The Madness of King George

A retired British army general, Michael Rose, has some advice for Americans debating the cost of pulling out of Iraq - look how well it served Britain to cut and run from America in 1776. In an editorial in the New York Times, Rose notes that King George's London fretted in much the same way over much the same concerns about leaving the American colonies as Washington is today over leaving Iraq.

"...Cornwallis, King George III and his ministers were convinced that this defeat and the withdrawal of British troops from the 13 colonies would result not only in anarchy in America but also in the collapse of the entire British Empire.

"France, Spain and other rivals, they were certain, would seize the remaining colonies in America, the West Indies, the Mediterranean and India. Worse still, the Irish, heartened by the success of the American rebellion, would rise up. At the end of the day, Britain would become no more than an unimportant island off northwestern Europe.

"If the Whig opposition, led by Lord Rockingham, had not had the moral courage and vision to accept defeat by the American colonists, and had not been able to persuade the king and his ministers to do likewise, Britain would likely have lost its position in the world, and today the people of the largest democracy in the world, India, would be speaking either French or Portuguese. By ending the unnecessary war in North America, Britain was able rapidly to rebuild its army and navy, eventually take on and defeat Napoleon, and become the unquestioned pre-eminent global power.

"Few saw this in 1781. During the cruel years of the war, George III had followed a hopelessly flawed strategy and had failed to commit adequate resources to the mission. He had never understood the character or nature of the American people and he had greatly underestimated their determination to throw off the yoke of British rule. The War of Independence had never just been about “taxation without representation.” It had been about the freedom for Americans to develop their own society in the way that they wished.

"George III was oblivious to the changed mindset in the colonies, and through a combination of hubris and a conviction that as the leader of the world’s premier military power he could bear no challenge to his authority, he had determined in 1775 to teach a sharp lesson to the radicals in North America: “Blows must decide.”

"Unfortunately for Britain, he attempted to fight a conventional war against insurgents, and sent far too few troops across the Atlantic to accomplish the mission. Although they initially took New York and Philadelphia, the British subsequently failed to adjust to a counterinsurgency strategy against the “war of the posts” that George Washington adopted after his defeat at Germantown, Pa., in October 1777.

"Instead of trying to isolate the rebels and gain the support of the loyalist and uncommitted colonials, the British spent much of their time defending their bases and maintaining their supply lines, only occasionally venturing out on punitive expeditions. They never succeeded in cutting off the heartland of rebel resistance in New England by taking control of the Hudson River Valley. Nor was the British Army — the finest in the world — ever able to establish sufficient security in the countryside or counter rebel propaganda. It soon came to be regarded as foreign occupation force.

"Finally, the British were never able to prevent a steady flow of arms, ammunition, instructors and fighters from entering the colonies from abroad. Thus Washington, whose Continental Army was down to a few thousand fit soldiers, managed to survive the harsh winter of 1777-78 at Valley Forge and rebuild his military strength.

"It had truly been the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. So how did Britain recover? War is the parent of illusions, and the first step in ending a war must be to shatter those illusions. It takes courage to accept defeat and vision to see that good can emerge from what appears to be disaster.

"Pitt set about rebuilding the British Navy and Army, for he could see that war with France was looming once again. He would often visit the yards to ensure that ships were being constructed on time. Under the energetic direction of the Duke of York, the king’s second son, the army was reorganized and retrained. New commanders were appointed for both services — men like Nelson and Wellington — who were determined not to make the same mistakes as their predecessors. It is hardly an overstatement to say that had Britain not ended the American War of Independence when it did, it could never have been in a position to defeat Napoleon.

"Today, of course, the United States finds itself in much the same position as Britain in 1781. Distracted and diminished by an irrelevant, costly and probably unwinnable war in Iraq, America could ultimately find itself challenged by countries like China and India. Unless it can find a leader with the moral courage of Pitt, there is a strong probability that it will be forced to relinquish its position as the global superpower — possibly to a regime that does not have the same commitment to justice and liberty that the United States and Britain have worked so hard to extend across the world over the past two centuries.

"The sound of the first shot fired at Lexington in 1775 echoed across the world. So too did the firing of the last shot six years later at Yorktown. That second echo brought salvation for Britain, and ultimately great benefit to the entire world."

Now, is there anyone in Washington today wth the courage to speak truth to power, the power of King George W.?