Henry knew that he required alliances to gain military success in France since England was not strong enough to fight alone. However Henry VIII’s campaigns achieved few solid gains and often benefited his allies significantly more than it benefited him. His allies were often self-interested, manipulative and unreliable. However in the same way Henry was never very reliable and could not support his allies through long campaigns due to lack of money and resources. His first alliance was with Ferdinand of Spain under the Holy League. They led a campaign in Aquitaine in April 1512, which would have benefited Ferdinand more as he was seeking to claim Navarre, which was conveniently close to Aquitaine. However the campaign was an utter disaster for Henry because his army got dysentery, got drunk and mutinied and once Ferdinand achieved his objective he left the alliance and made peace with France. Henry’s next alliance brought some success but at a price. He allied himself with Maximilian the Holy Roman Emperor at that time to make an attack on Northern France. Under this alliance he made gains by taking Thérounanne and Tournai. However these gains were relatively easy and provided a weak strategic or bargaining tool for Henry. In fact Henry had to spend lots of money building up the fortifications at Tournai. But Maximilian was pleased because two French fortresses that were potential threat to his Burgundy territory were no longer threats and so he too signed a peace deal with France. Henry’s problems with alliances reappeared in 1523 when Henry allied himself with the new Emperor Charles against France. In the same way as his predecessors used Henry and was unreliable, Charles had the aim of reducing the threat of France on his empire and gaining key locations but he had no interest in supporting Henry’s aspirations. Charles persuaded Henry to go after Paris instead of Henry’s initial aim of going for the more realistic and useful goal of gaining Boulogne. Henry, even nearly succeeded to take Paris if not for the failure of Charles V elsewhere. Charles also failed to give military support to Henry in other battles. Finally following Charles’ success in Pavia in Northern Italy in 1525 against Francis, Charles refused to support any of Henry’s plans to partition a relatively weak France and left England on its own. Therefore England was never able to maintain a strong relationship with other powerful nations because England was not a reliable ally and the other countries had their own interest at heart once their respective objectives were completed. England posed no benefit in alliance especially as focus shifted to support in the Northern Italy. In this way England was left isolated because of it was not a valuable tool for support and no country wanted to ally with it because of it was considered unreliable and unimportant.
When Francis came to the throne his early successes especially against the Swiss Army and in Milan would have led to certain England’s certain isolation from Europe. Therefore in order to maintain the aim of being at the centre of European politics and to receive recognition and glory, since they could not do this through military prowess they had to do it through diplomacy. Wolsey was also had a greater desire for peace and diplomacy than to have war and so he stole the Pope’s idea of universal peace. He not only secured a peace agreement with France and Europe through the success of Tournai but through Wolsey’s diplomatic skill he persuaded all of the major European leaders to sign a non-aggression pact under the sponsorship of Henry with the Treaty of London in1518. This led Henry to become the arbiter of Europe. This was the highest point of the diplomatic success under Henry. Peace among most countries lasted until Charles became the Holy Roman Emperor and so aggression between Francis and Charles rose. Henry, however still was in a position to bargain and negotiate between the two countries and create a new ally. Wolsey hoped to use the hostility between Francis and Charles to negotiate the best deal in the interest of England and Henry from either side. The extravagant Field of the Cloth of Gold thereby boosted the negotiations with Charles and Wolsey. Henry left the Field of the Cloth of Gold very happy because he had shown himself to be a lavish and glamorous host to the meeting and left the meeting with vows for peace from Francis. Therefore by acting as arbiter through peace and diplomacy he was able to gain some status in Europe and thereby achieve his aims of foreign policy of being the most important ally in Europe.
One of the other big problems, which Henry had no control over was the significant changes to European politics that total changed the political relations between the nations. The changes in political power led to the shift of importance from Northern France, to the Northern Italy which left England isolated geologically as well as politically. The main turning point was the death of Ferdinand and Maximilian, which led to Charles having all the titles bestowed upon him in 1519 and becoming both the King of Spain and the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Previously there were a few powerful countries with France having the largest share of power and money but after this Charles V became the strongest leader in Europe. This led to the complete breakdown of the Treaty of London. The introduction of a superpower into European politics led to a disillusion of the leaders that a peace would work. The dynastic rivalry between Francis and Charles escalated, as they were the main leaders in Europe. This made England the most important ally as it was through the English Channel that England could help or hinder Charles if it wished to. Therefore England had to make the transition from a position where they had proven success as the diplomats of Europe to a position where they had not had the best success – in alliances. He then allied himself with Charles but the with the alliance collapsing things suddenly changed following Charles’s success at Pavia in Italy. This success was another turning point as it opened a new route to the Holy Roman Empire through northern Italy for Charles. Therefore the route through the channel was not needed and securing the route through the problematic Northern Italian cities. The centre of Europe had once again shifted back to northern Italy an area where Henry had no influence or power over. Therefore when the Treaty of Cognac was signed, although it was sponsored by England, it did not sign because it was not an important part of negotiations in that region and following the Peace of Cambrai it found itself with no advantages in Europe and distant from the centre of European affairs.
