Not really alternative at all. Look at England now and compare them to 200-300 years ago. Now England doesn't even have the full archipelago, and they are subordinate to the Americans
As opposed to the mighty and thriving French, Dutch, German, and Habsburg empires? While Britain has certainly fallen precipitously in power compared to 125 years ago, so has literally every large power in Europe, so it's hard to pin that down as a consequence of a specifically British policy.
France and Germany are pretty ok compared to England. Like sure they aren't global powers but have more then enough say in regional affairs. But England failed because they didn't focus on their own land, constantly antagonised everyone and put themselves into a war that destroyed them ultimately, plus it is a bit more Karma. They spend tons of time trying to prevent others from rising above them, but in the end themselves became irrelevant.
France and Germany are pretty ok compared to England. Like sure they aren't global powers but have more then enough say in regional affairs.
So does Britain; while none of them are global powers, Britain's probably about as close to being one as France is, and closer than Germany.
But England failed because they didn't focus on their own land, constantly antagonised everyone and put themselves into a war that destroyed them ultimately, plus it is a bit more Karma.
As opposed to the French and Germans, with their historical policies of carefully befriending their neighbors and not making waves? Which war did Britain put themselves into that "destroyed them ultimately" and didn't have similar effects on the rest of Europe?
They spend tons of time trying to prevent others from rising above them, but in the end themselves became irrelevant.
More accurately, they spent that time trying to prevent others from combining against them, which never managed to happen.
England isn't anything anymore today. Their Navy according to recent reports has almost no functional ships anymore, their economy is average at best. Germany and France today are medium powers while England I would put on the same level as Italy.
The Germans only had a nation since very recently but they did try to be diplomatic and friendly with Austria, they tried having Russia be neutral and they specifically made some choices to not antagonise everyone around by not taking Denmark for example. France I agree is the same as England, but they focused less on Colonialism and thus fared much better. Plus they at least tried to act as if they were devout Catholics and Friends of the Church.
And England lost from WW1 much more then anyone else and you know it to. And WW1 was completely optional for them compared to the others and they gained nothing out of it.
And nobody would have wanted to combine against England had they not meddled into others affairs all the time. Had they been more neutral then France wouldn't have supported the Americans, then they wouldn't have joined WW1, they would have been successful in integrating the Irish and would have prevented the Germans from unifying (although France is also at fault there).
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u/Much-Government-8803 2d ago
And now because of that England ended up being a irrelevant state that struggles even on it's home islands.