BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?

Subject: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 02:45 PM

What if we(us American types) had lost the Revolutionary War? What if we were all English?

Hmmm..

Would George Bush be just another lonely cowpuncher down in Texas?
Would there be a Walmart?
Would Elvis have had a cockney accent?

Makes you wonder..

Jerry (Or would I have to be Jerome?)

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Les from Hull
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 02:57 PM

You'd be like Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa...

You wouldn't have been so beastly to the Native Americans. You'd've abolished slavery earlier. You could have created the sort of society that Texas might not have wanted to join!

You would have entered two world wars earlier.

Nobody on your side of the Atlantic would have been able to do a cockney accent. And they still can't (it always sounds slightly Australian).

And Jerome is a French name!

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:06 PM

Your spelling would improve too!
G ¦¬]

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: MMario
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:10 PM

You wouldn't have been so beastly to the Native Americans ?? Great Britain's track record with Native peoples hasn't been too terrific either, y'know.

I suspect that the States would have remained seperate or only very loosely confederated- so there would be multiple governments and countries; suspect that it would have caused the Canadian Provinces to remain more independent of each other as well.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: MMario
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:11 PM

and big Mac, McDonalds, and Burger King most likely would not exist. Hopefully the "mouse" would not exist.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: greg stephens
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:15 PM

Mudcatters would all understand irony.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: GUEST,Desdemona
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:16 PM

That last post reminds me of Bart Simpson's claim that cartoons are the only truly American art form (he goes on to say that he "doesn't count jazz 'cause it sucks")!

I wonder...

~D

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:16 PM

Is that like goldie and silvery Greg?
G.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: bobad
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:25 PM

Then you all would be putting bangers and picalilli in your buns.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:31 PM

* Texas might still be Mexican.
* Alaska might still be Russian.

* Les from Hull - Is your name 'Leslie'? In the US, it would tend to be Lester.

Yeah. If we were British, our section of this continent would probably consist of 35 plus countries (most of them about the size of GREAT Britain) with who-knows-how-many languages and dialects.

The Brits have not been all that great in letting countries govern themselves - so we might have been in constant war long since. With each other.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:33 PM

If someone wouldn't mind changing the title to US revolution, that would be great, thanks...

You'd never have been all English. The colonials were just that, colonials, just like they were in Canada. IIRC, if you asked a normal person in virginia in 1760ish what they were, the first response would probably be ' A Virginian', not American, or English.

As to how it would change history, pick an important event after about 1770, involving either the British Empire or the rebel colonies, and wonder how it might change.

The first big one that comes to mind is the Napoleonic Wars. If North America had been a freindly continent, supplying troops etc, it would certainly have changed the course of that war.

Other significant things would have to include:

If the North American continent had been available to British settlement, would various other places been conquered? Would the vast spaces of the west have sated demand, or would the exta demand from the east coast have pushed us to expand even faster?

How the slave trade would have fared in the south, given the different attitudes in the US and Britian.

Or was that more serious than you meant....

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:39 PM

Blimey!

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Little Robyn
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:44 PM

And you would be signing yourself Jeremy.
Robyn (and all the Robyns would be spelled with an i - Robin)

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: bobad
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:48 PM

And maybe even have such socialist institutions as universal medical care.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Bobert
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:51 PM

Ummmmm, we'd probably all have national health care, far fewer guns in the general population and spend alot more time gossipin' 'bout the royal family...

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:56 PM

Would we have to play cricket?

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: GUEST,marks
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 03:59 PM

We would have to drive on the wrong side of the street.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: GUEST,ifor
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:00 PM

Men [and women ] make their own history but they don't always do it in circumstances of their own choosing.
Karl

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: gnu
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:00 PM

No. You'd play it because it's a great game.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:02 PM

Oh yes, Jerry, and proper football. Not to mention use a knife and fork and hold your pinkie up when drinking your tea :0)

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:03 PM

Oh and tomorrow would just be Tuesday!

