Politically, circumstances favored the workers. Aft er the war the country was experiencing a coal shortage: not only would a strike directly impede the provision of energy to households; it would also close down industries in the early stages of conversion to peacetime production and imperil the eff ort to recapture overseas markets (shipping vitally needed coal). Moreover, the stakes were extremely high. Th e political situation was unpredictable: with the industrial unrest prevailing throughout the country a miners' strike could potentially escalate into a political breakdown. For the Scottish Socialist John Maclean and other infl uential members of the MFGB, "a miners' strike over hours and wages might, in the context of mass mobilization, pull in millions of workers from other industries with potentially revolutionary results" (Ives 2016, 47). Th ese were not completely unrealistic thoughts. In the early months of 1919, the forces of law and order were— in the British government's own estimation— unreliable. If upheaval occurred, the likelihood of containing it seemed low.

Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, loc. 388