WI:France does not support the American War of Independence

As was already said, the french material support was necessary for the rebels to succeed. The french provided the insurgents with weapons (they had just finished reequipping their army with new weapons, so they had full warehouses ready to be distributed), ammo, food, uniforms and paid the troops and even government expenses. Without all that, there is no chance of a success of the rebellion and the leaders will hang or go into exile.

As for the effects of the french revolution, the causes of it were numerous; finance was one and the trigger point, but the real cause was that french society was in effect static, with high nobility taking all real political power, while the rising wealthy bourgeoisie and low nobility wanting their say. The combinaison of a bad weather leading to crop failure with a financial crisis which meant the crown could not buy food abroad and subsidise was the trigger. If the french financial state is better (i.e. if king and court do not piss the money away), then the famine can be avoided by subsidising food. This buys some time, but, unless that time is used for structural reforms of the french society (preferably under a constitutional monarchy) as well as financial ones, this only buys, in my opinion, a dozen years at most and the revolution will be triggered by the next crisis (which has interesting butterflies. e.g. Napoleon serving the Ottomans). The reforms in question are not impossible but extremely unlikely, especially given Louis XVI character (or lack thereof).

Another interesting effects is what effects would this have on England? I read that the ARW caused the RN to change a lot of its procedures and standing orders as they proved inneffective in battle against the french navy. What would happen if the RN stays as it is at the beginning of the ARW when the next big war against France occurs (esp if there is no french revolution - which means France is better off financially and so has a stronger navy and the french officer corp is not gutted)? What other effects did the success of the ARW had on England? What about the colonisation in India if the North Atlantic cost of America is still british?
 
Mainly the Bourbon naval policy which was "Build, Build, Build!"

Not only. It was also 'Train, Train, Train!' under the late Bourbons, as shown by the number of naval military school created. However, these were restricted to nobility mostly, even if loosely defined (the Bonapartes were defined so) and the Revolution pissed away the trained officer corp.
 
I don't think you can really get either without a PoD well before the American Revolution.

By the British being foresighted enough and less greedy so as to prevent themselves from a "grab all we can and book" strategy in terms of their choosing when they would end their own participation in the 7YW.

The British gained enormous advantages from dropping out of that war when they did. But by leaving their biggest Continental ally Prussia in the lurch (who were only saved by Czarina Elizabeth's death) in doing so, Britain gained the enmity (to one degree or another) of the whole of Europe. British policy had always been to support the second strongest power in Europe so as to insure that no one power could ever threaten Britain with an undistracted army of invasion.

But as of 1763, it was Britain itself who was seen as the greatest power (read: threat) in Europe. And the rest of Europe, to one degree or another, who felt that Britain very much needed to be taken down a peg. And with the ARW, the British faced a major land war distraction of their own while their enemies in Europe faced no land enemies at all.

It was a golden opportunity for Britain's foes that almost could not be missed. Not even in the Napoleonic Wars was Britain so outmatched in balance of forces. Napoleon had a weaker (qualitatively and quantitatively) navy, and he would always have Continental worries that did not exist in the ARW.

So if you want Britain to be unmolested fighting the ARW, then see to it that they don't win nearly so big in the 7YW, and that they don't hang their allies out to dry.

What do the French get in return?

So unless the British offer up something worthwhile, it is entirely in France's interest to weaken the British; France and Britain/England had been dueling for dominance in western Europe and the Mediterranean for decades ... to not support the Americans with everything they could spare would be surrender in that contest.

The Seventeenth to Nineteenth centuries define power politics in Europe, and the American Revolution gave France and the other European powers a real chance to destroy the British; if they had taken it, the future of Europe in the Eighteenth to Twentieth centuries would have been remarkably different.

Best,

The Spaniards made it clear to the French that they would be satisfied with nothing less than a Franco-Spanish Seamammal. If not for Vergennes' interference, disease in the Franco-Spanish Channel Fleets, August Keppel's leadership, the Earl of Sandwich being North's only competent minister, and Parliament's refusal to send the English Militia (1) to put down the "Dublin Riots" (really just public demonstrations for Free Trade, but London had released the hounds upon the Irish for far less provocation than that), England would have been more vulnerable to invasion since anytime since the creation of the Royal Navy:cool: as a true modern professional fighting force.

1) Which would have left the fortifications of Southern England empty at that time.

Mainly the Bourbon naval policy which was "Build, Build, Build!"

