"Unfortunately it's become such a heated topic I'm not sure I see a time when it gets returned without Greece having some kind of leverage over the UK"
I don't understand your point here. Are you suggesting that returning it should be postponed because it would be an admission of bad practice or wrong doing of some kind?
I'm not saying it shouldn't be returned, I'm saying it won't be, not in the near future.
The Parthanon marbles are a political touchstone/dog-whistle in the UK, especially for people who view the empire in a largely positive light. Views like that are sufficiently widespread that it would be hard to get the sufficient public support for one of the two major political parties to back their return. Corbyn vowed to, but his wing of the Labour party are out of power at the moment. If they were to come back we might see a change in attitude, but they would be strongly attacked for it. I can't find any indication of the current Labour leadership's position, I would expect them to dodge the issue as the try to appeal to the center.
I guess the level of public knowledge about the British Empire is really very low. I just found out the other day that British gunboats shelled Wanzou district in the 1920s, killing anywhere between a handful to about a thousand people (depending on source). There are just so many 'incidents' like this that are deeply present abroad (imagine if the French had shelled Liverpool in the 20's!) but really obscure at home. (The burning of the summer palace is another Chinese example.
Yup. I try to learn as much history as I can, but I've not heard about that attack. Although from a quick google that particular one doesn't look like it was totally unprovoked, although it does appear to have been totally out of proportion to the provocation. I'll have to read up on that in more detail when I've got the time.
An aspect of the defense of empire that particularly frustrates me is the way people will attempt to obfuscate that all the european empires were about resources. People like to make out that we colonised India because we wanted to teach them about western beauracracy and trains. The initial occupaction was conducted by a literal commercial company for commercial gain. Robert Clive became one of (possibly the?) richest men in Europe as a result.
Similarly people make rebellions sound like they were completely unjustified. At the same time, if you ask them what Britain would have done if the Germans had invaded during WWII, they'd tell you we'd have fought them to the bitter end. It's the nationalistic version of the idea that "no-one is the villain of their own story". Somehow us invading somewhere is different to Germany (or France) invading Britain.
The incident seems actually pretty typical to me. There's often an element of provocation, a degree of legal ambiguity, often a degree of moral ambiguity about the laws themselves (extraterritoriality etc). My guess would be that the Nationalists would have seen it as fully within their rights to seize a merchant vessel in China for military purposes.
The attack stands out because it comes in just in the tail of the first world war, and it's a naval bombardment of the civilian city of an allied power. It's unlikely (but possible) that a chinese person who had served on the western front alongside the british might have returned home only to be blown up by a british shell! It's also recent enough that it's presumably within living memory for some people who live in the area.
It's also an odd time, because at that point, the british and japanese were close allies, and were mentioned in the same breath by the chinese.
I don't understand your point here. Are you suggesting that returning it should be postponed because it would be an admission of bad practice or wrong doing of some kind?