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: gnu
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:06 PM

Gosh... I wonder... If you Yanks were REALLY playing rugby and football and cricket, would you be winning most every contest? I'd say it's a good thing ye fellers dumped that tea in the harbour... er, harbor.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:17 PM

Even good tea does not get me that excited.....

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:26 PM

Our telephone booths would be a major upgrade, I'll tell you that..


Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 04:50 PM

Well, the World Series really would be a World series. Don't know what sport, but it would actually be one someone outside the continent plays....

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 05:05 PM

If the Continental Army had surrendered, it would not have been the end of the revolution. It would have continued as a grassroots, guerrilla-style insurrection until the Brits got fed up with fighting an unwinnable war and granted independence voluntarily. No guesses as to how long that would have taken, but probably no more than thirty years.

One question that arises, though, is "If there hadn't been a successful American Revolution, would there have been a French Revolution and would Napoleon have come to power?" If not, if the Brits hadn't had to devote most of their military resources in the early 1800s to the Napoleonic Wars, how strong a hold would they have been able or willing to maintain on the American colonies?

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: SharonA
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 05:27 PM

Bee-dubya-ell (in his first paragraph) beat me to it! I was going to say that if the colonists hadn't won the 1775-1783 Revolutionary War, they would've won a later one during King George III's reign. As George III sank deeper and deeper into mental illness, he would have done more and more things that would have outraged the colonists even further than they were in the 1770s (the Declaration of Independence demonstrates the popular view that he was personally responsible for their political woes).

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 05:27 PM

If the American Colonies had NOT won, would the Irish rebellions of 1798, 1803, the rest of the 19th Century, and 1916 have happened? Would India be a seperate country? And as has been asked, what about France? And Russia?

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: robomatic
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 07:04 PM

If we'd lost the Revolution, we'd all be speaking ENGLISH now.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: GUEST, Ebbie
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 07:16 PM

I was kind of thinking along the lines of the 'colonies' never having revolted, rather than having lost. I agree, the issue would have come up over and over again. Kind of like the Democrats against the Republican Party. grrrrrrr

But if 'we' had never revolted, if all disagreements had been peacefully resolved- hey, we'd be more like Canada.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 07:26 PM

We Aussies would be speaking French.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: freda underhill
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 07:27 PM

You would be descended from convicts.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 08:00 PM

Assuming that my various grandparents would have been let into this country in the 1890's, It probably would have been much the same for me. Of course I'd have had to learn the names of several dozen kings and queens, a hundreds of great battles, but I wouldn't have had to waste so much time figuring out what happened in the Civil War (1861-1865).

From my visits to Eastern and Western Canada, the folks there seemed quite civilized. Maybe we should start a petition to rejoin the United Kingdom, before it evaporates completely!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 08:47 PM

Of course if the French hadn't lost out a few years earlier, the Colonies wouldn't have wanted the British to clear out anyway. And the rest of North America would have been developed on the basis of a division between a French speaking area and a Spanish speaking area, both of them with a largely Native American population. And the Russians in an expanded Alaska.

I imagine slavery would have been abolished in the East Coast British Colonies about the same time as happened in places like Jamaica.

And there probably wouldn't have been a French Revolution, not at that time anyway. I suspect there would have been one in Britain around about the 1820s. Perhaps the Royal, Family would have legged it to the Colonies in America, and an Independent North American monarchy would have emerged, linked with Hanover and the rest of Germany...

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 10:20 PM

Ah. The Royal Family would have emigrated to the 'new' world- and all of its territory would have become the monarch's fiefdom.

(When my daughter was 7 or 8, I came upon her in deep thought. She looked up at me. Mommy, she said, do Royalty ever marry mortals?)

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: SharonA
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 10:47 PM

To those who say that slavery would have been abolished earlier: do you really think that the plantation owners and other slaveowners would have been any more willing to give up that practice under British rule than they were under US federal governance?

