Bulgaroktonos said:
I disagree with the whole concept that Britain viewed France or Russia as tremendous strategic threats to the Empire and therefore allied with them. At Fashoda, it was the French who backed down, not Britain. This signals that the French recognize their incapability of defeating Britain in an imperial match up. Russia is successfully contained in the Baltic for the foreseeable future, especially with increased German influence in Constantinople. Nor is India in danger.
No general in the world would believe that the Russian army would be able to march across the Stans, into the Hindu Kush against hostile natives, march across it, and then fight a war in some deserts and more mountains across huge supply lines against disciplined soldiers. The sheer idea is ridiculous......
If Britain and Germany allied in 1895, it is difficult to say what would happen. I think there would still be a war, despite the Dual Alliance's total superiority in all fields. I think Britain would require that France and Russia be treated humanely, and that France lose a good portion of her overseas Empire to Germany. This keeps the balance of power in Europe and gives Germany what she wants.....
The French backed down at Fashoda because they had a small expeditionary force that found itself outnumbered by 10 to 1. The overall balance between the military strengths of the British and French empires as a whole was nowhere near as lopsided.
As for the Russians being able to threaten the British position in India, many British military and political leaders spent most of the nineteenth century worrying about precisely that. Their worries were greatly exaggerated during the 19th century, but as the 20th century began and Russia began to industrialize more and build more rail lines, it was not at all out of the question for them to extend a rail network into Central Asia that could potentially move and supply a considerable military force. They would still have to get across Afghanistan, but the Afghans werent always on the best of terms with the British, so it was not impossible that many of them would join the Russians against the British rather than fighting them.
As for naval strength, Russia didnt need it to threaten Britains imperial position in Asia. Railroads were changing the strategic balance - once it was easier for the British to move troops to India or Constantinople or even China by ship than it was for the Russians to march thousands of miles over land, but with railroads the equation was reversed - large numbers of troops could move faster by rail than by water.
France couldnt challenge Britains fleet directly, but again, they didnt have to. France could concentrate part of its navy in the Mediterranean to keep communication open with Algeria, and send the rest as commerce raiding detachments in various parts of the world. As F. Nelson wrote below, think of something like the German Pacific squadron in 1914 except 10 times bigger and with a number of bases to operate out of. The British would eventually hunt them down, but it would take time and a lot of merchant shipping plus a few unlucky detachments of smaller RN ships would be sunk in the meantime.
Against either France or Russia alone, Britain was still strong enough to prevail in a colonial war. Since they were military allies, though, a war with one probably meant a war with both. Even if Britain had an outright alliance with Germany, Germany was unlikely to start a massive war on the continent against Russia and France just to support Britains colonial territories. In the sphere of colonial warfare, they couldnt help the British all that much.
The threat to Britain from an expanded German navy looked ominous at first, but then they realized that the Germans couldnt outbuild them because the huge German army still took up the bulk of the military budget. As long as Britain kept construction going on new battleships and battle cruisers, they would always have superiority over the Germans. Furthermore, if they settled their colonial differences with the French and Russians, they could reduce their naval strength in most parts of the Empire, pulling more of their best ships into home waters to keep watch on the Germans.
So, I think that the British realized that they had more to fear from having France and Russia as enemies than the Germans. They also had more to gain from being friendly to the French and Russians then they did from being friendly to the Germans.