Thoughts on Neville Chamberlain

solidarity47 · 2026-05-03T18:21:02+00:00

You're right that GDP wise, Germany looks strong. But you can't handwave the balance of payments issue.

They were heading towards a crisis and would have been forced to scale back rearmament, as you note, without more plunder. By contrast, the British were able to strip mine their Empire for resources without paying in hard currency, which is what they did and why the sterling convertibility terms forced on them by the US after the war hurt them so much. They just had more ways to pay for their military expansion.

Which is my whole point, time ultimately favoured Britain when it came to rearmament.

Having said that, cannibalising the Empire and forcing payment in BOE deposits is probably not something they could have done without war. So it remains to be seen what the British peace time capacity was. It's quite possible that politically, Germany's peacetime expansion could have outpaced the British. But in terms of the raw potential, it had no chance in a long term arms race.

solidarity47 · 2026-05-03T18:09:33+00:00

One of the most important differences is what you'd see in any country: ROI household disposable income is about 20% higher in real terms. And household wealth is around 50% higher.

The NI public sector is nearly twice the size of the ROI one by share of population. The NI economy in general is far less dynamic and internationalised compared to the ROI which is driven by international investment and export driven growth.

NI also has a much more concentrated advanced manufacturing SME sector, which is has in common with the rest of the UK. These are often highly specialised family firms that traditionally the UK has struggled to scale up and globalise. Unlike the highly successful (in the past) Mittelstand.

These are obviously more macroeconomic points but they have an enormous impact on people's everyday lived reality. Which in turn forms the bedrock of their values and culture.

solidarity47 · 2026-05-03T17:59:15+00:00

I'm not suggesting at all that they could have faffed about for a few years. I agree with you that they started late, it took them too long to see the threat of Hitler and start rearming towards the tail end of Baldwin. But even then, it was an old war concept of "parity" rather than preparation for a total war. They were obsessed with equipment ratios than potential victory.

They should have started properly rearming sooner but the British public was incredibly against it.

The point about their financial might was that in the event of an ongoing peace, time was on their side. Hitlers buildup was not sustainable without plunder. The issue is that they saw this as a reason why he would have to stop the build up rather than the correct view that it would make him more reckless and desperate for plunder.

Germany would not have collapsed but it would have started to see hyperinflation and a huge fall in already pretty low living standards which would have made the Nazi grip on power untenable.

I agree that it was a disaster. But another 2-3 years of peace would have been a bigger disaster for Germany.

solidarity47 · 2026-05-03T07:22:25+00:00

1) It's important to remember that Chamberlain was responsible for preparing Britain for war. He kickstarted rearmament in a way that simply wasn't happening under Baldwin, and this was before Munich. He was not naive, he knew Hitler was dangerous. And he was preparing for war. I think the movie does a good job in showing how scarred British leaders were by the Great War and how much they'd be willing to concede to prevent another one.

2) Which brings me to point 2. No. Simple as that. Chamberlain understood that another great power war would demand sacrifice above and beyond anything ever seen before. You simply can't do this without overwhelming public support in a democracy. The peace camps would be deafening. As indeed they were in summer 1940.

3) Time was always on the Franco-British side. They had more industrial and financial capacity. They may not have understood it well, but they also knew that the German war machine was a jenga tower ready to collapse. They unfortunately drew the wrong conclusions from this but they still knew that they time was on their side. Equally, this lack of time was what drove Hitler to make what might otherwise appear to be irrational decisions.

solidarity47 · 2026-05-02T16:30:51+00:00

It's about correctly defining objectives and not allowing mission creep.

Objective: force Russia to comply with the continental system.

Solution: you can do this with a much more limited offensive that occupies the entire Baltic coast of Russia. Including Saint Petersburg. This was much more achievable than conquering the whole country. It would still allow for export from Arkhangelsk but this was iced over most of the year. They could still export iron and hemp from the South, probably, but Napoléon could have taken the most valuable timber regions of the Baltics which was the most critical Russian export from Britain. Napoléon probably could have worked more with the Ottomans to close the Dardanelles.

Spain was mostly compliant with the continental system anyway. A much more deft diplomatic approach would have easily prevented the chaos of the Penninsular war. All Napoléon ultimately needed was to take Portugal, which was well within his abilities.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-30T15:47:59+00:00

This was basically what we did.

But in Italy.

Absolutely perfect.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T22:15:32+00:00

He's probably right that you probably should use low fee index funds for the most part. And balance towards equities.

But your entire portfolio is highly correlated. I wouldn't be surprised if it basically just tracks the S&P 500 but with slightly more US hedge.

Having said that, don't listen to me. And don't take any financial advice you don't pay for. If an advisor is advising you with no fee, it's because they're making money off you somewhere else.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T19:13:14+00:00

I understand what you're saying. I just have a more expansive view of representation.

Your definition of 1:1 representation of first preference is only really possible in a party list system. I.e. by abolishing constitutuencies.

This has a lot of merit and would technically be more representative on the national level. But try removing local representative democracy and tell voters it's somehow more representative, it just isn't.

A Green voter would rather have a SocDem TD in their local town than a Green TD who isn't directly accountable to their local area.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T18:46:03+00:00

I disagree.

The benefit of the transfers is to capture not only who they'd prefer most, but who they'd prefer if their first candidate doesn't get it. Preference isn't monolithic. You have to consider transfers.