Remember that people owned slaves even in the northern colonies and that that practice continued into the early 1800s in the northern states. Heck, the Revolutionary War would never have gotten off the ground if the northern colonies' representatives at the Continental Congresses hadn't capitulated to pressure from the southern colonies to allow the practice of slaveholding to continue in the new republic. The law of the land in the entire United States, even though abolitionists in the northern states found it reprehensible, was that any escaped slave was to be returned to his or her owner no matter where he or she was found. And when the Civil War was finally waged, the majority of Union soldiers were more concerned with preserving the Union than with emancipation.

Given the apathy in the general population of the North and the high feeling on the subject in the South, I suspect that if Britain still ruled the American colonies in the 1830s when various legislation abolished slavery in the British colonies, the Revolutionary War would have been fought then and, if the American colonies had won as they well might have (given the resources of the North especially in light of growing industrialism), the United States might have been a slaveholding nation for even longer than it was.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Big Mick
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 10:51 PM

We would have treated the Native Americans better? Kind of like the native Irish got treated? I don't think so.

With all due respect to my British friends, the Revolution didn't start because your Monarchy and Government were just a bunch of great but misunderstood folks. I surely don't have a problem with not bashing England, but one only needs look at the colonial policies of the Empire around the world to understand how it would have went.

To be honest, I sometimes tire of how it seems fine to point out every wart of the US, but doing the same to others doesn't fly. Great Britain has a historical track record around the world. If we had lost the revolution, we would have been treated as traitors and the repression would have been of the type designed to deal with traitors.

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 11:36 PM

Okay, Jerry, interesting question.

First of all, you should have said "the American Revolution". Do you know how many revolutions there have been in this world? Yours was not the only one, though I know it seems that way when you grow up in the American educational system... ;-)

But I digress...

Let's say that the British monarchy had been more flexible and sensible, and there had been no American revolution in the 1770's or later. Well, then, all of North America would have become a great British dominion instead of just the northermost half of it....the future "Greater Canada"? It would have been a greater dominion than India. Truly the "jewel in the crown" of England.

As such, it would have been administered in a rather different way...more focused on social order and consistent British law, less focused on aggressive individualism. The national policy toward the Indian tribes would probably have been handled in a somewhat more decent and law-abiding fashion (the British tended not to break treaties, for example, while the USA broke basically every treaty)...but the Indians would still have lost everything in the end. There would almost certainly have been far fewer Indian wars, but there would still have been some, I'm sure. The vast expanses of the west would have been opened up in the British fashion (as in Canada):

1. First you send in well-trained government lawmen and administrators, and make sure the structure of law and government is well established BEFORE the settlers pour in!

2. THEN you allow the settlers and business people in afterward. No "Wild West". Social order instead of a few decades of virtual anarchy.

That would have meant a frontier that was far less violent and lawless, it would have meant we would lose most of those great tales we have now about gunfighters, train robbers, whisky traders, and all the other violent stuff that makes American (and Mexican) western stories so much fun! Boring...right? The USA had hundreds of Indian wars out west and thousands of gunfighter incidents. Canada had 2 small Indian wars out west during the same period, and a handful of "gunfighter" type incidents. This was a direct result of the differences between Canadian (British) policy and America's laissez-faire "survival of the fittest" approach to opening up the frontier.

Slavery would probably have ended a few decades sooner, without a war being fought over it.

Napoleon would have had a much tougher time in Europe...if the French Revolution had happened at all, which it might not have.

Presently the entire British North American region would have become independent, as Canada has, through a gradual series of political developments of a parliamentary nature. It would have maintained strong cultural ties to the UK, and it would have directly assisted the UK in WWI and WWII (if WWII occurred at all). The Germans would have had a tougher time in both of those wars, because the odds against them would have been greater from the start.

