most Accomplished orator in all of the British Raj" by Queen Victoria...the same person later used his oratorical skills to advocate freedom.

hahaha reminds me of Empire Total War when I build too many schools in India and this leads to calls for dramatic reform .

anyway I think the British Empire arguably began to decline with the rise of Germany as an industrial power.

[Arjun]

hahaha reminds me of Empire Total War when I build too many schools in India and this leads to calls for dramatic reform .

anyway I think the British Empire arguably began to decline with the rise of Germany as an industrial power.

yeah.lol, education is the best equalizer.


yep. the British empire was starting to lose its grip when Germany became an industrial powerhouse; but I believe that if not for the British educated intelligentsia actively advocating for freedom in south Asia, india and its neighbors might have been under the British raj for a few more decades.

[Tiberius Tosi]

Industrial power became superior to colonial power. Britain got out produced by nations and therefore lagged behind, and their colonies became a liability for having to constantly fight wars to maintain their Empire.

[Babur]

Industrial power became superior to colonial power. Britain got out produced by nations and therefore lagged behind, and their colonies became a liability for having to constantly fight wars to maintain their Empire.

Attlee helped to finish it off , I guess the Labour Party weren't so bad in those days .

[Bovril]

The adoption of Romanticism by Bengali poets and novelists.

Hey, it was a factor...

[Lord Tomyris]

With all its talk of liberty and freedom the British Empire also had a very self-liquidating character...

[pannonian]

With all its talk of liberty and freedom the British Empire also had a very self-liquidating character...

The British empire had been based on Liberal ideals and industrial might, with idealistic rhetoric and policy promoting free trade, in the knowledge that Britain's advanced economy was best placed to exploit this. When Germany and other countries began to surpass Britain in industrial terms, these Liberal ideals stopped working to Britain's advantage.

[Marie Louise von Preussen]

The British empire had been based on Liberal ideals and industrial might, with idealistic rhetoric and policy promoting free trade, in the knowledge that Britain's advanced economy was best placed to exploit this. When Germany and other countries began to surpass Britain in industrial terms, these Liberal ideals stopped working to Britain's advantage.

The British Empire, in fact, had depended upon strict mercantilist notions where British navigation and trade would dominate and be based upon regulated Merchant Houses and monopolies such as the East India Company. Ergo, for profit and power.

Liberal idealism had little impact on the Empire except maybe as a propaganda buzzword, and the only effective sign of the death of Empire was when it was no longer seen as a possible asset to the Crown, regardless that it wasn't for much of the period. India was practically the sole golden basket of England since the XVIII century, and now with strife and rife coming allied with changing economic tides, it was simply seen as no longer necessary.

[jackwei]

Some can say the weirdest things thats happened to the British Empire is like over a 100 years later its former Thirteen Colonies in America known as the United States surpassed her economically and Industrially to be the number one industrial superpower of the world.

I still think even after that treaty after WWI, which made the British cut down on their naval strength would only be a matter of time before the United States eventually surpass her, which it did 1945 since it had all the resources and wealth to be able to sustain such a huge navy, airforce and large army.

One thing that gets me is that the British should of kept an eye on Bishmarck in the 1860s looking on his movements and especially at that time when most German States in terms of industry were surpassing Britannia by then. When Germany came it was thought it Britain that it would benefit, because the old enemy France had been defeated, however that turned out to be a mistake.

The Berlin congress in 1884 was also a warning that when Germany claimed lands in Africa that prevented the Cairo to Cape Town Railway, also meant that this new power was here to stay as a new potential rival in the colonial race. It would of only been a matter of time before war comes between these two Great Powers.