And a British inter-war policy 1763-1775 of letting the Royal Navy "Rot, Rot, Rot!":rolleyes: Winning too big in the last war can cost you in the next one. Just ask the Third Republic.

EDIT: ZERO support from France and I wonder if the Second Continental Congress will even declare independence? Anyway, in such an ATL, the Colonies get curbstomped, probably no later than the Spring of 1777. Year of the Hangman, indeed.
 
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What do the French get in return?

"Nations have no permanent friends or allies, they only have permanent interests," as a fairly well-known European statesman once said.;)

Statecraft is a deadly serious practice, especially in the terms of power politics - and opportunities to promote one's interests at the expense of a rival are not to be passed over lightly. In fact, one could say it would be downright inhuman - even "ASB"ish - to expect otherwise...

So unless the British offer up something worthwhile, it is entirely in France's interest to weaken the British; France and Britain/England had been dueling for dominance in western Europe and the Mediterranean for decades ... to not support the Americans with everything they could spare would be surrender in that contest.

The Seventeenth to Nineteenth centuries define power politics in Europe, and the American Revolution gave France and the other European powers a real chance to destroy the British; if they had taken it, the future of Europe in the Eighteenth to Twentieth centuries would have been remarkably different.

Best,

You say that as if the other powers didn't inflict a substantial defeat on the British in our timeline. They took away a fifth of the Empire by population, and an area with a potential to be a heck of a lot more. You could flip it the other way: if they had not taken their chance, the British *could* (assuming they sort domestic disputes) have had an even stronger hegemony and a lot sooner.
 
Has anyone considered that it might not even happen at all ...

... has anyone ever satisfactorily explained where the siege artillery the British found at Concord came from ???

24 pounders are not something that just appear out the resources available in Colonial America, France may have been meddling far earlier than its official support is recorded.
 
The actual advantage that Great Britain derived from its colonies is remarkably overstated. The United States-to-be provided less tax income for Great Britain's government than one half of a Caribbean island provided for the government of the Kingdom of France. In some hypothetical alternate universe where the US-to-be were not largely autonomous colonies and actually were some Spanish America-esque arrangement sending vast treasure fleets eastward over the Atlantic, I agree the American Revolution would have been a huge blow against Great Britain and thus a huge strategic victory for the Kingdom of France. In the real world, that simply was not true.

What the Kingdom of France gained was, mostly, just to spite Great Britain; the amount of income that the British government lost was not particularly great, and indeed it served as a great vindication of Adam Smith's ideas that the political control over the US-to-be did not greatly decrease the economic benefit to Great Britain of relations with those lands. What it lost was that it titanically screwed up its financial situation (well, even more than before, anyway) and provided a great deal of inspiration to domestic discontent, with the ultimate result of… the destruction of the Kingdom of France. This cannot possibly be viewed as a net benefit for the Kingdom of France, by which I mean, those human beings who were in power and making the decisions that governed the actions of the French.

Sure, it can be viewed as a net benefit for some nebulous concept of "France" if you imagine continuity of purpose between the royal Bourbons and the revolutionaries who hated them, overthrew them and killed them, but there is no good reason to imagine this to be the case beside modern nationalistic ideas that the men in question surely would not have felt; certainly Louis XVI, who made the decision to support the Americans and reaped the consequences thereof in the form of the loss of his power and his life, would have been unimpressed by that outcome. Some people prefer to view history through the prism of national interest. I disagree. What matters most is not national interest; what matters most is personal interest of each powerful individual involved, and national interest is only relevant in that it is sometimes in the personal interest of powerful individuals to be seen as supporting the idea of the national interest.

Therefore—supporting the American Revolution undoubtedly was an extremely poor decision on the part of the Kingdom of France. Obviously it was an excellent decision from the perspective of the Americans, and, probably, from the perspective of classical liberalism as a whole. But for the people who made the decision—the King of France and his reactionary, aristocratic advisers and government—it was an extremely poor decision, and they would have been well-advised to take the other one.

That said, I find myself (atypically) agreeing with TFSmith121 in one respect, which is: How do you persuade France not to intervene? After all, just because it was a stupid decision doesn't mean it was an unlikely one; anyone who attempts to model humans as perfectly rational actors is going to find it difficult to predict human behaviour. For the French government, the impulse to take vengeance upon the hated British enemy, regardless of the huge cost and distinctly minor benefits to them thereof and the terrible danger of inspiring domestic dissenters (and I daresay the French government would probably not have even thought of the latter factor), is going to be a strong one. I would say the problem is positive feedback. It was the early successes of the Americans that made France support them, which in turn bred more successes. If those were not to have occurred, the rebellion would have looked like a failed proposition in the first place, and the French government would have gritted its teeth and waited for the next opportunity to avenge the losses of the Seven Years' War. So for the challenge I'd think you would need British victories in 1776-'77, so that by the time France intervened in OTL it doesn't look like intervention is a credible prospect.

