The British Empire......LIVES!!!

[benedict XVII]

Because it was the last desperate chance of the nationalists to inflame Irish public opinion enough to derail the political process towards devolution.
Pearce was very clear about the need for the blood sacrifice and unfortunately the people fell for it hook line and sinker.

Public opinion was anti rebel, there are reporters are regular Dubliners hissing and spitting at the rebels.
The opinion only shifted because the Irish thought that the risers were being executed in an unfair manner because they were Irish (of course they weren’t, people were being shot left right and centre for traitorous activities).



No it hadn't although it wasn't as bad as it is made out to be and political reforms had come along way in that time which had answered all of the Irish peoples concerns except devolved governance which had also been passed just before the war.

Ireland was getting what it want and everybody knew it.

Well, you still put in your top-10 sins of the BE a couple of things that had to do with Ireland...

 

[benedict XVII]

The concern in fighting the Indians is not that we would loose to the Indians but how bad that would make the government look at home especially in the days of the news being reported in cinemas and papers. In a democratic society with elections every so often...

So you mean the Indians were ready to fight for independence? They really wanted it? They were really oppressed then?

Russia isn't shrinking all that much, what has wanted to go has gone (except Czechnia (spl)).
The US...How are they over extending? What new states are they wanting to admit? I don't see the American empire falling apart without something MAJOR.

Let's say the Russian Empire had been shrinking quite a bit in the last 15 years. Most recently Ukraine, some fighting in the Caucasus, and Belarus or Moldova will follow any time soon.

I was not limiting the US Empire to the 50 states... But let's say, when they have trouble embarking some of their key allies in a military adventure, when they can't extract from a country 2 years after they attacked it, when their ideology gets resoundingly rejected by a significant share of mankind, when they have concerns about their military ability to fight a second war in parallel, I would argue this can be constructed as early signs of overextension. And no, I don't think it will fall soon, it is more likely to wear out very progressively with some bright returns once in a while.

 

[benedict XVII]

There is difference between not doing anything and asking the Nazi's to come in and joining the Germany army to help conquer the rest of Britain which is essentially what the Indians did, it was Indians filling the civil service which kept India running, it was Indian soldiers which defended India (against revolution and external threat) and it was Indian police keeping law and order.

Britain had about 60,000 or 70,000 people to run and keep order in a country of 250 million, do you really think we could have done that without native assistance?
Up until independence 40% of India was still princely states because they had acquiesced to British protectorate status.

I have to ask how much you know about British India if you aren't aware of the basics such as this.

Don't insult me, though I'm not a specialist of India, I was aware of those facts.

Well, you know, Leopold held Congo with about 1500 Whites in 1908 for a population of about 10 millions. The Force Publique was probably the most effective fighting force in Black Africa, and composed essentially of Africans. And there were Black policemen in Congo as well. Stanley did sign many treaties with local chieftains on behalf of the CFS, occasionnally playing one against the other as the Brits could do in India. So, what does the fact that there was extensive collaboration prove in the end?

You see, when you are the power in place, when most of the population lives in dreadful ly precarious conditions, and you propose a social status and a regular paycheck, you will always find people wanting to work for you.
And human nature is such that most of them will end up developing a sense of pride for what they are doind.

Do you really think people can’t be misled or do you think people really knew what they were getting themselves into with Hitler or Lenin?

Lenin, surely, which is why he could not get elected democratically and had to make a coup. Hitler, certainly as well: people voted for him because he wanted to restore a Greater Germany and many supported his anti-semitism. In Belgium, the extreme right party Vlaams Blok has about 25% of the popular vote in Flanders. From talking to a few people who voted for that party, I can tell you they know full well what it stands for and are asking for it!

I'm not, it wasn't a crack about French hygiene it was a crack about the fact that the French government is notoriously unstable.

Nice try!

I saw you try to portray Belgium in the moss favourable light possible you mean.

Then you need glasses.

1. After the (2nd) Boer war we shouldn't have compromised on the subject of native enfranchisement, this essentially let the Afrikaans hijack the eventual South African Union and set up Apartheid which ruined possibly Africa’s best chance for a semi functioning state.

Thatcher was calling Mandela a terrorist in the 1980's.

2. In India (including Burma here) I think we showed too much tolerance to some of the more backward beliefs and didn't do all that we could to stamp them out(although we did a lot).

3.The Opium trade with China certainly stands out of something regrettable given modern views although there are certainly extenuating circumstances to a degree (Opium still used in Britain Chinese intransigence).

"regrettable", only?

4. Giving African colonies independence before they were ready for it which led to much destruction.

Good luck with trying to do that! Outcome would probably have been even worse. For this one, I think you were wise.

5. Not treating Caribbeans (especially, Indians tended to get respect from the same people they always had) who had served in WW1 with more respect.

6. Not granting Catholic emancipation along with the 1801 Act of Union

Or disenfranchsing the Catholics in the first place?

7. Not doing more to rein in settlers who abused natives.

8. Not clamping down hard of semi institutionalised racism in some areas, especially in places like in Egypt (white only Tennis club etc).

9. Not passing Irish home rule at an earlier chance.

Or invading Ireland at all, bringing in settlers, giving them all the political power at the expense of the native population?

10. Not setting up the tax system India in a better fashion (it wasn't uniformly bad but in many areas we had to rely upon the locals to be honest and they always tended to under value their own land and over values others).

Pick your favourite five, I can come up with many more and even more still if you are looking for what the Empire should have done better in a sense of benefiting the Empire

So it seems after all that there were racist or religious undertones in the BE. Contrary to Leej, it looks like you can be reformed...

 

[Darkling]

I had somehow guessed you had read that book.

Well you would have guessed wrong in concluding that is what I am basing my opinion off of.

There was more than the price tag, also some governance issues. Leopold wanted to retain some special rights in Congo, and the Crown Domain as his personal property. The Belgian government refused and that's why it took so long. Contrary to the EIC, which was subject to British law and with which HM's government could as pleased, the CFS was sovereign and a treaty had to be negotiated and signed with its powerholder, i.e. Leopold II. Before saying the Belgian government was not in a hurry, look at the Belgian press or parliamentary debates during that period.

Enlighten me.

