The British Empire

Was the British Empire any good at beating armies with similar technologies? E.g the French, Germans, Russians? Prior to 1900?

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That depends.

Is the fight on land or at sea.

The British were always a naval power, with a highly professional, but very small ground military.

They beat the Russians in the Crimean war. French in Napoleonic wars. Im sure there are others but cant think of any off hand

they were great at beating enemy fleets, especially after the Anglo-Dutch wars.
For centuries their wars were won at the sea, and the consequences of those wars were France or Spain losing some colony.

I dont think they ever fought alone, on land, in Europe, after the middle ages.

lol?

they warred and beat the french for about a thousand years straight which sort of gave germany a chance to exist. that and varus.

#longbow memes

The British were always thinking long term and always very cautious. They never got themselves involved in a war by themselves, they always had allies. They could easily control the seas but on land they never fought alone and often had others fight for them. Consequently, you probably have to revise the question a bit.

The British Empire often won it's wars, but British Interests did not always win through. The first five wars of coalitions against the french were won by - the french. But the british were never decisively beaten, because they controlled the seas, so they could come back for more.

But even the final battle of Waterloo was a joint british, prussian and dutch venture.

I can't really think of any one single war in modern times that the British have won on their own, except maybe the French and Indian war and the Falklands...

Lol?

The French did most of the job in Crimean and the Russian/Germans did most of the job with Nappy

Everyone already know that Britain is good at taking credit for their allies victories, OP wondered if they were able to fight too?

No they werent, neither before nor after 1900
Britain always took part in coalitions to defeat its rivals (Spain before 1650, France until 1815 and Germany in the WWs)

They most often did jack shit in Euope, and while their rivals were busy focusing on the European theater, Brits would send all their army overseas to steal colonies (Queen Anne's War, French and Indians War...etc)

The British army was generally terrible which is why it took them a decade to beat a bunch of outnumbered frogs in the French and Indians War, why they lost to untrained farmers in the US Revolution, why it took them 6 fucking years to win the Peninsular War despite it being a secondary theater Napoleon never set a foot on, why they surrendered at Singapore and fled at Dunkirk

Basically, Britain was pretty bad at war but was very clever which allowed them to thrive

Just like Americans taking credit for WW1 and WW2. Actually the reality was, Britain and her Commonwealth countries had to face off Imperial Germany alone for the most part when everyone was busy doing their own thing. And sure, America joined in to help them but they were only last minute extra cherries on top to solidify a victory.

WW2 was extremely different where instead of the Brits doing most of the work it was actually Russia doing all of it this time with the Allies half-ass helping her bit by bit on the Western Front (as they had put off an invasion onto Nazi occupied mainland Europe for a year or two).

What I'm trying to say here is, even though they had allies, the people who did the actual fighting when the percentages came down to it are the ones that should be praised in the annals of history, not necessarily the ones who helped the fighters.

>this is taught in schools today

>with a highly professional, but very small ground military.

That's a meme created by the Americans to make their victory in the revolutionary war seem more glorious
The British army was utter cancer and the laughing stock of the European armies
They performed okay against the USS rebels, but each time they faced other European armies they got trashed unless they had help from other powers

>but each time they faced other European armies they got trashed unless they had help from other powers

Got any examples?

>Just like Americans taking credit for WW1 and WW2. Actually the reality was, Britain and her Commonwealth countries had to face off Imperial Germany alone for the most part when everyone was busy doing their own thing

Get a load of this disgisting bong taking all credit for himself as always

In WW1, France made the heavy lifting even more than Britain
Sure Britain was relevant (compared to the european wars it fought before), but France still had more troops and the leadership of the allied war effort
Trying to remove them from the picture to give yourself an heroic image is pathetic

For WW2, I don't think I really need to explain.
Britain was a fucking joke while America and the Soviets won the war
We allowed Churchill at Yalta out of kindness, but you were never needed except to be used as a base from where to launch our invasion

Most Napoleonic battles

>They beat the Russians in the Crimean war
No, they didn't

wew tyrone.

No.