Big Mick - It's my opinion, having studied Canadian and American history, that the Indians would have been treated somewhat better by a British administration...but...as I said before...they would still have lost everything in the end. They had no real hope, either way.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Big Mick
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 11:41 PM

LH, a well thought out post. I am not sure I buy all the premises but you have put me in one of those "let me think this through" modes ..... shit, I hate it when you do that ..... LOL.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Big Mick
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 11:49 PM

One of the things that comes to me almost immediately is that I am not sure the whole concept of devolved power would have ever come about. The American Revolution, and its experiment in democratic republicanism, had a couple of hallmarks. One would be the Bill of Rights, but we all know the Magna Charta had a huge influence on that, yet it was unique in a number of ways. Another would be the idea that the ultimate power did not have to reside in some "thing", be it a King, or whatever. The Constitution which ultimately evolved out of the experiment, split that power in at least 3 parts. The recent decision by the US Supreme Court against the wishes of the Administration and its current war powers, shows that important principle, which was unique to the American Constitution, still works. It is interesting to ponder the unique differences in our style of representative democracy, and what the world would be like had they never occurred.

Great thread, Jerry. My mind shifted into overdrive after reading LH's post and now I probably won't get to bed for about 2 hours thinking about this.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 11:50 PM

Thanks, Mick. I really appreciate it when people are willing to consider alternative possibilities and think about them. It speaks well for you, because most people aren't willing to...they just react! (in the usual, predictable fashion)

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: LadyJean
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 01:18 AM

Slavery might have lasted longer, or turned into a kind of peonage.
Slaves were needed to work the cotton plantations in the south, also the sugar plantations and tobacco plantations. Those were major cash crops. If they had maintained control of India as well, then Britain would have had a near monopoly on cotton production. You have to remember that cotton was the wonder fiber of the 18th and 19th centuries, and the ability to produce cotton cloth cheaply revolutionized the textile industry.
England was a pioneer in the textile industry. If the U.S. had lost the revolution, cotton would have flowed steadily from Charleston and Savannah, and (I expect eventually) New Orleans, to the textile mills in Manchester and Leeds. I doubt that the British would have wanted to interfere with that nice, steady flow.
Then, of course, there's tobacco, and sugar, also very labor intensive crops, but very lucrative ones. It is possible that Parliament might have abolished slavery by promoting slaves to serfs. (Not much of a promotion.)

I might also mention one of the lowest moments in Pittsburgh history. Sir Jeffrey Amherst, the Royal Governor of North America wrote to Colonel Henri Bouquet, a Swiss mercenery who commanded Fort Pitt, reccomending that he provide the local Indians with blankets and various items of clothing that had been used by people who had died of smallpox, to spread the disease among the Native Americans. To paraphrase Sir Winston Churchill, "This was NOT England's finest hour."

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Bert
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 02:03 AM

Well, let's see and this is all MAYBE, and just one scenario of many possibilities...

There wouldn't have been a "Luisiana Purchase"

The Colonies would not have developed into into the wealthy industrial nation that the States was in the Twentieth Century.

Then Britain would not have had a Big Brother across the ocean to come and help out in two world wars.

The Battle of Britain would have been lost without the American supplies that were shipped across the North Atlantic.

The Axis Powers would have won WWII.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 03:59 AM

"We would have treated the Native Americans better? Kind of like the native Irish got treated? I don't think so." Big Mick.

The Irish are still in possession of most of their land (in spite of Dungeon, Fire and Swird). Not so the Red Indians.

No US revolution -> no French revolution, but a relatively peaceful slow liberalisation (which Louis wanted anyway). Probably most of europe following. The peaceful conditions would have hindered the growth of industry in England (no big military market) and so the industrial revolution would have been slower. Without the army's needs forcing up the price of horses and fodder, steam railways would have been slower to develop. Lower absorption of men by the forces would have speeded population growth (though partly counterbalanced by fewer soldiers with fiddles in their knapsacks). Emigration to America, both voluntary and penal, would have increased. The larger population would have put pressure on land, eventually leading to major conflict with aboriginals, who would probably have been forced beyond the Appalachians, but without mechanised transport no further. Australia probably would not have happened, at least not when it did, as America is much nearer.

Slavery would have increased as penal population increased, but would have been mixed- race rather than purely black- probably including aborigoinals in the mix too. Without the machinery that the industrial revolution developed, manpower would have been all the more important. With the growth of a slave caste in America, importation from Africa would have declined, and the slave trade eventually died of its own accord.