Of course, if Hochschild and traditional Anglo-Saxon historiography are your main sources. Jules Marchal, though he did some remarkable digging of sources, could also be somewhat selective in their use... That's what happens when you're foremost motivated by proving a point. This said, I can understand his drive given the obliterance of the CFS period in the 1950-80 period in Belgium. But you don't need to look very far in Leopold's correspondance or instructions to develop a more balanced vision of the man - I'll come back to that later.

The problem you are having though is that British historians really have no axe to grind over Leopold whereas Belgians do have a stake in painting the CFS and Leopold in a more favourable light.

In terms of having his work reviewed by a number of historians, Hochschild seems to have followed somewhat strange, if not outrightly intimidating, practices. I suggest you find back what Professors Vellut and Kurgan had to say about it in an interview with the Belgian television (www.rtbf.com - oh, I forgot, you don't understand French!)

Yet Marchal backed him up 100% mainly because Hochschild based his work heavily on Marchals (the halved population idea was lifted from Stengers work although Stenger disputed the conclusion).

He pressed the issue very rightfully. The resistance came for several reasons: some protection of the image of Belgium and the royal family maybe, overall inertia surely (politicans often have other issues to deal with than access to archives), just as the fear that the Royal Question would come to a discussion again (King Leopold III and most politicans involved in that episode were still alive at the time).

Which all seems god motive to sugar coat the situation.

Don't remember the sources used by Pakenham, so I'll abstain from commenting.

Pakenham is quite thorough in his sources and he also doesn't pull any punches when criticising British figures either, giving a good impression of his impartiality.

When those signals became too loud (in part thanks to Casement-Morel), he started realizing something was maybe wrong.

You see that doesn’t fit with the picture Pakenham (and others) paint of him, Leopold’s attempts to annex yet more territory, his recruitment of Stanley who was well known for being brutal, his strenuous efforts taken to minimise the chance of the truth getting out to the media, his usurping of rather vast profits and making sure he could maintain them, the way he manipulated the powers into thinking free trade was his game and then turning round and prohibiting just that.

The Leopold you see of the honest man who was just ignorant of what was going on is completely opposite to the version I have read about.

(3) eventually, as he grew older, like some other successful entrepreneurs, he developed a form of megalomania, becoming rigid, arrogant, and unshameful of anything he was doing. Not only in Congo by the way, you should just look how he treated his daughters for instance. People were hissing in the streets of Brussels at the carriage bringing his coffin to the grave.

Indeed his personal life in later times was rather messy.

However I would argue that the megalomania was always there to a degree he just let the mask slip more towards the end.

But certain statements made about Leopold are completely off-the-mark. 1. Leopold never had any genocidal intent, and the figure quoted by Hochschild in this respect rests on sand.

Leopold certainly didn't set out to kill people but that doesn't mean he was particularly concerned about his Congolese subjects lives either, he had the same attitude to even some of his employed Europeans when Stanley had informed him certain things would be very risky to his people he essentially played to Stanley's vanity to get him to go ahead anyway.

2. He had a genuine concern to put an end to slavery in Congo and it was not only a pretext. He had made statements expressing his horror at the treatment of slaves as early as in the early 1860's, in tempore non suspecto.

Yet he made the king of the slave trade in eth Congo one of his chief administrators, he may not have liked slavery but he was quite willing to put it aside to achieve his goals (a common theme).

3. He did not engineer the mistreatments in the rubber plantations - they were against CFS law, though his economic demands (you may call it greed if you want) did contribute to fostering the abuse.

I wouldn't call it greed, not at first anyway, the Congo was in dire straights early on and requiring a profitable colony to finance its development was perfectly reasonable however later on he reaped a tidy profit from it much of which could have been reinvested in eh Congo instead of spent building monuments in Belgium.

4. He was not a completely immoral person. He could not have been the respected constitutional monarch of one of the most democratic countries in Europe for 44 years if he really could not behave.

Being immoral does not preclude being intelligent besides which he could have held a lower regard for Congolese lives than Belgian ones.

By the way, what is your source about the fact that Leopold had made his money back before rubber?

He didn't, he was on the point of chucking in the towel when the rubber saved his bacon.

Britain did not want Portugal, Germany or France to have it; that's why they settled for Belgium.

Yes because those were all protectionist powers, Britain was convinced that the CFS wouldn't be protectionist because they thought Leopold would play nice given Britain’s status as something of a patron of Belgium.

Come on, it was the logical place to start.

It should have become apparent that Leopold was neck deep in the affair but then again Leopold had quite the capacity for convincing people he was a nice guy.

Look at a map of Africa in the 1950's.

I thought you had statistics?

The French, British and Belgians also had their fair share of revolts. I did not mean to say the Germans were better, I have no clue because the evidence is pointing in so many directions. Rather than make generalizations and rankings, I prefer more focused comparisons.

The Belgians were able to keep things relatively quiet for there first few years as did the British in most of their territories.
The French had more problems with first conquering the locals than subsequent revolts.

All the previous powers tended to rule with a softer touch (Britain especially preferred to work through the local power structure) whilst the Germans were far more hard nosed, just compare how the British made it clear they ruled at the behest of the Sultan of Zanzibar whilst the Germans almost instantly caused a revolt and called for the restoration of the Sultans rule.

I agree the "modern standards" argument is a bit weak, though you've used contextual relativization as well in some of your statements regarding the BE.

Only in comparison to other Empires at the time, I ultimately judge actions on why they were carried out and most importantly what they achieved (I have a large streak of "ends justify the means" running through me).

But Stengers and other Belgian historians (the "establishment" as Marchal or Hochschild would put it) also had more substantive criticisms of the book.

Hochschild does have some Belgian supporters as well, it seems far more likely to me that the Belgian establishment would be off the mark than the British, Americans and some Belgians.

Yes, the French had taught them a lesson. But let's say they were all the more eager to pursue that policy after the American Revolution. They also suddendly became much nicer with the Québecois at that time...

No the British became friendlier with the Quebecois before the revolution, the fact that Britain had allowed the French to keep their own laws in Quebec is even mentioned in the declaration of Independence as one of the Kings great crimes (the Americans were also non too happy with the Catholics being granted sufferance in Quebec).

