AHC: USA, post 1790, builds a populous, unincorporated overseas empire by 1900

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
With any PoD after the beginning of the first Washington Administration under the 1789 constitution, how can we have the U.S. acquire a collection of colonies on multiple continents/hemispheres several times larger and more populous than its OTL colonial empire in the PI, Hawaii, and other parts of Pacific and Caribbean.

In OTL, after the annexation of the PI, around 1900, the US had a population of unincorporated subjects of about 9 million.

This was slightly larger than the 8 million colonial subjects that Portugal had.

However, the U.S. still ranked behind:
1) Britain, with 341 million subjects exclusive of the metropole and the white dominions
2) France with 40 million unincorporated subjects, excluding Algeria. It's 45 million, including a million-ish French citizens if we count Algeria.
3) Netherlands, with 38.2 million colonial subjects
4) Germany, with 24.1 million colonial subjects
5) Japan with 16 million Korean
and Taiwanese subjects
6) Belgium, with 15 million subjects in the Congo.

The challenge, if you accept it, is to move the US to 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th place, so that it is in a
league with, or above France, Netherlands or Germany.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
In many ways, the ACW stopped the USA growth for a while. It caused a bunch of lingering problems that took a generation to fix. IMO, there are lots of POD to avoid the ACW, but you want expansion, so here is a quick run.

  • In Mexican American war, the USA diplomat gets Mexico to concede to original USA hopes/demands. i.e. We get several more Mexican states.
  • ACW is butterflied away. We still have issues. Still painful, but at some time we move from formal slavery to the less formal economic exploitation similar to Jim Crow laws.
  • USA has a much stronger financial situation, so as pressure rises, ITTL, the USA is easily able to expand its Army and Navy.
  • USA could have annexed Dominican Republic but voted it down. It made economic sense for the elites of both sides. It passes the Senate.
  • USA had parts of Borneo, but sold to UK near ACW. We keep it.
  • Sometime around 1870, USA gets in war with Spain. We get OTL conquests and Cuba. Basically, USA has bigger army and navy by wide margin than OTL, and we pick a chance to gain when things are good.
  • Stronger USA gets more of Latin America such as Mosquito coast.
  • Interesting butterflies means Liberia is still established, but is part of USA.
  • USA joins UK in stopping slavery at some point, so we setup some more Navy stations in Africa near Congo River and say Angola.
And for the big one. USA is in position so when race for Africa happens, USA also grabs land to the interior of ports. Liberia is several times OTL size, and the USA gets some big chunks Africa.
 
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