A  Fast-Paced History of the British Empire in a Modern Context 

History matters to people, institutions, and nations. Inevitably, in today’s increasingly polarized political landscape, nowhere is this more intense than when it involves the history of empires and the imperial model. During the Greenland crisis of 2026, Donald Trump stated that there was “nothing wrong” with acquiring territory, as he intended to do with Greenland. Trump lamented empires that “had great, vast wealth, great vast lands, all over the world”, but went “in reverse”. In a May 1, 2026, speech about Cuba, Trump said the US would be “taking over almost immediately”. Elsewhere, other leaders have sought to widen the aperture. In May 2026, French President Emmanuel Macron, in a speech in Kenya, said “we must not exonerate from responsibility the seven decades that followed independence” and that China operated with a “predatory logic” in Africa, recalling past great power competitions, including both Western and indigenous empires.

The history and context of Britain’s empire is a political issue. The emergent Reform UK party would oblige schools to roll out a curriculum teaching the positives of British history. Conservative Party Leader Kemi Badenoch pledged a review of the national curriculum to be overseen by historian Robert Tombs, author of The English and their History.

Britain’s Imperial Histories is by the prolific historian Jeremy Black, professor emeritus at Exeter University, whose extensive writings include books on the rise of the British Empire and the worldwide evolution of military capabilities. He presents a story of imperial rise and decline, intending, in the book’s closing words, “an assessment that is more alive to the context and character both of that imperialism and the modern world” (p. 214). A ten-page introductory chapter starts with Britain being conquered and ruled by outsiders through force of arms that enabled societal change – centralizing Romans and feudal Normans – through complex processes shaping centuries of conflict and consolidation.

The heart of the book is a grand synthetic fast-paced narrative, some 160 pages, Each chapter summarizes a century’s worth of issues, reflecting the author’s belief (p. 2) that “diversity in contexts, situations, and views appears clearer if a chronological approach is adopted”. There are no maps, charts or -- though the narrative is crammed with information -- tabular presentation of data. The 16 pages of endnotes reflect high points of a published literature the author accurately describes as “massive” (p. 216).

This approach does not leave much space for any single episode of a global centuries-long story. Britain’s 1962-66 confrontation with Indonesia – a political-military success – is covered in one sentence (p.179). Tangiers, Britain’s first (short-lived) possession on the African continent, gets a single paragraph (p. 41). Two paragraphs (pp. 30-31) tell the rise of Virginia from Jamestown in 1607 to its 1640s consolidation, the subject of much published history (and even more hagiography, for the first families of Virginia enjoy reading about themselves). While such brevity can be eye-watering, the history is high-quality and the writing is clear and to the point. While the viewpoint is, of necessity, high-speed and high-altitude, the reader is not misled. Its narrative incorporates stimulating insights and global coverage. While the author does hit the high points, the space available means that the scope for the presentation of context – let alone deep dives -- is limited. The result is to focus the reader’s attention on the immediate context of the narrative.

As the context of the multi-century British Empire is global in scope, the author has had to convey the vastness and variety of human military experience that is integral to its narrative. Those familiar with the author’s writings will be aware of his impatience with Anglocentric or Eurocentric history. The British Empire was shaped by its interaction with peer competitors. Military, geopolitical, and economic realities across the globe required dealing and, less often, conflict with opponents ranging from sophisticated empires – often at least as advanced, if not more so, in terms of military progress and technology – to loosely organized hunter-gatherers. The narrative shows their political agency shaping the course of empire, often more so than decisions made in London. Politics and diplomacy are integral to this narrative; in Britain and worldwide, the stronger a state’s internal domestic coherence, the greater its ability to project power externally.