You seem to be confusing cause and effect, Britain being nice to the Quebecois and the Indians helped provoke the Revolution not the other way around.

And it's easier to preach morality in the treatment of Africans when you don't have all that precious rubber to harvest. Such is man!

Very true although the French weren't quite as bad in their slice of the Congo and Britain wouldn't have been willing to go to such lengths to make the colony a going concern (if for no other reason than it couldn’t be kept a secret like Leopold could keep it).

You know what, I knew you were going to come up with something like that. You're grabbing all the poles that are being handed to you, it's so much fun!

The little smile face indicates it was a joke, I even put it in to stop your misinterpretation it and you still did.

I hope you'll agree I've brought my fair share of facts and arguments.

Certainly more than some others n this thread but you do regress on occasion.

And regarding "the BE was the best thing that ever happened to mankind" (in short, BEBTEHM), I though you agreed that it was a bit meaningless to argue.

In which case state such instead of trying to argue it by raising a laundry list of Evil British Actions TM.

 

[Darkling]

Well, you still put in your top-10 sins of the BE a couple of things that had to do with Ireland...

Admitting Britain did some things wrong in regard to Ireland is different than concluding that the Irish were chomping at the bit to rebel.

 

[Darkling]

Don't insult me, though I'm not a specialist of India, I was aware of those facts.

Then why make such a silly statement as questioning whether any Indians "collaborated".

Well, you know, Leopold held Congo with about 1500 Whites in 1908 for a population of about 10 millions. The Force Publique was probably the most effective fighting force in Black Africa, and composed essentially of Africans. And there were Black policemen in Congo as well. Stanley did sign many treaties with local chieftains on behalf of the CFS, occasionnally playing one against the other as the Brits could do in India. So, what does the fact that there was extensive collaboration prove in the end?

That Congolese helped the CFS maintain control in the Congo, it was mainly the Cannibals that defeated the Arabs (or the Arab's cannibals).

You see, when you are the power in place, when most of the population lives in dreadful ly precarious conditions, and you propose a social status and a regular paycheck, you will always find people wanting to work for you.
And human nature is such that most of them will end up developing a sense of pride for what they are doind.

I'm not questioning that, I said the Indians aided the British and you contested the point by comparing it to a passive resistance to occupation which it wasn't.

With that said I would say your Congo Free State analogy is somewhat flawed given the more advance state which India was in during British rule (or before it) compared to the CFS.

Lenin, surely, which is why he could not get elected democratically and had to make a coup.

He got enough people to follow him to overthrow the Provisional government and make it stick.

Hitler, certainly as well: people voted for him because he wanted to restore a Greater Germany and many supported his anti-semitism. In Belgium, the extreme right party Vlaams Blok has about 25% of the popular vote in Flanders. From talking to a few people who voted for that party, I can tell you they know full well what it stands for and are asking for it!

Hitler wanted to overturn Versailles and lead Germany back to the top, he didn't campaign on a platform of getting into a war with the rest of the world, exterminating the Jewish race and finally cracking down on anything external to the party (up to and including he Christina churches).

I can say with confidence that most Germans weren't voting for that, they were voting to get a job.

Nice try!

Nice try what?

The context was clearly about government stability, if I was saying the French don't change their underwear then saying the government lasts forever doesn't make a statement about their government.

Not only are you calling me a liar but you are illustrating your less than masterful grasp of the obvious.

Then you need glasses.

No, I'm still pretty convinced.

Thatcher was calling Mandela a terrorist in the 1980's.

And the point would be?

You assume that A) You assume that I agree with Thatcher or hold her in some esteem, B) That one cannot be a terrorist and not be fighting for a just cause or C) that the status of Nelson Mandela has anything to do with the subject at hand.

You are just bickering again.

"regrettable", only?

And again.

Good luck with trying to do that! Outcome would probably have been even worse. For this one, I think you were wise.

For us certainly but cutting the Africans loose out of convincing was just us being selfish (although perhaps given the changed world situation it was more realistic).

Or disenfranchsing the Catholics in the first place?

It only really became a problem once we added the Irish to the Union, of course precluding people from civil liberties based upon religion is bad I wouldn't rate it as a particularly bad mistake (given it was solved over time) worthy of springing immediately to mind.

Or invading Ireland at all, bringing in settlers, giving them all the political power at the expense of the native population?

I wouldn't rate that as a particularly bad mistake, the Irish were quite useful soldiers for the Empire and it secured Britain by ensuring we didn't have a weak and divided island to our west.

So it seems after all that there were racist or religious undertones in the BE.

On an interpersonal level certainly in some cases (although not all), things at a governmental level were far closer to what he describes.

Contrary to Leej, it looks like you can be reformed...

If by reformed you mean sycophantically agree with your every utterance (and you do) then no I can't and it’s a bloody good thing too.

 

[benedict XVII]

Well you would have guessed wrong in concluding that is what I am basing my opinion off of.

I did not say so, I even praised you for not taking over the 10 million number. You mentioned Hochschild and Pakenham, but I'd be curious to know about your other sources.

The problem you are having though is that British historians really have no axe to grind over Leopold whereas Belgians do have a stake in painting the CFS and Leopold in a more favourable light.

Which stake? That was a hundred years ago. And of all European people, Belgians are probably the least chauvinistic. And a large section of the intelligentsia, mostly in Flanders but some also in Wallonia, are doing anything they can to put Belgium in the worst possible light because they want the country to split.

Yet Marchal backed him up 100% mainly because Hochschild based his work heavily on Marchals (the halved population idea was lifted from Stengers work although Stenger disputed the conclusion).

Sure, that's quite a circular relationship. And you see, Hochschild takes the idea of genocide from Stengers, but fails to report properly the rigorous arguments made against that number by the same Stengers. That's what I personnally call bias.

Which all seems god motive to sugar coat the situation.

It is not sugar-coating, it is taking perspective. If you are passionate about something, it becomes the center of your life. You may then tend to forget other people could have different and possibly perfectly legitimate priorities. You start interpreting their actions, or lack thereof, in that light, and you get angry at them. I don't mean to say everybody was snow white in this game, but that was not necessarily a conspiracy.

