For what it's worth, I suppose they had WW Nth at one point or another. Britain (and perhaps other parts of Europe) either managed to stay mostly out of it or else already had at least one domed city in place.

It wouldn't even have to be such total devastation. If the aftermath put other countries in a position where they weren't able to keep up key technologies or where people with needed skills and knowledge weren't passing them on, then the country that was able to preserve these should have a natural edge.

Of course, maybe it's the other way around. Maybe the U.K. was completely devastated and English became the official language precisely because it was a dead language that could be used without playing to local nationalism. Imitation of British culture (or what was perceived as British culture) was the in thing, especially for the upper class (with French and imitation of perceived French culture becoming the natural way of rebeling and getting wild in Gambit).

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