Challenge: Make the British Empire really really big

So, you want to take one of the world's largest empires. An empire that ruled a fourth of the world and add more to it!? !

Why not?;):p


That said, have the US less interested in keeping Chinese markets open and at least part of China becomes a UK colony. Or, the British capture Afghanistan when they first try to. And of course there's the obligatory "US loses the ARW" scenario, but I have my doubts that Britain would get as big of an empire if it was that focused on NA.

The last point is probably very accurate and something that a lot of people tend to overlook. A better route for size is probably a more successful 1812 fight-back, leading to a series of clashes in N America keeping the US trimmed back and possibly split up into a number of successor states. Canada expands to cover most of the west of the country but the threat from the US means its more in favour of imperial federation. Also the frequent clashes, along with concerns in Europe mean that Britain doesn't coast as it did during the 19thC and continues to be an industrial and technological leader longer.

At the same time the initial loss of the colonies does mean attention is spread wider. Britain hence makes the gains in Africa and Asia it does OTL but in the longer run being more powerful it ends up with more.

You would have to either drastically change the Victorian viewpoint or have a total collapse of China to get big British colonies there. The reason Britain put so much effort into keeping China united and reasonably independent was because they realised it was better to trade than rule as the latter is a lot more expensive.

Similarly with Afghanistan. There are plenty of places I would much rather Britain have gained as that would always be a pig to rule - at least unless your genocidal - and you would gain very little from it.

The big problem of course with a big [and presumably stronger] empire is that Acton's Law comes into play. Britain got too complacent in its position as it was. Make it so powerful that it need fear no opponents and potentially you have a very dark situation.:( I wouldn't trust any power with overwhelming dominance, not even Britain.

Steve
 
I have a love-hate relationship with the British Empire. On the one hand, they're one of the most benevolent empires of the time(if not the). On the other, as an American anti-monarchist with Fenian ancestors I'm required by law to wish them ill.:p;)

Also, good points. Although, my thing about China was that it was the combined diplomatic efforts of the US and UK that kept the other Euro powers from trying to carve up the Dragon. It's possible without US support that the Euros might instead push China over the edge and during the chaos directly annex their spheres of influence. Left with no other option, Britain gathers as much of China as it can keep out of other hands and sets it up as either a protectorate or a dominion.
 
Wait, seriously? And here I thought I was being original.:(

Jord839

Afraid so. - I was playing in an adaptation of SPI's World at War, actually as the US and after some disagreements between the US and UK, the GM joked a bit about starting a war of words and threw a few insults into the ring, including that one.

Steve
 
Would they really move it? Especially to another continent? Washington DC only has a population of 500,000 but the Americans keep it as their capital.

bernard patton

Good point. Especially since in a multi-national empire of that size a change of capital would probably be a matter of heated debate. Probably simplier to keep it in the old historical capital.

Steve
 
Is, and i'm being purely speculative, as i'm not very good with monarchies and such, there any chance that England/Britain could unify with Spain as the Spanish Empire is dying and the Brits are getting going?

What i'm thinking is that, the upcoming British, could save the Spanish Empire, and add to it, if that makes sense?

:)


I don't think so as that would require either a protestant Spanish king or a Catholic English king.
 
I don't think so as that would require either a protestant Spanish king or a Catholic English king.

Not to mention that the Spanish and English had very different styles of governance. The English had "grown up" as a people with a series of French rulers and such who took several centuries to Anglicise, which helped create perhaps the first case of nationalism forging a country's people together. The Spanish on the other hand had to have native Spanish monarchs slowly reconquer their country from the Moors, which created a society which stratified - they placed trueblood Christian Spaniards at the top, then the converted Moor Christians, then the converted Jews, then the Islamic Moors, and so on. This carried over to their Empires - the British empire was formed around a basis of colonists who believed themselves to be living and ruling over an overseas area of England, with vassal status native tribes. The Spaniards instead conquered the territories which formed their empire and then ranked the populations according to how pureblood Spanish they were - they in fact developed a highly complex and lengthy series of classes based on blood heritage - a morisco (converted native) and a European would have a child ranked as a "mulatto", for instance. A European who married that mulatto would have an even lower ranked child, and it got more complicated if Europeans weren't involved and depending on whether the male or female was of a higher social status.

When you bear in mind that these ideas of social classification were pretty much innate to both countries, and that the locally-based Governors are by and large the ones responsible for policy, it becomes hard to see an English takeover of the Spanish Empire by non-conquest methods as managing to reform the Spanish Empire very efficiently, except after several centuries. The Spanish will want to retain the right to appoint Spanish Governors and impose their own rule, and refusing to accept that will probably cause more problems than Latin America is worth.
 
Well the Anglo-Portuguese_Alliance is the oldest in the world, so maybe if it happened earlier in history before Britain went Protestant. After that, probably not.

Catherine of Braganza? It could happen if you just tweak the circumstances a bit (the male Portuguese heirs would probably have to die off after the marriage as, for the obvious religion reason, the Portuguese liked the English but wouldn't want to risk Personal Union with a Protestant country). My previous point sticks to my mind though - I think that a late inheritence of a big empire would be hard to mold into an Anglicisation, though, since the Portuguese would want to retain control of their empire and thus the English would find it hard to implement their own reforms. But anyway.



