What If: Timeswitch England 2012 A.D. with England 12 A.D.

[madd0ct0r]

well aside from farmer's stockpiling fertiliser so they don't have to buy it when the market's high, AND the stored stockpiles at the fertilizer factories, there is another source.

the water treatment companies have been stockpiling dried compressed shit for decades, since they don't want to pay to landfill it and they're still waiting to be allowed to sell it as fertilizer. It's just a non-trivial matter of logisitics.

Crofting (hill sheep) doesn't use fertilizer, so i guess mutton will be back on the menu. hmmm. time to look at statistics for WWII rationing and production...

[Thanas]

well aside from farmer's stockpiling fertiliser so they don't have to buy it when the market's high, AND the stored stockpiles at the fertilizer factories, there is another source.

Neither will last a lot.

the water treatment companies have been stockpiling dried compressed shit for decades, since they don't want to pay to landfill it and they're still waiting to be allowed to sell it as fertilizer. It's just a non-trivial matter of logisitics.

Human waster is not a good fertilizer iirc.

Crofting (hill sheep) doesn't use fertilizer, so i guess mutton will be back on the menu. hmmm. time to look at statistics for WWII rationing and production...

Yeah but sheep do not a population feed.

[HMS Conqueror]

Why would England lose fertiliser production? It has both a fertiliser industry and production of the feedstock (natural gas)?

Secondly I wouldn't be so sure that even a big reversion would kill a lot of people. British agriculture right now is extremely low in resource utilisation. It employs something like 1% of the population and a lot of those are being paid not to produce food by the EU, or are deliberately low-yield organic farmers. British agriculture can get a whole lot less efficient and still provide for the populace. Now sure a country where 20% of people are working the land (to take an extreme example) is going to be a lot poorer relative to now. But given that this England contains the majority of all literate people in the world, has a vast stock of industrial equipment, and knows exactly where all the good natural resources deposits are that will be exploited for the next 2,000 years, all it has to do is survive the initial year or two before the deficiencies due to its loss of global trade are made good.

[Thanas]

Why would England lose fertiliser production? It has both a fertiliser industry and production of the feedstock (natural gas)?

What are their production, especially regarding the need that will have to be filled?

Secondly I wouldn't be so sure that even a big reversion would kill a lot of people. British agriculture right now is extremely low in resource utilisation. It employs something like 1% of the population and a lot of those are being paid not to produce food by the EU, or are deliberately low-yield organic farmers. British agriculture can get a whole lot less efficient and still provide for the populace. Now sure a country where 20% of people are working the land (to take an extreme example) is going to be a lot poorer relative to now. But given that this England contains the majority of all literate people in the world, has a vast stock of industrial equipment, and knows exactly where all the good natural resources deposits are that will be exploited for the next 2,000 years, all it has to do is survive the initial year or two before the deficiencies due to its loss of global trade are made good.

I am sure that a collapsed society will not work.

[HMS Conqueror]

Why would England lose fertiliser production? It has both a fertiliser industry and production of the feedstock (natural gas)?

What are their production, especially regarding the need that will have to be filled?

Ah, you gave the impression that you knew.

Secondly I wouldn't be so sure that even a big reversion would kill a lot of people. British agriculture right now is extremely low in resource utilisation. It employs something like 1% of the population and a lot of those are being paid not to produce food by the EU, or are deliberately low-yield organic farmers. British agriculture can get a whole lot less efficient and still provide for the populace. Now sure a country where 20% of people are working the land (to take an extreme example) is going to be a lot poorer relative to now. But given that this England contains the majority of all literate people in the world, has a vast stock of industrial equipment, and knows exactly where all the good natural resources deposits are that will be exploited for the next 2,000 years, all it has to do is survive the initial year or two before the deficiencies due to its loss of global trade are made good.

I am sure that a collapsed society will not work.

Begging the question.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah but sheep do not a population feed.

No, but they help. As does fishing like mad in the suddenly replenished oceans around them.

[Thanas]

Ah, you gave the impression that you knew.

Yeah, I've been told by people before that this will not work.

