The French invade the Netherlands. The Dutch, significantly outnumbered in both resources and manpower, use their last resort to open dikes to flood their fields and put the French in difficulty. In the long run, the Netherlands will never fully recover and will never return to the glories of the Short Dutch Century (1600-1672). The English immediately seize the opportunity to fill the void left by the Dutch. They expand into India and, in 1707, with the death of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, annex the entire Indian subcontinent to the British Empire, thus also dominating trade with China and sealing England’s supremacy in trade.
