The first full-length study of militarism and militaristic associational culture in interwar Britain.

While militaristic and patriotic organizations formed an important part of political culture in Edwardian Britain, 1918 often marks a terminus for histories of organized militarism. Taking the end of the First World War as its starting point, this book argues that militarism was able to survive World War I, despite the competing rise of liberal internationalism, pacifism, and anti-war sentiment. Focusing on the ideas, aims, and activities of the Navy League and the Air League of the British Empire—two extra-parliamentary organizations established to promote naval and aerial supremacy—the book examines how the Leagues negotiated the trauma of the First World War and how they contributed to the societal and military preparation for a second global conflict as the clouds of war gathered in the late 1930s.

Drawing on extensive archival research, Organised Militarism in Interwar Britain explains how these Leagues mobilized broad public and political support and what the story of each organization tells us about the impact of war on British society and culture, civil-military relations, political and private activism, military theater and commemoration, youth, and the politics of disarmament, collective security, internationalism, and national defense. In doing so, it demonstrates that martial and militaristic sentiment remained an important part of mainstream British political culture, despite the ravages of war.