Which do you think was/is the Greatest Empire ever?

[srirangan]

This is not a poll because people are bound to have a different opinions regarding this. This thread is more of a discussion rather than a comparison of different empries and civilizations.

Personally I would have to select the British Empire as being the greatest ever. Not only was arguably the greatest ever in terms of demographics, but coinsidering the impact it has left on the world and the fact that its legacy continues to grow.

Below are a few sources that impressed upon me in this regard.

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The British Empire

The British Empire in the early decades of the 20th century, held sway over a population of 400–500 million people (roughly a quarter of the world's population), and covered nearly 30 million square kilometres, (roughly two-fifths of the world's land area).

The British Empire came together over 300 years through a succession of phases of expansion by trade, settlement or conquest, interspersed with intervals of pacific commercial and diplomatic activity, or imperial contraction. Its territories were scattered across every continent and ocean, and it was described with some truth as "the empire on which the sun never sets." Arguably, its zenith was achieved in the 1890s and 1900s.

The Empire facilitated the spread of British technology, commerce, language, and government around much of the globe. Imperial hegemony contributed to Britain's extraordinary economic growth, and greatly strengthened its voice in world affairs. Even as Britain extended its imperial reach overseas, it continued to develop and broaden democratic institutions at the homeland.

From the perspective of the colonies, the record of the British Empire is mixed. The colonies received from Britain the English language, an administrative and legal framework on the British model, and technological and economic development. During decolonisation, Britain sought to pass parliamentary democracy and the rule of law to its colonies, with varying degrees of success. However, almost all former British colonies have since chosen to join the Commonwealth of Nations, the association which replaced the Empire.

Nonetheless, British colonial policy was always driven to a large extent by Britain's trading interests. While settler economies developed the infrastructure to support balanced development, tropical African territories found themselves developed only as raw-material suppliers. British policies based on comparative advantage left many developing economies dangerously reliant on a single cash crop. A reliance upon the manipulation of conflict between ethnic and racial identities, in order to keep subject populations from uniting against the occupying power — the classic "divide and rule" strategy — left a legacy of partition or inter-communal difficulties in areas as diverse as Ireland, India, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Uganda, Iraq, Guyana and Fiji. Colonel Frank Kitson, in his book Gangs and Countergangs (1960), described how British colonial authorities in Kenya successfully manipulated the Mau Mau uprising so that it became warfare between rival factions; ultimately only 22 Whites were killed, as opposed to 18,000–30,000 natives.

The credit for the first ever usage of the words "British Empire" is usually given to Doctor John Dee, Queen Elizabeth I's astrologer, alchemist and mathematician.

Extent
At its height in 1921, the British Empire consisted of the following territories —

Africa
* Bechuanaland (now Botswana)
* British Togoland
* Cameroon
* Gold Coast (now Ghana)
* Egypt
* Kenya
* Nigeria
* Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia)
* Sierra Leone
* Somaliland
* South Africa — including Lesotho
* Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe)
* South West Africa (now Namibia)
* Sudan
* Tanganyika (now Tanzania)
* Uganda

The Americas and Atlantic
* Ascension Island
* British Guiana (now Guyana)
* British Honduras (now Belize)
* Canada
* Falkland Islands
* Newfoundland
* West Indies
o Anguilla
o Antigua and Barbuda
o Bahamas
o Barbados
o Bermuda
o British Virgin Islands
o Cayman Islands
o Dominica
o Grenada
o Jamaica
o Montserrat
o Saint Kitts and Nevis
o Saint Lucia
o Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
o Trinidad and Tobago
o Turks and Caicos Islands
* St Helena
* Tristan da Cunha
* South Georgia

Antarctica
* British Antarctic Territory

Asia
* Aden (now part of Yemen)
* Bhutan
* British New Guinea (southern part of what is now Papua New Guinea)
* Brunei
* Burma (now Myanmar)
* Ceylon (now Sri Lanka)
* Hong Kong
* British India (now India, Pakistan and Bangladesh)
* Iraq
* Kuwait
* Malaya (now part of Malaysia)
* Maldives
* Palestine (now Israel and the occupied territories)
* Nepal
* North Borneo (now part of Malaysia)
* Oman
* Qatar
* Sarawak (now part of Malaysia)
* Singapore
* Transjordan (now Jordan)
* Trucial States (now United Arab Emirates)

