Britain lost 750,000 soldiers in World War I, the first war the country had fought on European territory since Waterloo some 100 years earlier. The Allies began to make progress after the U.S. entered the war in 1918.

Britain’s wartime prime minister had promised that after the war Britain would be a land of heroes. However, the country plunged into social change, skyrocketing unemployment and economic recession. Women received full rights to vote in 1928, but as trade unions of the working class began to form, labor relations worsened.

Great Britain and France was obligated under a treaty to declare war on Germany in 1939, when Hitler invaded Poland. The Second World War had catastrophic results for all European nations, and at war’s end Britain experienced massive social upheaval, as the country was bankrupt. Wartime Prime Minister Churchill lost power, and the new government nationalised many industries, including those of gas, health, electricity and water. The disintegration of the great empire of old was reflected in all facets of British life, especially in literature, when the poetry of Yeats, especially his line ‘things fall apart; the centre cannot hold’, was used as religious symbolism and anguish over the decline of Europe’s ruling class.

The reign of Margaret Thatcher characterised the 1980s for the country, and the Royal Family became more popular after Prince Charles married Diana in 1981. The Beatles, who sold some one billion records by 1985, also came on the scene in Britain, as well as other well-known Rock bands. Today, the UK is enjoying economic prosperity. It became a European Union (EU) member in 2004, but will not join the EU monetary system because currently the pound is much stronger than the euro.