The British Imperial Establishment, Post Imperial Era, and the ‘Churchillian’ World View, 1945-2016. (Adjustments & Challenges in Contemporary British Diplomatic Strategy)

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increasingly under pressure “to consider which region had priority and in which
it might be
necessary to give way gracefully since it was appreciated that if Britain
concentrated too much in one
region, she would have no strength to protect the
others.”27

Nevertheless, as it has been said, the decline of the United Kingdom’s
economic, colonial and
strategic superiority remained invisible for a long period.
The country’s resources, in particular
its accumulated overseas holdings, were
enormous up to 1914; its diplomatic flexibility offered a good
prospect against a
global disaster from an overwhelming foreign coalition; and the decline
was
relative not absolute.

Impact of the Two World Wars on the
British Empire

“The British ULTIMATUM to Germany on the 4th August 1914
committed the whole British Empire to
war on the sole authority of the
government in London. With Ireland on the verge of civil war, India in a
state of
ferment and the Dominions maturing as individual nations, it seemed to the
Germans that the
British Empire had come to the brink of dissolution and that a
British declaration of war would push it
over.”28

Despite the past experiences, the Germans still failed to realise that Britain
would make all efforts
to defend itself. As we have already said, “being a small
island Kingdom lying close to the
continent of Europe where from time to time
through modern history, great military powers had arisen that
would have
overwhelmed her, had they been able to transport their land forces across the
narrow
intervening area of the sea,”29 Britain had to maintain the
following
general principles of policy and strategy towards continental Europe:

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