Speaking of Flip Flops! Check this Flip Flop out!
Just when was the Seventh World Power established as a World Power? Notice what the ‘Our Incoming World Government-God’s Kingdom’ book in 1977 claimed in chapt 3 paragraphs 49 & 50 :
“49 However, the Sixth World Power was also to fall, for the angel said to the apostle John: “One is, the other has not yet arrived.” (Revelation 17:10) This signified that a seventh world power was yet to come, to correspond with the seventh head of the wild beast. In the apostle John’s day that ‘seventh head,’ or ‘seventh mountain,’ or ‘seventh king’ was a mystery. But centuries of world history since John’s day have unraveled the mystery. What, then, is the Seventh World Power of Bible prophecy? It came forth in the year 1763 C.E., in the form of the British Empire, the Britannia that ruled the seven seas.
50 Twelve years later, in 1775, the thirteen American colonies broke away from the British Empire, to set up the American Republic, the United States of America. In the process of time the English-speaking American Republic found it advisable to work together with the English-speaking British Empire, both in peacetime and in wartime, a thing that was emphasized during World Wars I and II. In actuality, then, there has been a British-American Dual World Power. So, for many years now since the American Revolution of 1775-1783 this Anglo-American political combination has been the Seventh World Power. It acts like a two-horned beast.—Revelation 13:11. (1977 Our Incoming World Government-God’s Kingdom book Chapt 3 Par 49,50)”
Now notice what ‘Questions From Readers’ (June 15, 2012 WT Study Edition page 19) says as to when the Seventh World Power was established: “From the perspective of Bible prophecy, then, the Seventh World Power did not become established in the late 1700’ when Britain first began its rise to prominence. Rather, it attained that position at the beginning of the Lord’s day (1914). “
Seems like WT was off by over 130 years from its’ first guess (1914 minus 1783 = 131 years)!