You see that doesn’t fit with the picture Pakenham (and others) paint of him, Leopold’s attempts to annex yet more territory, his recruitment of Stanley who was well known for being brutal, his strenuous efforts taken to minimise the chance of the truth getting out to the media, his usurping of rather vast profits and making sure he could maintain them, the way he manipulated the powers into thinking free trade was his game and then turning round and prohibiting just that.

The Leopold you see of the honest man who was just ignorant of what was going on is completely opposite to the version I have read about.

I did not say Leopold was ignorant or honest. I said he chose to ignore it at least for a while, I acknowledged his manipulation skills and admitted that the word greed could apply to him. He also had a strong "ends justify means" streak, but I thought you were in line with this - mind you, I am not! The only thing I wanted to point out is that the uniformly black portrait that's often made of him needs to be nuanced. He can't be put in the same league as Hitler or Stalin, as Hochschild does for instance.

However I would argue that the megalomania was always there to a degree he just let the mask slip more towards the end.

Sure.

Yet he made the king of the slave trade in eth Congo one of his chief administrators, he may not have liked slavery but he was quite willing to put it aside to achieve his goals (a common theme).

Like most colonizers, he could recognize a strong opponent and could put him to work for him under certain conditions. Not that a find this particularly glamorous, but he surely was not unique in doing so.

I wouldn't call it greed, not at first anyway, the Congo was in dire straights early on and requiring a profitable colony to finance its development was perfectly reasonable however later on he reaped a tidy profit from it much of which could have been reinvested in eh Congo instead of spent building monuments in Belgium.

Indeed. As you probably know, the Belgian government refused Leopold's grants, and he did most of those works under the form of private initiative.

Being immoral does not preclude being intelligent besides which he could have held a lower regard for Congolese lives than Belgian ones.

Like most Whites at the time. And some still do today, look at the total failure of stopping the Rwanda genocide in 1994.

He didn't, he was on the point of chucking in the towel when the rubber saved his bacon.

That's what I thought, but why did you make then the opposite statement?

Only in comparison to other Empires at the time, I ultimately judge actions on why they were carried out and most importantly what they achieved (I have a large streak of "ends justify the means" running through me).

If you look at what Congo ultimately became under Belgian rule, you should be pretty indulgent for Leopold. And you should also think the worst mistake Belgium did was decolonization. I don't share those opinions.

Hochschild does have some Belgian supporters as well, it seems far more likely to me that the Belgian establishment would be off the mark than the British, Americans and some Belgians.

A bit weak as an argument. You have American and British historians who have more nuanced views on Leopold, though they're harder to find. As far as Hochschild's supporters in Belgium, you will find Marchal of course (but that's a bit circular if you see what I mean), a lot of journalists who love the sensationalism of the arguments but know no s*** about the period, and quite a few members of the Flemish nationalistic intelligentsia who are quite happy to further discredit Belgium. There are a few others, but if you remove the ones I've listed here, you won't be left with much. Most historians think that the book triggered an interesting debate and helped people realize a darker side of their country's history, but think of the book as having little scientific value, containing quite a few mistaken statements, and failing to take into account the sources that would contradict or nuance the thesis presented.

No the British became friendlier with the Quebecois before the revolution, the fact that Britain had allowed the French to keep their own laws in Quebec is even mentioned in the declaration of Independence as one of the Kings great crimes (the Americans were also non too happy with the Catholics being granted sufferance in Quebec).

You seem to be confusing cause and effect, Britain being nice to the Quebecois and the Indians helped provoke the Revolution not the other way around.

Sure, the British were pragmatic after the conquest of Québec. But they still passed quite a few bills improving seriously their situation in the context of the AWI.

The little smile face indicates it was a joke, I even put it in to stop your misinterpretation it and you still did.

I had noticed the smile and had perfectly understood you weren't being serious. But I still thought it was funny I could anticipate what you were going to make out of my statement. We had a sort of meeting of the minds

Certainly more than some others n this thread but you do regress on occasion.

So do you, so do you... You can indulge in ad hominem attacks at times.

In which case state such instead of trying to argue it by raising a laundry list of Evil British Actions TM.

Sometimes I prefer wit to bland statements. That's my own style and I hope you'll get used to it. Well, obvisouly you must have some fun at those exchanges, otherwise you wouldn't have pursued them for so long...

 

[Michael Canaris]

If you look at what Congo ultimately became under Belgian rule, you should be pretty indulgent for Leopold. And you should also think the worst mistake Belgium did was decolonization.

While I can't speak for your interlocutor, that does happen to be my view (the paternal side of my family spent the years 1945-1969 in Ghana/Gold-Coast.)*

As a man who's simultaneously an Anglophile, Belgophile and Gallophile, one thing which pains me about the whole process is how many of our respective partisans swallowed American or Soviet propoganda concerning the other partners in our Sacred Alliance. Regardless of the nature of the metropole in question, one meta-dynamic which I've observed over the 20th Century is that the tighter the control of a Client-state by its sponsoring Metropole, the better the populace was treated (while I wouldn't have liked to live in the DDR, I'd vastly prefer it to living in Romania under Ceaucescu.)

 

[Straha]

Why is it that we don't ever get to see ATLs where the british empire is crushed earlier and britain completely levelled with massive atomic bombings? I've yet to see a TL with those...

 

[Wozza]

Why is it that we don't ever get to see ATLs where the british empire is crushed earlier and britain completely levelled with massive atomic bombings? I've yet to see a TL with those...

This was in fact the topic of one of the world's earliest AH's "If the Armada has landed"

Such AH's would be far preferable to zillions of parochial American AH's,particularly on the US civil war but surely peaking recently with "If long Island had been a state"

 

[Straha]

This was in fact the topic of one of the world's earliest AH's "If the Armada has landed"

Such AH's would be far preferable to zillions of parochial American AH's,particularly on the US civil war but surely peaking recently with "If long Island had been a state"

Yes but the spanish armada landing would abort the british empire and I'm talking about an earth where they rise but a grand alliance destroys the UK. Those american AH's which tend to turn everything utopic... bore me. I'm working on a US loses ACW one which takes lots of traditional ACW scenario stereotypes and usual assumptions about the ACW from this forum then uses them in cruel and unusual ways. Bioterrorism in the CSA anyone? union-imperial japanese alliance anyone?.