Now, prove your assertion. You made the positive claim, now do so.

[madd0ct0r]

i don't have time today, but http://faostat.fao.org/site/368/Desktop ... =368#ancor is the United Nations food balance database. just plug in the UK and see what the major imports and exports are. Fertilisier is available on a different fao database, but don't have time to hunt for it.

[Apollonius]

A lot of food (up to 40%) is wasted. Part of it spoils during transport, but a whole lot is just thrown away because it doesn't look pretty enough. Once people realise that they cannot afford to waste food, they will start eating vegetables that don't look as pretty as what we are used to see in today's supermarkets.

Modern agriculture also produces a lot of foods that don't yield much nutritional value. If they switch to crops that yield many calories per acreage, they could perhaps sustain the population. Replace wheat (which only yields 6 million calories per acre) with potatoes (18 million calories per acre); if you must have meat, replace cattle and chickens (around 1 mil. calories) with pigs (3 mil. calories per acre). Forbid supermarkets from throwing away stuff that doesn't look pretty, relax food regulations to reduce wastage, issue ration cards. Britons consume way too much food anway, no wonder they're the most overweight people in Europe. People can live on 2000 kilocalories per day and still be perfectly healthy, and yet, the average Briton consumes over 3000 per day. Allow manual laborers to eat that much, and keep the rest of the population on a lean diet. Outlaw the production of pet foods and alcohol, so that these resources can also be dedicated to food production.

It may be true that they wouldn't be able to feed the population with what they're currently producing, because economically, it makes more sense to just import certain things rather than to produce them locally. Once importation becomes impossible, they will have to start producing stuff that wouldn't currently generate any profit. Things that are cheap today would probably become very expensive, and people will have to spend most of their income on food, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they will be starving.

But even with starvation, general anarchy and collapse of civilisation is unlikely. We had starvation in the Soviet Union and many other places during the 20th century, and yet, society didn't collapse. It may be necessary to introduce summary executions for minor offenses, both to reduce the unproductive parts of the population, and to keep people from rioting, but a sufficiently determined government would be able to keep things from getting out of control. What is most important, is preserving political unity. If a civil war were to break out, everything would collapse.

[Irbis]

I'm afraid I'd have to question the assertion the society would immediately collapse. Fertilizer production in UK, according to this site, is 560 thousand tons; Consumption equals 1466 thousand tons. Assuming we can make UK population survive on half of that used due to rationing*, eliminating waste and frivolous foods, we need 733 Kt, of which 560 Kt covers 77% (let's assume we stay on 560, assuming production will not be ramped up during first year to conserve feedstock). But, there are tried and proven ways to supplement that, with little to no additional fertilizer used, or doing what the Brits did in both World Wars, ramping up fish industry (seeing oceans now teem with wildlife). Shortages can also be supplemented by imports from Gaul and Spain. UK has enough nuclear power plants to keep electricity net supplied too, assuming electricity rationing and control, saving gas burnt in these for fertilizer production.

[*Half to be conservative - just before WW2, UK imported 70% of the food, yet, country was able to ramp up food production to cover for transports sunk by U-Boots, especially in first, worst year of the Battle of Atlantic.]

Now, let's assume the above isn't enough and the food rations fall to very low in first year. Would that cause riots and society collapse? Especially in country that in last century survived twice 5 year periods of huge food shortages under German bombs? I don't think so, for two historical reasons. One, Poland in 70s and 80s, also faced huge fall in fertilizer production/imports due to first currency/credit crisis, then international embargo. The result wasn't pretty (bread queues - and by queues, I mean something hard to imagine for most of readers today, queue that opens at 3 AM with promise to maybe get a loaf of bread by 10 AM), but there were little if any rioting. The other, Germany between 1945-50, where food rations were below amount healthy humans need for a long time, also didn't suffer any societal collapse or become a failed state. Why would UK fail to follow 4 above examples, and instead fail? The country will be put into state of emergency, and even if any riots or looting begin, they will be meet with live bullets. Society would collapse only if there was a place you could run to, but seeing UK would be literally only place in the world left for modern humans there would be big incentive to keep calm and carry on, so to say.

