Britain and Germany did the same kind of colonization but on a different scale .?

Question

if it was right for Britain to colonize the world , why was it wrong for Germany to colonize Europe? Surely Germany was less greedy and killed less people than Britain in achieving its aim.Mind you , Germany's colonisation of Europe triggered the two world wars , but Britain's colonization started from the date of African slavery.

Answer 1

It is a social phenomena.

England's standard mode of operation was to establish a colony and then destroy crop and other sustenance resources of the indigenous population starving them into submission. They did this in every colony they established except for the U.S., where they got run off, and Canada, where there were not enough resources to make it worth while.

If a country's population managed to survive and flourish, they repeated the process calling it population control in Parliament and boasting of the number of people they killed. As close to 2 million people starved in Ireland during the managed potato famine, Parliament lamented that the famine would only eliminate between 1 and 2 million Irish.

During their occupation, they managed to murder close to 8 million Irish, 3.5 million in India, and the entire population of Tasmania, just to name a few. Overall, they committed genocide in more countries against more people than Hitler ever dreamed of. As they were doing this, the press depicted the people that they were murdering as less than human with illustrations comparing them to such things as swine and apes. They clearly thought that they were of a superior race.

Why this is not as publicly visible as the Jewish holocaust is beyond reason.

Answer 2

At a time when colonisation was an accepted practise among more "developed" nations, Britain's empire was far more tolerant than many others: ask the Ethiopians of Italy's empire or the Congolese of King Leopold's (Belgium's) empire. Sure, Britain had it's problems: the trading of slaves, (which Britain also helped eradicate!), the Mau Mau rebellion, the Indian Mutiny and the invention of concentration camps in the Boer War but these are less significant compared to other empires!

Colonisation was never morally correct, (by today standards especially) but was accepted practise. The genocide of the Jews, Slavs, Gypsies and homosexuals was never and has never been considered "accepted practise". 27 million Russians and ethnic Slavs died on the Eastern Front in WW2, ("only" 8 million were Soviet troops); 6 million Jews in the gas chambers.

In a time of Empires, Britain's was far more tolerant than others. And ask yourself this: when it came to the crunch, when Britain and her Empire stood alone against the German pan-European Reich, would any other Empire have given it's all to defend freedom and democracy? Britain knew that fighting against the Reich would cripple her economy and destroy the Empire but it did the right thing, whatever the cost!

Answer 3

Is slavery right? No. But was it right 500years ago, well no but people considered it OK because it had been going on since the Egyptians in the 7th century, and trading in an existing commodity didn’t seem that wrong back then, so god knows who started slavery, the Brits just made slaves a global commodity and then made everyone ended it.

British colonisation was of poor countries that welcomed new technology and wealth that the traders brought (some of the time – well if some one offers to buy all your tea what you going to say? No?).
If they weren't welcome in India, how did 30,000 troops conquer a country of 200m plus?

If the British met too much resistance, they moved on, in the 1700's there was a lot of land for grabs. But by 1900's there wasn't much left. So people had to fight for it. Anyways, the US, Canada and India are huge countries with low landmass/population figures, Europe is densely populated.

But to answer your question, killing people for land is not good whatever the situation.
But Britain walked into most countries, and came out fighting
Germany went in fighting right from the beginning.

I don’t think the Brits killed anywhere near 20m people, which is how many Russians that died in the WW2

Answer 4

The answer seems to rest on the differences between Britain and Germany's conquests. I think it would be rather unpopular for anybody in the modern day to say that Britain's colonization was "right". However it does seem that we do view it as relatively 'less' wrong than Germany's conquest of Europe. Most of Britains colonization of the world was carried out a hundred years before Germany's. This is extremely relevant as culturally as well as morally humanity progressed a long way from the height of the British Empire to the rise of the third Reich.
Again this is relevant because on what terms do we morally judge historical events? Those of the modern age?... This is as fruitless as calling Newton an idiot because he didn't understand genetics. Standards of the present cannot meaningfully be applied to past. During Britain's colonization everybody in europe was following similar policies, most of the western world considered it morally acceptable to do so. However in the case of Germany europe was full of self governing fully formed states that did not want in any shape or form to be invaded by and controlled by Germany, in short Germany had nothing to offer except a loss of freedom. However in the age of Colonization all the Powers of Europe had things to offer the lands they eventually took that some at least at the time wanted; i.e. trade goods, technology, weapons to help subjugate other local tribes.

