I would've been forming a 'we hate the British' club and getting the Spaniards to build another less flammable Armada. I guess German sea-power wasn't amazing and that's always a bit shit when you've got an island nation to take out. Ireland, Spain, Indian rebellion and ask the American's to sit it out and just provide the uniform designs would be my strategy.

We'll be fine as a nation in the next conflict as long as nobody builds a tunnel between here and mainland Europe. :o/