 

[Wozza]

Yes but the spanish armada landing would abort the british empire and I'm talking about an earth where they rise but a grand alliance destroys the UK. Those american AH's which tend to turn everything utopic... bore me. I'm working on a US loses ACW one which takes lots of traditional ACW scenario stereotypes and usual assumptions about the ACW from this forum then uses them in cruel and unusual ways. Bioterrorism in the CSA anyone? union-imperial japanese alliance anyone?.

You cannot have the British Empire destroyed by 1860, as it has more battleships than the rest of the world put together
You can by 1880, but that assumes the British do nothing against the allies ranged against them - and the Empire has massive financial and industrial resources to fall back on.
By the twentieth century there are possibilities...

 

[Straha]

You cannot have the British Empire destroyed by 1860, as it has more battleships than the rest of the world put together
You can by 1880, but that assumes the British do nothing against the allies ranged against them - and the Empire has massive financial and industrial resources to fall back on.
By the twentieth century there are possibilities...

I was aiming for the 20th century to include the possibility of massive nuclear weapons use

 

[Wozza]

I was aiming for the 20th century to include the possibility of massive nuclear weapons use

Hmm
Option 1: British lose WW1, (a la Turtledove or another POD) get nuked at the end of the re-match.

Option 2: UK wins WWI still, but gets nuked WW2
problems with this is that if Britain goes down in its moment of danger in 1940 it will not get nuked, as it is beaten. If it survives it is likely to have the big battalions ( ie US.)
So,
Option 2a: Anglo-German peace 1940, Hitler defeats USSR 1941.But why does he need to nuke the UK?
Option 2b: Hitler defeats USSR 1941, but why does he get nukes faster than the US?
Option 3: Uk makes peace 1940, USSR defeats Hitler late 1940s, USSR develops atom bomb first...
(This scenario was developed by Andrew Roberts in an AH book)

Of course there are plenty of variations within this.
Certainly Option 1 could lead to some interesting AH's, and is a generally under-considered area

 

[Darkling]

I did not say so, I even praised you for not taking over the 10 million number. You mentioned Hochschild and Pakenham, but I'd be curious to know about your other sources.

Mainly those two, I haven’t read anything else as in depth as those two although I have read other histories which do a smaller focus on the events and tend to broadly agree with them.

Which stake? That was a hundred years ago.

The same goes for the British Empire for the most part besides whcih you yourself pointed out their was a desire to not tarnish the monacrhy.

And of all European people, Belgians are probably the least chauvinistic.

You are coming rather close to that improvable line there.

Sure, that's quite a circular relationship. And you see, Hochschild takes the idea of genocide from Stengers, but fails to report properly the rigorous arguments made against that number by the same Stengers. That's what I personnally call bias.

No Hothschild made the argument that Stengers own research naturally led to that conclusion and Stenger shied away from it for non historical reasons.

It is not sugar-coating, it is taking perspective. If you are passionate about something, it becomes the center of your life. You may then tend to forget other people could have different and possibly perfectly legitimate priorities. You start interpreting their actions, or lack thereof, in that light, and you get angry at them. I don't mean to say everybody was snow white in this game, but that was not necessarily a conspiracy.

Leopold did run a conspiracy though, to both get the CFS and keep its public image good, he had numerous paid people in many governments and he co-opted a lot of the Belgian state diplomats.

That however doesn’t amount to a conspiracy to kill Africans as an end unto itself (which isn’t what was going on in my opinion).

I did not say Leopold was ignorant or honest. I said he chose to ignore it at least for a while, I acknowledged his manipulation skills and admitted that the word greed could apply to him. He also had a strong "ends justify means" streak, but I thought you were in line with this - mind you, I am not! The only thing I wanted to point out is that the uniformly black portrait that's often made of him needs to be nuanced. He can't be put in the same league as Hitler or Stalin, as Hochschild does for instance.

I don’t put him in the same league as Hitler or Stalin and I am quite willing to admit Hochschild is a bit too extreme, I find myself mainly agreeing with Pakenhams position which essentially that Leopold was a rather intelligent and unscrupulous individual.

Like most colonizers, he could recognize a strong opponent and could put him to work for him under certain conditions. Not that a find this particularly glamorous, but he surely was not unique in doing so.

Quite so, my point was that he was willing to put aside his dislike of slavery in order to achieve his aims which is the overarching theme here, he is willing to put aside moral concerns (and good sense) in order to achieve his aims.

Like most Whites at the time. And some still do today, look at the total failure of stopping the Rwanda genocide in 1994.

I wouldn’t strictly put that down to not caring about black lives just people don’t really consider Africa to be fixable.

That's what I thought, but why did you make then the opposite statement?

I didn’t I stated he had made his money once the boom in rubber picked up (i.e. once he began getting profits from the rubber he was quickly able to recoup his losses), not before the boom in rubber.

If you look at what Congo ultimately became under Belgian rule, you should be pretty indulgent for Leopold. And you should also think the worst mistake Belgium did was decolonization. I don't share those opinions.

Not really, that is like thanking Stalin for the EU, he may have had a hand in bringing about being about better Belgian rule in the end but that wasn’t his intention and he did far too much damage to make his actions better than an alternate action (forcing Britain to take it on for example, or dividing the place up).

As for the worst mistake Belgium made being decolonisation, I’m not sure about that (I still hold they were lax in reforming the place after they first took over) but if the Belgians had had another 20 years to finish off building up0 the Congo it would be much better off than it is today.

Sure, the British were pragmatic after the conquest of Québec. But they still passed quite a few bills improving seriously their situation in the context of the AWI.

Yes they improved the situation in Canada but that was part of a general process of keeping people in Canada happy (by the 1840’s he British were attempting to undermine and breed out the Quebecois), the specific attempts to court Quebecois opinion came before the AWI not after.

I had noticed the smile and had perfectly understood you weren't being serious. But I still thought it was funny I could anticipate what you were going to make out of my statement. We had a sort of meeting of the minds

Great minds I guess.

So do you, so do you... You can indulge in ad hominem attacks at times.

Quite true, although I try to focus it for particular points of reason I see as cheap.

You on the whole aren’t employing many though which is why this conversation is still ongoing unlike the other I was having in this thread where I got bored of saying the same thing ten times in a row and still getting no intelligent response.

