A Native American "Easter Rising", 1918

Native American resistance what if's come up fairly regularly on the board, and, as I often respond, I don't think there is any real chance for North American Natives to effectively resist European encroachment past maybe the mid 18th century.

That said, an interesting, if rather depressing, POD idea came to me the other day: how plausible would it be to have an "Easter Rising" on one or more of the largest Native American reservations at the point when US military forces are at their highest commitment level overseas in World War I, and the mainland US government is also distracted dealing with the influenza pandemic? Where would the weapons come from? How many Natives could participate in the uprising? And how long could they hold off US national guard or military units before the inevitable conclusion? What long-term effects would the memory of such an uprising have in Native American consciousness? Considering the Irish Easter Rising spurred major changes further on, despite it being as thoroughly and bloodily crushed as would be a Native Rising in TTL, we could see a very different 20th century for Native Americans, but what exactly, I'm not sure. Thoughts?
 
Canada would probably be a better bet -- larger numbers, for one.

Getting weapons is going to be a bitch though, although a simultaneous Quebec rising or something might help out...
 
The Indian Wars lasted into 1924 FYI, in 1918 the US was engaged against the Yaqui as part of the troubles in Mexico spilling over the border, and the conflict with the Apache was ongoing, and with the Ute was in a lull that boiled over in 1923.

In any case Native Americans didn't have much solidarity with each other yet, and volunteered to fight for Uncle Sam in large numbers. So at most you get a few pissed off tribes and no real change
 
The Indian Wars lasted into 1924 FYI, in 1918 the US was engaged against the Yaqui as part of the troubles in Mexico spilling over the border, and the conflict with the Apache was ongoing, and with the Ute was in a lull that boiled over in 1923.

In any case Native Americans didn't have much solidarity with each other yet, and volunteered to fight for Uncle Sam in large numbers. So at most you get a few pissed off tribes and no real change

Those final conflicts were exceedingly minor though, involving at most a few dozen people on either side; they could just as well be characterized as personal feuds or criminal activity as an Indian War.

There is the issue of Natives serving in the armed forces - around 10,000 served in World War I according to this site. However, it appears there was widespread dissatisfaction with the recruitment system. Natives were not yet US citizens at this time (that process would begin in 1924), and so were not eligible for the draft; however, they still had to register for it, which led to confusion and frustration. So the ones who served were all volunteer, and took the chance to acquit themselves well in battle, as have other minorities in the US military throughout the country's history. But of course, they still would have had to deal with personal and systemic racism from white soldiers, officers, and government agents. The site I linked above gives further examples of this.

For this POD, I'm not so much focused on the logistics of an uprising and how it could succeed or not, because it certainly won't. It's questionable whether even enough heavy weapons would be available; they're certainly not going to come from US military depots, and how would foreign agents smuggle machine guns or grenades over thousands of miles into remote parts of the country? I'm more interested in the long-term fallout that a Native uprising during the war would have on Native identity, and Native-White relations, as well as it's potential influence on African-American movements. Any thoughts?
 
Those final conflicts were exceedingly minor though, involving at most a few dozen people on either side; they could just as well be characterized as personal feuds or criminal activity as an Indian War.

There is the issue of Natives serving in the armed forces - around 10,000 served in World War I according to this site. However, it appears there was widespread dissatisfaction with the recruitment system. Natives were not yet US citizens at this time (that process would begin in 1924), and so were not eligible for the draft; however, they still had to register for it, which led to confusion and frustration. So the ones who served were all volunteer, and took the chance to acquit themselves well in battle, as have other minorities in the US military throughout the country's history. But of course, they still would have had to deal with personal and systemic racism from white soldiers, officers, and government agents. The site I linked above gives further examples of this.

For this POD, I'm not so much focused on the logistics of an uprising and how it could succeed or not, because it certainly won't. It's questionable whether even enough heavy weapons would be available; they're certainly not going to come from US military depots, and how would foreign agents smuggle machine guns or grenades over thousands of miles into remote parts of the country? I'm more interested in the long-term fallout that a Native uprising during the war would have on Native identity, and Native-White relations, as well as it's potential influence on African-American movements. Any thoughts?

I guess the racism for the volunteers would get even worse, making them quit before they got lynched to death. Native-White relations would deteriorate, but hopefully the Natives don't take to bottles as they did IOTL. Can you come up with a better source of income for the Natives than gambling?
 
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