Why did the british want to conquer Australia?

Answer 1

It was not that the British wanted to "conquer" Australia. It wanted to colonise Australia. Conquering suggests an active subduing of the people of another land by force, and that was never the original intention of the British, even though it was the outcome in many places. In fact, the British regarded the indigenous people as little more than "savages" and not in need of "conquering". Colonisation was simplified for Britain, which was able to prove to the satisfaction of the judicial system that Australia was terra nullius - a land without ownership - because the English had no way to negotiate a treaty with the indigenous people.

The fact that there were local inhabitants all over the continent didn't make much impression on the colonists, except for their nuisance value or as cheap or free labour: they'd no written language that Europeans found comprehensible, didn't wear clothes, and built nothing recognisable as houses; settlers viewed them in much the way they viewed kangaroos and possums. So, just as an empire does not conquer animal life, it also did not to seek to conquer Australia.

However, the British decided to colonise Australia for several reasons:

1. To expand the British empire, and prevent the French from gaining a foothold in the Australian continent or in the southwest Pacific.

2. To solve the problem of Britain's overcrowded prisons (a consequence of the Industrial Revolution) by establishing a new penal colony in a land which showed promise for eventually becoming self-supporting. Britain had been sending their excess prisoners to North America, but the American War of Independence put a stop to the practice. Following this, the English were no longer able to transport surplus prisoners who couldn't legally be executed to North America.

3. Australia could provide commercial and political gains to Britain.

4. Due to war, Britain needed to find an alternative supply of Flax and timber as her Baltic supply was under threat. It was believed that nearby Norfolk Island would provide this.

5. Britain needed a port in the East to promote trade with China and to extend its naval and commercial power.

6. The continent had Natural Resources which England wanted.