Of course, then you're left with the question of when the Americans rebel again (which they almost certainly will), and whether the French help them that time. Et cetera ad infinitum.
 
You say that as if the other powers didn't inflict a substantial defeat on the British in our timeline. They took away a fifth of the Empire by population, and an area with a potential to be a heck of a lot more. You could flip it the other way: if they had not taken their chance, the British *could* (assuming they sort domestic disputes) have had an even stronger hegemony and a lot sooner.

Reason Numero Uno why the Loyal Opposition spent the ARW pounding their collective skulls into the wall over North's/Mad King George's short-sightedness. And why just as the North Government has been considered one of the Worst. British. Parliamentary. Governments. Ever., so too IMVHO Britain's Loyal Opposition in the ARW was perhaps the greatest they ever had, with the names of giants among their number.:cool::cool::cool: IMO it was only the nature of a pre-1832/pre-1867 Great Reform Act parliamentary system (including the awful nature of the rotten boroughs) that allowed someone like North to last so long.:mad:

Make BNA (as a combined territory including what is the present day USA & Canada) a solid part of the British Empire, and you might even butterfly the 20th century's world wars.:cool::) OTOH, the Empire might well face a Europe united against such an awesome super-hegemony. ITTL, the "British going everywhere" speculation could well be justified. Within reason, at least. More a case of where else they would expand further rather than could they expand further.

Has anyone considered that it might not even happen at all ...

... has anyone ever satisfactorily explained where the siege artillery the British found at Concord came from ???

24 pounders are not something that just appear out the resources available in Colonial America, France may have been meddling far earlier than its official support is recorded.

TBH, that issue HAS been answered many times, but I don't honestly remember the details. Something about 7YW surplus IIRC. But don't quote me on that. If the Colonials were going to get arms from the French, they needed muskets, powder, bullets, and bayonets (the last of which they didn't have). If the Colonials were getting cannon from the French, then Knox's expedition to Fort Ticonderoga wouldn't have been needed.
 
The French get in return a functioning government and economy.Even Turgot,the finance minister was against going to war.

They had both ... Which is why they were able to help break the British Empire.

Which was ultimately to France's advantage.

Enemy of my enemy, and all that.;)

Best,

Err... They broke the British FIRST empire, which didn't stop them from their Second Empire. So that was not in the long run in France's advantage.

It also broke the French state, which was NOT to France's advantage.

So, I'd have to disagree with you here.
 
Err... They broke the British FIRST empire, which didn't stop them from their Second Empire. So that was not in the long run in France's advantage.

It also broke the French state, which was NOT to France's advantage.

So, I'd have to disagree with you here.


Actually it could be argued that what the british amassed after the american revolution paled in comparison to what they could have had.

Having all of north america behind them would have made britain near unstoppable and it would have given them far more secure supply lines that didnt stretch acrosss the planet.

Controlling large parts of africa,the indirect rule over india and having australia probably didnt make up for lossing the territory of the USA.

If they had been able to keep it they might not even have gone after those far flung territories to such an extent.
 
The Revolution was not doomed to fail without France.

The war had been ongoing for 4 years before France even declared war on Britain, Five years before Spain, and six years before the Netherlands.

America was holding their own.

France made no direct contribution to battle until 1781.

Naturally, the loans helped but Britain would have gotten tired eventually.

On another note, no one ever questions what would have happened to French political society of Great Britain had been left a transcendant power into the 1790's.

With utter domination of global trade and of North America, this would have left several interesting questions:

Would Britain eventually have tried to conquer Louisiana (Spanish at this time), Mexico and the rest of the Spanish Empire?

How would Britain's utter dominance of Trade, even in the Mediterranean change things?

With Britain so engorged, would not France find even adding secondary elements of Empire (Indochina and parts of Africa) virtually impossible?

Think George III, Emperor of China and Japan.

I think French intervention
 
Yes. France's support of the american insurgents, the way it was done, was a very generous ... suicide.

No clear and rational political goal that would serve national interest.

Laughable negotiations with the insurgents who basically got everything for free and gave nothing back in exchange later, except nice and empty words (it is true that France higly values nice and empty words).

