AHC: Britain goes Japanese

[EternalCynic]

Your challenge if you choose to accept it, is for Britain to use the Industrial Revolution to view itself as the undisputed technological and military master of Europe with a view of bringing all of Europe under its hegemony. It must use its naval might primarily for the aim of building a "Greater European Co-Prosperity Sphere" and must see the Army and RN grab increasing amounts of power from Parliament. Over several decades, parts of the continent are annexed into Britain, militarily occupied, or turned into puppet states. Finally, the Army begins a rampage all across Europe, committing unfathomable atrocities including human germ testing, chemical weapons, deliberate starvation of continental Europeans, a "Rape of Paris", a "Three Alls" Policy, and so on.

Bonus points for a racial theory putting the British as the Master Race, the monarch elevated to literally divine status, and the Church of England used as a vehicle for the ideology.

 

[Elfwine]

That's . .. going to take quite a bit of doing.

Not to mention that Britain is in no position to do this, power-wise.

 

[B_Munro]

Yeah, it's empire was always essentially created on the cheap, with small armed forces and native auxiliaries. Now, say we have a victorious Napoleon (or *Napoleon) that rules or puppetizes everything west of Russia: Britain becomes severely militarized simply to stand off invasion. Fifty years later the overextended Empire falls apart in civil war, leaving a fragmented Europe ravaged by revolutionary movements from all parts of the compass. The Brits move in to "restore order", but get sucked ever deeper into the mess, and the Russians are mucking around, too...

Bruce

 

[MalcontentRex]

Not totally ASB. Look what they did to the Irish.

 

[B_Munro]

Not totally ASB. Look what they did to the Irish.

The Irish had the combined misfortunes of being weak, hard to assimilate (the Catholicism thing) and right next door, all things conducive to mutual loathing, and weakness is probably the most important. It's not like getting the British to be racist enough is problematic: Benjamin Frankin didn't think Swedes were white enough. (The old expression was "the wogs begin at the Channel"). It's military capacity which is the problem. If Europe were fragmented into a hundred little Irelands, I imagine the Brits might well expand. Such a scenario is hardly likely, however.

Bruce

 

[iori]

The Irish had the combined misfortunes of being weak, hard to assimilate (the Catholicism thing) and right next door, all things conducive to mutual loathing, and weakness is probably the most important. It's not like getting the British to be racist enough is problematic: Benjamin Frankin didn't think Swedes were white enough. (The old expression was "the wogs begin at the Channel"). It's military capacity which is the problem. If Europe were fragmented into a hundred little Irelands, I imagine the Brits might well expand. Such a scenario is hardly likely, however.

Bruce

Japan took on China IOTL, so it's not that difficult.

 

[MalcontentRex]

The Irish had the combined misfortunes of being weak, hard to assimilate (the Catholicism thing) and right next door, all things conducive to mutual loathing, and weakness is probably the most important. It's not like getting the British to be racist enough is problematic: Benjamin Frankin didn't think Swedes were white enough. (The old expression was "the wogs begin at the Channel"). It's military capacity which is the problem. If Europe were fragmented into a hundred little Irelands, I imagine the Brits might well expand. Such a scenario is hardly likely, however.

Bruce

Yeah, you are correct, which is why I said "not totally ASB" instead of "easy". I totally believe that the Brits had it in them to do this to most of the Continent, or if not easily could have with a few minor PoDs, but yes it would be difficult. Probably the easiest means would be to have some plagues or droughts/famines hit the Continent at around the time the British Industrial Revolution is really hitting its stride that don't reach England, or if they do are not that devastating. That's not implausible at all.

 

[kasumigenx]

If the Plantagenet line whether Yorkist or Lancastrian survive in the male line that is very possible because they have claims to the French throne.

 

[Socrates]

Japan took on China IOTL, so it's not that difficult.

China was much further behind Japan technologically than Germany and France were behind Britain.

 

[Cináed]

You would need a huge tech differential to undertake the sort of expansion/subjugation wars that the Japanese undertook.

 

[iori]

China was much further behind Japan technologically than Germany and France were behind Britain.

Er, not really, while China was certainly not a major power, by the time of SJW 2 China had a good deal of modern weapons and stuff either bought or given to them from others (Soviets, French, British, Americans)

If you could get a Western Europe, either as one thing (Carolingian HRE for ex.) or multiple states that are behind for some reason than it could be done.