Europe
* Cyprus
* Gibraltar
* Malta
* United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Pacific
* Australia
* Ellice Islands (now Tuvalu)
* Fiji
* Gilbert Islands (now part of Kiribati)
* Nauru
* New Zealand
* Pitcairn
* Solomon Islands
* Tonga

Motto: God and my right

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Which do you think was/is the Greatest Empire ever?

 

[gf0012-aust]

Largest empire ever known - British Empire - 300+ years
largest Contiguous empire ever known - Mongols
Largest economic power - The USA - at the end of WW2 it subsidised 14 countries in Europe (via the Marshall Plan) and built itself into the strongest economic power in the world - even though it was carrying 14 other nations
Hyperpower - the USA
Ancient Military Power - Rome
Longest running Blue Water Naval Power - English 300+ years

 

[srirangan]

Ah the US I won't think belongs to the league of empires as yet. Yes it is a super power, the lone super power. But this status is yet to last even a 100 years. And some would argue that the US is just a continuation of the British empire now in a different avatar.

Also its not always mere statistics but also the empires effect and significance on the rest of the world that matters. Thus I'ld rate many much higher than the US. We need to count cultural influence alonmg with territory and military power.

The Mongols were, ofcourse, exceptional in their rise and military conquests. But I don't think it influenced culture and society of its time the way Greeks, Romans and British did.

 

[gf0012-aust]

Ah the US I won't think belongs to the league of empires as yet. Yes it is a super power, the lone super power. But this status is yet to last even a 100 years. And some would argue that the US is just a continuation of the British empire now in a different avatar.

Also its not always mere statistics but also the empires effect and significance on the rest of the world that matters. Thus I'ld rate many much higher than the US. We need to count cultural influence alonmg with territory and military power.

The Mongols were, ofcourse, exceptional in their rise and military conquests. But I don't think it influenced culture and society of its time the way Greeks, Romans and British did.

The Mongols were the first meritocracy, the first to structure up a military college, the first nation to make freedom of worship of any faith enshrined in law, the first to establish intercontinental communications using a structured pony express model.

The US Impact on the world has been enormous. At a military level in their civil war, the Germans had already predicted that they would be a military superpower, their military innovation has been greater than any other. The US Civil War still stands as a time when the most military inventions were patented and implemented during conflict. - Greater than WW2 even. They set the model for republican democracies - as opposed to monarchical democracies, and they have been the worlds greatest continental industrial power since 1901. They are not a superpower - they are a hyperpower, no other superpower comes militarily or economically close enough. Even the French (and it was Chrac who coined the expression) acknowledge that.

To say that their impact is not as great as classical powers ignores the reality of how they changed the map of the world from 1946 on. Take away the US out of Europe, and say let them only fight in the pacific (as Roosevelt initially only really wanted) and the world map at a political and idealogical level would be completely different.


Power is not a temporal measure - it's cause, effect and influence on change that denotes it.

 

[srirangan]

The Mongols were the first meritocracy, the first to structure up a military college, the first nation to make freedom of worship of any faith enshrined in law, the first to establish intercontinental communications using a structured pony express model.

One or more of this could be challenged. The buddhists and hindu kingdoms in the subcontinent and central asia had freedom of religion, some almost a millenia before the mongols. "The first to structure up military college" can be challenged by the Greek Spartans. And meritocracy can be claimed by many many nations right throughout history.

Coming to the Americans, republican democracy is hardly the most effective model, nor is it the most popular. There are better models of democracy and the idea of democracy is hardly "American".

Yes, after the World Wars USA has emerged as a real super power and has shaped the politics of the world for nearly 60 years (sharing 40 of those years with the USSR). So basically being the most dominant nation of 20 years doesn't give the US an empire status, no matter how far ahead she might be of the other contemprary players.