Laughable strategy towards Britain. The goal was nothing more than prestige : inflict a defeat to Britain while it should have bet all on having an army cross the Channel.

Not to say astonishing contradiction in supporting insurgents asserting political and philosophical principles radically opposed to those founding the french political regime.
 
I dont think the british were that obsessed with territory,if anything lossing america made them that desperate.

The north american continent could covert most of the needs of the home islands easily.

Shortening ones supply line makes sense after all,why haul resourses over the planet when you can have a simple two way system across the north atlantic.

If anything britain would probably leave the mediteranian alone since it would be useless to them with no colonial supply lines to protect further south.
 
The actual advantage that Great Britain derived from its colonies is remarkably overstated. The United States-to-be provided less tax income for Great Britain's government than one half of a Caribbean island provided for the government of the Kingdom of France.

The British lost a captive market, had to deploy troops along the borders of a great power, lost the source of major naval supplies, and lost control of North America. This is a pretty good deal, IMO.

This is not including territories like Minorca or Florida.


Contemporary Britons certainly viewed it as a disaster.
 
No, no they didn't. After the war Britain and the U.S. became important trading partners
Sort of. the US was able to put up tariffs and restrict access to the American market, which it would do so. Look at the tariffs and barriers to the American market in the US compared to Canada throughout the 19th century.

And while the US wasn't a "great" power in 1783, the War of 1812 shows that containing it would require significant resources on the part of Britain.

Minorca and Florida's importance to the British wasn't much. Florida was worth nothing to Britain, it had no resources of import and was now in a bad position for a war against Amierica. Minorca was losing its importance it was a good naval base except for the fact that the French and Spanish easily took it twice and would have done so more if the British didn't cede it after the ARW.

If it was so useless, one wonders why Britain didn't cede it in return for Russian intervention or Spanish neutrality, as they considered...

I am fully prepared to agree with you that Lord North, George III, etc. were all idiots, but they did not view the loss of the colonies as "no big" the way you are.
 
The actual advantage that Great Britain derived from its colonies is remarkably overstated. The United States-to-be provided less tax income for Great Britain's government than one half of a Caribbean island provided for the government of the Kingdom of France. In some hypothetical alternate universe where the US-to-be were not largely autonomous colonies and actually were some Spanish America-esque arrangement sending vast treasure fleets eastward over the Atlantic, I agree the American Revolution would have been a huge blow against Great Britain and thus a huge strategic victory for the Kingdom of France. In the real world, that simply was not true.

There is quite a massive gulf between benign neglect and Spanish-style resource extraction. Longer term, there was room for tax to go up, providing other reforms went with it, like the elimination of mercantilist policies in the navigation acts. And, of course, the American south had yet to take off at the time of the ARW. While cotton was never as profitable as the Caribbean sugar trade, there was a heck of a lot more production of it that could bring in a huge boon to the British exchequer. A North American base could also mean the British could penetrate Latin American markets a lot sooner. And there's also the extra manpower for future wars.
 
The British absolutely did have a policy of exploitation on the American colonies. They banned them from trading with anywhere but Britain, and discouraged manufacturing and professions in the colonies. Ironically, this probably meant Britain got less out of America than she could have. Starving the chicken isn't the best way to get the most eggs.
 
Maybe if they manage to keep the 13 colonies longer they might realise the potential and just decide to fully integrate them into the united kingdom,the population were british subjects anyways so not much to lose.

It would help if the matter was decided by someone more able than the kings of the period,1 was psychologically unstable and the other was a glutton.
 
Yes, I agree, but the thing was the British garrisons against the Natives and Spanish were larger then the garrison of Canada.

Cite?

Russian intervention? Russia had problems of its own in Bavaria. Not to mention no interest in Minorca or Florida.

Russia wanted Minorca as a naval base. This is wrong; check out Three Victories and a Defeat for but one book discussing this point.
 
I ask you to look to the Caribbean and claim what was done in AMerica to be exploitation. In fact before the 7YW the British pretty much left their American colonies alone.

I'm not sure what your point is here. The British also engaged in worse exploitation in the Caribbean, yes. That does not mean they did not exploit America.

They set up a mercantilist system in the American colonies where the aim was for the colonies to benefit the people of Great Britain, and the welfare of the people of America was an irrelevance. This was a similar approach they had been doing to Ireland for a long time. The only difference was they enforced it in Ireland, and distracted attention had meant they did not in North America.