Sometimes I prefer wit to bland statements. That's my own style and I hope you'll get used to it.

I prefer to start civil and then let the other person set the tone, if I feel they have thrown a low blow then I respond in kind otherwise I stay civil.

Well, obvisouly you must have some fun at those exchanges, otherwise you wouldn't have pursued them for so long...

Certainly.

 

[Tyr]

So you mean the Indians were ready to fight for independence? They really wanted it? They were really oppressed then?

What? No. Where did I say that?
Had we turned evil and started to stop them from protesting then they may have turned to armed insurgancy but as was my point even if the government had wanted to do that they could not.

Let's say the Russian Empire had been shrinking quite a bit in the last 15 years. Most recently Ukraine, some fighting in the Caucasus, and Belarus or Moldova will follow any time soon.

Past 15 years- Isn't SHRINKING. Present tense.
The others- They aren't part of Russia.

I was not limiting the US Empire to the 50 states... But let's say, when they have trouble embarking some of their key allies in a military adventure, when they can't extract from a country 2 years after they attacked it, when their ideology gets resoundingly rejected by a significant share of mankind, when they have concerns about their military ability to fight a second war in parallel, I would argue this can be constructed as early signs of overextension. And no, I don't think it will fall soon, it is more likely to wear out very progressively with some bright returns once in a while.

You mean Puerto Rico and the other little American places?
I don't see many of them going off on their own. If they did it would be no big loss. American colonialism was so utter and absolute that their empire has been painted the same colour as their core lands. That will not fall apart unless something really major happens like WW3.

So it seems after all that there were racist or religious undertones in the BE. Contrary to Leej, it looks like you can be reformed...

What on Earth do you mean by that?
Reformed? WTF, you are the one who needs to be reformed. Your view of history is stuck in the past.

Why is it that we don't ever get to see ATLs where the british empire is crushed earlier and britain completely levelled with massive atomic bombings? I've yet to see a TL with those...

Because by the time the empire has formed it is very difficult to do that. It'd be even harder then the USA being utterly destroyed today.

 

[benedict XVII]

Sorry for a belated reply on this one. Just been very busy those last couple of days

Then why make such a silly statement as questioning whether any Indians "collaborated".

Which statement did I make. I never said Indians did not work for the Brits, I simply put their motivations in perspective.

That Congolese helped the CFS maintain control in the Congo, it was mainly the Cannibals that defeated the Arabs (or the Arab's cannibals).

Absolutely. In spite of the violent penetration of Congo by Stanley and others' expeditions, Congolese were still willing to fight for the CFS. And if you could find Congolese to do so in spite the abuse going on, you cannot conclude that the fact that some Indians were working for the Brits means that the Brits were necessarily behaving well in India nor that they had wide support in the population. QED

I'm not questioning that, I said the Indians aided the British and you contested the point by comparing it to a passive resistance to occupation which it wasn't.

Well, there is an interesting little book that was issued a few years ago on the German occupation in the Channel Islands, and the reaction of the population. Can't remember the title, but I'm sure you could find it easily through a Google search or on Amazon. Well, the point of the book was to show that the authorities and inhabitants of those charming islands found some pretty good accomodation with their German occupiers. IIRC, and please forgive me if some details are wrong - that was a while ago, the local authorities developed a rather warm and fuzzy relationship with the Germans, the local administration participated in the identification, if not the round-up, of the local Jewish families (fortunately not many), hardly any act of resistance was recorded contrary to what was happening on the Continent, etc. So, if subjects of HM, who had bathed for many generations in the light of a liberal government, could abandon themsleves to such subservient behavior, what about Indians who did not enjoy such traditions and lived in much more precarious consitions? And by the way, I don't think Channel Islanders were particularly happy to host the Germans for five years, but well, they had to accomodate...

With that said I would say your Congo Free State analogy is somewhat flawed given the more advance state which India was in during British rule (or before it) compared to the CFS.

B****S***. I'm talking here about universal truths that a power in place tend to gradually gain support from sections of the population, for a number of easy to understand reasons. Some very advanced French collaborated with the Germans in WWII, that still does not prove the French people as a whole were happy with the Germans occupying their country.

Hitler wanted to overturn Versailles and lead Germany back to the top, he didn't campaign on a platform of getting into a war with the rest of the world, exterminating the Jewish race and finally cracking down on anything external to the party (up to and including he Christina churches).

I can say with confidence that most Germans weren't voting for that, they were voting to get a job.

Hitler's anti-semitism was very popular, and he was always talking of somehow getting rid of the Jews during his rallies. It was impossible not to know that. As for getting a job, the unemployment peak had passed by the time the elections that brought Hitler to power were held. 40% of the Germans were fascinated by that lunatic who had managed to arouse what is worse in man. Some of them may not have measured what would befall upon them as a consequence, but the evil was all to be seen. Mein Kampf was circulated, and many journalists did a perfectly proper job reporting what the man was about.

Nice try what?

The context was clearly about government stability, if I was saying the French don't change their underwear then saying the government lasts forever doesn't make a statement about their government.

Not only are you calling me a liar but you are illustrating your less than masterful grasp of the obvious.

First, I did not call you a liar. Let us keep this civil. I had perfectly understood what you meant, please stop assuming I am an idiot - I think I've already given ample proof I'm not -and try sometimes to read things on a second degree. This said, your point was indeed clearly about French governmental stability, but you did use a classical demeaning stereotype to get it across. That was insensitive.

And the point would be?

You assume that A) You assume that I agree with Thatcher or hold her in some esteem, B) That one cannot be a terrorist and not be fighting for a just cause or C) that the status of Nelson Mandela has anything to do with the subject at hand.

You are just bickering again.

No, I did not assume any of the above. I simply wanted to illustrate that some prominent persons in Britain (I assume you'd acknowledge Thatcher was one, even if you don't share her policies) were not taking apartheid as serious issues even in the late 20th century. I could be mistaken, but I somehow recall Thatcher refused to apply the UN embargo on South Africa?

For us certainly but cutting the Africans loose out of convincing was just us being selfish (although perhaps given the changed world situation it was more realistic).

Whoever pisses against the wind...

