What would happen if America acquired little territory from the Mexican-American War?

Coyote Knight

What would happen to the Compromise of 1850? Would it simply be butterflied away if America only got a much smaller Texas? Would the Civil War have happened a decade earlier?

It's for a TL where America doesn't gain control of either the Oregon Country, most of Texas, and the Mexican California cession.
 

Alternate1812

Coyote Knight said:
What would happen to the Compromise of 1850? Would it simply be butterflied away if America only got a much smaller Texas? Would the Civil War have happened a decade earlier?

It's for a TL where America doesn't gain control of either the Oregon Country, most of Texas, and the Mexican California cession.
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First off, it wouldn't have been the U.S. getting a smaller portion of Texas from Mexico. It would have been a smaller Republic of Texas (since Texas was once an independent country before being annexed by the U.S. when it went bankrupt).

Mexico had no territorial claims on the Oregon country. That was Russia, Great Britain, and the U.S. that had claims on it.

California on the other hand might have still belonged to Mexico. But I think they would have declared independence from Mexico too.

The Civil War I doubt would have started earlier than it did. That is if the presidents were still the same. It was because of Lincoln's views on slavery that threatened the South so much that they feared he would end it, so they seceded (or tried to at least). So unless a new president (one that neither ran for or got elected president) were elected prior to Lincoln and shared the same views, I doubt there would be an earlier Civil War.
 

Coyote Knight

Alternate1812 said:
First off, it wouldn't have been the U.S. getting a smaller portion of Texas from Mexico. It would have been a smaller Republic of Texas (since Texas was once an independent country before being annexed by the U.S. when it went bankrupt).
Click to expand...

Yes, but Texas was annexed shortly thereafter.

Mexico had no territorial claims on the Oregon country. That was Russia, Great Britain, and the U.S. that had claims on it.
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I'm aware. I was just providing additional background information.
 

Simreeve

If America acquires little territory from the Mexican-American War?

Seriously, I'd expect a second Mexican-American War -- on some pretext or another -- not very long after the USA had reorganised its forces into what it considered suitable form for the attempt.
 

jycee

Alternate1812 said:
First off, it wouldn't have been the U.S. getting a smaller portion of Texas from Mexico. It would have been a smaller Republic of Texas (since Texas was once an independent country before being annexed by the U.S. when it went bankrupt).
Click to expand...

This is a bit of a grey area though. Mexico had quite a large border dispute with Texas (who was still not recognized by it). A succesful Mexico in the Mex-Am War should be able to keep some of this territory, the Nueces strip and the trans-Pecos region. So yes, the OP isn't wrong on its post the US is getting a smaller Texas from Mexico; by itself Texas could only give it the "core" territory.

Simreeve said:
If America acquires little territory from the Mexican-American War?

Seriously, I'd expect a second Mexican-American War -- on some pretext or another -- not very long after the USA had reorganised its forces into what it considered suitable form for the attempt.
Click to expand...

It depends how little, or how the war ended. The primary goal of the US was getting Texas and the "useful" part of California, which gives them access to San Francisco and Monterrey Bay (they got more than that in OTL).

If the US gets a border where they keep most of Texas and then a straight line border from the Pecos river to the Pacific at the 37th parallel (this border was proposed by Jose Joaquin Herrera to avoid the war, but he was deposed at the start of the war). Another, option is the 35th parallel so the US gets northern Arizona/New Mexico, and the San Joaquin valley in Califonria, including Monterrey Bay; Mexico only keeps the southern "cow counties". Depending on how the war ended, the US should be satisfied in both cases. And life goes on.

Except that now it would be clear that the southern states would not be getting any new slave territory, excpet Texas. And that would be the big issue. Personally I think that before the US can declare war on Mexico again, a bloodier bloody Kansas (which is likely to happen) will result in an earlier civil war.

Mexico for its part has a much stronger north. If it plays its cards right, it will keep this north. California in particular would develop as the highway to the gold rush. My TL bellow is an example of this scenario; where Mexico looses the war, though not as badly as OTL, and emerges as a united and stronger nation.

