What do you guys think happened to the British Empire?

Question

The British Empire was the largest empire by GDP, landmass, and population the world has ever seen. It also had one of the strongest navies the world has ever seen. By 1913 it held 458 million people (one fourth of the world's pop), and 14.2 square miles of land (one fourth of the land on Earth). I believe that Gandhi had a role in liberating India, inturn dissolving the British East India company (the main revenue source for the empire), King George III also dealt the empire a blow when he lost the thirteen colonies. Major fires in London hurted the economy. The two World Wars drained Great Britain. And the sheer distance the empire's land was spreaded out made it easy for foreign power attacks and revolutions to start in one certain area. What do you think happened to the British Empire that forced it into a small island country today known as the U.K?

Answer 1

it became the commonwealth, india was returned to its rightful people, ghandi played an infleuential role in getting his country liberated,however the history of the british empire will show that given the historical data at the time of Englands rise to the mechanical age, that was built upon the exploitatian of other countries, once that was realised Britain did the correct thing in re evaluating its foriegn policy starting with the abolishment of slavery.
There are many countries around this world that are friends of Britain,every nation has its empire this was ours, perhaps America decided that economic empire has all the benifits with none of the retrobution, you dont have to educate ,build schools hospitals,infrastructure, if you cripple the country with coke and that bloody burger,you just finnance a small coup here a little war there sit back and watch them decimate themselves.
we even sent convicts to one of our far flung outposts and they made a better job of running that country than our own elected government. im quite happy to someone else to do all the hard work we get the nuts taxed off us for the empire we havent had for over a century, thars why we all moved to spain. LF

Answer 2

The British Empire, by far, surpassed the Greatness of Roman Empire (Including Eastern Roman Empire). Then, when the time of changes came, it changed, successfully. Britishers (I like this Indian noun) use today their enfant terrible (USA) as the front shield, keep on developing Commonwealth, keep on "conquering" EU (smart approach) not by force but the advantages of the language.
Thus the question: What do you think happened to the British Empire that forced it into a small island country today known as the U.K? does not correspond to the reality. They applied Byzantine experience to be greater than ever. I have traveled a lot, visited many cities, yet only Istanbul (Constantinople) and London openly show to a visitor that they are IMPERIAL cities.

Answer 3

They treaded us like second class citizens. They imposed taxes upon us, but didn't give us a voice in Parliament. They required that manufacturing trade go through England. They quartered their soldiers on private property without payment. They confiscated firearms. They required us to be members of the Church of England. Pretty much everything that's included in the Bill of Rights were all things the British Empire did to us, and our Founders wrote those 10 Amendments to make sure the new government could not do the same thing.

Answer 4

The British Empire was bound to be a casualty of the 20th century. Maybe the second World War advanced it by about ten years. It was just something Britain couldn't afford, especially after the addition of Africa - Gladstone said 'This will beggar us' and how right he was. India, too, from an asset had become a liability.

Answer 5

I think the Second World War and the rise of native nationalism afterward, plus a crisis of conscious, brought the British Empire down.

Answer 6

well, simply stated, as is the case with all previous empires throughout history, it rose and then declined, and fell.. that's the natural cycle for all that "comes into existence", is it not? how's the american "empire" doing? seems to be in a bit of a decline to many ;-)

Answer 7

If memory serves me correctly, most of it had something to do with the Socialist labour party buggering things up (like they do everytime the country goes stupid enough to vote them in to power)

Answer 8

the empire got so big, there were'nt enough troops to occupy and, hang on to all of it.