module 1 The fall of the British Empire BEFORE READING Answer these questions. a. Why do you think the British Empire began to decline? b. Which was the last British colony to become independent? c. When did apartheid end? d. Do you think that other empires could be formed in the future? Decolonisation and decay (1945 1997) Britain and the Empire emerged victorious from the Second World War, but the effects of the conflict were profound. Much of Europe was now in ruins. Britain was left virtually bankrupt. In 1946 the United States loaned the British government $3.5 billion and the last instalment was only repaid in 2006. At the same time, anti-colonial movements were on the rise in the colonies. Between 1945 and 1965, the number of people under British rule outside the UK itself fell from 700 million to five million. The pro-decolonisation Labour government elected in 1945 moved quickly to cope with the most pressing issue: Indian independence. The borders drawn by the British to divide India into Hindu and Muslim areas left tens of millions as minorities in the newly independent states of India and Unit Pakistan. Millions of Muslims subsequently crossed from India to Pakistan and Hindus in the reverse direction, and violence between the two communities cost hundreds of thousands of lives. Burma and Ceylon gained their independence the following year in 1948. India, Pakistan and Ceylon became members of the Commonwealth, though Burma chose not to join. The British Mandate of Palestine, where an Arab majority lived alongside a Jewish minority, presented the British with a similar problem to that of India. Britain announced in 1947 that it would withdraw in 1948 and leave the matter to the United Nations to solve. The UN voted for the partition of Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state. In 1956, the Egyptian government unilaterally nationalised the Suez Canal. The British Prime Minister, Anthony Eden, and the French government planned an Israeli attack on Egypt to retake the canal. Though the invasion reached its objective, UN intervention and US pressure forced Britain into a very humiliating withdrawal of its forces, and Eden resigned. Britain could no longer act without at least the approval, if not the full support, of the United States. The events at Suez wounded British national pride, leading one MP to describe it as Britain s Waterloo and another to suggest that the country had become an American satellite . In the Mediterranean, a guerrilla war fought by Greek Cypriots ended in 1960 in an independent Cyprus, with the UK retaining the military bases of Akrotiri and Dhekelia. The Mediterranean islands of Malta and Gozo were amicably granted independence from the UK in 1964. Most of the UK s West Indies territories achieved independence in the early sixties. British territories in the Pacific acquired independence between 1970 (Fiji) and 1980 (Vanuatu). Tuvalu, the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea chose to become part of the Commonwealth. The end of the Empire The granting of independence to Rhodesia and Vanuatu in 1980 and British Honduras in 1981 meant that, except for a few islands, the process of decolonisation that had begun after the Second World War was largely complete. In 1982, Britain s determination to defend its remaining overseas territories was tested when Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands, acting on a claim that dated back to the Spanish Empire. Britain s ultimately successful military fight during the Falklands War was thought by many to have contributed to reversing the downward trend in the UK s status as a world power. The same year, the Canadian government cut its last legal link with Britain. The 1982 Canada Act passed by the British parliament ended the need for British involvement in changes to the Canadian constitution. Equivalent acts were passed for Australia and New Zealand in 1986.