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Comment by alcuin | Hacker News Reader

>but the UK is the most powerful Empire to ever have existed.

Interesting to see this popular myth still being regurgitated when someone as perceptive as Bertrand Russell who lived through part of it admitted it was self-aggrandizing propaganda. In truth 80% of the British "Empire" were impoverished Indians. While back at home the Blue Books were churning out shocking reports of the misery and physical state of the British working class compared to their American and European peers. Read the archives from the early 20th century for a real eye-opener. And to top it all off, the "rule the waves" trope when Britain lost the Battle of the Chesapeake, aka the one naval battle that truly mattered in its history.

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Ultimatly, the new-comer empires got the old warhorse in such a fight, it had to give up the empire- and the us wisely kept out of that classic extractive empire buisness, supporting free trade to placate all those sandwiched late-comer nation as empires going hyperactive.

So in a way, germany got its wish- the french and british empire where no more after 2 world wars.

Germany didn’t want to destroy the British and French empires. They wanted continental domination and their “place in the sun”. Germany remains central to Europe as is unavoidable but it’s not dominating the continent in the way either the Kaiserreich or the third Reich wanted.

Incidentally there was no greater period of free trade in human history than under British hegemony. Even the US has not pursued unilateral free trade.

I wouldn't say the UK is now, but was the most powerful empire to have existed. What else would you call a nation that 65 nations have claimed independence from? They can't claim independence if they weren't once part of the empire.

> physical state of the British working class compared to their American and European peers

Probably not European, British workers were very well paid by continental standards (cost of living was higher though). If you want an example of pure exploitative capitalism where workers were reduced to near serfdom there is Belgium.

In which European countries were wages higher than in Britain? In which countries were the living conditions so much higher than in Britain in that period? That Britain ruled India and India was poor is no secret but that also doesn’t mean they weren’t powerful.

Also regarding Chesapeake, Britain’s century of hegemony came afterwards. Trafalgar came afterwards, and mattered a lot. Losing that battle doesn’t mean the navy wasn’t globally dominant in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

What’s the Bertrand Russell quote?

You can list a long series of reasons why they were weak and crap, ackshually. But presumably plenty about them was also not weak and crap otherwise they wouldn’t have ended up the global hegemon for a century. Certainly in terms of global trade dominance, at their peak nobody in history has come close, not China and not the USA.

Are you claiming that the Battle of Trafalgar didn't matter?

The Royal Navy indeed won many battles "that mattered". Saying that Chesapeake is the only one is just ridiculously ahistorical.

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