The atrocities of any European power in their colonies can to a large degree be put down to ignorance. In most cases colonization of the time was down to idealists creating an intellectual atmosphere of "helping civilise the masses". This allowed the inevitable greed to rationalised and appear under the guise of a fair trade (labour, resources for civilisation). However with Germany the motive was purely conquest one which many at the time deemed immoral (hence the World War), that is without mentioning the acts of calculated and methodical genocide, based on not faulty beliefs of superiority, but instead deliberate and calculated propoganda.

In essence from our point of view neither was morally right, however neither were they the same type of colonization. Further slavery was taking place at the time of the ancient Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, Persians. In fact Africans were selling each other into slavery long before there ever was a British Empire.

Answer 5

Is there a difference between colonising and gaining land in war and temporarily occupying those lands? I think there is. So why pick on Germany? Can't be bothered to go to the Internet, but if my memory serves me correctly at the height of the British Empire, at least two thirds of the globe was coloured pink. Germany had Namibia for about 15 years and Northern Cameroon for a shorter period. If you want to point a finger at colonialists other than the British, try Spain, France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Turkey (Ottoman Empire) or Portugal. At one stage there was a Papal decree dividing the known world between Spain and Portugal. Italy had Abyssinia (now Ethiopia and Eritrea) and Libya.

Answer 6

Britain colonized the world solely for the purpose of extracting resources and opening up new markests., They also used indirect rule, often leaving indigenous popluations in charge (often at the expense of other indigenous people, but that is a diiferent story). There are exeptions to this rule, of course. Germany did not "colonize". They were not looking for new markets, or extracting resources in Europe. There were looking for Lebunsruem (sp?) meaning "living space" for the German people. The ultimate goal was the enslavement and eventual annihilation of the inhabitants of these areas (Eastern Europe), specifically the slavs. So, yes, colonization is not cool. But you can't judge people who lived 200 years ago for not adhering to the morals/values of today. As far as comparing Britain and Germany, you are mixing apples and oranges my friend.

Answer 7

If all 3 were to declare war on each other....Everyone would get demolished, probably france first cos its in the middle geographically. Britain and Frances navies would annihilate each other, Germany would still control the baltic though. I dont know but you have 3 very modern and well trained armed forces having a 3 way war. Theres gonna be a lot of blood.

Answer 8

Colonization implies settlement and establishment of order within a geographic area to increase your mercantilistic base by providing an area for finished goods to be sold and raw materials collected. What you are saying is completely the opposite. Their is a big difference between colonization and genocide.

Answer 9

So what are you saying...two wrongs make a right? Neither was good but modern world history is defined by conquests so what either nation did is not new...similar instances can be found in ancient history.......

But I'll play....WW2 for the Germans was largely motivated by ethnic cleansing which we now all agree is heinous and cannot be tolerated while the English were motivated by economic goals which one can argue might look a little better on paper than genocide under the heading of "Mission"...but neither one is truly better than the other......

Answer 10

for a start they both had very different systems of goverment. hitler wasa dictator, the british empire was a democracy. the british empire although killed many people did not commite mass extermination like hitler.

many parts of the british empire were not taken over in the same way as what the germans did in europe. for example when the british took control of india. india did not exist as its own country but rather a number of different states. british rule was less harsh in many cicumstances than there previous rules. try asking the polish or french is german rule was better than there previous rule.