And about influencing society and culture I believe you are mistaking the achievements of the Westerm civilization (ie. Spain, Portugal, France, UK and Germany maybe even Russia along with the United States) for over 500 years and attributing all of them to the United States prematurely.

 

[gf0012-aust]

The Mongols were the first meritocracy, the first to structure up a military college, the first nation to make freedom of worship of any faith enshrined in law, the first to establish intercontinental communications using a structured pony express model.

One or more of this could be challenged. The buddhists and hindu kingdoms in the subcontinent and central asia had freedom of religion, some almost a millenia before the mongols. "The first to structure up military college" can be challenged by the Greek Spartans. And meritocracy can be claimed by many many nations right throughout history.

Did those faiths actually have a representative at their courts? I don't think so. Genghis actually sent emissaries out to bring representatives of each faith back so that he could see for himself what drove man to believe in a higher order. He had some 50 denominations and religions in the Mongol Court.

Coming to the Americans, republican democracy is hardly the most effective model, nor is it the most popular. There are better models of democracy and the idea of democracy is hardly "American".

Did I say that it was the best democracy? Read my words again. The republican democracy was the first where an autocrat or monarch was not the nominal head of state. There are 5 versions of democracy, which would you say is represenative of each?

Yes, after the World Wars USA has emerged as a real super power and has shaped the politics of the world for nearly 60 years (sharing 40 of those years with the USSR). So basically being the most dominant nation of 20 years doesn't give the US an empire status, no matter how far ahead she might be of the other contemprary players.

At what point did Russia actually dominate the world? Where did she bring military, economic power to the world stage?

And about influencing society and culture I believe you are mistaking the achievements of the Westerm civilization (ie. Spain, Portugal, France, UK and Germany maybe even Russia along with the United States) for over 500 years and attributing all of them to the United States prematurely.

Not at all, you're reading into this what you think I said. I have made the us influence quite specific.

What nations were the instruments of change at Versaille? The Washington Treaty? The creation of the League of Nations? The initiator of the UN as the replacement for the League?

US influence on world events has been slow but progressive ever since 1861.
The US carried 14 European economies including Japan and Germany. The bulk of NATO deployment was US, the umbrella was US. Comapring Russia to the US is nonsense. The pact were countries in name only, their economies were subservient to the Russian economic need (except for Yugoslavia). You can't seriously state that in a timeline Russia had the same degree of influence over 140 years with other nations politics?

I'm not trying to lump other western achievements into a US basket at all - and a comparison is inappropriate.

germany was just as much a situational super power in history as Hannibal was - it's just that it lasted far less than Alexanders.

Power is not only about baubles and trinkets, writing and large libraries - its about sustained influence at defining moments in history - where a nation has repeatedly impacted on change and circumstance. - where it has altered a timeline to such a degree of significance that it has altered the political, economical, cultural and geographical landscape of other nations.

That is not the sole province of a western enclave, and it's not a melding of western idealogies into an english, german, french or american flag bearer - but it can be atrributed to nations - irrespective of duration. Nations that cause change in periods of of Chaos or nations that reduce chaos so that their infliuence dominates the political landscape are nations of power.

 

[srirangan]

Gary,

Interesting post but I get the impression that you are going into the details ignoring the larger picture. In the long run would the League of Nations be ever considered? How has the treaty of versailles effected human society in the long run?

Allow me to put forward a more generalized argument. I am by far not discounting the role USA has played in the 20th century. She kept on growing since the 1850's and reach maturity at around the 1920's. By the 1940's the Old Western European order was no more and USA and Russia became prominent, US a bit more than Russia to begin with/

Eventually the Soviet collapsed and USA was left all alone as the main power/ So far the most iconic achievement of the Americans has been putting a man on the moon. But this achievement has been closely matched by other powers of this order.

Now let's look at iconic achievements of the other empires. British had 1/4th of the world, French were playing the game but were far far behind. British influence over America itself and the rest of the world in undeniable. So in the 1500's what was a linguistically divided world, has become an English speaking majority. No empire ever has had this sort of success. French and the Spaniards could not even come close. Today like it or not if a person of any random asian country would like to talk to a person of any random african/south american country (let alone europe or north america) he/she would do it in english.