>For several centuries the British have ravaged the world. They have spilled the blood of Americans and Europeans, Asiatics and Africans in their mad race for conquest and loot. This they achieved, not by military prowess, but by guile and terrorism, and by a careful selection of whom and when to attack. They are not a fighting race, and in all their history, never once have they won a war, when alone, against a first-class power. The only time they attempted this was against America, when Lord North and his British troops were ignominiously kicked into the sea by the young, half-armed and half-trained Americans. It is quite true that the British have always been one of a winning combination, as when at different periods they fought Spain, France, Russia, Germany and Italy, but one looks in vain through the pages of history for a single instance of success when challenging alone a country of even half Britain's strength. Britain's proud boast is that she has fought seventy-seven wars in the last four hundred and fifty years, but her jingoes always omit to mention that ninety per cent of these victories were the slaughters and massacres of unarmed tribesmen from the jungles of West Africa to the rice-fields of China. When I was a schoolboy our geography told us that the British possessions were colored red, and the large map of the world on the school all and the globe were patched deeply with that color. It was only later in life that I could appreciate how appropriate this color was.

>unarmed tribesmen
>china
ok

well I'm not a chinaman, nor am I versed in Chinese history and lore, but I don't think you could've considered the Chinese at this time to be particularly advanced on a micro scale in many of their communities, past what we might call tribalism

youtube.com/watch?v=pifOYo7SjNc

You're aware that Qing China (the one Britain defeated) was a fucking shitshow and had nothing to do with current China, right?

>They are not a fighting race, and in all their history, never once have they won a war, when alone, against a first-class power.

Doesnt this apply to the US as well then?

>despite it being a secondary theater Napoleon never set a foot on
Uh, user:....

The Pacific War theatre is the one exception.

The comparision is between West Africans and the Chinese. That's not a sensible comparision by any stretch.

ok

>The Pacific War theatre is the one exception.
Hardly they had China tying up the Bulk of Japans resources and basing/support from Australia

When did Napoleon face the Brits in Spain?

They did reasonably well in the War of Spanish Succession, the Seven Years War, the Peninsula War and the Crimean War.
In most of the other wars they were still above average but still nothing to brag about.

They were a juggernaut at sea though once they got past the Dutch and the earlier french attempts at dominance at sea; so in every conflict were the blue sea was an important tactical feature you better bet your money on them (with the one exception being the US War of Independence)

>They did reasonably well in the War of Spanish Succession, the Seven Years War
Only if you focus on the irrelevant North American theaters
They got stomped in Europe in the Spanish Succession and barely did shit at all in the Seven Years War

>the Peninsula War
No
Taking 6 fucking years to beat beack a second-rate French army one a remote theater while Napoleon and the main French army where busy elsewhere isnt "well"

>the Crimean War.
Britain performed horribly in that war
If it wasn't for France, Russia would've won

I agree for the naval part though
Britain was great at sea, but they were terrible on the land

>nothing to do with current China.

Yes, user. Modern China's a completely different country in a different part of the world. Qing China was in Africa.

During his invasion of 1808.
The British had kicked out the tiny occupation force in Portugal and then tried to go to Madrid to secure it, but had to learn that the main spanish frontline had been annihilated.

Napoleon was more then delighted to finally face the British after they had been hiding on their isle all the time; and hurled some corps at them (thus saving Southern Spain from being invaded for the next year or so); at which the British fled in pure panic to the sea, abandoning the massive arms and supply depots they had built for the spanish war effort and in the final battle (where Napoleon was not present though, he remained in Madrid) they narrowly avoided being driven in the sea though suffered huge casualties and their top leaders were killed, before escaping on the ships and sailing back home (and of course in best Dunkirk tradition calling it a great victory)

Brit here

No but we were good at playing the game

Paddies can bitch about muh tribesmen all they want as well, but Ireland is only known thanks to us and St. Patricks day

...

why is it we always defeat the british so easily?

why are they such a failure of a nation compared to us?

Come on, thats going for the other extreme. The US did the absolute majority of heavy fighting that defeated the Japanese (and if you want to talk about other powers kicking down poor Nippon, than I would rather mention the Commonwealth or Soviet Union then China)

fucking what?

The US were hiding on their continent while the French did all the fucking work

>Doesnt this apply to the US as well then?

And aren't the UK and US quite successful when looking at history?

Shit leadership, underestimating fucking Napoleon of all people and facing with a relatively unproven army some of the most elite divisions of the Grand Armee in that particular case.

Also I dont think I need to remind you, what the final score of France vs GB in the Peninsular War was (and while it is true that the French were only kicked out after the whole Invading Russia bussiness and then pulling out every half decent commander and unit to form the new front in Germany; its still no secret that the French did not exactly were at their best during the larger battles in Spain)

You sound like a buttmad anglo. Face it, we BTFO'd you.