Henry’s main aim for the most part was to make gains in France but in order to do so he had to neutralize any threats from Scotland. By neutralizing Scotland they could focus on more important matters in Europe without fearing an invasion by the Scots. The fears of a Scot invasion were seen after James IV renewed the ‘auld alliance’ with France after French stirring and invaded England in 1513 while England was at war in France. Therefore Henry sent troops against the Scots and defeated and killed James IV at the battle of Flodden. Since the heir was only 1 year old, his sister Margaret took over acting as Regent. This seemed to be the ideal situation, as the Scottish threat would be diminished for years. The aim from this point was to have English control over politics and to break up the link with France. However the French then sent the earl of Albany who was James V’s uncle and became acting regent for James V for pro-French policies and created enough unrest to forced Margaret to flee. However it was in the best interests of England to have control over Scotland. Therefore further negotiations allowed for Margaret to return and for the earl of Albany to leave. However again in 1523 problems in Scotland caused a delay of Suffolk’s expedition to France and so the English retaliated by attacking Scotland at its borders. When James V was proclaimed as King in his own name in 1524 it was another small success as James was effectively a prisoner until 1928 when James ruled as his own master and continued to have strong links with the French by marrying the Mary of Guise in 1538. Therefore their methods had mixed success but although they had control over Scotland for the most part French interference created many problems and the link between France and Scotland was never destroyed.
In order to have any military attacks on France Henry knew that he required a well-funded and equipped army. This required a lot of money. However England was one of the poorer of the important nations and securing the money for attacks that seemed to continually end in failure was extremely difficult. Henry spent £960,000 in 1511-13 and £430,000 in 1523-5 on warfare. All this was during a period where he received only £110,000 a year most of which was carefully saved by his father Henry VII. His extravagant ambitions led him to follow similar aspirations of wealthier monarchs such as Francis I and Charles V who earned over £900,000 between them each year. Henry’s strategy for raising the extraordinary revenue needed to fund his expeditions was to raise taxes and get loans. Wolsey aimed to meet the costs from the poor and the church, which led to many difficulties. As England had a small population the rise in taxes in 1523-4 and the cost of the forced loans in1522 and 1523 was unprecedented and was extremely unpopular with both parliament and the tax payers. Wolsey then tried to raise more money through the Amicable Grant in 1525, which was not supported by parliament, which led to a widespread refusal to pay it. Wolsey was threatened by revolts in Suffolk and had to concede which meant that the attack on France had to be scraped. Therefore the lack of money during this period led to the huge down fall for the campaigns and so made England seem like an unreliable ally and prevented it getting anywhere near the to the level of itself European counterparts. It was so weak that when the focus was against Charles, Henry created and became the Head of the League of Cognac but was unable to commit any resources to it. Therefore by 1929 it found itself on the outside of Europe and so isolated from Europe.
Another significant problem with foreign policy was that quite often Henry and Wolsey had conflicting views and interests. Henry’s main aim throughout the whole of this period was to gain glory in some form and to establish himself as a powerful and respected monarch in Europe. However Wolsey although he always tried to work in his master’s best interest, he was less ambitious and more cautious than Henry and preferred a diplomatic approach to Europe as England was not strong enough for any other campaigns. For the most part Henry supported much of Wolsey’s work as they provided him some glory and prevented isolation from Europe. However by the late 1520s Henry’s main aim as King which was to secure England’s position in Europe shifted to getting the Pope to agree on an annulment or divorce from his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. As the treaty with Charles collapsed as he did not support any of Henry’s aim and Wolsey negotiated the Treaty of Moore with France in 1525 and Henry takes full control over policies in Europe and set up the League of Nations against Charles to weaken his power over the Pope but in 1527 Charles V attacked Rome and imprisoned the Pope. This was hugely unfortunate as it meant that the Pope was under Charles’ control and as the nephew of Catherine of Aragon he was strictly opposed to the annulment. They tried military actions in 1528 against the Low Countries to force the release of the Pope but the dependence of the English cloth trade with the Netherlands meant that Peace had to be agreed by the end of the same year. The failure of the French in Northern Italy led to peace agreement s between the Pope, Francis and Charles through the Treaty of Barcelona between Charles and the Pope and the Peace of Cambrai made peace between Charles and Francis. However England could not make peace with Charles because he needed the annulment and so required could not have an agreement with Charles, as he would not support them. Wolsey was not allowed to go to Cambrai where he hoped to prevent certain isolation by making an alliance because Henry wanted him to focus on his divorce rather than in negotiations. He could not negotiate between Francis and Charles because England was no longer neutral to both sides and because the policy of Henry was too narrow to give any room for political manoeuvring. Therefore they became isolated from Europe by not having any more allies and because now that Henry was in full control, the focus was not what was best for England in Europe but what Henry needed i.e. a divorce which therefore limited Wolsey’s options to the extent that
England found itself isolated under the League of Cambrai, which involved all the major powers except him in 1511, and by 1529 he found himself in the same position under the Peace of Cambrai. England’s methods were practical but slightly naïve and had mixed results for Henry and Wolsey. England’s strongest and most successful method was to use diplomacy and peace negotiations and to have Henry as the arbiter of Europe. Unfortunately some of Henry’s methods were reason for the overall failure of his foreign policy in this period as well as other factors such as the changing political scene in Europe and Henry’s desire for a divorce. Therefore by the end of 1929 England found itself isolated from Europe for many reasons, which came down to England having no allies or money for war; Henry taking charge in response to his desire for a divorce; the strength of Charles V and the shift of the focus of Europe. Once Charles became Holy Roman Emperor, it was possible for England to become isolated from Europe but it was able to stay at the centre through Wolsey’s diplomacy but once Henry took charge it could not last any longer at the centre pf European politics.