But if Mexico can't get its shit togeter; if it continues to bicker and the central government refuses to aknowledge the north, then a movement like the Rio Bravo Republic might become more than a ruse to stick it to Sanata Anna and an actual independence movement (and Southern California would likely develop a similar movement). That is up to Mexico, but by the time this is happening the US will likely still be suffering its Civil War. A cool scenario would be a set of independnent Sun Belt Republics (CSA, Texas, Rio Bravo, Southern California) as a buffer between Mexico and the US.
 

funnyhat

FellowNerd said:
In terms of States, That's pretty short
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But at that point, most countries in the Western Hemisphere were pretty young. Mexico itself was only 25 years old as an independent country when the war began.

The Republic of Texas was very different from the California Republic et al. It had an actual functioning government, held multiple presidential elections and had international recognition (though not from Mexico).
 

fox~ringo

jycee said:
This is a bit of a grey area though. Mexico had quite a large border dispute with Texas (who was still not recognized by it). A succesful Mexico in the Mex-Am War should be able to keep some of this territory, the Nueces strip and the trans-Pecos region. So yes, the OP isn't wrong on its post the US is getting a smaller Texas from Mexico; by itself Texas could only give it the "core" territory.



It depends how little, or how the war ended. The primary goal of the US was getting Texas and the "useful" part of California, which gives them access to San Francisco and Monterrey Bay (they got more than that in OTL).

If the US gets a border where they keep most of Texas and then a straight line border from the Pecos river to the Pacific at the 37th parallel (this border was proposed by Jose Joaquin Herrera to avoid the war, but he was deposed at the start of the war). Another, option is the 35th parallel so the US gets northern Arizona/New Mexico, and the San Joaquin valley in Califonria, including Monterrey Bay; Mexico only keeps the southern "cow counties". Depending on how the war ended, the US should be satisfied in both cases. And life goes on.

Except that now it would be clear that the southern states would not be getting any new slave territory, excpet Texas. And that would be the big issue. Personally I think that before the US can declare war on Mexico again, a bloodier bloody Kansas (which is likely to happen) will result in an earlier civil war.

Mexico for its part has a much stronger north. If it plays its cards right, it will keep this north. California in particular would develop as the highway to the gold rush. My TL bellow is an example of this scenario; where Mexico looses the war, though not as badly as OTL, and emerges as a united and stronger nation.

But if Mexico can't get its shit togeter; if it continues to bicker and the central government refuses to aknowledge the north, then a movement like the Rio Bravo Republic might become more than a ruse to stick it to Sanata Anna and an actual independence movement (and Southern California would likely develop a similar movement). That is up to Mexico, but by the time this is happening the US will likely still be suffering its Civil War. A cool scenario would be a set of independnent Sun Belt Republics (CSA, Texas, Rio Bravo, Southern California) as a buffer between Mexico and the US.
Click to expand...

Working on an independent California and "Arizona" TL. Got ya covered. ;) Not sure what I'll do with the American Civil War, was thinking of a longer, bloodier Reconstruction but maybe they'll stay separate.
 

fox~ringo

Less territory from Mexico probably means a much bloodier Bleeding Kansas and stronger Southern advocacy of annexing Cuba.
 

raharris1973

a map of the 37th parallel version. I'm ambiguous on whether far south Texas is Mexican or US.

346_1 copy.jpg
 

The Uchronian

Coyote Knight said:
What would happen to the Compromise of 1850? Would it simply be butterflied away if America only got a much smaller Texas? Would the Civil War have happened a decade earlier?

It's for a TL where America doesn't gain control of either the Oregon Country, most of Texas, and the Mexican California cession.
Click to expand...

One good start is have just a few more things go wrong for us in regards to Mexico: maybe, for example, Winfield Scott dies during the battle for Veracruz.

However, though, without us doing so well in Mexico, a fight for 54'40" does become substantially more likely; this is the war that Polk had originally wanted, more than anything(after all, it was even part of his campaign). In fact, at this point, the likelihood of the United States never reaching the Pacific was rather slim. And if there's no Mexican War at all, then Oregon is very likely toast; Britain, at this point, had no real chance to effectively defend their holdings with enough American troops on their case, and the Russians barely had anything in Alaska themselves.

One interesting thing to contemplate is the possibility of a larger Alaska, perhaps encompassing the entire North Pacific Basin(think of the Alaska from "The Story of a Party"), if a sale to the U.S. still occurs. How might that work out? :cool:
 

zoomar

Although the border dispute between the new state of Texas and Mexico was the official cause of the war, the US was bound and determined to buy or take northern Mexico by force one way or another. The US goal was to spread from "sea to shining sea" on way or the other. Only a Mexican War that ended in something less than a complete US victory could result in something less than what the US achieved OTL.

