Compared with losing the war, making concessions to East Africa was clearly not unacceptable. By now, Prime Minister David and the other British leaders understood all too well that no country could halt the rise of East Africa and the United States, two powers outside Europe.
There was no need even to mention East Africa and the United States, which ranked near the forefront among the great powers. Even Japan was no longer the little brother Britain could once knead and shape at will.
Even without East Africa's emergence, Japan's development in the previous life had exceeded Britain's control. Japan's later withdrawal from the League of Nations, led by Britain and France, was ample proof. During the Second World War, Japan had further struck Britain hard in the South Seas.
Japan was certainly not as powerful as Britain, but Japan was far enough away from Britain, and that was Japan's advantage. Indeed, leveraging its geographical position, Japan could stand toe-to-toe with the United States, another Pacific power.
As for East Africa and the United States, they were not especially far from Britain in terms of distance. In theory, all three were coastal nations of the Atlantic Ocean. Yet East Africa and the United States were several levels above Japan in sheer scale.
With the world having developed to this point, the world order once dominated by traditional powers such as Britain and France could be said to have reached the brink of collapse. Even Europe's status as the world's "center of civilization" had come under challenge.
Since the Age of Discovery, when European nations had risen rapidly and become the builders and leaders of the new world order, this was the first time such a situation had appeared.
At the root of this development were the rapid rises of the