The British Empire was completely and totally infeasible at the time. This was largely and widely known, at least in the U.S. I had grandparents who were born a

The British Empire was completely and totally infeasible at the time. This was largely and widely known, at least in the U.S. I had grandparents who were born around 1900, give or take, and the dominant idea about Europe and Britain was that it was corrupt, that the principle seat of corruption as the royal system and that they could go to hell in their own way. It took Considerable Doing ( and a lot of John Wayne movies ) to sell WWII to the mothers of America. And you know what? One grandmother had one son of five serve in WWII and two serve (in Germany) after. One in the early '50s, the other in the '60s. The sort of American Exceptionalism that emerged after WII was ( I would say ) completely unknown prior.