|
|
|
|
|
|
by simonh
1746 days ago
|
|
|
Yes japan had more modern ships and crews with the technical skills to crew them, and the infrastructure to deploy them effectively. They were very rapidly modernising in ways that China simply wasn't. Those reparations figures are wildly overestimated, the cost of the war to Japan was estimated at about half of the reparations for example. Looking at Britain, most of the imperial revenue flowed to the gentrified classes and into their estates. The industrialisers were mainly middle class domestic manufacturers and it's the growing friction between these two sides of the economy that drove political conflict and reform in Britain. Most of Europe had no third world empire. As I pointed out, Germany proved conclusively that Empire was irrelevant. Spain and Portugal had huge Empires and just fizzled out because they didn't industrialise. France also failed to capitalise on Empire in ways that mattered long term. China also has industrialised rapidly over several decades, and their imperial assets in Tibet and Xinjiang played no significant role in this. What matters is policy and economic culture. This is what distinguishes say Israel from it's neighbours. They're similar sizes, similar resources but night and day in terms of development. |
|
|
I feel like I'm understating them. I'm getting my overview of the amounts from this paper[0], but in principle, even getting paid a part of the costs of a war is a very good deal, because that money usually goes entirely to your own economy (since they are supplying your military), you get essentially free training for your military, you get prestige, and you get the actual war aims (in this case, control over Korea, which is in itself lucrative).
If you consider another colonial war, the second opium war, the chinese government indemnity in this case didn't cover the costs of the expedition (iirc). However, it's still a really great deal, because you get access to the chinese market, which is worth a ton, and the state finances themselves aren't negatively impacted because the indemnity is enough to cover costs.
I think it's probably true that by the time Germany reunified, empires weren't always that worthwhile.
I don't totally disagree with your culture idea. I just think there's nothing worse for a nation's political culture than being colonized, and it's also terrible for the economy, so it's unsurprising that almost every first world nation was either never colonized, or if it was, is currently ruled by a seceeding group of the colonizers themselves (e.g. the USA).
[0]: https://eprints.lib.hokudai.ac.jp/dspace/bitstream/2115/3069...