It only really became a problem once we added the Irish to the Union, of course precluding people from civil liberties based upon religion is bad I wouldn't rate it as a particularly bad mistake (given it was solved over time) worthy of springing immediately to mind.

No, it was morally wrong, even if Ireland had not been part of the Empire. There were enough Catholics in Scotland or England who could deserve to participate to the political process, or make a career in the administration or the army. Even France had Protestant Ministers in the late 18th century. The issue may have been solved at some point, but that does not do any good to the previous generations. And the issues some raise about Blair's potential stealth Catholicism are unworthy of a modern country.

I wouldn't rate that as a particularly bad mistake, the Irish were quite useful soldiers for the Empire and it secured Britain by ensuring we didn't have a weak and divided island to our west.

I will assume this is deliberate attempt at provoking. I will not respond in kind.

On an interpersonal level certainly in some cases (although not all), things at a governmental level were far closer to what he describes.

I would say in MOST cases (although not all).

If by reformed you mean sycophantically agree with your every utterance (and you do) then no I can't and it’s a bloody good thing too.

Of course it's a good thing. After a couple of good laughs at your sycophantic dances, this thread would get pretty boring.

 

[benedict XVII]

The same goes for the British Empire for the most part besides whcih you yourself pointed out their was a desire to not tarnish the monacrhy.

So you agree we are similarly biased?

You are coming rather close to that improvable line there.

I know I am a bit chauvinistic, and readily acknowledge that contrary to some people on this board. But I swear you, I am really a-typical in this respect for an average Belgian.

No Hothschild made the argument that Stengers own research naturally led to that conclusion and Stenger shied away from it for non historical reasons.

Which shows the benefit you would have had being able to read Stengers. The reason why Stengers and others do not agree with the 10 million number if very simple, and quite historical, I would argue. The 10 million number is the difference between a population estimate of 20 million made by Stanley in the 1880's and a rough counting (not really a census) done during the early years of the Belgian administration. Though one can agree that the later counting does provide a reasonable order of magnitude of the population at that time, Stanley's methodology was fundamentally flawed. Stanley made that estimate looking essentially at the population in the areas around the lower Congo, and then extrapolating them to the entire territory. The trouble is, those were the most densely populated areas at the time. It's a bit as if you calculated the population of the US by looking at the East Coast and then multiplying by the remaining unchecked area. I'll let you guess the outcome... One can also speculate that Stanley could also be motivated to provide a large number for quite obvious advertising reasons. Another reason for contesting the 50% decrease is the mere size of European presence in Congo. You're talking about a couple of thousand of individuals at most towards the end of the period, of which half missionaries. Even if you take into account the approximately 10,000 men of the Force Publique, you can't simply have that force kill so many people in that time frame. Finally, a fact which is often overlooked, the rubber plantations themselves covered only about a third of the total area of Congo, and not the most densely populated.

Now, where "serious" historians agree is that (1) there was a sizable population decrease in all of Equatorial Africa - not only Congo - in the late 19th century, but estimates vary widely as to its extent; (2) part of that decrease should be attributed to colonization, forced labor, etc.; (3) but other factors also came into play, among which internal warfare, slavery and diseases. Some even argue there may have been a new streak of malaria striking at the time populations that were not yet immune to it. The anecdotal evidence that lacustrian communities tended to be hit hardest by the population dip would tend to support the importance of malaria as a factor. But all in all, a lot of speculation.

I would hope you are now convinced how Hochschild could at time completely twist his sources. There were lots of other fantasy population calculations in other geographies at the time, a fact to which a professional historian would have been attuned to.

Leopold did run a conspiracy though, to both get the CFS and keep its public image good, he had numerous paid people in many governments and he co-opted a lot of the Belgian state diplomats.

The conspiracy I was referring to was about the Belgian archives. And as far as Leopold was concerned, he did indeed maintain a network as any reasonable government ought to do.

That however doesn’t amount to a conspiracy to kill Africans as an end unto itself (which isn’t what was going on in my opinion).

I don’t put him in the same league as Hitler or Stalin and I am quite willing to admit Hochschild is a bit too extreme, I find myself mainly agreeing with Pakenhams position which essentially that Leopold was a rather intelligent and unscrupulous individual.

I start having some reassurance. By the way, which among all the people who scrambled for Africa was stupid and scrupulous?

Another one on Leopold, he signed on his deathbed, the day before he was taken, the bill instituting the draft in Belgium. He had been fighting for that measure for almost 5 years, in parallel with launching an ambitious program to modernize the Belgian forts. By that act alone, I am ready to argue that he saved the Entente in 1914.

I wouldn’t strictly put that down to not caring about black lives just people don’t really consider Africa to be fixable.

I beg to disagree. If the people killed in Rwanda had had white skins, the intervention would have been a matter of days, not of months. Look at what happened in Kolwezi in the 1970's. And possibly my greatest shame for my country is that we pulled out our paratroopers so quickly when the massacres started.

As for the worst mistake Belgium made being decolonisation, I’m not sure about that (I still hold they were lax in reforming the place after they first took over) but if the Belgians had had another 20 years to finish off building up0 the Congo it would be much better off than it is today.

The worst abuse (hand-chopping, wife-kidnapping, etc.) did fade away very quickly after the Belgian take-over, even after the 1905 International Commission actually. Forced labor was officially abolished in 1911, but remained in practice in place in some areas until 1920 or so. Partly, because our allies needed the rubber so badly. Partly because it is very difficult to collect contributions for the population through other forms in a non-monetized economy. Partly because one had to take over a huge territory with a very limited administration at first. And Belgium had indeed some other priorities at the time, with the drums of war threatening her long-standing neutrality.

Quite true, although I try to focus it for particular points of reason I see as cheap.

Sometimes you see cheap where it is not. And your susceptibility can lead you to misinterpretation if not downright underestimation of your interlocutor.

You on the whole aren’t employing many though which is why this conversation is still ongoing unlike the other I was having in this thread where I got bored of saying the same thing ten times in a row and still getting no intelligent response.

I am flattered

 

[benedict XVII]

Past 15 years- Isn't SHRINKING. Present tense.
The others- They aren't part of Russia.

