Rhodes: ‘Does this House think that it is right that men in a state of pure barbarism should have the vote? Treat the natives as a subject people. Be the lords over them. The native is to be treated as a child and denied the franchise.’ ibid.
Gold was discovered in the Transvaal. ibid.
When one people’s desire for independence confronts another people’s need to rule, the result can only be explosive. The Boston Tea Party and the day of Indian Independence. Days that Shook the World: End of the British Empire, BBC 2003
1773: the road to war is paved with tea ... The mood has changed: the people of Boston are ready to act. ibid.
14th August 1947: the English Empire will release its grip on its most prized possession: India. A vast nation of some four hundred million people. ibid.
Great Britain has lost an empire and has not yet found a role. Dean Acheson, 1893-1971, American politician
The foundations of the future grandeur and stability of the British empire lie in America. Benjamin Franklin
The days of Britain having to apologise for the British Empire are over. We should celebrate. Gordon Brown
Britain will be honoured by historians more for the way she disposed of an Empire than for the way in which she acquired it. Lord Harlech
You are not going, I hope, to leave the destinies of the British Empire to prigs and pedants. Benjamin Disraeli, 1803-81, speech House of Commons 5th February 1863
Those wretched colonies will all be independent, too, in a few years, and are a millstone round our necks. Benjamin Disraeli, letter to Lord Malmesbury 13th August 1852
Her Majesty’s dominions, on which the sun never sets. Christopher North aka John Wilson
We cannot bring ourselves to believe it possible that a foreigner should in any respect be wiser than ourselves. If any such point out to us our follies, we at once claim those follies as the special evidences of our wisdom. Anthony Trollope 1862
We are the first race in the world and the more of the world we inhabit the better it is for the human race. Cecil Rhodes
God’s chosen instrument in carrying out the divine idea. Cecil Rhodes
Africa lies ready for us: it is our duty to take it. Cecil Rhodes
We do not want Egypt any more than any rational man with an estate in the north of England and a residence in the south, would have wished to possess the inns on the north road. All he could want would have been that the inns should be well kept, always accessible, and furnishing him, when he came, with mutton chops and post horses. Henry John Temple, Lord Palmerston
Britain conquered Palestine from the Turks in 1917-1918. First Her Majesty’s Government promised Palestine to the Jews in the Balfour Declaration in 1917, and then again in the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine of 1922 ... Then it repudiated that promise in a White Paper of 1939 which announced Her intention to allow only 75,000 Jewish immigrants into Palestine over the next five years (this was World War II and the Holocaust was just beginning) ... Having already promised Palestine to both the Jews and the Palestinian Arabs, Britain after World War II promised it again, this time to Syria! ... Britain encouraged the Arab states to form an Arab League as World War II came to an end ... In an unprecedented act in the history of colonialism, the British simply withdrew, leaving the country that they had misgoverned for thirty years in total chaos. American Thinker online article May 2008 ‘How Britain Created the Arab-Israel Conflict’
See that little stream – we could walk to it in two minutes. It took the British a month to walk it – a whole empire walking very slowly, dying in front and pushing forward behind. And another empire walked very slowly backward a few inches a day, leaving the dead like a million bloody rugs. Scott Fitzgerald 1896-1940, Tender is the Night 1934
Remember the Patriots are in the right and are going to win ... But they must win quickly. The British public has no interest in a war that drags on decisively. A few sharp victories, some conspicuous acts of personal bravery on the Patriot side and a colourful entry into the capital. That is The Beast Policy for the war. Evelyn Waugh, Scoop, 1938
Other nations use ‘Force’; we Britons alone use ‘Might’. ibid.
The Suez Crisis I think showed us, and showed the public, that this world of patricians and idiots who previously everyone had respectfully thought could run things and could be reliable - leave it to people like Anthony Eden to look after England’s interests. We realised after ’56 that this simply was not the case, these were in fact pin-striped poltroons. But that was already happening before we appeared. And I think we were a symptom of those years. Jonathan Miller, interview Heroes of Comedy: Peter Cook
Just over four hundred years ago a group of London merchants arrived here on the India coast hoping to do some peaceful trading ... and built from scratch a commercial enterprise to export goods to Britain ... and by accident created one of the most powerful empires in history. Dan Snow, The Birth of Empire: The East India Company I, BBC 2014
The greatest company the world has ever known. ibid.
Determined to reassert supremacy, Clive recaptured Calcutta. ibid.
The nabobs represented the East India Company at its most venal and corrupt. ibid.
It’s estimated that between two million and ten million died: a salutary lesson in the dangers of unchecked corporate power. ibid.
Massive government bail-out ... it was decided that the East India Company was too big to fail. ibid.
It was nothing less than the birth of empire. ibid.
Nepotism and corruption, and eventually a chilling story of drug running and famine. Dan Snow, The Birth of Empire: The East India Company II
The emerging struggle between Trade and Empire. ibid.
There was now nothing else standing in the way of total British domination in the sub-continent. ibid.
European customs and manners were emphasised. A huge gulf was opening up between the British governing elite and the Indian subjects. ibid.
A government-backed trade in drugs. ibid.
The Indian Mutiny – but to the Indians it was the first war of independence. ibid.
The East India Company made some devastating mistakes. ibid.
By 1771 goods from her colonies were pouring into Britain. Dan Snow, Empire of the Seas: How the Navy Forged the Modern World III: High Tide
Britain was now at war with her own subjects ... a transatlantic war. ibid.
Britain gave up her thirteen colonies in North America but retained key possessions all across the globe including her vital Caribbean colonies. ibid.
The Royal Navy was here to open up China for business. Dan Snow, Empire of the Seas: How the Navy Forged the Modern World IV: Sea Change
Gunboat diplomacy – British interests secured down the barrel of a gun. ibid.
At the height of the British Empire very few English novels were written that dealt with British power. It’s extraordinary that at the moment in which England was the global superpower the subject of British power appeared not to interest most writers. Salman Rushdie
A dull, decent people, cherishing and fortifying their dullness behind a quarter of a million bayonets. George Orwell, Burmese Days
These families are effectively expected to sacrifice their young men on behalf of a neo-colonial geo-political agenda which is all about control of the global resources. Ian R Crane, interview On the Edge with AlexG: Iran
The reality of human existence in Ireland over the last few centuries has been dominated by the British Empire. Ireland is the oldest colony in that empire. Marx summed up the nature of that long imperial rule in a single sentence: ‘England has never ruled Ireland in any other way, and cannot rule it in any other way, except by the most hideous reign of terror and the most revolting corruption’. Four hundred years ago Ireland was ‘planted’ with colonists loyal to the British crown. Under the cover of the Protestant religion, armed and equipped by the most powerful force on earth, these colonists made Ireland safe for British landlords. The Irish population was kept in order by consistent and ruthless violence. Paul Foot, article July 1988, ‘Dividing Ireland’
So now we are at war, apparently, to root out the horror of New York. I would define that horror as reckless bombing without warning which leads to the mass murder of innocent people. As a result, every night on the television there are the familiar pictures of explosions in the night air, superannuated generals discussing tactics, endless talk about precision bombing, targeted terrorists, humanitarian missions, international law. And already we can see what it all means – reckless bombing without warning which leads to the mass murder of innocent people. Paul Foot, Stop the War: The Truth Machine