>US American thinking they did shit in ww2 in europe

>They got stomped in Europe in the Spanish Succession
I'm pretty sure you are thinking about a different war here, because the Spanish Succession War was probably one of the heights of british land power. I think they lost never a major battle (despite fighting from the beginning till the end), broke the myth of french invulnerability, faced again and again the main armies under the best french marechals and still prevailed every time.
While Wellington was a meme general, Marlborough was the real deal.

>and barely did shit at all in the Seven Years War
They destroyed the french colonial empires in NOrthern America and India, while facing France on the continent with a bunch of shit tier second rate german troops and still kicked them back over the rhine. I mean honestly, what more do you expect them to do?

>the Peninsula War:
They won their battles and then that war, thats all what counts. We are not claiming that they defeated the Napoleonic Empire at the height of their power, but in that particular theatre they performed very well.

tricky question, the empire didnt really need to fight any major european armies, the empire not really being a thing until the mid to late 18th centuries.

if you mean did the british forces do well in the fighting that established the empire then yes, yes they did.

jesus the bias, they beat the french in the 7 years war despite the french mounting guerrilla campaigns (you need more troops if you must defend a larger area) they tended to be roughly equal at point of contact, for example the battle of the plains of abraham, in which 4000 british troops crushed 4000 french.

they lost the revolutionary war only after massive french intervention and the US army wasnt untrained farmers having taken every chance they had to train.

as for the rest the english army was always small but consisting of well trained volunteers and was considered to have very good troops and frequently quite bad generals (good generals with good troops lead to things like marlboroughs campaigns)

war of the spanish succession,
that would be the one marlborough fought? the one where he kicked frech arse so comphrensively that the french king ended up thanking one of his generals for not losing as terribly as the last 3, a war in which every british objective was met and the british only gained.

and the seven years war while notable for the fact that the british essentially gained much of the empire in the fighting also featured such incidents as the battle of minden where the british contingent of the allied army essentially won the battle more or less unassisted and almost by accident, misinterpreting a order to 'march upon the sound of the drums' meaning to march when they heard a drum signal to mean march to the sound of drums, started the drummer boys playing and advanced on the enemies center punching through and collapsing the enemy army, while their allies looked on astounded until they realised the british were winning and joined in

>hurrr I'm an anglo retard hurr

If Reventlow is right they were just pirate raiders seizing all kind of ship in time of war with the excuse of carrying contraband.

Well, it was true that they had a small, professional army at the beginning of ww1 and were probably to most experienced at private level because of the boer wars and other colonial engagements, but then I guess plebs like to generalise it to a few centuries.

french losses versus british over the course of the peninsular war paint a different picture, the french lost most of the major battles, getting absolutely smashed at salamanca

>We allowed Churchill at Yalta out of kindness

wow, i though all the ww2 staff members of US High Command were already dead.

post about your experiences during the war please

yeah most napleonic battles, indeed most battles from the musket period, british troops were known for being harder to break than anyone elses and damned good at the musketry part of the fighting, generalship is extremely spotty but the redcoats were well regarded by other armies even when the generals werent, when the generals were good, then you got battles like salamanca, the plains of abraham or blenheim.

the british army was like the navy in that its troops were very well trained, the navy however tended to have numerical superiority and better admirals than the army had generals

can we tone it down with the "invulnerable sea juggernaut a bit?"

I mean sure, the brits did have the strongest navy post Napoleon and they were always good semen, not to mention they focused their strategy towards naval power, but they certainly weren't as some here portray them.

For one, they had a lot of trouble competing with the Spanish and the Dutch in the 16th and 17th century, the loss of the English armada and their defeats in the Anglo-Dutch wars being a big thing.
Even once they got their thing running, it wasn't complete naval dominance, in fact, during the Napoleonic wars, the brits were afraid of the naval power of the combined French and Spanish fleets and Trafalagar was a very unlikely event.

sorry for the horrible grammar, something something, the jews are responsible

>I'm pretty sure you are thinking about a different war here, because the Spanish Succession War was probably one of the heights of british land power. I think they lost never a major battle (despite fighting from the beginning till the end), broke the myth of french invulnerability, faced again and again the main armies under the best french marechals and still prevailed every time.
>While Wellington was a meme general, Marlborough was the real deal.
That has to be a joke
Marlborough (who always fought with more German troops than British ones) had some success at tye beginning, but then started to take massive losses against numerically inferior French forces, which culminated with the pyrrhic "victory" at Malplaquet.
fter that, the British cowardly pulled out and France decisively defeated their now allies at Denain, effectively undoing all what had been done by Marlborough and winning the War of the Spanish Succession

