What came from Britain colonising countries all over the world?
The British Empire was once regarded as ‘the empire on which the sun never sets’. Besides the significance this holds symbolically - in terms of the ‘we will never cease’ spirit, it also holds quite a literal truth because at one point in time, the British Empire was so well spread that the sun was always shining somewhere which Britain had conquered. Britain had a sizeable overseas military resulting in it being essentially effortless for the British to colonise a multitude of countries around the world, including but not limited to India, Canada, Papua New Guinea, areas of Africa and Australia.
Britain became of higher wealth from all of this colonisation - profits gained in the early centuries came mostly from the trade of furs, tea and slaves. From the slaves came successes in sugar, rubber, cotton and other plantations. By 1850, Britain accounted for, allegedly, half of the total world GDP (Gross Domestic Product - a measure of goods and services in a period). John Hobson commented on the economical progress made by Britain when he said “ It is not too much to say that the modern foreign policy of Great Britain has
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Not only has it shaped the country to the way it is today, it also developed the entire world into how we know it today. In the lead up to WW1, the British army had lots of support from their commonwealth countries overseas, making Britain a huge rival for many countries, in battles and wars prior to WW1 and a force not to be reckoned with. A lot of these countries could and still can speak English due to the spread of the empire which strengthened trading relationships and allowed Britain to gain more wealth and produce. Additionally, Britain now had more money to spend on weaponry, ships, vehicles and to develop tactics - this obviously augmented the British military and reinforced their chances of