Yeah, though the UK has been playing Pokermon Go a lot longer than other countries, still - one persons invasion map is another persons exploration map.
But certainly the whole grey area of exploration and invasion have been ironed out in today's times and not a grey area any more.
What I find interesting is how many wars did the UK have with France in some form or another - crazy times and historically the UK been at war with Russia in some form on it's side more times than with the French on the same side. That's kinda crazy, but perspectives of the time and perspectives today are different and much nuance to history that sadly does get lost or overlooked.
> This tradition lives on in the "Anyone but England" rule at sporting events... ;-)
Yes, even in my youth as a child in the 70's/80's in football, nobody wanted to be England, so I get that. The panini football stickers and what was popular player/team wise showed this out nicely.
Walk around central London, which I expect has more statues per capita than just about anyplace on Earth, and there are a remarkable number erected to commemorate some English general or admiral defeating the French in some battle or other.
Unaware of the history, a few years ago I visited the fort in the Tibetan town of Gyantse only to discover unexpectedly that part was prominently labelled “Anti British Museum” and featured a number of depictions of this invasion.
Quoting Palin [1]
- In 1903, however, on a trumped-up pretext, an army, under Colonel Francis Younghusband, crossed over from India, fought a bloody battle not far from Gyantse in which some 3000 Tibetans died, before storming the fort from which we're looking out and going on, unopposed, as far as Lhasa. The British left four years later, leaving behind in Gyantse a post office and a public school. All that remains now is the Anti-British Museum, housed in the dzong.
In the circumstances seems reasonable that British visitors (like me) should be made to feel more than a bit uncomfortable about this episode.
"The British expedition to Tibet, also known as the British invasion of Tibet"