>They destroyed the french colonial empires in NOrthern America and India, while facing France on the continent with a bunch of shit tier second rate german troops and still kicked them back over the rhine. I mean honestly, what more do you expect them to do?
Don't lie to yourself
Britain did jack shit in Europe during the 7YW
All they did was take a decade to steal Quebec from a French force they outnumbered 4 to 1

>They won their battles and then that war, thats all what counts. We are not claiming that they defeated the Napoleonic Empire at the height of their power, but in that particular theatre they performed very well.
They lost shittons of battles against heavily outnumbered Frenvh forces
Britain performed so badly that hadnt it been for numerical advantage and French defeats on the more important theaters, Wellington would have never seen the Pyrenees

>they tended to be roughly equal at point of contact
Sure, like at the Battle of Carillon?

>for example the battle of the plains of abraham, in which 4000 british troops crushed 4000 french.
Why would you lie on the internet?
That battle saw 4;400 British soldiers face 1,900 French soldiers and 1,500 natives

>Thread about the glorious British empire
>French butt hurt derails the thread

Every time

Marlborough was order to leave by the Austrians and the U.K. Still won the Spanish succession

it's not our fault we are simply better than you

nobody even fucking remembers the british "empire"

but if you say empire people immediately think of the French Empire which dominated Europe and the world, and the Roman Empire which was greatly supported by the French

>indeed most battles from the musket period, british troops were known for being harder to break than anyone elses and damned good at the musketry part of the fighting,

This is literally a pop culture meme invented by modern americans to make their revolution seem glorious
Evet seen a source claiming redcoats where ebin superior warriors outside of The Patriot or AC3?
British troops were superior to US militias, but they were utter garbage when facing other european armies
They proved it in the Seven Years War and in the Napoleonic Wars
Hell, fucking Napoleon consideredt hem so bad that he sent a disgraced guy he had dismissed from the Grande Armee to fight them as a punisment (like "you acted like a faggot so you'll fight these faggots, no glory for you")

>The French forces were commanded by Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, who had just been stripped of his command after disobeying orders at Wagram. Dismissed from Napoleon's Grande Armée, Bernadotte returned to Paris and was sent to defend the Netherlands by the council of ministers.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walcheren_Campaign

Top kek
Punishment for a Napoleonic general was to be sent fight the British while outnumbered 2 to 1 by them, because it was so easy you would gain no glory from it
You can't make this shit up

>then you got battles like salamanca
One great victory drowned in a flow of British defeats on that theater

>the plains of abraham
Glorious until you look at the numbers

>blenheim.
Pretty great victory
That Malborough guy was quite good
Too bad he had to use an army made of Germans because the famous redcoats were so shit
Reminds me of that Irishmen who also used German troops to defeat Napoleon in the name of Britain

Out of these three battles you carefully cherrypicked, only 2.5 even fit your point

>and the U.K. Still won the Spanish succession

Nope
At most Britain won the Queen Anne's War, the North American theater
The European theater (the one that mattered) ended with the Grand Alliance losing all the territory it had gained under Malborough at Denain and the Bourbon king supported by France winning the Spanish throne (that's what the war was about)

>The British were always a naval power

Ummm yes they did? Spain lost the kingdom of naples, the Netherlands, Gibraltar and Minorca

Also the bourbon king got to the throne because the other pretender randomly died, as a result France and Spain had to agree to British and Austrian terms

>thread about european historical nation
>butthurt nationalists personalise events that happened hundreds of years ago and go full jingoist petty bickering

every time

That's not how war works, monkey
When you enter war to accomplish an objective and you fail to do so, you lost.
Even if you stole two rocks in the process

hey who else summoned a storm to defeat the spanish navy?

>75 vs 56

Dude, I like France and aknowledge they were better at war than Britain but that aint glorious
It's like when Brits brag about battles in which they outnumbered the enemy like Plains of Abraham or Waterloo
Never brag about battles you won while outnumbering the enemy, that's Ottoman tier

readAlso if Marlborough wasn't sent off by the Austrians because Eugene got butthurt at his success he would have taken paris

>no ships lost

awww is the anglo mad that we defeated you time and time again

awww did I hurt you fee fees when I suppoted William's claim to the English throne?

Sounds like the story of Britain's life
Heavily relying on allies because you can't do shit on your own, and having to obey them like a little bitch

Scotland reporting in.

That looks like an English defeat, not a British one, Pierre.

Endless levels of French butthurt in this thread.

