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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warship-building by foreign rivals. But military-political power and industrial
wealth are closely
connected. The famous editor of The Observer newspaper
J.L.Garvin, put the fact this way, “that
power was relative, and that such power
was relative, and that such power ultimately depended upon a
nation’s resources
and industrial efficiency. If, therefore, the period 1870-1910 saw a
two-fold
British superiority over Germany in annual steel output gradually change to a
situation
where the Germans produced more than twice as much as the British,
then it was not surprising that
Britain should come under pressure from Germany
in the field of power-politics as well.”24

As
Britain’s dominance in the world’s industrial output and trade gradually
diminished she found it
increasingly difficult to keep up with the cost of
maintaining a military force at a standard which would
be capable of defending
the British sea communications and counter-balance forces possessed by
political
enemies. “The most remarkable feature of the post-1815 Pax Britannica was
its
cheapness. Apart from several short-lived ‘scare’ periods, the naval budget during
the
early and middle parts of Victoria’s reign averaged around £7 million to £8
million per annum – a
reasonable insurance policy for a position of unmatched
global pre-eminence. The army tended to be rather
more expensive (in 1870 it
cost £13.4 million as opposed to £9.8 million for the navy), but even in that
year
the total defence budget worked out at 14s.9d. per head of the
British
population.”25

However, by the turn of the century, this cheapness turned into a horrifying
escalation in costs.
“A 90-gun warship of the mid-century could cost as little as

£100,000; the
‘Majestic’ class battleships of 1893-5 cost around £1 million each;
the ‘Queen Elizabeth’
class battleships of 1912-13 cost around £2.5 million.”26
Therefore, the more costly the armaments became, the more countries would
be
forced to abandon the race of being a great power and Britain was no exception.
Having interests
in every part of the world, the British government became

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