The following is an essay as to why the British lost the
American revolution. Feel free to steal ideas or criticize, it isn't one of my best.
While greatly outmatching the
fledgling America in terms of soldiers and weaponry, the social climate was against
Britain from the beginning, and morale was the key to winning the revolution. Distance was another deciding factor, as speed of response is a huge
tactical advantage in war. Several minor problems also contributed to the downfall of the British – the American’s knowledge of terrain, the clever
propaganda of
Thomas Paine, inciting rebel factions across the continent. The Americans had full public support on their side, including immediate access to resources. The British had huge, slow supply lines and a bad reputation, and they had earned few allies by use of restrictive laws and military force in troublesome spots such as Boston.
Britain could stand little more
economic loss; after fighting against the
French to the north, and keeping control of their far-flung colonies the loss of America – part of the essential trade route that ran from Europe to the Caribbean to America – was a top priority. This route brought in a great deal of money for British importers and exporters, shipping new luxury goods such as rum and molasses back to Europe for consumption, and then European made goods to the Americas for frontier use. The loss of the tariffs the British government had placed on these trade routes, as well as the loss of a major sector of the economy would be shattering to the British empire.
While the British government and merchant class would have understood the reasons for war, the lower class – with only limited profit from the trade routes – would have seen little need for it; as far as the poor were concerned, it was another frivolous use of money that could have been used to improve the socio-economic situation of Britain, rather than keeping another unruly colony in line. On the American side, the revolution must have seemed much more immediate, as the fighting was much closer. While many Americans may have been ambivalent about independence, the mismanagement of the citizens of Boston – with the harsh Intolerable Acts – more and more people felt threatened by a government with little perspective of American problems and desires. Coupled with Thomas Paine’s inflammatory articles, the sense of injustice rallied many Americans behind the rebel flag.
While the Americans had fewer starting resources, their access to them was much more immediate than the British supply lines. Where Americans were able to create much of what they needed on location, the British were forced to wait three months for supplies to arrive. American operations were easier to carry out, as even loyalists had little love for the German
mercenaries employed by Britain, while a large segment of the population supported the rebels’ efforts. The German mercenaries, fighting for gold rather than freedom were also - despite their training – less fierce fighters, they simply didn’t have the same level of
motivation as the Americans: a cornered animal always fights more fiercely.
This combination of
apathy in Britain, distrust in America, and the horde of location-related problems the British had in the New World grew to an overwhelming point. Further, the revolution had become more than an army – it was a
concept held in the heart of the general populace – the
Intolerable Acts had marked the British as oppressors; and it was impossible for the British to destroy that idea. More than the difficulty in getting supplies, more than the lack of motivation of their soldiers, more than the contrary wishes of the British populace, the war was lost because the British tried to kill a concept with force.