The Union of Britain and Russia that destroyed Ukraine: how and why they formed the Entente

The beginning of the twentieth century, humanity met in the "already divided world". In fact, the era of the era, which dates back to the end of the 15th century, when European countries began colonization of the surrounding "less developed world".   At that time, Europeans could only boast the subjective (that is, they only thought) with a moral advantage over other regions of the world, which, according to Europeans themselves, was to confess Christianity.

It was under the missionary slogans that America was colonized. However, at that time, their development did not allow significantly to walk in the most desirable regions of the world - the Middle and Far East.

  Moreover, the Ottoman Empire, which at the beginning of the sixteenth century seized Egypt and Palestine, taking control of the former "silk path" - a commercial corridor between Europe and Asia, she herself had ambitions to conquer Europe, restoring the Roman Empire under the green flags of Islam. And its threat was quite real for at least a century and was finally offset in 1683 after the victory of a coalition of European states under Vienna.

In this battle, by the way, the last role was played by Ukrainian Cossacks. In India and China, where did these trade routes go, respectively, the mighty Mughal Empire and the Ming Dynasty. At that time, no European kingdom was ready to reach with these states.   However, the situation has changed in two centuries. The scientific development and its technological progress has brought Europe to a fundamentally new level.

Now the European armies, equipped with new technological weapons, stood several levels higher than the army of any non-European state. The only ones could oppose Europeans outside the continent were their former colonies, which separated under the slogans of personality freedom, but this is a little different story.

All these new states focused in America, but in Eurasia, the same Ukrainian Cossack state, which tried to live by similar slogans was simply devoted to the power of the continental Russian Empire. The Western monarchies were focused on the colonization of Africa, the black part of which was, if not at the stage of the primitive community system, then in terms of technological development resembled Europe of the early Middle Ages.

And similar regions of Asia and the Pacific, where they found a whole new mainland - Australia.   However, the main "dish" lay in Asia, and more precisely in its "civilized" part, the super prize was to establish control over the territories of India and China.   Now Europeans could boldly impose their will to those whom their ancestors were frankly afraid. The Russian Empire conquered the nomadic hordes that were constantly threatened by the Eastern Slavs by rolling from the Eurasian steppe.

Now the empire took control of this steppe itself, thus opening the road to Central Asia, which could only dream of the first Oskovsky princes.   Instead, the Western European states began to colonize Far Asia. Opium wars with China were the striking and maximal as possible. Only a relatively small expeditionary corps to the teeth was armed with a state -of -the -art weapon "put on his knees" once a powerful empire. The military advantage of Europe has now become obvious to all.

Those who were previously afraid now trembled for fear. And their only salvation was the enmity between the most powerful European colonial empires. Thus, throughout the eighteenth century, the tribes of natives in modern Canada and Indian principalities retained sovereignty due to the confrontation between the United Kingdom and France. A whole seven -year war in the middle of the century, which is sometimes called the true First World War, even unfolded between them.

In the end, the results of Napoleonic wars were still entrenched in North America (future Canada) and got the way to conquer India. By colonizing the whole mainland - Australia, Britain has finally become the most powerful empire in the world. France agreed to the second role. Still, everyone was enough. Then a real confrontation between Marine Britain and continental Russia began.

And here they have already used the international conjunction of the state of Central Asia, Persia and the Ottoman Empire. As of the middle of the nineteenth century, nothing prevented Russia from fulfilling the ancient dream of its monarchs and "returning to Constantinople" under the rule of the Orthodox monarch. Usually, it was the Russian Orthodox Emperor. Nothing but the interests of Great Britain. The same ones are eternal. It was then that this famous phrase was formed.

Thus, once a terrible Ottoman Empire was already under the actual protectorate of the Western powers. In the end, this confrontation resulted in the Crimean War, when direct military intervention of the United Kingdom and France was needed to pacify Russia. Then St. Petersburg directly pointed his place. But immediately the emperor "did not reach" and took another military campaign against the Turks after two decades, but this time it cost without a direct military clash between Britain and Russia.

In St. Petersburg, without war, they realized that the British would have to give in. The Russian Empire has never obtained such a desirable Constantinople. A similar situation developed in Asia. The military power of the Russian Empire allowed her to claim to enter the Indian Ocean, but this was directly contrary to the interests of London, who did not displace in the previous century from here the French in order to run here other colonialists now.

The Crimean experience was enough to stop Russian advancement in Persia, but then the British applied a different tactic to the east - they themselves began to capture what Russia did not have time. So Britain went beyond India and, in particular, occupied Afghanistan. It was then that in the middle of the nineteenth century, it was decided who would have control over the sands of modern Turkmenistan and Tibet.