Not all the narrative holds together seamlessly. The chapter on the Empire’s nineteenth century heyday includes some 12 pages (pp. 108-120) focused on the Imperial dimensions of the writings of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. While Sherlock Holmes remains a valuable exemplar for strategists as well as sleuths, as the late Jon Lellenberg pointed out, focusing such an in-depth treatment here seems out of place in the narrative. The 18-page penultimate chapter is largely polemic in its intent, bringing home to the reader the British Empire’s place in the current political, cultural and historical battlegrounds. Approaches to the imperial experience and its legacy range from today’s politically-driven history (which the author portrays as having occupied the mainstream) to literary street theatre of the sort the late Tony Blankley termed “malicious imbecility”. The author sees the noise from these as having effectively drowned out complex historical debates. The vastness and variety of experiences embodied in the history of the British empire provides ammunition for multiple attacks on its legacy and meaning. The author had staked out, in the opening pages, that “I do not see Western Civilization and the Enlightenment as inherently racist” (p. xii), and this puts him at odds with “frequent calls for a ‘conversation’ about empire but this is rarely a conversation being usually a one-sided diatribe” (p. 188). While his writing is cogent and often persuasive, and his barbs hit their targets, juxtaposition of the narrative (focusing on the whole rather than the most compelling parts) with this polemic chapter (with its focus on recent uses and abuses of history) -- is not an easy fit.

There are other aspects of the narrative where the book’s limited space might have been better allocated to meet the author’s goals. The story of the British Empire was in many ways a constitutional one, from its medieval roots to the present, although never more than in the decade leading to the events of 1776. This is not treated at length. For example, Edmund Burke, the parliamentary defender of the rights of America and scourge of Warren Hastings and the East India Company’s nabobs, is conspicuous by his absence here, despite his critiques of imperial efforts that would be taken up again repeatedly over the subsequent two centuries. But even after 1776, the story of the empire remained an Anglo-American one, with British and American policies, ambitions, crises and culture influencing each other up until the present. British and American imperialism and anti-imperialism alike drew on each other’s experience and used the other as a mirror (or for funhouse-mirror distortion).

The value of this book is in its informative and, often, insightful narrative. At times, the length of the work does seem too limiting for such a broad time span, especially as many conflicts and much context receive only brief discussion. Despite this, the book is accessible and valuable for its presentation of the global nature of empire in all its myriad dimensions. Polemic intent aside, there is much here of relevance to the ongoing battles over the meaning of the legacy of empire(s), which leads the reader back – willingly or not – to 2026’s current events. While the British Empire may be largely gone except for the battles over its history and meaning, US and Russian demands for annexations in Greenland and Ukraine remind the reader is that the concepts of land and control – and the military force to turn them into realities – will be shaping a shared future of new imperial desires in a world where old imperial histories are repurposed as new political cudgels.

---///---

Our Reviewer: David Isby, a veteran historian, defense analyst, and war game designer, covered the Soviet-Afghan War from the front lines. His books include The Decisive Duel: Spitfire vs. 109 (London: Little Brown, 2012), Afghanistan: Graveyard of Empires: A New History of the Borderland (New York: Pegasus, 2011, and Jane’s Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress (London: Harper Collins, 1999). and Fighter Combat in the Jet Age (London: Harper Collins, 1997), and he is the author of articles for Air International, Air Forces Monthly and other magazines. A pilot, he has flown B-17s. His previous reviews include The Eastern Fleet and the Indian Ocean, A History of the Mediterranean Air War, 1940-45, Volume Five, From the Fall of Rome to the End of the War, 1944-1945, The Mighty Eighth, Under the Southern Cross: The South Pacific Air Campaign Against Rabaul, Rearming the RAF for the Second World War , Red Dragon 'Flankers': China's Prolific 'Flanker' Family, The Cactus Air Force, Eagles Overhead, Bomber Command, Brotherhood of the Flying Coffin, Victory to Defeat: The British Army 1918–40, To Do the Work of Men, Churchill, Chamberlain and Appeasement, The US Eighth Air Force in World War II, Churchill's Eagles, The Mighty A, and Battle of Britain: Target London, 7 September 1940 – 17 September 1940.

---///---

Note: Britain's Imperial Histories is also available in e-editions.

StrategyPage reviews are published in cooperation with The New York Military Affairs Symposium

www.nymas.org