Britain alone could not hope to defeat the might of Napoleonic France
which, through enforced conscription, had become a nation in arms. But
British leaders had a long history of forging alliances to counter their
rivals and when revolution ravaged France in 1793 and a levée en masse
raised a huge patriotic army, it was through a coalition of monarchies
that French ambitions were restrained - a coalition made possible by
British gold and British industry.
When Napoleon seized the reins of power in France, he too introduced
conscription and, once again, it was a succession of British led and
funded coalitions which eventually brought Napoleon to his knees. During
the years 1793 to 1815, the British Government formed and underwrote
seven coalitions that cost Britain £1,657,854,518 as the national debt
tripled from £290,000,000 to £860,000,00. Of that, British subsidies to
around thirty allies amounted to £65,830,228, along with staggering
amounts of war supplies mass produced by British factories and shipped
to allies.
Britain's leading role in Europe did not end with Waterloo. Immediately
following the Sixth Coalition, and amidst the Seventh Coalition, Britain
constructed, with the other great powers, a security system of
cooperation and consultation called the 'Concert of Europe' that
prevented a serious war among them for two generations.
Britain's power to underwrite those coalitions came from a related
series of revolutions - agrarian, mercantile, financial, technological,
manufacturing, cultural, and political that developed over the
proceeding century. For many reasons that happened in Britain and not
elsewhere. Of them, cultural values may be most crucial. Constraints
were fewer and incentives greater for enterprising Britons to invest,
invent, buy, and sell in ways that enriched themselves and their nation
more than elsewhere. During the eighteenth century, Britain's leaders
mastered a virtuous power cycle of victorious wars, expanding
production, captured territories and markets, and more income.
During a speech before Congress in December 1940, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt called on Americans to be an 'arsenal of democracy' to aid
Britain and other countries threatened by the imperialistic fascist
powers. Britain played exactly the same role during the Napoleonic era.
The Coalitions Against Napoleon explores how Britain developed and
asserted the financial, manufacturing, and military power to achieve
that goal.
