How legitimate would you judge Britain's reaction to French
How legitimate would you judge Britain's reaction to French occupation of Fashoda to have been?Immediately after the Crimean War Britain and France were seen as great allies. And when the scramble of Africa started the main thing Britain did not want to happen was to start a large war with another major country, and especially a former ally. However, luckily a war never happened between them.I believe that Britain's reaction was legitimate to the French occupation of Fashoda because, as Grey said, the upper Nile valley had belonged to Egypt and, since the Mahdi's revolt of the 1880's, had become a diplomatic no-man's land over which Egypt (then under British protection) had by far the best claim. In fact France had had nothing to do with Fashoda at all.What we do no is that Britain were not willing to give up and let France keep Fashoda as they really wanted to link Cairo with Cape Town as it would have been an incredible advance if there was a railway line between these two cities. It would mea
Also they wanted to remain one of the greatest naval forces in the world, and they wanted to have an obvious trade route, running from Cairo to Cape Town. n that more trading could be done; there would be a quick way of getting around, communications would be a lot quicker throughout Africa and therefore any messages to Britain would be quicker, and it would also be very good for getting troops around to protect British interests. So they didn't want any country to occupy Fashoda because it was right in the way between Cairo and Cape Town. I conclude that the British reaction to French occupation of Fashoda was legitimate, because they had control over Egypt, and they wanted to maintain British interests in Africa, these mainly being protection of trade, trade with African countries and the balance of power. As the Fashoda incident was quite soon after the Crimean War Britain and France would both certainly have not wanted to go to war, but Britain was luckily in a better position that France, and Britain would not the balance of power to be upset. The French navy was also undermanned. Another reason why Britain was not willing to give up was because they knew that the French wouldn't be able to hold onto it with all the pressure on them and if they did they could easily disrupt French supplies from France to North Africa with the Royal Navy if there was a war. Britain and France were very competitive to get as much as Africa as possible and Britain certainly didn't want the French economy improving if they got Fashoda because it would give them a direct route from Dakar to Djibouti which would be great for their trade and then they would become an even bigger threat to British interests. In the end Britain did well with General Kitchener not charging in wanting a fight, but to try and agree terms (over some champagne!). The next clever move by the British was to move the Royal Navy to Gibraltar to disrupt and French supplies which were heading for North Africa. However Marchand was stubborn and insisted on asking his government even though he knew that it would be suicide to try to repel any British attack. It was good that he used the Gun boat tactic as it made sure that Marchand would not fight as they were outnumbered and outgunned. By doing this it meant that the French would have had no chance of winning a war between them and Britain as they wouldn't have any supplies and so they had no choice but to give up Fashoda. It would also be a big thorn in the side for the British Empire in Africa as a land route from Cairo to Cape Town would be virtually completely cut off, and Britain would not have wanted to go out of their way to link up the two cities.
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