I don't know how many of you have stumbled across the name Bernhard Forster before. For those who are unfamiliar with him he was a semi-prominent figure in the German far right in the late nineteenth century, and like many such figures at the time he was insanely anti-Semitic to the point of proto-Nazism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernhard_Förster. He was married to Elizabeth Forster-Nietzsche, sister of Friedrich and future Hitler groupie in her twilight years. In 1886 they attempted to create a German colony in Paraguay they dubbed Nueva Germania, basically your standard proto-Nazi wet dream of a breeding ground for the purest specimens of Aryan racial stock, or so Forster envisioned. In fact the remnants of the colony still exist in Paraguay to this day. Unsurprisingly, of course, the colony failed to thrive as Forster envisioned, and he wound up committing suicide in 1889.
Basically, there are two major points of difference I'm proposing here. For one I'm curious what you think it would take for the colony to succeed, to thrive and attract ongoing numbers of German settlers so that Forster remains stable enough to not off himself. But more importantly I'm wondering about what the wider consequences would be if Nueva Germania did thrive. I also read about the Samoa Crisis of 1887-89, the long and short of which is that the United States, Germany and Britain were bickering with each other over how Samoa was going to be partitioned and the whole thing heated up enough that at one point there was distinct danger of a war breaking out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samoan_crisis. So my other question is; imagine that a war does break out, with the result being that an Anglo-German coalition goes up against the United States. The conflict is strictly a naval one. Britain, its navy being indisputably the strongest in the world at the time, shoulders most of the fighting for itself and Germany, and the result is most likely that the United States can't compete and is resoundingly defeated, most likely with heavy losses. In fact, the US is defeated so utterly it can no longer throw its weight around to uphold the Monroe Doctrine and fend off European meddling in Latin American affairs, effectively granting Britain and Germany carte blanche to do as they please in the region. Let's imagine that all of this is going down at around the same time that Nueva Germania is finally taking off. Bernhard Forster survives into the era of bellicose Wilhelmine era militaristic imperialism and can speak Wilhelm the Second's language to him in order to get himself made the governor of the colony so that it can provide a launching pad for German expansionism in the region. The Kaiser is voraciously hungry for colonies, pissed off that Germany fell so short in comparison to Britain and France during the Scramble for Africa, and even more pissed off that so many Germans are opting to immigrate to the United States. Several Latin American countries, not just Paraguay but also Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Venezuela etc, have significant amounts of German settlers already dating back to the mid nineteenth century. With Germany being granted a relatively free hand in the region as payment by the British for fighting the Americans with them, does this mean the beginning of a new age of German territorial acquisition and general gunboat diplomacy in Latin America, especially when the Kaiser embarks on his famously ambitious plans to expand the German navy? Might the Germans make other territorial acquisitions, like shaking down the Spanish to acquire the Philippines, Cuba, Puerto Rico etc. like the Americans did in 1898? What would the longterm consequences be for such a development, especially with the United States now resentful and seeking possible revenge? Will it potentially affect the direction or outcome of the First World War down the line?
(P.S.: It's been brought to my attention that I haven't been clear enough in this post, but the idea is that if Forster's colony attracts enough settlers and the Germans get the right to do as they please in the region, he can potentially persuade his government to either annex the country or install a pro-German regime, so a scenario in which the colony holds together likely involves Paraguay losing its sovereignty in some way eventually.)
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