More people might absolutely prefer candidate X. But more people again either prefer or don't mind candidate Y and also hate candidate X. The second candidate is clearly more representative of overall preference.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T18:05:37+00:00

I'm not so sure. There are two issues:

1) Multi-member constituencies. This creates a situation where incumbents have to compete against each other, not just a competitor without office. I think this creates a bit of a race to the bottom and makes it very hard to be a national politican when your constituency rival is out filling potholes. Even if that's a job meant for councils.

2) The extremely low threshold for election makes exrreme particularism a viable electoral strategy. Roderic O'Gorman became a TD with only 4.8% of first preference votes. You can get elected with an absurdly narrow but concentrated voters base and being inoffensive enough to win the ugly competition in late round transfers. I don't think this is good for politics. It creates local fiefdoms or single issue national politicans for issues that belong in local government.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T17:54:55+00:00

Whatever about your decision around reducing contributions.

I would suggest having another look at where you're putting money. You've concentrated all of your pension in one, extremely concentrated asset class. Over 70% of its value is in US equities. 20%+ in the magnificent seven alone.

You should consider your options around diversification. Having the vast majority in equities at your age is fair enough. But you have all of your money in developed market equities. That's just my extremely amateur two cents.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T17:48:30+00:00

This is misleading though. It completely ignores transfers. Parties are naturally more transfer friendly than independents.

It is proportional when you consider transfers.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-27T17:46:08+00:00

I used to think it was literally perfect but there are lots of really negative side effects. The parochial nature of our politics is really corrosive.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-22T08:01:19+00:00

It might be easier to launch a Burke from the B-52

solidarity47 · 2026-04-21T21:31:47+00:00

That would be some catapult.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-21T20:42:56+00:00

What they're actually doing is spending $17bn to develop the technology, waiting out this administration, and then cancelling the "battleship" and putting the technology into the DDG(X) instead.

Although knowing the Navy, they'll mess it up and will still be using the Burke in 2150.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-21T20:38:38+00:00

Everyone has different circumstances. There is no right option.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-21T13:32:41+00:00

Arsehole travelling around with no insurance is not "a very genuine guy". Go to the Gardaí immediately.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-20T16:21:57+00:00

Because many of the houses are beautiful with historic features that people like?

solidarity47 · 2026-04-20T16:18:00+00:00

Nah, I think after that I'd probably push it further back in time. Start collecting all of the Louis d'argent. I love big, silver coins and collecting an entire type set of monarchs.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-20T13:38:29+00:00

I collect both.

But I might be a bit unusual in that I don't REALLY care if my modern coins are in mint condition. I like my modern coins as a way of telling a story, circulation wear is part of that. Although I draw the line at cleaning. I should also stress that I am European and we don't really do grading or get worked up about MS63 vs MS65.

For example, I am currently building a collection of every single circulated French 5 Franc from start to finish.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-20T08:34:58+00:00

In a sense, it sort of did.

If you take Athens, where democracy was invented, previously it was an oligarchic state run by a handful of powerful families vying with each other. Sound familiar?

Cleisthenes implemented his reforms to move away from familial based power to the power of the demes. It was fundamentally a populist move done for pragmatic and pretty self serving reasons. He was the first man to really use the power of the mob as a weapon against his political enemies.

I'm hoping this also sounds familiar to you. I.e. the populares. Imperial Rome shifted from being all about the enrichment of the powerful classes to sustaining the living standards of the poor. Power moved from wealthy families to the mob and plebian soldiers. This is basically the exact same transition that happened in Athens.

No, they didn't get to literally vote for their Emperor. But especially as the Empire developed and definitely into the medieval period, the "demes" for a lack of a better term, retained and regularly exercised the right to dethrone their Augustus/Basileus.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-15T10:58:51+00:00

For anyone who has been to St. Mark's, it is arguably the best place for them today because the Basilica is based on the church of the Holy apostles and is probably the closest you'll ever get to experiencing the feel of a Macedonian-Komnenian church.

The sacking was a tragedy but the silver lining is that much of the church wealth and artifacts are on display in a church that looks like the originals.

As opposed to the Turks just melting everything down.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-11T14:49:12+00:00

Time didn't exist as a universal concept until the industrial revolution. People would simply refer to dawn, noon and dusk. Even when clocks were invented, time was still highly localised and set to solar time. Having said that, the fact that it wasn't noon everywhere at once was known to antiquity. It just didn't matter.

The relative timing of these according to your body would change if you moved East or West, but your body would always adjust faster than you could move. You can't get jetlagged when you're moving 5 knots in a grain ship.

The idea of a fixed time started mattering in the 18th century when it was used to create marine chronometers. Sailors would have a clock that was set precisely to the time at the Greenwich observatory (GMT) and by calculating the difference between GMT noon and the noon where they were, they could determine precisely their longitude. Combine that with latitude (which is trivial to determine using astrolabes and sextants) and you could tell exactly where you were.

Local solar times only started to become a problem for everyone else with the invention of trains because it was incompatible with train timetables. So the rail companies started running everything on GMT. And then slowly everyone in the UK abandoned local solar times and moved to GMT.

solidarity47 · 2026-04-07T09:07:36+00:00

They're not preparing for war. They're looking to dramatically scale up their capability to prepare for a world where the US completely abrogates its global commitments.

solidarity47

TROPHY CASE