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Notes -
Something like that, yeah.
The Industrial Revolution gave unprecedented firepower to European empires. As it continued, that power was steadily diluted to their subjects. By WWII’s end, we’ve got the Maxim gun, but they have, too, not to mention the improvised explosives. The balance tips. Maintaining a garrison rapidly gets more expensive. Colonial policy has to tread ever more carefully. At a certain point, it’s no longer cost-effective to play at empire. Only the biggest can keep trying, and they’re usually pretty unhappy with the process.
So yeah, social pressure shies away from traditional colonialism. It’s expensive and keeps generating ugly pictures for our mass media. Every time someone bucks the trend, they take a bunch of casualties and then get accused of being fascists. Far better to find a reason to give up that imperial ambition.
Two years after the maxim gun had been developed, well before it had reached wide acceptance:
Arguably it was never cost effective.
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