No More Napoleons: How Britain Managed Europe from Waterloo to World War One [Hardcover]

How, for just over a century, Britain ensured it would not face another Napoleon Bonaparte—manipulating European powers while building a global maritime empire
 
At the conclusion of the Napoleonic Wars, a fragile peace emerged in Europe. The continent’s borders were redrawn, and the French Empire, once a significant threat to British security, was for now cut down to size. But after decades of ceaseless conflict, Britain’s economy was beset by a crippling debt. How could this small, insular seapower state secure order across the Channel?
 
Andrew Lambert argues for a dynamic new understanding of the nineteenth century, showing how British policymakers shaped a stable European system that it could balance from offshore. Through judicious deployment of naval power against continental forces, and the defence strategy of statesmen such as the Duke of Wellington, Britain ensured that no single European state could rise to pose a threat, rebuilt its economy, and established naval and trade dominance across the globe.
 
This is the remarkable story of how Britain kept a whole continent in check—until the final collapse of this delicately balanced order at the outset of World War One.“[History] conveyed in bracing prose supported by telling quotations and superb illustrations. . . . The real lesson of Mr. Lambert’s highly instructive book is how hegemons can lose the respect of adversaries over time.”—Brendan Simms,Wall Street Journal

“In his fresh new book, Professor Lambert delivers indeed a commanding reassessment of Britain’s strategic posture in the long nineteenth century. With scholarly rigor and narrative finesse, Lambert charts the course of British foreign policy from the aftermath of Waterloo to the eve of the Great War, arguing that the island nation’s deft orchestration of European affairs forestalled the emergence of another lS,