Admiral Matt
Gone Fishin'
Maybe if Gibraltar didn't vote to become part of Spain in the 2002 referendum Britain would still have a non-settler colony that isn't an island or in the Pacific or Caribbean.
AHC: Britain retains a non-settler colony that isn't an island
- Thread starter Zuvarq
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Devvy
Donor
Hong Kong is probably the best bet. British assist & supply the RoC during the Chinese Civil War in return for a perpetual lease/transfer of sovereignty on Hong Kong or something? I'm not too up on the Chinese Civil War, but would that be plausible.
Singapore is possible if it is properly defended during WW2 I think.
Those two are probably the best bet - and while they are technically islands, they are both accessible via bridge or tunnel, so they aren't really islands of the same type as the Pitcairn or Solomon Islands, or Fiji etc etc...
Singapore is possible if it is properly defended during WW2 I think.
Those two are probably the best bet - and while they are technically islands, they are both accessible via bridge or tunnel, so they aren't really islands of the same type as the Pitcairn or Solomon Islands, or Fiji etc etc...
A city under foreign control laying on a country's coast is always unbearably humiliating for this country and a headache for both. The Brits are pulling it in Gibraltar and the Spaniards in Ceuta et al. Those are headaches though.
One doesn't want 1 billion+ mad Chinese, I'd say.
Well french Guyana is not a colony that's why they keep it.
Devvy
Donor
Well the UK only gave HK back to China when it turned out to be impossible to keep HK without splitting the territory in half which is completely unworkable. Britain is pretty hot on keeping it, so if they have a perpetual lease/sovereignty, then it's only going to be late 2000s/start 2010s when China can really start to throw her weight around enough to make Britain sit up and take notice (assuming no butterflies on that).
It'd be a thorn in China-British relations, but something that can be ignored enough generally for relations to continue. I don't see China having the balls (at least yet) to invade, and I don't see Britain handing it over unless they have to.
It'd be a thorn in China-British relations, but something that can be ignored enough generally for relations to continue. I don't see China having the balls (at least yet) to invade, and I don't see Britain handing it over unless they have to.
It used to be a colony, but was incorporated into France. I think that would count for the POD. Ii is not as if you could call the current French, Dutch or British Carribean or Pacific islands colonies, but they certainly used to be.
At least Brazil don't annoy them over it like another south american country over a british island.
Isn't there some vague claim between Brazil and France Guyana? It is often hard to draw conclusive borders deep within the jungle. I know Surinam and British Guyana have a border disagreement and according to wikipedia Surinam and France have a disagreement too. To be fair a border disagreement doesn't mean anything if both sides don't care enough about it. Even friendly countries like the Netherlands and Germany have a small border disagreement.
Malta and Belize have already been mentioned, and not at all unlikely. Gibraltar might qualify, since the British and British-descended population constitutes about one third of the total inhabitants.
An intriguing possibility would be the area around the Suez Canal, perhaps including the Sinai, perhaps not.
An intriguing possibility would be the area around the Suez Canal, perhaps including the Sinai, perhaps not.
There were at times light-hearted crazy schemes of Brazil invading French Guiana. Not that the plotters thought of French Guiana as rightfully Brazilian but thought of such an enterprise more as a purely imperialist/expansionist venture.
Anyway, the geographic layout of French Guiana (having an also lengthy border with Suriname) doesn't exactly create the irredentist psyche.
No historical dispute for Brazil to claim the whole of Guiana either. Every border dispute in the region was essentially settled in Brazil's favor anyway.
Malta certainly tops the list of colonies that could have stayed British (since it actually voted in favour of a referendum that would have integrated it directly with Britain, but it was decided that the 59% turnout was insufficient and was never implemented). But as an island it doesn't fall under what the OP is asking for.
I agree Belize looks to be the most likely possibility for a mainland colony sticking with Britain - it's small and thanks to Guatemala could very easily choose to stick with self-government under British protection and foreign policy control (similar to the present system for the Falklands).
Most of the other colonies, especially in Africa, would be difficult to hold onto. You might have a slim chance of hanging onto something tiny like the Gambia. And, while not particularly plausible, there's also the slim chance that someone might decide to follow up on Sierra Leone's apparent desire to regain British rule (though I very much doubt that relationship would be anything that one might call a colonial one - if anyone did decide to do anything about it it would probably be limited to closer military and economic cooperation)
I agree Belize looks to be the most likely possibility for a mainland colony sticking with Britain - it's small and thanks to Guatemala could very easily choose to stick with self-government under British protection and foreign policy control (similar to the present system for the Falklands).
Most of the other colonies, especially in Africa, would be difficult to hold onto. You might have a slim chance of hanging onto something tiny like the Gambia. And, while not particularly plausible, there's also the slim chance that someone might decide to follow up on Sierra Leone's apparent desire to regain British rule (though I very much doubt that relationship would be anything that one might call a colonial one - if anyone did decide to do anything about it it would probably be limited to closer military and economic cooperation)
Its not a question of can Britain hold onto a colony. Its a question of can a colony hold on to Britain.
Get some leading figures in some colony or other to realise that their people would be very well off indeed should they keep getting British subsidies thrown their way and have the people decide on being better off over nationalism and...well, its pretty hard to force Britain to give independence to people who don't want it (as Northern Ireland has shown).
Agreed that Belize or Guyana would be the best bet.
Get some leading figures in some colony or other to realise that their people would be very well off indeed should they keep getting British subsidies thrown their way and have the people decide on being better off over nationalism and...well, its pretty hard to force Britain to give independence to people who don't want it (as Northern Ireland has shown).
Agreed that Belize or Guyana would be the best bet.
The British might have reneged on their promise to return Hong Kong in 1997, citing the brutal Communist regime in China. Were a referendum held, this would have been the likely outcome.
86% of HK wasn't permanently British but a 99-year lease from China that would expire in 1997.
Any referendum would only have been good for less than 14% of the territory and if it succeeded, that would pretty much drain the patience out of the Chinese, I think.
It's a settler colony.