Why did communist Grenada keep the Queen? (Short Animated Documentary)

we all know the famous saying workers of the world embrace monarchy or not it won't surprise you to know that communist revolutionaries and monarchies don't exactly get along and whenever a communist revolution occurs in a kingdom or an empire the ruler is often swiftly removed one way or another yet in 1979 granada which is here had its own communist revolution which turned it into a one-party marxist state with one notable difference it kept queen elizabeth ii as its head of state thus making grenada a communist monarchy which you know why why did communist grenada keep its monarchy intact so as of the 1960s the british empire was well on its way to no longer existing grenada was slowly given more and more autonomy until it gained its independence in 1974 and its new government kept the existing monarchy in place because it made the transition to independent government much smoother it also helped to maintain good relations with britain which was a major trade partner in 1976 grenada's incumbent prime minister eric gary won re-election like other elections he did this by getting the most votes however unlike other elections he did not do this by having better policies but by having his secret police assault anyone who wasn't going to vote for him the opposition the marxist new jewel movement refused to accept the results because obviously and so started to plan to get rid of gary three years later whilst gary was away the njm launched a coupon overthrew the government and it placed its leader maurice bishop in charge his government then arrested the queen's representative there the governor general paul scoon who was soon afterwards released and the communists kept him in his position so why well the reason was that keeping the monarchy suited the government's short-term needs the governor-general was required to stay politically neutral and school was willing to stay on despite his own opposition to the new government this was useful for bishop since keeping the governor-general gave the government much more international legitimacy although that's not how the british monarchy or government saw it speaking of which the second reason that communist granada kept the crown was to improve relations with the united kingdom as well as keeping its place in the commonwealth the uk government led by margaret thatcher was especially unhappy with the communist coup and thus they sanctioned the country but bishop kept the governor general because as he saw it british governments changed fairly often whereas his would stay there forever meaning that irrespective of how long it took relations would be normalized eventually but beyond this having a governor-general gave the grenadian government a direct link to the ruler of these countries without having to go through their governments who didn't like them this lessened grenada's international isolation but also allowed for some mild top-down pressure to be applied to the rest of the commonwealth now whilst none of this happened the british monarchy was also happy to maintain a governor general in granada for similar reasons when a colony abolishes the monarchy it doesn't often come back and as far as the british were concerned the communist government would eventually fall and when it did the monarchy would be the sole legitimate power in the country allowing for it to continue so basically both sides were expecting to outlive the other whilst using the governor general to legitimize their presence there it wouldn't be long until these plans were tested since in 1983 bishop's government fractured he was seen as not communist enough and too dictatorial as such he was captured executed and his deputy prime minister took over only for himself to be ousted five days later and replaced with a military hunter to the united states the coup there presented an opportunity at this stage of the cold war communist and communist aligned governments were on the rise across the americas and so toppling the grenadian government would undermine that rise and also rob cuba of any friendly neighbors and thus after the governor-general appealed for help the u.s along with jamaica and barbados invaded the country to overthrow the government as a result the grenadine communist monarchy was toppled leaving the rest of the world thereafter a little bit puzzled by the entire thing i hope you enjoyed this episode and thank you for watching with a special thanks to my patrons james bissonette kelly moneymaker corso wolff jerry lamden jordan longley adam stalter y and hockey captain cydog rod d martin marvin castle spencer lightfoot gustav swan common yoon boogery wiggly matthew shipley marcus asner the mc whopper aaron the white max and flaurio maggie paxkowski corey turner alex schwinn anthony beckett spinning three plates copper tone words about books podcast winston k wood charles the first ben evinson and scottish trekkie

Channel: History Matters

Views: 1,573,994

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Id: APs9NFU9xNI

Length: 3min 55sec (235 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 07 2022