But that's literally the opposite in the case of the Spanish succession, Austria and the Netherlands got btfo when the British left

>Scotland
>voted no
>forever cucked

Looks like the British obeyed them like little bitches and left because they were to pussy to stand on their own
Had they been so great they'd have said "fuck it" and conquered Paris alone
But unfortunately, as good as Malborought was, without Austrian, German and Dutch support he was stuck with extremely shitty British troops that wouldnt have brought him anywhere

?

Which referendum are you talking about?

Even a super power can suffer defeats, France was a military power yet they still lost battles/wars. Besides the battle of Trafalgar was when the British confirmed their naval dominance

The British rarely had a large army besides the world wars and the second boer war while France had one of the largest armies in Europe so of course the UK relied on allies for military support

fucking what?

France has never lost a battle or a war.

>be 16 year old who lied about his age to serve in the army
>raised a good christian
>never seen nekkid ladies
>find this leaflet
and thus the cuckold fetish was born

Go troll somewhere else, faggot bong falseflager
I'm the dude who posted most of the anti-british replies itt and I'm not even french
Take care of that obsession

Why do people get so personal in these threads and start roleplaying?

Did England/France hit you when you were a baby?

I sure wonder whose behind this post...

>I-I'm posting ant-english replies
>I-I swear by our quee-
>i-i mean by the a-american flag!

but I'm not even british, I just thought that /int/ is reserved for this kind of "my daddy is stronger than your daddy" childlike behaviour and we can actually talk about history here, in the few thread that don't get spammed with /pol/ and Veeky Forums bullshit

>talking shit out Marlborough

You just don't understand, France then was seen as invincible, winning every battle then this random british general came and completely embarrassed the French at ramillies, completely btfo the french while mostly outnumbered most of the time so much that only Cambrai was left between him and Paris before he was forced to end his campaign.

Also during the peninsular war logistics made Wellingtons campaign very hard for him, he liberated Spain/Portugal and invaded France in a shorter time than when France conquered Spain.

>he liberated Spain/Portugal and invaded France in a shorter time than when France conquered Spain.

Is that a troll?
He took 6 fucking years
That's longer than what it took France to conquer its way to Moscow and what it took Russians to fight the French back to Paris
Literally no other campaign was as slow as Wellington's in the Napoleonic Wars

To bring back the focus on the huge bullshit you just spouted, France "conquered" Spain in a few weeks, not in 6 years (although they have no real glory since it was a sneak attack)

The Spanish Americans defended themselves pretty well from the many British conquest attempts in general.
Pretty much the only lost territories in 3 centuries were Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago (both islands with very small populations that simply moved to Cuba and Venezuela), and Belize (which was a small strip of uninhabited jungle used for getting wood)

>6 years

Wellington began his campaign to liberate Spain in 1812. Napoleon didn't have to deal with mountains, it was just flat ground which was easy for him to move his troops. Also it took France 2 years to conquer Spain

>Veeky Forums bullshit

Spammed with book recommendations and DFW?

>Wellington began his campaign to liberate Spain in 1812.

Don't pretend to be retarded
Wellington arrived to Iberia in 1808 and tried to kick the French out from there
1812 if the moment he started to be somewhat successful ta it (gee, I wonder what event can have caused France to care less about Spain from that moment?)

Ever notice how Britain/England before the Union does better when ruled by a non-English royal family? The Angevins (Normans), the Tudors (Welsh), the Stuart (Scotland), the House of Hanover, and now the fucking clusterfuck presently on the throne?

Has England ever been ruled by an English family post 1066?

And the Angevins werent Normans, butthurt bong
They were pure French from Anjou (which isnt in Normandy)

>UK
>A super power

J'suis français mon vieux. And yes sorry I thought along the lines of the still fresh Norman invasion by our good Guillaume, but the Angevins were indeed frenchier than a camembert left in the sun on a warm August day.
Nope, although I'm sure they all argued that they were English/British. I guess true loyalty is where the power's at.

Veeky Forums is full of french loving faggots, seriously this is a poor place to learn about nationalistic history

>Arrives after the point where WW1 is starting to be won
>Arrives in WW2 after the Russian War Machine is starting to take back all the land
>Fight Japan in WW2, but Japan is too retarded to figure out to use their technology or ships
I think only the last one might count, but its in a grey area.
Japan could have fought USA on equal ground, but didn't, for a number of reasons.

He started his offensive in 1811, most of the time he defended Portugal

UK became the first global super power

The UK and US was keeping russia on it's feet throughout WW2, and they wouldn't have been able to counter against the Axis without US and UK goods being shipped in en mass

Spain-was-the-first-global-power

Kek