Elizabeth’s policy of deliberate inconsistency preserved her freedom of action.

Evidence

Her foreign policy was to have no foreign policy not alterable by the lightest touch on the helm. Her consistency was in being always inconsistent. … Time untied so many knots, cancelled the necessity for so many desperate decisions, revealed so many unexpected shifts of pattern in a kaleidoscopic world, that the shrewdest statesmen were glad to take refuge in a wise passivity, a cautious opportunism. — Garrett Mattingly, The Defeat of the Spanish Armada, 70

Categorization

• SEED: Essay angle: why ‘decision fatigue’ and committed positions can be strategic liabilities, using Elizabeth as the archetypal case.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Garrett Mattingly, The Defeat of the Spanish Armada, 70
• XREF: connects to: Elizabeth maintained deniability by authorizing secret aggressive missions without formal commissions — John Sugden, Sir Francis Drake, 417; Elizabeth’s changefulness functioned as a deliberate strategy against time. — Garrett Mattingly, The Defeat of the Spanish Armada, 70

Library Connections

• Elizabeth maintained deniability by authorizing secret aggressive missions without formal commissions #expands (0.85) — John Sugden, Sir Francis Drake, 417

Broader Connections

• Elizabeth’s changefulness functioned as a deliberate strategy against time. #expands (0.80) — Garrett Mattingly, The Defeat of the Spanish Armada, 70