Which wars, if any, should Britain have been involved with in the 20th century?

[-:Undertaker:-]

The problem with waiting though is sometimes it can be too late. What's to say that if we waited instead of fighting, we wouldn't have been ready and then easily defeated.

While we might have went to war with Germany for the wrong reasons I do feel it was the right thing to do in the end and I do believe we made a difference.

Well where is the evidence for that? the Royal Navy even at the time of when war was declared (and we were ill-prepared) was the biggest Navy in the world along with the United States, hence why the Germans and Axis powers never had control of the seas. Not only that, but Britain controlled the Pacific area (backed by the US as a counter-weight to Japan) along with being in ownership of the oil-producing areas of the Middle East (Iraq, Jordan, Arabia). Add on to that again, it's highly likely that (as happened anyway) the Third Reich and the Soviet Union would lock themselves in a long war against one another meaning that as they destroyed themselves, Britain would be rearming whilst Germany would be fighting for her survival.

Besides, I have always seen the Reich as a modern version of the Mongolian Empire - that it was only strong while it expanded fast and used up resources, economically it was a pillage Empire unlike the Spanish, British and French Empires which actually had a good economic outlook. So I think even while Hitler may have been successful at first, it would have eventually crumbled.

[Ardemax]

Not really. It's true that economically socialism was starting to grip - but that was true throughout the western world - and it's also true that whereas in the 1850s to around 1890 Britain was miles ahead of it's rivals, the inter-war period and after 1900 we had a rapidly rising America and a newly unified Germany as competitors ... along with a stronger Japan in the East. I wouldn't label it as 'decline' .. more as a fact of rivals appearing.

I think without the wars then we'd be talking about a world today where the US, British Empire and Germany would be more or less equal powers with no single power being the top dog - kind of like a world when it was the USA vs USSR as opposed to today where America is unchallenged as the world power.

But hey, the annoying thing is that we'll never know.

Hmm I'm not entirely sure. As the Dominions became bigger and more economically advanced I'm pretty sure they would've wanted independence sooner rather than later and would have preferred to rule over themselves (take Canada, Australia and South Africa for example).

I know a lot of politicians back then we very fussed about preserving the Empire and I can understand where they are coming from, but I'm not entirely sure it was feasible.

[Grig]

okay I'd go as far to say that WW2 wasn't in our national interest but it was a necessary war to take part in, the only problem for us was that we didn't join soon enough. who knows maybe we'd still be the british empire if we joined in earlier.

another war would be the cold war, even though it was publicized as usa vs russia it was pretty much all western countries vs russia I think it was all of NATO not sure though. well the cold war was stupid and impractical even though it led to amazing technological advancements it led to much tension and a relentless amount of fear for everyone globally, should have stayed out!

gulf war another war we were pulled into because of the usa and us having our noses shoved firmly up their arse was unnecessary and in my opinion was only to strengthen bonds with the oil rich saudi arabia. i mean it was bush.........................

"Operation Desert Fox" was another one which was stupid considering it was purely to cripple the already crippled iraq and led to much hate and tension between the western world and iraq and possibly one of the main factors of the "war on terror".

I disagree about the Cold War. It was Thatcher's cozy relationship with Gorbachev that got Reagan on board to negotiate. She played a large part at the back half of the Cold War.

Also Britain had a much higher spending in arms compared to its European neighbours and much less in welfare, despite people saying "oh it was the welfare state". Statistically, other European countries spent much more on welfare.

Sure, it wasn't publicized as much, like you say, but looking into it, Britain was definitely involved.