Alexander captured 90% of the known world of his time. A feat that has till now not been matched by anyone of anytime, let alone by Alexander's contempraries.

Do the treaty of Versailles or forming of the League of nations or forming the NATO against the USSR even qualify as achievements of the proportions discussed above?

I'm not saying US is irrelevant, hardly; but its not as proportionally relevant as some others.

 

[gf0012-aust]

Gary,

Interesting post but I get the impression that you are going into the details ignoring the larger picture. ........
I'm not saying US is irrelevant, hardly; but its not as proportionally relevant as some others.

No, I get your point, what it gets down to is definition. Apart from the fact that the US successes in different areas constitute a construct of "empire", I agree with you.

The nature of the word "empire" is fundamentally a legacy construct of colonial times - so there is some difficulty in it having some currency - unless you want to accept Reagans comment about the "evil empire"

 

[srirangan]

eh, I wasn't even born when he made that comment. lol

 

[mysterious]

The Mongols were the first meritocracy, the first to structure up a military college, the first nation to make freedom of worship of any faith enshrined in law, the first to establish intercontinental communications using a structured pony express model.

Err, I only started reading your post and have to say, zero marks on that one my friend. Perhaps your fascination with the Mongols outstrips the facts that lie in history. You might want to take up a course on Islamic history, culture and civilization (which is something I've been doing) if such a course is offered in Australia and I'm sure it would pretty much lay it out in the open for you as to who did all that (the actions you stated above) first. The Mongolians came to do all this at a time when it was already flourishing in the Muslim world. :smokingc:

 

[The Watcher]

Lets not forget the Islamic Empire from 700 ad to 1700/1800s!

heres a site on islamic civilization

http://www.cyberistan.org/islamic/

The Islamic Civilization is in reality an amalgam of wide variety of cultures, from North Africa to the western periphery of the Pacific Ocean, and from Central Asia to sub-Saharan Africa. The traditional beginning of the Islamic civilization is the birth of Muhammed, AD 622, and, of course, it continues to the present.


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mongols came to destroy islam, they burnt libraries full of books in baghdad but they ended up becoming muslims and protecting the same religion / culture / people they came to destroy!

http://www.islamset.com/islam/civil/con1.html

http://www.muslimheritage.com/

 

[gf0012-aust]

The Mongols were the first meritocracy, the first to structure up a military college, the first nation to make freedom of worship of any faith enshrined in law, the first to establish intercontinental communications using a structured pony express model.

Err, I only started reading your post and have to say, zero marks on that one my friend. Perhaps your fascination with the Mongols outstrips the facts that lie in history. You might want to take up a course on Islamic history, culture and civilization (which is something I've been doing) if such a course is offered in Australia and I'm sure it would pretty much lay it out in the open for you as to who did all that (the actions you stated above) first. The Mongolians came to do all this at a time when it was already flourishing in the Muslim world. :smokingc:

1) The Mongols developed the longest courier system in the world - east coast of china to poland. No muslim empire let alone country was ever that big

2) Where in the muslim states were hindus, coptic christians, orthodox christians, christians, jews, pagans, catholics, buddhists able to practice in a formal place of worship?

maybe I should have clarified it with denominations - Ghengis was curious as to why there were variances in faith. Where in any of the Islamic states was there a location where up to 50 different denominatiinal representatives actively practiced and conducted services and were protected by the state. I am of the belief that even Saladin, who was the first visible advocate had less than 4 faiths in his country.

3) How is Islam a meritocracy?

4) Any links on Islamic Military Colleges I would be interested in seeing. As admittedly I have seen very few which indicated such a process as being universal. It may have been in certain countries - but I was fairly sure that it tended to be unique to a ruler in some areas - not all.

 

[tatra]

No one beats the British empire but, on a 'per capita' basis, the Dutch VOC trade empire comes close :

Taking advantage of the decline of Spain and Portugal in the first half of the seventeenth century, the Netherlands—one of the smallest states in Europe—established a global trading network. It included all of Indonesia (not indicated on map).