Liberal western Europe would probably have eventually resulted in major wars with feudal Russia, and the industrial development would have accelerated maybe 50-100 years later than it did in our history.

With a lower rate of industrialisation, there would have been less competition for oil. The Middle East would have remained a romantic political backwater, only of interest as somewhere on the way to india, which itself might well have remained a collection mostly nominally independent, Balkanised states.

Northern Ireland would have been exactly the same, as nothing there has changed since 1689.

In 1984 Miss M. Roberts, grocer and spinster of Grantham, was taken into custody after a vicious attack on Mr.A.Scargill, a collier from Yorkshire. She claimed he had marched into her shop, demanding lower prices for miners, and singing "'ere we go, 'ere we go, 'ere we go". After an investigation in which it was found that she had sold the family silver, burned the floorboards and stolen milk from local schoolchildren, she was sent to the National Lunatic Asylum at Westminster, London.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 04:33 AM

Most of these theories are based on NOT HAVING a Revolution, not if the North had won it...

As an English person whose own history is confusing enough, my education omitted American history (mind you, they omitted about 1000 years of British history too), so I'm still a tad confused; Are we talking about the American Civil War (North vs South) or the American War of Independence (Britain vs the Colonies)?

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 04:48 AM

War of Independence or The Revolution, which has daughters, in US parlance. The other one was the War Between The States, which has many progeny but none of them legitimate. The Louisiana Purchase was when Napoleon sold Cajun to the USA, France got off lightly. Davy Crockett got them Tex-Mex to go with it, and California too, and the Tsar (Alexander I think) sold them Alaska in 1867 when everybody thought it was useless.

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 05:02 AM

Ah... Independence.. Well... we wouldn't have that film with Will Smith in it, nor would you have a whitewashed copy of St Pauls Cathedral as your main lunatic asylum.

Your main fast food outlet would be the Greasy Spoon or Olde Corner Tea Shoppe (alternatively known as the Copper/Singing Kettle or the Spinning Wheel), and you'd have Primark rather than Walmart....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: alanabit
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 05:04 AM

First up, Happy Fourth of July to everyone over there! I think Jerry's original post was a lighthearted one, because in reality, Independence in the statutory sense could only possibly have been deferred. Its destiny was always certain. Independence may not have been recognised by treaty before, but it was the reality on the ground. A new nation was already forming and no amount paper waving could change that reality.
Personally, I can live without Coca cola, oversized cars, chewing gum, heavy duty advertising and the garish TV productions. These things are presented to me as the substance of American culture. I don't believe it all and I believe that many Americans feel their country represents something much better to them. I can see some of this kindness and thoughtfulness at Mudcat.
I often feel our British identity is falsely described in terms of our royals, our class system and the ridiculous pretensions of empire - which robbed our own citizens nearly as much as the invaded countries. I think no less of Americans, who have to carry a lot of similar baggage around with them.
Overthrowing an outdated power has always proved easier than building a better system.
Just one suggestion... Any chance you might adopt the European concept of pedestrian precincts? It would make life a little easier for us buskers!

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 05:31 AM

But in all likelihood we would still have had MacDonalds, Burger King, Pizza Hut and White Castle, since those franchise chains all trace, albeit some rather indirectly, back to early entrepreneurs in Kansas, where the existence of a "real world" of any kind is unknown.

Pizza Hut was inspired by a couple of courses in "small business management" at the "University of Wichita" which has since been renamed "Wichita State University," but is commonly called, by the few local people with an actual education from places with "credentials" as "Hillside High."

The University, fairly shortly after it was apparent that Pizza Hut was doing well, was among the first, if not the first as they claimed, to offer a degree in "Enterpernuership." And yes, it's true, that they ran the ads on local TV for more than three years before someone pointed out to them that they'd spelled it wrong.

England? What's an England?

(I gave up trying to explain it to the locals decades ago.)

John

Subject: RE: BS: What if We had Lost The Revolution ?
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 06:51 AM

The "British" did win the war.
If you think about it the "Continental Army" were mainly of British stock, Fighting a German King who was using German troops.