Answer:
A. That Britain only did so out of self-interest.
Step-by-step explanation:
Thomas Paine is the author of ''Common Sense'' which is about a exhortation to colonists, because they were debating if send troops or not, even they had doubts about the Independence ideals, so Paine gave a speech where he said that freedom to mankind was given by God, natural laws about freedom don't exist, like the British said.
So, Pain had his detractors whom responded to him with some arguments, one of them was this ''Britain has defended the colonies in the past'', and he precisely replied that those actions were in self-interests, they (Britain) only want us to be safe, but that means ''with no allies, no other Nation supporting us, because of the Independence ideals''.