By the way, the Netherlands is still the third largest investor in the US today

Interesting article on lesson to be learned from the British by the US empire http://chronicle.com/free/v49/i29/29b00701.htm

 

[gf0012-aust]

Interesting article on lesson to be learned from the British by the US empire http://chronicle.com/free/v49/i29/29b00701.htm

Now thats the kind of articles I like, balanced and non judgemental.

 

[srirangan]

Sad to see no mention of the Romans thus far.

 

[mysterious]

I think Gary mentioned the Romans in the military context and that is as far I'd go as well in terming them the greatest empire.

 

[srirangan]

I believe the Roamn's were a lot more than just a military power, they transformed Europe like never before and still wield a large influence on the western society and culture and literature.

 

[srirangan]

Any info on the Arab empires and about the Turks? Which one of these were you (Myst and The Watcher) referring to by the term "Islamic Empire"?

 

[buffalo bill]

I would have to agree that the U.S. has not reached empire status because it is not an empire, but a single nation. However, it is the richest nation there ever was. This is impressive. The U.S. has no provinces, and doesn't siphon the resources out of its provinces all for themselves. This is because they have no provinces. As Empire status goes, the romans top the list. Their influence and legacy is better documented then any civilization. Impressive for one that is 2000 years old. However, I do not understand why some of you people say that the British were the greatest empire. This is very false. The fact that they couldn't conquer their neighbors is uncontested proof that they were not all that great. What did the british conquer, India?, some poor asian countries, the caribbean islands? Taking over america when it was founded by spain (actually an italian) when there were half naked indians with bows and arrows. The Carribean islands? The british were too weak to conquer their neighbors, so they take on all these nations run by half naked tribesman. Conquering a half naked tribesman is nothing to boast about. I admit that it was impressive that the british gained all that territory and recources from a small island country, but a big reason for their success was because they modeled themselves after rome. They did things the roman way. (very tactical in war, conquering nations, senate/parliament system with a monarc/caesar, etc.) England is a great nation, but far from being the greatest empire. British people half to face the fact that their nations achievements were not the best of all time. Is it really that hard to not have so much pride? I am canadian, and I half to deal with being a citizen to the inferior nation in the north of the United States.

 

[gf0012-aust]

However, I do not understand why some of you people say that the British were the greatest empire. This is very false. The fact that they couldn't conquer their neighbors is uncontested proof that they were not all that great. What did the british conquer, India?, some poor asian countries, the caribbean islands? Taking over america when it was founded by spain (actually an italian) when there were half naked indians with bows and arrows. The Carribean islands? The british were too weak to conquer their neighbors, so they take on all these nations run by half naked tribesman. Conquering a half naked tribesman is nothing to boast about. I admit that it was impressive that the british gained all that territory and recources from a small island country, but a big reason for their success was because they modeled themselves after rome. They did things the roman way. (very tactical in war, conquering nations, senate/parliament system with a monarc/caesar, etc.) England is a great nation, but far from being the greatest empire. British people half to face the fact that their nations achievements were not the best of all time. Is it really that hard to not have so much pride? I am canadian, and I half to deal with being a citizen to the inferior nation in the north of the United States.

I think you oversimplify the feats of the British.

For over 300 years they were the greatest maritime power the world has ever seen.

They were the first ever blue water navy, and they were the first navy to be persistent in capability. No country matched them in military innovation for centuries - not until the US Civil War had any nation demonstrated a capacity to outflank them on technical development.

People forget that the main target for the americans in the Washington Treaty was the RN - not the emergent powers. It wasn't until 1927 that Britains Navy started to slip - and even then it wasn't really until 1941.

Although there are similarities to Rome on the surface - the style of govt and the comprehension of the issues of logistics in warfare was unmatched. Rome paid part of the price for falling on that basic concept.

As a military power they did more than take on "natives" - more to the point, they were an example of how a small military power was able to manage alliances and manipulate force against their opponents - very few countries can show similar capability in creating military economies of scale.

There's more, but I've got to actually do some work rather than be distracted here!