It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say: --
"We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."
And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!
It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say: --
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."
And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: --
"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!"
Obviously, the sentiment has broad appeal. But in practice it almost always goes the other way -- caravans prefer paying bandits off to fighting them; shops prefer paying protection money to defying the mob; villagers prefer paying taxes to declaring rebellion; and, as called out in the poem, empires prefer paying foreign aid to sending their expensive armies off into the middle of nowhere. Paying the Dane-geld is forever, but even when you do defeat the barbarians it's not like they stay defeated. You just get different barbarians later.
Interestingly, the Roman empire liked to make sure that negotiations with border tribes went its way by waging terrifying scorched-earth campaigns against those border tribes shortly beforehand. It worked. But the negotiated settlements would include subsidies paid annually from Rome to the new barbarian leaders -- Rome liked this system because the subsidies (a) made sure the new leaders were pro-Rome, and (b) really helped stabilize the pro-Rome guy against local challengers.
In the same vein, the most bravado-laden thing an American president ever said was Madison announcing his intent to fight the Ottoman states that were sponsoring raids on American ships:
The United States while they wish for war with no nation, will buy peace with none, it being a principle incorporated into the settled policy of America, that as peace is better than war, so war is better than tribute.
But the extended Dane-geld concept is quite rarely referred to as tribute. It was a feature of Chinese foreign policy during the pre-modern period that all diplomatic relationships involved the other country explicitly acknowledging the superiority of China. Other countries paid tribute to China, and China responded with the magnanimous grace (return gifts) appropriate to its exalted station.
Despite finicky wording, a lot of money and silk somehow got sent up north.
Cities all over the world and across history have found it preferable to hand out welfare to the local poor rather than suffer through riots. The Romans conceived of a goddess of welfare (yep) to whom it was proper for the poor to give thanks when they got their free bread. Modern Americans like to speak in terms of prserving the essential dignity of being human. But it's not so easy to see a difference in the policy, or the strategy, other than the rhetoric that accompanies it. I suspect that if the rhetoric were switched to "let's pacify the poor so we don't get murdered in our beds", support would drop despite the policy staying the same.
Similarly, you can "buy peace" with another nation just by overpaying for some minor consideration they end up giving you in the peace negotiations - basically the same concept as accounting goodwill. Everyone involved knows what's going on, but the process is near-totally opaque to the outsiders who cry "war is better than tribute".
Interestingly, the Roman empire liked to make sure that negotiations with border tribes went its way by waging terrifying scorched-earth campaigns against those border tribes shortly beforehand. It worked. But the negotiated settlements would include subsidies paid annually from Rome to the new barbarian leaders -- Rome liked this system because the subsidies (a) made sure the new leaders were pro-Rome, and (b) really helped stabilize the pro-Rome guy against local challengers.