The defeat of the so called Spanish Armada in 1588 by the English navy during the reign of Queen Elizabeth 1 marked the beginning of the dominance of the British Navy which later provided the means by which the British Empire was built. Admiral Alfred Thayer Mayan in his seminal book on sea power has demonstrated admirably the influence of sea power on history and how this is a key to understanding the rise and fall of the British empire. At the height of the empire it was usually stated that the sun never set on the empire that stretched from Canada in the North American continent in the west to India and Australasian countries of Australia and New Zealand and islands in the pacific. As the sun is about to set in North America, it will be rising in the eastern possessions of the empire. The British were justifiably proud of the awesome achievement of a small island nation dominating the world. It achieved this feat not through territorial expansion in Europe as the other European powers like Spain, France, the Netherlands, Austria, Germany and Russia tried to do. In fact, Britain’s power was based on staying away from European diplomatic and military entanglement. Whenever Britain intervened in Europe, it was to maintain a balance of power. This policy of “little Englanders” sufficed for a long time and saw Britain come out victorious in two world wars. Of course it was the power of the new world redressing the balance of the old world of Europe that secured victory for Britain in the two world wars. If not for Americans, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders and less celebrated efforts of people in the sub-continent of India and our own people in the Anglophone countries in Africa south of the Sahara, Great Britain would not have remained great for this length of time.
It was therefore understandable for Winston Churchill after the Second World War In 1945 to declare that he would not be “the First Lord of the Treasury (prime minister) to preside over the liquidation of the British empire. “Unfortunately for Churchill, there were potent forces at work undermining the empire and in hindsight, it seems no one could have stood against the force of history. Beginning with India and Pakistan in 1947, Ceylon in 1948 to be followed by Sudan in 1955 and the Gold Coast (Ghana) in 1957 and a host of others including Nigeria in the 1960s the British Empire dissolved into its various national entities.
While this was going on, France and Germany after the Second World War decided to co-operate by pooling their resources together shepherded by their two illustrious sons of General Charles de Gaulle of France and Konrad Adenauer of Germany by forming what later evolved into the European Economic Community ( EEC) and now the European Union(EU). Britain following its well laid down tradition of distancing itself from European entanglement, kept away and continued to manage its empire whose size after the war was still considerable. By the 1970s it occurred to the leaders of Britain that it could no longer afford to cut itself off from the economic development and regional integration in Europe, particularly as its trade was beginning to be closely tied up with Europe. On January 1, 1973 Great Britain became a member of the European Economic Community. Even at that time not every one of its leaders were persuaded that membership in the economic community was absolutely desirable. Thus developed two groups of Euro- sceptics and pro-Europeans within the British political spectrum. As European politicians began to dream big of a federal Europe, the British became worried about losing their peculiar British tradition in a Europe economically dominated by Germany – the biggest economy in Europe, and politically dominated by the French who always had the support and understanding of Germany as founding nations. European integration gathered more speed with most of the countries with the exception of a few refuseniks like Britain adopting a common currency the Euro on January 1, 1999. Then followed the Schengen Agreement by which most of the countries in the European Union adopted more or less a common immigration policy that permitted freedom of movement of one country’s visa holders entering all countries of the Schengen group. The admission into the European Union of countries in Central Europe just coming out of communist domination and granting them right of movement in the union and many of them flooding British cities upset many Britons who felt they should have control on those who come to live in their country . What seemed to have finally made some Britons to agitate against remaining in the European Union was the possibility of the admission of Muslim Turkey. Euro-sceptics whipped up emotions of Britain being swamped by uncontrollable foreign immigration and possibly of Muslim Turks when Turkey becomes a member of the European Union. The rising British opposition to Europe forced the government of David Cameron to negotiate for Britain’s control of its immigration. The EU was not going to have the British benefit from the European market while having power to keep Europeans from living in Britain. This was what forced David Cameron, the prime minister in 2016 to gamble on a referendum of whether to leave the European Union or stay. He had hoped and campaigned that Britain should stay but the rise of nationalism and nativism triumphed over economic common sense and the British people voted to leave in a vote that sharply divided the country into 52 percent leavers and 48 percent remainers. Analysing the vote shows people in Northern Ireland and Scotland voted to remain while people in wales and England voted to leave. The youth to which the future belongs voted to stay while the older generation who are less educated and more inclined to be xenophobic voted to leave. As an honourable man, David Cameron resigned as prime minister and was succeeded by Theresa May who after three years of negotiations with the European Union got a deal which the British parliament rejected three times thus forcing her to resign. The new prime minister, Boris Johnson who is regarded as an unprincipled and ambitious man is now saddled with getting a deal with Europe which the British parliament would approve. Boris Johnson has made it clear that with or without a deal, Britain will leave the European Union on October 31. He has asked for radical changes in the deal negotiated by Theresa May. He is particularly piqued by the so-called Irish backstop, an agreement to prevent a hard border between Northern Ireland which is part of Britain and the Republic of Ireland. Removal of this Irish back stop could conceivably undermine carefully negotiated peace deal between the nationalist forces of Sin Fein and its armed wing the Irish Republican Army ( IRA) and the British. Undeclared war has been raging between the British and the Irish Catholics in Ulster since the division of their Island between the Catholic south and the largely Protestant Northern Ireland which has substantial catholic minority who feel discriminated against.
American meddling in this crisis is changing what is an internal affair of Great Britain. Barack Obama as president of the USA had advised against Britain leaving the European Union. Trump has now promised post-BREXIT United Kingdom a rapidly negotiated trade deal to replace whatever the United Kingdom may be losing by withdrawing from Europe. The United States House of Representatives has said through its speaker Nancy Pelosi that no matter what President Trump may promise his British mimic, Boris Johnson, the U S Congress will not pass a USA- UK trade deal if there is a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. People of Irish descent are well mobilized against any British – European Union agreement that will jeopardize peace on the island of Ireland. Furthermore the Scottish National Party( SNP ) which is the ruling party in Scotland has said since the people of Scotland did not vote to leave the European Union, any precipitous British withdrawal from the European Union will trigger another referendum in Scotland about whether Scotland should remain as part of the United Kingdom or not. If Scotland were to withdraw from the United Kingdom, the status of Northern Ireland in the United Kingdom will now have to be determined either by a referendum or continued Irish Republican Army (IRA) campaign. If Britain were to withdraw without a deal with the European Union, there will be serious consequences. In spite of continued security alliance with Britain, the European Union will not be economically open to Britain as a partner. A new agreement would have to be fashioned out which will not be as favourable to Britain as when it was in the European Union. The upshot of all this will be rapid decline of the country because its products will not continue to receive most favourable conditions in Europe and London which for many years has been perhaps the most important financial centre in the world will lose its pre-eminent position to cities like Paris, Frankfurt, and Dublin with devastating effects on the British economy. This could lead to the unravelling of United Kingdom with Scotland voting to leave the country.