Now, the other points in this thread. First, that modern society has little farmers. So what? We can assign 10 of suddenly out of job young adults and adults to each farmer, seeing that you need only supervisor that knows what he is doing, dispersing population and increasing food production, eliminating the problem of feeding the cities in the process. After a few years, we have enough farmers to cover all of the British Isles in farms, even if these won't produce modern yields.

Commerce - why bother with selling technology to Romans? Take a look at simple drinking glass. Such regularity and clear glass is beyond any glass Romans can produce. That plastic bottle you throw away without second thought? For Romans, it's magical material beating their small amphorae in virtually every single respect. Made in China stainless steel cutlery? Hand clocks? LED torches? Virtually every single piece of cheap crap is suddenly luxury article, all you need is to dump a few supermarkets worth into Roman markets and you have enough local coin to pay for grain and other essentials.

Military - I especially don't understand the assertion UK army can't occupy Europe or match Romans in any way. I beg your pardon? UK currently has 227,160 members of armed forces, plus 174,800 regular, active reservists. That's about the same as Roman army at its height, and that is if you forgot about little unimportant things like machine guns, trucks, tank divisions or RAF. Ok, I know Romans conquered all of that incrementally, by building infrastructure before grabbing next piece of land, and no one sane in transported UK would wage continent-sized wars of conquest anyway, but if UK wanted to grab, say, northern Gaul, there is nothing Rome can do about it. That Legion they sent to recapture it? Roman strength, building fortified camps to rest at night, is huge weakness here - now, you have big, important immobile target that can justify single aircraft sortie to bomb it into oblivion.

Ok, I agree UK might see economy crash and fall to second or even third world life standard in places in first few years, even localized famine and rioting, but I think 10 year after that you'd have strong country with XVIII-XIX century tech level replacements for all that was lost, covering all of British isles and parts of northern Europe, not failed society preyed on by Romans and such. The government is too strong and legitimate for this, IMHO, population will do as told even without extreme measures.

[HMS Conqueror]

Ah, you gave the impression that you knew.

Yeah, I've been told by people before that this will not work.

Now, prove your assertion. You made the positive claim, now do so.

You made the assertion: "80-90% of England dies off over the next two years and technology collapsed".

Since you offer nothing to support it I don't even need to respond.

---

I largely agree with Apollonius and Irbis on the specifics. Only thing I disagree with is that I see no reason Britain would revert to 18th or 19th century after 10 years. The only thing necessary to fix any raw material shortage is a little time; a couple of years. Britain knows where all the raw materials in the world are and how to extract them. In fact prices are likely to actually drop on the 10 year timescale because we have already mined out most of the easy/obvious deposits in modern times, whereas in 12AD they're pristine. The only problem is the modern UK enjoys a global division of labour that will disappear, which leaves a temporary gap in some things, of which a few may be important. But unless a vast swathe of the population actually dies (which I don't think it would), making it impossible to set up the new supply chain in 12 AD, there is no reason Britain wouldn't resume 2012 living standards after a decade or so.

nb: important just means a shortage that can't be endured in the short term. Britain would likely totally lose a supply of new computers for quite a while, for instance, which would drop the economy a lot in 2012 terms. But it wouldn't threaten Britain's ability to survive until it could build a domestic computer supply chain, so in the medium term it's not important.

[Thanas]

You made the assertion: "80-90% of England dies off over the next two years and technology collapsed".

Since you offer nothing to support it I don't even need to respond.

Actually you do, as you made the assertion that Britain can survive on its own. As for that machinery, they will have to drop down to early industrial levels at the least as they will not get machine tools and Britain does not produce all they consume anyway.

Military - I especially don't understand the assertion UK army can't occupy Europe or match Romans in any way. I beg your pardon? UK currently has 227,160 members of armed forces, plus 174,800 regular, active reservists. That's about the same as Roman army at its height, and that is if you forgot about little unimportant things like machine guns, trucks, tank divisions or RAF. Ok, I know Romans conquered all of that incrementally, by building infrastructure before grabbing next piece of land, and no one sane in transported UK would wage continent-sized wars of conquest anyway, but if UK wanted to grab, say, northern Gaul, there is nothing Rome can do about it.