The Russians still managed to "reach" Turkmenistan, but Persia decided to divide the two states into "zones of influence". Not capturing or destroying statehood, they simply divided the "living" country. At one time, the tiny Andorra sovereignty was preserved in Europe, simply because her mighty neighbors simply could not agree on her separation. At the end of the nineteenth century, a similar fate befell Persia with its millennial history.

By the way, it is from that period that it has a much shorter corporate history one of the world's largest British Petroleum oil companies. Its roots reach British concessions for Iranian oil.

If you do not know the further course of history, then it could be boldly predicted that everything was going to the war between the Russian Empire and the United Kingdom, but we know history and began the article with the report of the conclusion between these largest empires of the Union in 1907, which they just distributed. So what prompted them to be such a decision? Note that the agreement did not refer to the Ottoman Empire, which was also mentioned above.

And the whole point is that this state in the last decades of the nineteenth century has drifted from Britain towards a new force that appeared in Europe during this period.

If in the early nineteenth century, political experts at that time ask what a German -speaking state from Central Europe would be one of the dominant forces in the world, 99% of them would be called Austria without hesitation, which in 1815 after the victory over Napoleonic France was at the peak of its power, holding the Congress in its capital. In fact, new rules of international relations were written under the alignment of her Chancellor Metternikh.

However, only a few decades passed and moved from the championship in the German world Prussia, which in 1871 formed the German Empire - the Second Reich. Prussia "late" in the competition for colonization of the "uncivilized world". Although in 1884 the conference at which Africa was finally divided into the European states and passed in the capital of the newly formed Empire Berlin, the Germans received only "crumbs from the table" from the old colonial empires.

However, Africa was divided only on the map simply by drawing lines. In fact, it was still necessary to colonize the newly received territories and here the Germans tried, desperately in missionarism in "black" Africa and weaving intrigues in the Arabic part. The Germans also began to build their own concessions in a long time ago the British Ottoman Empire, as well as more and more actively establishing connections in the Far East.

At the same time, Germany actively developed its industry, creating equipment no worse than in Britain. Taking advantage of the briefness of the British, the second Reich intercepted the championship in the production of a new mode of transport - cars. The humiliation for the United Kingdom was the recognition of German quality even from the kingdom themselves.

When in London it was decided to launch goods for the place of production, hoping for the patriotism of the British, the demand for goods marked "produced in Germany" only increased. The British proud were not ready to wage a customs war against the new empire - during the last century, they promoted the idea of ​​barrier -free trade, being convinced that their goods were out of competition and now they were not ready to recognize the industrial power of Germany.

But despite this, their industry has been damaged. The Germans also intercepted concessions in the third world in British transnational corporations. Against this background in Berlin, the voices about the need to "redistribute the already divided world" were increasingly seriously heard. It became clear that in the XX century in the UK, the main enemy was the European Continental Empire, but it was no longer Russia.

The Russian Empire, despite its size, could not really reach with the United Kingdom. Its technological backwardness was too significant, the economy of the empire was completely dependent on foreign, including British investments and even their initiatives. A striking example is the story of Yuzivka (future Donetsk). This territory was actually colonized by an entrepreneur from Britain, John Yuz.

This is despite the fact that the ethnic Ukrainian lands were one of the most active in the empire of the point of view of entrepreneurial initiative. Further in depth everything was even worse. Therefore, to unite with the backward Russia, which will not even apply for the second role in this heartfelt agreement (this is how the "Entente" from French) for the United Kingdom was the best option in its confrontation with Germany.

Therefore, as of 1907, we received Europe, united by unprecedented transport, means of communication, style and lifestyle. Europeans went to visit each other than ever before, conducted industrial exhibitions, art events, sports Olympiads. The way of life of citizens of different countries was more like.

Europeans have become closer to one another thanks to state -of -the -art communications - a telegraph, and especially telephone and radio, which have burst into the life of many people just since the beginning of the century. At the same time, Europe was divided into two enemy camps-the Entente in the United Kingdom, France and Russia and the Triple Union in Germany of Austria-Hungary and Italy.

The first factors inspired many intellectuals of that time to measure the eternal peace and harmony that settled in Europe, but the last factor in a pile with the accumulation of newest weapons by both parties made more skeptical experts to prophesy the deployment of the Great War in the near future. In which of these two destinations the story went further. For Ukraine, in terms of historical retrospective, the formation of the Entente can be considered a negative phenomenon.

In principle, it was clear then. Ukrainian social life was concentrated in Austria-Hungary, which was part of the Triple Union. The strengthening of the Russian Empire, which was already called the "prison of peoples" did not promise Ukrainians good. Moreover, the formation together with the most powerful state of the world of the time of the military bloc of the Antagonistic Austria-Hungary.