Don't bicker about present tense. Russia has trouble in Chechnya, it has recently lost Ukraine, and some other will follow at some point. It is in the process of shrinking even if not at this very second. And the fact that some of those areas were or are formally independent countries does not mean they were/are not part of a Russian Empire.

You mean Puerto Rico and the other little American places?
I don't see many of them going off on their own. If they did it would be no big loss. American colonialism was so utter and absolute that their empire has been painted the same colour as their core lands. That will not fall apart unless something really major happens like WW3.

Are you really stupid or do you only pretend?

 

[Darkling]

Which statement did I make. I never said Indians did not work for the Brits, I simply put their motivations in perspective.

No you first eluded to channel islanders taking a neutral stance because they didn't want to get killed and linked it to Indians not having a choice but to help the British, they did have such a choice and they were quite happy to side with the British.

Many Soldiers kept pictures of the Queen Empress around for pities sake.

The first meeting of Congress was chaired by a Scotsman’s and they referred to the Queen Empress as mother, even that ludite zealot Ghandi credited Britain with making India possible.

Absolutely. In spite of the violent penetration of Congo by Stanley and others' expeditions, Congolese were still willing to fight for the CFS. And if you could find Congolese to do so in spite the abuse going on, you cannot conclude that the fact that some Indians were working for the Brits means that the Brits were necessarily behaving well in India nor that they had wide support in the population. QED

However eh British weren't being as oppressive as the CFS an there was much better infrastructure to allow rebellion in India, we aren't talking about some cannibals being paid to eat people we are talking about loyal soldiers going about soldiering and civil servants doing their jobs.

As for the British behaving well, I didn't make that claim although they did behave a damn sight better than the CFS did.

My claim is that the Indians were more than happy to work with the British and they weren't forced into it.

Well, there is an interesting little book that was issued a few years ago on the German occupation in the Channel Islands, and the reaction of the population. Can't remember the title, but I'm sure you could find it easily through a Google search or on Amazon. Well, the point of the book was to show that the authorities and inhabitants of those charming islands found some pretty good accomodation with their German occupiers. IIRC, and please forgive me if some details are wrong - that was a while ago, the local authorities developed a rather warm and fuzzy relationship with the Germans, the local administration participated in the identification, if not the round-up, of the local Jewish families (fortunately not many), hardly any act of resistance was recorded contrary to what was happening on the Continent, etc. So, if subjects of HM, who had bathed for many generations in the light of a liberal government, could abandon themsleves to such subservient behavior, what about Indians who did not enjoy such traditions and lived in much more precarious consitions? And by the way, I don't think Channel Islanders were particularly happy to host the Germans for five years, but well, they had to accomodate...

Once again I must point out the difference between a few tens of thousands of people deciding not to risk getting killed by an occupying army and people from amongst 250 million joining up with you and helping you to conquer more land and police the land already held.

The fact that the Indians didn't have a liberal tradition is exactly the point, they were quite used to switching to the more powerful side and they did so once Britain became such.

B****S***. I'm talking here about universal truths that a power in place tend to gradually gain support from sections of the population, for a number of easy to understand reasons. Some very advanced French collaborated with the Germans in WWII, that still does not prove the French people as a whole were happy with the Germans occupying their country.

The French government concluded a treaty with the Germans, they were willing to cooperate in order to keep their government alive and it was only when they failed to maintain control that the Germans finally put the boot in and took over the whole shebang.

You also completely failed to address by point, you have whined about there being reasons for people to collaborate with an occupying force (and I wouldn't count the British in India as such anymore than the previous owners) but you haven't counted on the points I raised about the difference between the CFS and the Raj, either address my points or don't waste time pretending to reply to them.

Hitler's anti-semitism was very popular, and he was always talking of somehow getting rid of the Jews during his rallies.

There is a difference between deporting them and murdering them wholesale, there is a difference between leading Germany back to being a great power and trying to conquer all of Europe.

It was impossible not to know that. As for getting a job, the unemployment peak had passed by the time the elections that brought Hitler to power were held.

Yes the economy was just beginning to recover but when 30% of the workforce is unemployed they are quite willing to go for somebody who promise radical change which is exactly what Hitler did (and seemingly achieved although in a non sustainable way).

40% of the Germans were fascinated by that lunatic who had managed to arouse what is worse in man. Some of them may not have measured what would befall upon them as a consequence, but the evil was all to be seen. Mein Kampf was circulated, and many journalists did a perfectly proper job reporting what the man was about.

Mein Kampf was available yes but you will note that the Russians didn't take those ravings seriously and neither did the British or French or even the Jews who decided they could stay in Germany and live things down, I find it hardly suspiring that the average German didn't expect him to abide by his ramblings.

No, I did not assume any of the above. I simply wanted to illustrate that some prominent persons in Britain (I assume you'd acknowledge Thatcher was one, even if you don't share her policies) were not taking apartheid as serious issues even in the late 20th century. I could be mistaken, but I somehow recall Thatcher refused to apply the UN embargo on South Africa?

And again how is that relevant?

Thatcher deciding that an embargo wasn't going to help anybody (her opinion) doesn't in any way relate to my regret that Apartheid happened in the first lace, it doesn’t even show Thatcher wouldn't have preferred it to not happen.

Whoever pisses against the wind...

Ah but we set the tone, if we hadn't led the way would the French of Belgians have felt as much pressure to follow?

No, it was morally wrong, even if Ireland had not been part of the Empire. There were enough Catholics in Scotland or England who could deserve to participate to the political process, or make a career in the administration or the army. Even France had Protestant Ministers in the late 18th century. The issue may have been solved at some point, but that does not do any good to the previous generations. And the issues some raise about Blair's potential stealth Catholicism are unworthy of a modern country.

It may have been morally wrong but it still doesn’t rate as a major problem until the Irish were let into the Union.

I will assume this is deliberate attempt at provoking. I will not respond in kind.

Not at all, annexing Ireland and creating a unified government isn't something I am particularly unhappy with.

I would say in MOST cases (although not all).

But of course you would however I don't see your proof.

Of course it's a good thing. After a couple of good laughs at your sycophantic dances, this thread would get pretty boring.

Instead we got to see a lovely parade of red herrings, post colonial hand wringing and Leopold apologia.

Yes much better.