What's the basis for Britain's "balance of power" policy?

Sabot Cat

Banned
I really wonder, why is Britain so eager to prevent any nation in continental Europe to single-handedly dominate everyone there?

Simply because if there's a power dominating the European continent, they're in a good position to assail the United Kingdom's position as top dog.
 
Simply because if there's a power dominating the European continent, they're in a good position to assail the United Kingdom's position as top dog.

Less their position as top dog and more their position as a naval power residing on an island. A Continental Hegemony can afford to cut back on expenditures for its land army and concentrate on building a naval force big enough to sweep aside the Royal Navy and invade the Home Islands. As it was, even a super power like France couldn't afford to have both an army capable of defeating all comers while also having a navy capable of going toe to toe with the RN.
 
Where do they get the notion that Top Dog in continental Europe -> invades Britain next?

Not all nations hate the British, right?

Probably Napoleon. And even though not all nations hate the British a contiental power could do this, and it is better to be safe than sorry.
 
Where do they get the notion that Top Dog in continental Europe -> invades Britain next?

Not all nations hate the British, right?

It *could* use its new-found naval power to threaten Britain's status as an independent maritime power. The flow of wealth from India and America to Britain can be turned off like a tap. Hence it is imperative to ensure Britain's navy rules the waves. It is classic divide-and-rule.
 

Riain

Banned
Where do they get the notion that Top Dog in continental Europe -> invades Britain next?

Not all nations hate the British, right?

There as been no shortage of serious invasion threats to England/Britain in the last 500 years as well as plenty of small raids and the like. In addition foreign powers have allied with Scotland against England and supported things like the Jacobite rebellion which invaded England in 1745.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_England

So the balance of power thing was a direct response to actual invasion threats.
 
I really wonder, why is Britain so eager to prevent any nation in continental Europe to single-handedly dominate everyone there?

Well, it was quite rational and it was Britain's policy before It became the top dog.

When you are an Island and when you know that you can't encroach on the continent and become your self the hegemonic power on the continent (the hundred years war demonstrated it), you do everything possible to avoid any other power becoming hegemonic on the continent. Especially if this other power is your neighbour.

Because you know than any other rational power dominating the continent could cut you away from the continent and/or dominate you.
 
Where do they get the notion that Top Dog in continental Europe -> invades Britain next?

Not all nations hate the British, right?

Because top dogs rarely, if ever, get along well and situation sooner or later turns into some sort of cold war. British were just making sure that top dog is not strong enough to challenge the in meaningful way.
 
I would think a hegemonic power would also have much greater ability to control -- or forbid -- British access to Continental markets.
 
Where do they get the notion that Top Dog in continental Europe -> invades Britain next?
The top dog in the 16th century would be Spain and they would try to invade Britain. The top dog in the 17th and 18th century would be France and they certainly would try to invade Britain. The top dog in the late 19th and early 20th century would be Germany and they probably cared the least about Britain, but looking at the first and second world war Britain probably is still not safe.
 

Riain

Banned
Germany's ability to build the worlds second largest navy by 1914 shows how quickly the threat to Britain can develop, and the Uboat campaign shows how vulnerable Britain is.
 
Yes. But it also shows how dangerous and fatal it was to challenge Britain.

Britain was able to contain and decisively defeat any power that dared threatening its supremacy : France in the 18th and early 19th century, Russia in the mid 19th century, and then Germany in the early 20th century.

Being the main naval power and guaranteeing balance of powers in the european continent was the best hand any player could have in this great game.

There are some decisive trends and situations. Basically, the fate of the world was decided somewhere between the middle of the 18th century and the early 19th century. It was a rivalry between Britain and France that decided who would exert political, cultural and economic supremacy in the world for the next 3 centuries. The winner would take it all : controling the world empire.

After all this defining decades, any challenge was, to a large extent, vain and suicidal.

Just consider this : only the emerging of demographic giants twice to three times as crowded as the whole anglo-saxon world has made possible really challenging the supremacy of the anglo-saxon empire/condominium.
 
I don't think it was necessarily all Britain, though.

As in, everyone but the one about to become a hegemon fought along Britain, because while Britain would be threatened by a hegemon building a navy, everyone else was at least as threatened by their armies.

Thus, the French fought with the British against the Spanish, then with the British against the Dutch, only for everyone to switch sides against France when it looked to be winning a bit much.

In other words, the British did nothing different than anyone else. The Dutch fought the Hegemons except when they sortof were one, the French did except when they were it, the Habsburgs fought the hegemons except when they were hegemonic, everyone banded together against the ottomans just long enough to ensure they couldn't rule Italy and Austria...

And, of course, the American revolutionary war was everyone thinking Britain was getting too hegemonic and acting accordingly (in this particular case it eventually failed, because France made a too-succesfull subsequent bid for dominance).
 
To quote British Television Series, Yes, Minister, British foreign policy works like so:

"Minister, Britain has had the same foreign policy objective for at least the last five hundred years: to create a disunited Europe. In that cause we have fought with the Dutch against the Spanish, with the Germans against the French, with the French and Italians against the Germans, and with the French against the Germans and Italians. Divide and rule, you see."

But you can also add with the French against the Dutch, with the Austrians and Spanish against the French, with the Russians against the Swedish, with the Swedish and Polish against the Russian and with the Germans against the French, Russians and Austrians.
 
The basis of the British balance of power was: "Fuck you, got mine."

To be less glib, Britain was if not the top dog, usually one of the top tier European great powers post-middle ages. It was certainly afraid of invasion by a dominant continental power, and so tried to prevent such a power from coming to be, but it was also jealously guarding its own power and influence and used the "balance of power/our only friends are our current national interest" ideas to go interfering in other nations to preserve their own power.

It's not in any way a unique or special thought process, it's just realpolitik.
 
if I may say the "balance of powers" was during more than 200 years in a row fighting against France. Great Britain was only playing "Balance of Powers" because its ressources were insufficient to hold any continental land without the French attacking it. Actually, Hanover was an easy way for France to harm Britain for most of the XVIIIth century.
 
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