Suppose that Weimar Germany survives, and that WW2 doesn't happen in Europe, and that the war is limited to the Asia-Pacific region against Japan. How would decolonization take place a few years later? Will it always be similar to OTL, or would it be different, due to the absence of conflict in Europe?
Decolonization if no WW2
- Thread starter PauL62
- Start date
Well, for a start, the French and British Empires wouldn't be so deeply dependent on American reconstruction aid, so I see a rather high likelihood that their Empires would to an extent or another stay around significantly longer.
Deleted member 90949
It would certainly be delayed without a Second World War. Decolonization would still be inevitable as the population ratio of Europe to Africa and Asia would rapidly decline. I could imagine there being significant vestigial empires around the turn of the 20th/21st centuries, but not much later.
I do wonder whether instead of DE colonization, we'd see RE colonization, as the British and French empires shrank but rather than the colonies necessarily becoming independent, they fell under the sway of newer would-be imperial powers like Italy, Poland, Japan, Germany or even the US and USSR.
There's alot of ways for this to go though.
fasquardon
Poland: almost as big an economy as Italy. Very much wanted colonies to show that they'd "arrived" as a modern European power.
Basically without the narrative of fighting for freedom and democracy of the victorious side in WW2, the old ideas of having colonies as a symbol of a nation's power stay around longer and without Europe being smashed and creating a vacuum that only the anti-imperialist US could fill, with no WW2 the imperialist powers are still strong concerns and the power vacuum caused by the relative declines of the UK and France has lots of want-to-be imperial powers wanting to fill it as well.
fasquardon
I suspect that France would likely concentrate on its African possessions at some point and let go of its Indochinese possessions.
I do not see Poland acquiring a colony of its own, unless it purchases some Spanish colonies.
Italy is not in a position to successfully contest on its own the greater colonial powers, and was already given a lot of leeway already IOTL when it annexed the Kufra province by taking on the Senussi, and then getting the Aozou strip and Abyssinia.
Deleted member 94680
For British territories, it would probably be something along the line of the Indian experience, but slowed down and drawn out. It might start around the mid-sixties with greater indigenous representation in colonial political offices. Slowly, the peoples of a colony will gain greater representation (overcoming whatever racist systematic blocks the electoral system of each colony puts in their way) until the prime/first/leading minister of the colony is indigenous. Then, a push for independence would happen and the metropole would hold on for as long as possible, making various promises until reality is unavoidable. Maybe sometime around the mid eighties the colony would be ‘granted’ independence in some form of Commonwealth analogy designed to retain benefits for the metropole.
That's if there isn’t an armed struggle for independence, obviously.
That's if there isn’t an armed struggle for independence, obviously.