Actually, it'd be even easier, at the time of the Second Sino-Japanese Was China had around 520 million people compared to Japan which only had 73 million (not counting Korea and Taiwan), now Britain and the major Mainland European countries are generally much closer together in terms of population, with a difference of generally only about 5-15 million until the second half of the 20th century.

 

[Elfwine]

When did Franklin make a comment that Swedes weren't white enough?

On population (figures in 1800):

British Isles: 16 million

France: 28 million
Habsburg Empire: Same.
Prussia: 9.5
Russia: 37 million
Spain: 11
Sweden: 2.3
United Provinces: 2

Total: 117.8 million

7.36 to 1, vs. 7.12 to 1.

And having stuff bought from/sent by others isn't the same as being able to produce it on your own.

 

[Chris Triangle]

If the Plantagenet line whether Yorkist or Lancastrian survive in the male line that is very possible because they have claims to the French throne.

And why not throw in a claim to be descendents of the Trojans or something along those lines?

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

And why not throw in a claim to be descendents of the Trojans or something along those lines?

You mean like OTL? Not the monarchs, specifically, but the people.

 

[Kome]

I always thought a restoration of the British monarchy would be cool.

 

[mrmandias]

Actually a British Civil War POD might work for this. You could have the army as 'guarantor of the state' and occuping a quasi-constitutional role that way, and if you keep the Cromwell-era foreign affairs successes, you might have a Britain that feels more confident in itself and its abilities to meddle in continental affairs.

 

[B_Munro]

When did Franklin make a comment that Swedes weren't white enough?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observ...crease_of_Mankind,_Peopling_of_Countries,_etc.

The money quote:


Which leads me to one remark: That the number of purely white people in the world is proportionably very small. All Africa is black or tawny. Asia chiefly tawney. And in Europe the Spaniards, Italians, French, Russians and Swedes are generally of what we call a swarthy complexion; as are the Germans also, the Saxons only being excepted, who with the English make up the principal body of white people on the face of the earth. I could wish their numbers increased. While we are scouring our planet by clearing America of woods, and so making our side of the planet reflect a brighter light to the inhabitants of Mars or Venus, why should we in the sight of superior beings darken its people?

And having stuff bought from/sent by others isn't the same as being able to produce it on your own.

Not to mention China, a nation lacking much of a military tradition since Tang times outside losing to nomadic horsemen (or that of nomadic horsemen themselves after they took over) is an iffy analogy for the blood-and-military-values soaked European continent - which had taught Japan the lessons in modern warfare it used in PWNing the Chinese in the first place.

It's highly improbable for a post-industrial-revolution Britain to develop enough of a military edge to make up for the comparable or superior skills of European armies, and the tech edge isn't there either: Europeans just copied British technological advances too fast. Britain might be able to heavily outproduce them in the early period, making for armies with a lot more hardware per soldier, but Britain is a capitalist economy: it's not going to be able to bolster its economy by selling stuff to the people it is at the same time trying to conquer.

You need to also deeply screw up Europe.

Bruce

 

[B_Munro]

Actually a British Civil War POD might work for this. You could have the army as 'guarantor of the state' and occuping a quasi-constitutional role that way, and if you keep the Cromwell-era foreign affairs successes, you might have a Britain that feels more confident in itself and its abilities to meddle in continental affairs.

Throw in an Anglo-Prussian dynastic union, and we're really getting somewhere....

Bruce

 

[Smaug]

Just change it from bushido...to businessido...lol

 

[Monty Burns]

To improve the numbers, what about keeping the Anglo-Dutch union and have it expand on the continent a bit (Munster, Kleve, Julich, marriage) before the industrial revolution sets in? Then avoid any independence movement in the Americas.

Results in a "British" Empire with 18+ million inhabitants in Europe plus around 4 million settlers in the Americas, the whole thing ruling the waves and having a decent army (they needed it) plus industrializing (maybe also owning OTL Belgium).

To have a stable, more or less democratic union of all those crowns and territories implies an institutional outset that is able to include further territories on the continent. If they manage to get the Catholics on board (and the Dutch may help in that), the institutional framework fits to conquer and integrate large parts of Europe.