I'm not well up on American history so why is it we the UK are closer to the USA (since the days of independence) than the French are?

Is there some detail I'm not aware of? (more than likely I suspect).

Sir, I should advise that provisions, reinforcments etc had a somewhat lenthy journey. Did Howe really want to engage his own people no, he actually fought with a heavy heart. :03:

The short version (I hope).
As British subjects we fought against the French in the Seven Years' War, which we called the French and Indian War. As I jokingly mentioned, the revolution began when parliament wanted us to pay the brunt of the cost, which might have been okay except they didn't ask us first, or allow the Colonial assemblies to do it; they just ignored us. When this finally led to war and then independence, the French supported us and became our friends.

Some time later came the French Revolution, and yet another war between Britain and France. Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson wanted President Washington to support the French (well, not support actually, but to give lesser status to the British), because after all they had helped us in our fight for freedom, and the former "oppressors" were not to be trusted. Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton felt just the opposite, since despite our former troubles we were still British at heart, and the Revolutionary French government was not the one which had helped us before, and we shouldn't trust the new one.

We stayed neutral until Jefferson retired, and Hamilton convinced the president to sign a treaty with Britain. Later, when John Adams was president and Jefferson vice-President, we came very close to war with France due to their bitterness over our signing that same treaty. And by that time of course Napoleon was in charge and who was going to trust him?

During our Civil War Britain and France were friends, but they tacitly supported the South and the North won so we had to hate them both equally. Part of our reason for staying out of the First World War as long as we did was that we didn't want to support anyone in Europe, partly because of the way everyone got involved in that war because of all the treaties they had signed, and partly because we didn't like any of you and didn't care who won.

And now we're back to the real bottom line: We started off English, and all the immigration in the world doesn't change the fact that we all have some British ancestry in us, and consider the British to be the closest relatives we have. Of course we like the Australians best because they have exactly the same background we do, only different. The Canadians? Well, they're still Brits whether they admit it or not, except for the part where they're French too. What's up with that, eh?

Kind of tangentially related, but something I never understood was the relationship between the U.S. and Great Britain in the 1800s. After the Revolution was "won" (or more accurately the Brit's quit), was there a lingering discontent? I would think there had to be to spark the War of 1812. But was the War of 1812 really just about impressment of U.S. sailors into the Royal Navy? Seems like a flimsy casus belli to me. And then after the War of 1812, what was the relationship like? How did we go from enemies then to allies in WW1?

The impressment was complained about repeatedly, and ignored repeatedly. Factions in the US wanted a war because they felt that they needed to teach those arrogant Brits a lesson, and factions in Britain wanted a war because they felt that the US was still a territory that could be won back. I addressed it four years ago in this thread http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=117199.

As for being friends again, as I said in my previous post I think it was more kinship than friendship. Even though we stayed neutral for most of the Great War we were still more British than anything else, at least in our own eyes. It might have something to do with the "common language" thing as well. The British might be haughty nosybodies, but the French and the Germans are still so "furrin".

Well, you'll probably never find an American book on the War of 1812 that will admit this, but "flimsy" is probably the most charitable word you could use to describe it.

For example, the US and France had fought a vicious and more-or-less undeclared naval war in the early 1800s, America suffering far worse depredations from her former ally than anything experienced at the hands of the Royal Navy, but at no point was there a rush to declare war. As for impressment, that was a matter for diplomatic handbag-swinging at best, and would have been the way most countries would have dealt with it.

US historian's attempts to cast the War of 1812 as a second War of Independence have had to rely on some very awkward contortionism on their part. Britain had no intention of retaking its former colonies. The idea is an insane fiction. It was fighting a war of survival in Europe and around the globe that had gone on in one form or another for the best part of 20 years. Still, for certain powerful Americans there was "unfinished business" with the Loyalists in Canada at the time, rich and poorly defended pickings just north of the border, and many Hawks saw the entirety of North America as their rightful, God-given property. Despite promises of land grants to victorious commanders, a good spanking from some Canadian militia put that idea to rest.

At Bladensburg and Washington, Madison, for all his martial bluster about defending the capital himself, ran like a rabbit leaving his wife and slaves to defend the White House. The fact that British soldiers were able to steal his clothes, hats, and valuables - even his love letters - eat the victory banquet prepared in advance, and then burn his home to the ground provides a reason for talking up the subsequent American victory at the (ultimately meaningless) Battle of New Orleans. I've even seen it described as "one of the biggest defeats ever suffered by the British Empire", when in reality it was pretty much a skirmish by the standards of what Britain was engaged in on the continent at the time.

In short, War Hawks, high as gas sniffers on the fumes of Anglophobia, feelings of national superiority, and the expansionist dreams that led to Manifest Destiny, almost managed to wreck the union by pushing New England to the brink of secession, destroyed US coastal trade for years, wasted thousands of lives, and only narrowly avoided a defeat. The US Navy, despite earlier winning some highly-publicised single-ship actions by virtue of having bigger and better-armed ships, ended the war blockaded in port.

Shorter version: a war for sailor's rights that the US attempted to secure by launching a land invasion of central Canada.

(taught as a great American victory in US schools to this day)

Maybe that kind of thinking is why you people lost your empire. The kidnapping and enslavement of our citizens by a foreign power is just about the best justification for a war declaration that I could think of ready or not.