The current UK Army couldn't occupy Afghanistan three times. The French army could not hold Spain, using much more brutal tactics. What makes you think the UK will have a better track record than what they are currently able to establish?

And a lot of those armed forces are currently outside the UK and propably will not apply to this RAR anyway. Meanwhile, have fun moving modern day logistics on Gallic roads.

[Simon_Jester]

The current UK Army couldn't occupy Afghanistan three times. The French army could not hold Spain, using much more brutal tactics. What makes you think the UK will have a better track record than what they are currently able to establish?

By that argument, the Romans shouldn't have been able to conquer Gaul in the first place, even given years of brutally suppressing attacks against their authority and given the way they played one Celtic tribe off against another.

And I question your examples.

Afghanistan is a backwater whose chief exports are opium and angry riflemen; a British MP of any era from the 1830s to the present could argue that controlling the place wasn't worth the blood of a single British soldier. He'd arguably be right. That impacted British willingness to make the effort.

France occupying Spain? They were up against a peer competitor, Britain, and the locals could match any technology the French had available. They certainly didn't have medical technology indistinguishable from magic in the locals' eyes. They didn't have weapons indistinguishable from magic to arm their allies (like, say, single-shot breech-loading smoothbore muskets, decisive in pitched battles between Gauls and Gauls or Gauls and Romans, but largely useless against a modern army). They didn't have communications indistinguishable from magic... by this time you get the pattern.


Assuming the economy of timeshifted England/Britain survives, I'd expect a British attempt to occupy northern Gaul to look less like a British occupation of Afghanistan, and more like the British occupation of 18th century Egypt.

[Thanas]

By that argument, the Romans shouldn't have been able to conquer Gaul in the first place, even given years of brutally suppressing attacks against their authority and given the way they played one Celtic tribe off against another.

The Romans also used tactics the Britain of today cannot use, unless they are willing to go to full blown military dictatorship. Conquering and holding on to Gaul also took a lot of manpower.

I have no doubt that Britain can crush any Roman army. I doubt they can hold on to the territories they potentially could conquer.

And I question your examples.

Afghanistan is a backwater whose chief exports are opium and angry riflemen; a British MP of any era from the 1830s to the present could argue that controlling the place wasn't worth the blood of a single British soldier. He'd arguably be right. That impacted British willingness to make the effort.

I am talking about today.

As for spain, what matters in an occupation are less tech levels, but more of force projection.

Assuming the economy of timeshifted England/Britain survives, I'd expect a British attempt to occupy northern Gaul to look less like a British occupation of Afghanistan, and more like the British occupation of 18th century Egypt.

That is a very big assumption to make. No society so far in history has survived once its tech base collapsed. Heck, it took a very minor decend in tech levels to throw Europe into the dark ages.

[Simon_Jester]

By that argument, the Romans shouldn't have been able to conquer Gaul in the first place, even given years of brutally suppressing attacks against their authority and given the way they played one Celtic tribe off against another.

The Romans also used tactics the Britain of today cannot use, unless they are willing to go to full blown military dictatorship. Conquering and holding on to Gaul also took a lot of manpower.

Manpower is not the problem- a society as regimented as Britain would have to be to have any chance of surviving this would be able to enact conscription.

Methods are a problem. But the need for brutality in counterinsurgency comes mostly from the fact that the occupiers have sticks but no carrots, when it comes to their dealing with the locals*. They want to take things from the people who live there, but have nothing to give back that justifies it. Here, that isn't so much the case; there are very real advantages to cooperating with the British against the Romans. And the British don't need to maintain absolute control; they just need to break Roman rule and deal with the local population for, what- agricultural land? Timber rights? These are not especially hard things to arrange and you don't necessarily have to kill people in huge numbers to get them, if you have enough to offer them in exchange.