The debate in the 1760s was between the Tory view that they should start enforcing mercantilism and capital extraction from America (with extra provisions to make sure it happened if necessary), and the Whig view that they should respect the de facto evolution that had taken place there and look at American colonists as Englishmen with English rights.
 
The British lost a captive market

Where the fact that losing political control over the North American colonies did not actually translate to a great loss of economic benefits was a significant vindication of Adam Smith in his homeland. Did I forget to state this?

had to deploy troops along the borders of a great power, lost the source of major naval supplies, and lost control of North America. This is a pretty good deal, IMO.

This is not including territories like Minorca or Florida.

Contemporary Britons certainly viewed it as a disaster.

And?

How did Great Britain's political control of part of North America actually benefit Great Britain? The tax income that it provided to the British government was small; the economic benefit of relations with the United States was not vastly greater than it was after Great Britain lost political control thereof. Both these things I have noted; and one could also note that Great Britain had to station soldiers in British America, and was dragged into war by the endless expansionism of the American colonists, which continued even when it was politically inconvenient for the government in London. It does not take much thought to say "government X lost Y, so that was bad". It is decidedly more difficult to say "government X lost Y that was genuinely useful to government X because of Z, so that was bad". The loss of British America was not zero, but it was not as great a loss as nationalism would make many people like to think.

Ruling space on a map is not the same thing as a concrete benefit for the nation that does so. It all depends on what is gained from it; and from British America, propaganda aside, Great Britain gained little.

The American national myth makes it pleasant to imagine that the British Empire was this vast colossus deriving huge amounts of income from British America (cruelly robbed from the hands of the virtuous and oppressed freedom-loving people, naturally) and the loss of British America was some crippling blow to this evil hegemony. The practical facts are that the tax income derived from British America by the central government was rather small, the British Empire's era of greatest strength came after the loss of British America, and indeed the loss of British America did not greatly harm it save for its pride, which was certainly very greatly battered.

There is quite a massive gulf between benign neglect and Spanish-style resource extraction.

Of course there is, I concede that without doubt. The Spanish example was deliberately a dramatic one in order to illustrate the point.

Longer term, there was room for tax to go up, providing other reforms went with it, like the elimination of mercantilist policies in the navigation acts.

Would the British Empire, without the vindication of Adam Smith and blow dealt to mercantilism by the continued economic benefits of trade with the United States after the loss of political control there, have turned against mercantilism and been willing to take such a step at all, especially with a glorious Tory victory in crushing a revolution? One cannot remove such a huge British political event as the humiliation of the Tories and gain for the Whigs in the American Revolution without rather large effects on British politics.

And, of course, the American south had yet to take off at the time of the ARW. While cotton was never as profitable as the Caribbean sugar trade, there was a heck of a lot more production of it that could bring in a huge boon to the British exchequer.

Would it bring much of a boon to the exchequer in London, or to the exchequers of the colonists? Let me repeat that taxes on the whole of British America gained less for the British government than half a Caribbean island did for France. The idea that taxes on British America were high, or even moderate, does not stand up to the cold light of this fact.

Regardless—the French government could not have foreseen that, whereas it should have foreseen that it would be bankrupted and its domestic opponents emboldened.

A North American base could also mean the British could penetrate Latin American markets a lot sooner.

They penetrated Latin American markets thanks to the collapse of Spain, thanks to the French Revolution. As long as the Spanish Empire is alive, that's not going to happen.

And there's also the extra manpower for future wars.

Was there really? The American colonists were unhappy with paying for the British Army even when it needed paying for because it had just taken up lots of money conquering land for them, in a war they started. I doubt they would have been willing to send troops to fight wars for Great Britain in lands that were not their own.

Okay to prevent a French intervention you need to have the Spanish firmly refuse to support France in such an action. Without Spain's support France was not in a good position to oppose Britain, which is why Vergennes considered Spain's alliance indispensable in such a war. To do this have the British offer the return of Minorca to Carlos if he does not enter the war. This combined with Carlos presentiment against intervening on the Rebel side should prevent Spain from supporting a French intervention.

I'll take your word for it. But is a Great Britain rendered so arrogant and offensive to its European partners, even its former allies, with its victory in the Seven Years' War likely to be willing to lose face by offering to give up territory, even if it would be the sensible thing to do? And if Spain sees Great Britain feels itself weak enough that it (Great Britain) has to make such a step, does Spain take the offer, or feel emboldened and try for more?

Those are honest questions, not merely rhetorical.
 
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