A good way to assess a country's true psychology is to look at how it treats other nations.
The UK's relations with Europe and the rest of the world are currently going through a radical reconfiguration, thanks to Brexit. But equally, the way that the UK government is handling Brexit and its relations with its near neighbours in Europe is also highly-revealing in telling us the true nature of the country's leaders, and their motivations. As a result of this, European observers of the negotiation process between the UK and the EU are having to sharply re-evaluate their preconceptions about Britain's sense of morality. They are beginning to realise that Britain's honesty and transparency can no longer be taken for granted. They realise that Britain is behaving like a "troublemaker".
Divide and rule
When the chips are down, Britain's government has an instinct for devious behaviour (in particular towards its own population).The British government's negotiation strategy with the EU (if it can be coherently said to have one), seems to follow on from the same tactics, which Britain also once used when it was an Imperial power.
Back in the day, the British government's strategy for keeping the colonies under control was one of "divide and rule". In India, this was about balancing the different ethnic sides off against each other. The tensions between those sides (e.g. Hindu versus Muslim) were then stoked by Britain as a deliberate policy to sabotage the growing independence movement. This then made post-independence violence all the more certain; as we know, millions died in violence during those population exchanges. Earlier in Britain's rule over India, we had the Indian Mutiny, which caused widespread devastation, and also numerous famines over time that caused the deaths of millions, to the general indifference of its British rulers.
Closer to home, and another example of "divide and rule" that is often forgotten by Britain's population, was the treatment of Ireland: the land "across the (St George's) channel" that was effectively Britain's colony, with much of its Catholic population treated as virtual slave labour. Institutional indifference led to the potato famine, causing the deaths of millions, and the widespread depopulation of Ireland. Meanwhile, there was Northern Ireland, where again, Britain's ignorance of its bloody past and persecution towards the Ulster Catholic minority, is widespread. As we see, the policy of "divide and rule" is still at the heart of how the government runs the country even today, thanks to the DUP. And that doesn't even mention the current government's arrogant attitude towards the Irish government as part of its negotiations with the EU (more on that later).
The same could be said of Britain's rule over Palestine, where the Arab majority were played off against the Jewish minority. As the violence between them and their British overlords got increasingly out of hand, the British left the whole mess to the newly-created UN, who were totally unable to deal with the situation. As with "divide and rule" in Ireland, the Middle East is still dealing with the after effects of that today.
Britain, as an Imperial power, therefore had a long reputation for dealing with its colonies in a Machiavellian manner. The three mentioned, India, Ireland and Palestine, are just a few of the more glaring examples. There are many others. Of course, this strategy was common among all "Imperial powers", and Britain was very far from the worst in this regard. However, the cases of India, Ireland and Palestine are three stains on Britain's colonial record - in terms of the collective human impact of their policies - that stand out even among other acts of colonial infamy by other powers. Britain may not have used torture on an mass scale like some other Imperial powers, but it would be naive in the extreme to think of Britain as a paragon on Imperial virtue, like as it has been with some, nostalgic over the past.
The manner in which the UK government has dealt with the EU during the negotiations follows the same path. On one hand, Britain's Prime Minister talks of wanting a "deep and special partnership" with the EU based on trust and co-operation. But on the other, while negotiations are ongoing with the EU as a whole, her government (and the PM herself) seeks to drive clefts within the nations of the EU itself. Firstly, Theresa May and her ministers engage in the type of diplomacy that looks for issues that individual members of the EU might agree with Britain on, separately from the rest of the EU; the purpose of this is to build some kind of "inner coalition" within the EU that might be more supportive towards Britain's goals. Secondly, in the case of Germany, David Davis seems to be on a strategy to win over the support of its industrialists that would then act a some kind of "lobby" to pressure Angela Merkel on Britain's behalf. In this case, it is like developing a "cleft within a cleft". His comments just recently, where he blamed France and Germany for holding up the negotiations, support the view that Britain's strategy is to drive wedges between nations, as well as even wedges between interest groups in the nations themselves.
These two examples show not only the glaring lack of tact of Britain's government, but also reveal its government's true motivations: treating Europe as a kind of "colony" that can be manipulated and exploited to achieve its goals.
Looking at this objectively, it paints a very poor picture for Britain as a nation to be trusted. Not only is it being devious; it is being tactless. And everyone can see it.
It is almost reminiscent of the tactless behaviour and self-defeating diplomatic strategy of Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II. When he came to power, he wanted Germany to be a great power, but also one that had good relations with its neighbours. Through a series of misjudgments, Germany fell out of favour with Britain, Russia and France, leading the Kaiser to look for alliances with nations that others were wary to be close to. This left Germany diplomatically-isolated from the major Imperial powers, leading its government to seek self-reliance as the best form of defence. We know where that ended.
In a different context, Britain's government seem to be repeating many of the same kind of blunders: making enemies where it should be making friends; while in seeking to divide existing alliances, the only effect this has is to unite them against itself as their common agitator. This kind of "imperialistic approach" will only end in failure, while showing to others that Britain's motivations are antagonistic in nature.
"Special treatment"
Apart from the Imperialistic strategy of "divide and rule", there is the UK government's (equally Imperialistic) mindset of expecting the EU to do everything for them, give in to all their demands, while offering little in return.
This is the lazily-entitled mindset that Britain had seen in remission during its membership of the EU. In many ways, joining the EU was an admission of Britain's relative weakness in the post-Imperial world. As it was not in a position to make demands, it allowed Britain an opportunity to reshape its own sense of identity. Brexit represents a backwards step to the entitled, patronising attitude that the country had during its colonial past: nothing is ever Britain's fault.
David Davis seems to summarise this mentality well: a monoglot who is incapable of understanding even the basics of his brief, or seeming to care. To him, Brexit all seems like a bit of a lark. As far as he sees it, Britain has already offered "compromises" (I struggle to think of any), and so the onus is on the EU to do the same. This attitude ignores the fact that the EU is simply following its own rules, as clearly laid out in statute in the Lisbon treaty. This has been explained repeatedly to Davis, who never seems to listen. The EU is not setting out to "punish" Britain; it is simply explaining the rules as they stand, and what is and isn't possible within that framework. But Britain's government wants the EU to ignore its own rules in order to indulge its wishes. In its lazily-entitled thinking, Britain has all the bearing of a haughty Imperialist of yesteryear that expects "foreign lackeys" to do all its work for it, while it wallows in its own self-satisfaction, ordering others around.
For some reason, Britain thinks it should be entitled to some kind of extra-legal cloud-cuckoo land where it gets "special treatment" from the rest of the world.
Expecting "special treatment" on one hand, while enacting a strategy of "divide and rule" on the other, Britain's government has simply slipped back into the lazy Imperialistic pretensions of a hundred years ago, but minus the Empire.
While the negotiations with the EU continue, the rest of the world (who Britain expects to have preferential trade agreements with) must look on with a mixture of bemusement and bafflement. If Britain can't even negotiate properly with its supposed "friends and allies", what chance has it got against anyone else?
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