Especially not if you can find some of the local power blocs willing to cooperate with you in order to hurt their enemies. You're not going to see desperate, frantic, last-ditch resistance to someone who isn't doing anything that they would need to resist that badly.

*(If you do not understand this idiom, please look up "the carrot and the stick")

And I question your examples.

Afghanistan is a backwater whose chief exports are opium and angry riflemen; a British MP of any era from the 1830s to the present could argue that controlling the place wasn't worth the blood of a single British soldier. He'd arguably be right. That impacted British willingness to make the effort.

I am talking about today.

So am I.

Like modern Germany, modern Britain can very rationally argue that they should not be in Afghanistan at all. The only thing keeping them there is the Anglo-American relationship, which isn't worth enough for Britain to do something drastic like draft a hundred thousand men and send them to Afghanistan. It's not that a modern society is literally unable to do that, it's that doing so has costs, and Afghanistan isn't worth the price.

So doing something like that is simply not in the cards for Britain, which means Britain alone would never have any chance of occupying Afghanistan- they don't want to do it enough to put in the massive and painful effort it would take to succeed. Which is wise of them, they shouldn't want to do it, because all questions of law and morality and not fighting unjust wars aside... Afghanistan is useless to Britain. The British would have to be fools to make a really major commitment to controlling Afghanistan.

But don't confuse what a modern country does when it's in no real danger and is just trying to oblige an ally with what that country would do if it were suddenly in mortal danger and urgently needed land and resources to survive the next decade.

As for spain, what matters in an occupation are less tech levels, but more of force projection.

This is an article of faith which the age of colonialism does not bear out, I think. When trying to occupy a country with strong nationalist ideas, with a population that has rifles and explosives, with people who have good communications and a refined concept of guerilla warfare, tech levels matter less than force projection.

When trying to occupy a country that does not have these things... well, how many men did Cortez need to push the Aztec Empire to its knees?

Assuming the economy of timeshifted England/Britain survives, I'd expect a British attempt to occupy northern Gaul to look less like a British occupation of Afghanistan, and more like the British occupation of 18th century Egypt.

That is a very big assumption to make. No society so far in history has survived once its tech base collapsed. Heck, it took a very minor decend in tech levels to throw Europe into the dark ages.

Thanas, I'm staying out of that part of the debate. I don't care about the outcome nearly enough to want to get involved. You can fight that out with whoever you wish, and if you can prove to my satisfaction that a modern economy would collapse into Stone Age or Iron Age conditions in a few years like that, I'll believe it and move on.

But I do take exception to your efforts to force a comparison between modern Britons in ancient Gaul and modern Britons in modern Afghanistan, instead of, say, late Renaissance Spaniards in Bronze Age Mexico. That strikes me as a case of cherry-picking your evidence.

[HMS Conqueror]

You made the assertion: "80-90% of England dies off over the next two years and technology collapsed".

Since you offer nothing to support it I don't even need to respond.

Actually you do, as you made the assertion that Britain can survive on its own.

We both made positive claims; in absence of evidence either way the most we can say is we don't know what would happen. However you refuse to substantiate yours, while implying it's the default view, which it is not.

As for that machinery, they will have to drop down to early industrial levels at the least as they will not get machine tools and Britain does not produce all they consume anyway.

The machinery already exists, and some of it makes machine tools. Nor is the knowledge of how to make such things (the really time consuming part) going to disappear.

The current UK Army couldn't occupy Afghanistan three times.

What do you mean by couldn't? Britain was militarily defeated in Afghanistan once, due to a spectacular series of blunders, and returned the next year and destroyed the army that defeated them. It was rather than then, as now, Afghanistan is not worth the cost of holding. This is the problem of cherrypicking - the USSR failed to conquer Afg at an acceptable cost, yet it succeeded in conquering half of Europe. Britain never incorporated Afg into British India, but you'll remember that there was a time before that when it was just called India. The claim that Britain cannot, based on historical record, conquer large tracts of land simply fails on its own terms, and the Roman Empire is a minnow compared to, say, the Maratha Confederacy, which actually had up to date weapons.