Had Mexico been more successful, such as by defeating the US expeditionary force at Veracruz or in Mexico City while US forces or American "volunteers" still seized all of most of sparsely populated and weakly defended north Mexico, the US war hawks in the Polk Administration might be discreditied (the war was fairly unpopular anyway). This could set up some interesring options for a negotiated settlement beside a change in the lyrics to the Marine Hymn. This might range from the US bargaining away virtually all of its north Mexican conquests in exchange for Mexican recognition of the Texas border as claimed by the former Republic of Texas. Since OTL, the US went ahead and technically "bought" the territory it had siezed by force, I could see an attempt be made to buy some or all of the territory in the wake of a less sucessful war although Mexico could demand a higher price. Perhaps the US might succeed in convincing Mexico to recognize the quasi republic set up by American "volunteers" in California a la Putin (which, like Texas and Crimea would ask to be annexed) and buying a northern tier of connecting territory (modern Utah and and Nevada, perhaps, while more densely populated New Mexico remained Mexican.
 
FleetMac

FleetMac

Yes, but as noted before the bit south of the 37th. Parallel was (and sorta is by itself, even now) useless as territory worth fighting over, whereas Monterey and San Francisco are prime agricultural territory, are climatically more pleasant, and (this is the critical part) make for outstanding sea access in a merchant/naval context. So really, not getting SoCal/Arizona/New Mexico doesn't curtail "from sea to shining sea" as a goal in any way, especially if a greater chunk of Oregon is taken along with it (again, as Polk originally wanted).

Looking forward several decades, the biggest hit this would result in is the loss of Hollywood as a cinema center; it's not like Cali's riches would be out of American hands since much of the mineral wealth of California is in the inland NorCal area more-or-less directly east of the Bay, and more towards Sacramento, and less so further nearest the Colorado River. Really, except for the entertainment industry, SoCal and the SW doesn't have much of anything the Upper West and NorCal doesn't.

EDIT: Actually I forgot there actually is some of those deposits of gold/silver in what would be Mexican California/Independent *Sonoran Republic, so acting as a possible "facilitator" of Gold-Rushers might be of benefit to them and not just folks in American California...names here selected at random, naturally.
 
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rottenvenetic

I know it's probably ASB but a full Mexican victory where they kept everything they had and (in time) peopled it would've been pretty sexy :D except for the natives of course, not that the pale faces treated them any better.
 
FleetMac

FleetMac

Meh, I forget what forum it was in, but somebody IIRC brought up that just having all their original territory won't mean much for Mexico in the long run insofar as being prosperous; their issues are far more systemic than that, and holding onto the entire SW would amount to a big "white elephant" that solves none of their problems with corruption, abuses of authority, lack of investment in human capital, etc. From an aesthetic point of view...I can actually understand that one. Just realize it won't make Mexico any better off in the long run without other changes to their socio-political culture.
 

Tallil2long

Would Mexico be able to keep the area in question?

It's really big, far from Mexico City, and communications and effective governance would be rather difficult. Plus, Americans will be constantly pushing across the borders to settle.

Eventually I suspect we'd see either a war and annexation resulting from Mexican efforts to suppress settlement, regions breaking away from Mexico to eventually seek admission to the Union, or areas declaring themselves autonomous States which eventually become little but American satellites.

Not trying to burst any bubbles here, but that's how I see it.
 

rottenvenetic

Well, Mexico did also lose a lot of territory in the south quickly with all those little statelets becoming independent so it might just be an issue that their system was too weak and too corrupt to hold together such a huge territorial expanse.

The American settlers pushing the borders illegally is indeed a massive problem. Nothing would've stopped them short of a violent response by a force capable of matching their sungle-minded ruthlessness as well as operate on and occupy a border that is literally thousands of miles of inhospitable wilderness at this point.

Even ignoring the differences in technology I think the American settlers and their Frontier culture would've troubled even the Roman Empire at its peak under the Nerva-Antonine dynasty.

In fact the German tribes who destroyed the WRE (and even moreso those who invaded the British Isles after the Romans left) contain many of the American colonizers' distant ancestors! Coincidence? I think not :eek:

In the end even a Mexico wanked up into a solid, well-led superpower is in for a world of pain in the middle 19th Century...
 
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