If you really think it's merely a diplomatic issue then go ahead and try it now. We'll give you some diplomacy all right. :shucks:

As for your take on Madison, i'd say that's at best an unfair assessment of his efforts and troll bait at worst. Madison did all that he could have done given the military and political situation at the time, and while the English might have burned our capital in the war of 1812, (not to mention occupying our capital during our War of Independence) the fact remains that England fought for and lost America, twice, and in doing so shed a lot of American blood. Your nation is darned lucky that we didn't side with Germany during WW1 because of that history.

Post of the year....if we weren't on the same SubSim committee and ineligable to vote :rock:

Aaaaand the "My side is better than yours" game starts again.

First, the depredations were about equal from both sides, poaching on unescorted American merchants. Washington tried to maintain neutrality, but Hamilton pushed him into the Jay treaty, which royally ticked off the French.

No rush to declare war? Hamilton and his Federalists pushed, cajoled and threatened John Adams to declare war, but Adams steadfastly refused. This cost him Hamilton's support in the next election, and the election itself, with Hamilton writing articles accusing Adams of wanting war, rather than the other way around.

We tried. For years. You refused to listen, or to talk.

Not really, since the Americans of that time, right or wrong, saw it that way.

I said there was a faction in Britain who preached that. And now I don't have my books, so for I can't give a reference. I never said that was a goal of the country or the government, nor do I believe it.

And that led them to embargo France, forbidding American ships from trading with the French. We saw that as an attack on our sovereignty.

Certainly true.

"A good spanking?" I agree with your assessment, the US militia pretty much sucked. But you sound like King George III himself, talking about "recalcitrant children". A good debate is lowered when you become grandiose.

He was in danger. They weren't. Pretty much the same as during the Revolution when Tarleton invaded Virginia. During his presidential campaign Jefferson was accused of cowardice, but it didn't stick, probably because the accusers were members of the legislature who cleared out first.

But if the British had taken New Orleans they would have controlled the Mississippi River, halting westward American expansion and containing us to the eastern seaboard. Pretty darned important skirmish.

British apologists always talk about the "bigger and better-armed ships", but ignore the battle where Constitution fought against two British ships and still won. And eluded an entire squadron through good seamanship and shiphandling. No, we didn't do them any damage, but we sure tweaked their noses, and British newspapers were demanding heads over the very idea. And Americans like to point out that Shannon beat Chesapeake because Chesapeake's crew weren't properly trained and Shannon was commanded by the man who literally wrote the book on naval gunnery, but I say the Brits won that one fair and square, and the capture of USS President was also fair, even though she was outnumbered three to one.

That's both arrogant and condescending, and bad debate to boot. If you read my link you would read quotes from the British, including the Iron Duke himself, explaining exactly what the Americans did win. But that seems to be too much trouble.

I love that I've stirred up this vigorous debate. It's entertaining AND I'm learning.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1KTWDOjOu_...t-mr-burns.gif

Yet there was the counter justification for war of harbouring fugitives and supplying false documents.
Even before the outbreak the Sec. of the Treasury said there were at least 5000 british sailors(all liable for service in the RN) onboard american vessels.

But with the Milan decrees American ships were no longer considered neutral, this led to France seizing over 200 American ships. No war with France followed that attack on soveriegnty

Link or quote, please.

And I've already explained why the war was only 'quasi'.

I will have to lookup Gallatins quote

check the dates for the start and end of the quasi war then check the date of the decree.

A.D. 313?

Oh, not that Milan Decree.

It did lead to a reciprocal statement that all British and French shipping in American ports would be seized. Why no war? I'm not sure. It could be that we were trying to avoid any involvement in European matters. We also put off war with Britain that same year despite the Chesapeake affair.

So no, I don't know.

[edit] Oh, I forgot.
Not necessary in this case. I recall reading about it in the Jefferson books. I'm pretty sure that at that time we were more than willing to help anyone wanting to flee British "tyranny". Conditions for sailors in the US Navy were far better than in the Royal Navy at that time. Were we wrong? That's arguable either way, and I don't really blame the British, even for the impressments. Sure it was arrogant, to say the least, but to their minds it was also both warranted and necessary.

Consider the challenge accepted, colonial manque! I shall order the Empire's fleet into action at once!

Apart from the obvious absurdity of your statement, the sight of a man doing the internet equivalent of standing up from a bar-room table and theatrically rolling up his sleeves for a "square go" is baffling. I can practically see steam coming out the ears like a Tex Avery cartoon as you prepare to give the arrogant Movie Brits a collective cherry nose while "Johnny Comes Marching Home" plays in the background.

This bit is only worth repeating to state the fact that the empire was given back (to the people who really owned it), and that no one under the age of about 80 really remembers it.

:haha:

August, you really do an Olympic-class job of coming across as an insecure trumpet in that post.

It honestly was not my intention to wind you up, but the result could not have been improved as an example of the type even with liberal references to tea and oral hygiene.

"Spanking" in this sense is another example of the British idiom. It simply means a seeing off, and often appears in reference to the result of sports games.

I did read your post in fact. I also think that Wellesley's reputation is only enhanced by his lack of involvement in the war.