If the objective of this thread is the total super-sizing of the British Empire, then I offer the following as a scenario:

In 1386, John of Gaunt, father of the future King Henry IV, sends an expedition to Castile. Through his wife, John claims that he is the rightful King of Castile as his wife is technically the leading claimant but has been denied the throne over wranglings on the legality of her mother's marriage. IOTL John campaigns for a few months, makes little progress, and is paid to give up his claim by the usurper Pedro the Cruel. Take as a POD this campaign, and say he is more successful. Scenting blood, John refuses to sacrifice his claim and defeats or kills Pedro, forcing Pedro/his supporters to sign a peace recognising Isabella (John's wife)'s claims. Say for instance that Henry Bolingbroke (Henry IV), nearly 20 at the time, dislikes his father's new Kingdom and chooses to remain in England. With John gone, Richard II begins his dispossession of the Lancastrian estates early, inducing Henry to swear to defeat him after fleeing to Spain. John dies as OTL, Henry inherits Castile and quickly sends an army to dethrone Richard. He then is happy to rest on his laurels and establish a stable government in both countries, but his son isn't. Henry V becomes a strong English nationalist, as in OTL, and invades France during his reign. Using his Castilian levies, the Spanish nobles enjoying a good fight with the French, as well as his English troops, he does better than IOTL (his victory is more comprehensive, doesn't rely on the Burgundians as much, and he doesn't die). Being really quite English - for instance, his is the first King to choose to reject French in favour of English, he chooses to ignore France's huge prestige value as a single state and the jewel of a crown, strips the ancestral Angevin lands from France, claiming them as English dependents (apparently there was a clause in the Treaty of Troyes 1420 to prevent Henry from annexing French land to England, so...it could happen) and London becomes his chosen administrative centre. If it's the way you swing you could even throw in Henry achieving his life ambition of a successful crusade to the Holy Land, too. Heck, there's even the potential for mischief when (IOTL) his brother marries the Countess of Holland. If he supports Humphrey and Jacqueline of Hainaut, then you could maybe even add Holland as a vassal-satellite of England...

Now this only deals with Europe, but if you're just looking at an uber-empire, how's that for creating a union of three (or even four if you add Holland) of the biggest colonial powers just before the colonial era? Could make for a pretty incredible world empire...
 
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Catherine of Braganza? It could happen if you just tweak the circumstances a bit (the male Portuguese heirs would probably have to die off after the marriage as, for the obvious religion reason, the Portuguese liked the English but wouldn't want to risk Personal Union with a Protestant country). My previous point sticks to my mind though - I think that a late inheritence of a big empire would be hard to mold into an Anglicisation, though, since the Portuguese would want to retain control of their empire and thus the English would find it hard to implement their own reforms. But anyway.



If the objective of this thread is the total super-sizing of the British Empire, then I offer the following as a scenario:

In 1386, John of Gaunt, father of the future King Henry IV, sends an expedition to Castile. Through his wife, John claims that he is the rightful King of Castile as his wife is technically the leading claimant but has been denied the throne over wranglings on the legality of her mother's marriage. IOTL John campaigns for a few months, makes little progress, and is paid to give up his claim by the usurper Pedro the Cruel. Take as a POD this campaign, and say he is more successful. Scenting blood, John refuses to sacrifice his claim and defeats or kills Pedro, forcing Pedro/his supporters to sign a peace recognising Isabella (John's wife)'s claims. Say for instance that Henry Bolingbroke (Henry IV), nearly 20 at the time, dislikes his father's new Kingdom and chooses to remain in England. With John gone, Richard II begins his dispossession of the Lancastrian estates early, inducing Henry to swear to defeat him after fleeing to Spain. John dies as OTL, Henry inherits Castile and quickly sends an army to dethrone Richard. He then is happy to rest on his laurels and establish a stable government in both countries, but his son isn't. Henry V becomes a strong English nationalist, as in OTL, and invades France during his reign. Using his Castilian levies, the Spanish nobles enjoying a good fight with the French, as well as his English troops, he does better than IOTL (his victory is more comprehensive, doesn't rely on the Burgundians as much, and he doesn't die). Being really quite English - for instance, his is the first King to choose to reject French in favour of English, he chooses to ignore France's huge prestige value as a single state and the jewel of a crown, strips the ancestral Angevin lands from France, claiming them as English dependents (apparently there was a clause in the Treaty of Troyes 1420 to prevent Henry from annexing French land to England, so...it could happen) and London becomes his chosen administrative centre. If it's the way you swing you could even throw in Henry achieving his life ambition of a successful crusade to the Holy Land, too. Heck, there's even the potential for mischief when (IOTL) his brother marries the Countess of Holland. If he supports Humphrey and Jacqueline of Hainaut, then you could maybe even add Holland as a vassal-satellite of England...

Now this only deals with Europe, but if you're just looking at an uber-empire, how's that for creating a union of three (or even four if you add Holland) of the biggest colonial powers just before the colonial era? Could make for a pretty incredible world empire...

You could probably throw in the Burgundian inheritance in there and you'd have a frighteningly large and rich western nation:D
 
Yes but an empire in the 15th century which spoke almost a dozen languages, a resentful nobility (with London the centre and a King favouring English aristocrats over Spanish and French ones and a King in Aragon keen to encourage his Castilian neighbours to rebel and various Valois including Burgundy with a strong claim to the throne of France waiting in the wings), numerous differences in styles of Government between his varying nations and one assumes we're talking personal union rather than merger plus you have a dynastic squable still waiting to happen - even if Henry V lives his full span his cousins descended from Lionel of Clarence have a strong claim and with union with the descendants of Edmund of York (who also had a Castilian wife) the Wars of the Roses would be a nightmare....and then add in the reformation and your Empire is going to be in bits before 1550 if its lasts that long.
Arguably its long been thought that had England been continentally successful (ie winning the 100 years war) then she would have been perpetually caught up in European conflicts and her colonial expansion reduced significantly.
 
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