Burgoyne wins at Saratoga, but French already Intervened

In OTL, the Battle of Saratoga convinced the French to throw their lot in with the Americans.

Suppose General Howe decides to attack Philadelphia by land instead of by sea in 1777. This means he would be occupying parts of New Jersey he had to vacate after Trenton. He then follows one of his original idea of trying to hold land to convince Loyalists that they crown was winning (in OTL he actually made plans for an overland march and considered slowing down to consolidate territory).

Back in Europe, the French decide the American victory at Trenton last year meant the American were going to win the war. They plan an attack on Gibraltar and British holdings in the Caribbean. War is declared.

In the Americas, Burgoyne wins at Saratoga and bags over 3,000 prisoners. He marches over to Albany and waits for his allies to supply him through boats coming from New York. He starts up his plan to use Albany as a base and cut off New England from the colonies (this involves raiding parties and not a static line across the Hudson). A supply boat from New York informs him that they just received word from Europe France declared war on Great Britain, Gibraltar is under attack by the French (but they are failing miserably with no help from the Spanish... yet), reinforcments to Howe has been redirected to the Caribbean Islands (More economically important than the North America), and rumor is that Span might throw their lot in with the rebels too.

When word of Saratoga reaches Spain, would they decide to not intervene, or would they still be gearing up for a fight to take Gibraltar back? Would the Patriots have enough morale to continue the war after getting a butt-whipping (it was New York and now Saratoga and Albany)?
 
France is not launching an attack on Gibraltar. Spain wants it back for historical prestige purposes, and wouldn't take kindly to France trying to take it. France isn't attacking it for purposes of giving it back to Spain. I think (been awhile since I read up on it) France didn't want such a major effort in attacking it, correctly believing it would divert resources, but Spain was so insistent, France had no choice if it wanted Spain in the war.

IF France declares before Spain, it leaves open the option for Britain to negotiate a return of Gibraltar to Spain, to get Spain to stay out of the war. Britain had offered it back to Spain at the beginning of the 7 yr war, and didn't have a strong attachment to it at that point. France put the boots on the ground, and is thus remembered more than Spain, but Spain had a huge impact on the war, as well. No Spain in the fight is a (edit: "is a biggie". somehow biggie got left off originally)

Britain's being able to knock NY out of the war and separate the colonies is a biggie. Patriots morale is sinking fast, while the Loyalists are going to come out of hiding.
 
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Is Gates captured, but not Arnold? War goes on.

This is what I had in mind. I'll make this realistic. Saratoga had Burgoyne outnumbered. Let's say Arnold doesn't even take command until Gates is cut off from the rest of the Army (Gates' original plan before Arnold said "screw it" was to watch Bygone take the high ground and then try to bombard it if Burgoyne holding it was any problem) and Arnold is the one turning a full on rout into a somewhat organized retreat of the survivors. Burgoyne bagged 3K Prisoners, Gates, and all the Patriots' heavy equipment? Ah, but Arnold managed to escape with most of the Army, and live to fight another day.

France is not launching an attack on Gibraltar. Spain wants it back for historical prestige purposes, and wouldn't take kindly to France trying to take it.

Really? I read they in OTL made some probing attacks before Spain was even in the war. Spain wants Gibraltar and wouldn't take too kindly to France taking it for themselves (and the monarchs are family members who were on good terms and not going to betray each other) so I assumed Louis XVI or his court had done these attacks in an attempt to either simply destroy any naval facilities there (which would neutralize any use of it as a base for some time), or in preparation to take Gibraltar back for Spain to get their favor. Under the assumption this was true, I had France just jumping the gun after Trenton, preparing for war in the Caribbean and Mediterranean.

In other words I thought the offer France was making to Spain was "Hey... I'm already trying to return Gibraltar to you and you have some stuff in the Caribbean that are close to British positions. With your help we can do this" and not "Hey... I'm at war with Britain. They are getting their butts kicked. If you join us, we can even get Gibraltar back for you!"

But maybe those OTL probing just some reconnaissance in force missions and the French knew that Spain was going to enter and they just needed to formalize things with the not-yet-signed Treaty of Aranjuez (1779) and they had no unilateral intentions on it (such as taking it purely for the intention of returning it to Spain).

In that case, scrap the Gibraltar attack and say the French do whatever they might do in TTL not knowing if Spain was going to do anything or not. The Caribbean and Mediterranean territory is where they would be aiming and for Britain, both are more important than the Americas. At most, the court might ask an officer to figure out logistics if Spain did join France and the Patriots, but these would obviously stay on paper for the moment.

Would Spain accept TTL France's offer of "hey... let's gang up on Britain! If you join us, we can get Gibraltar back for you!"?

Or would Britain think as the 1777 and 1778 campaigns close (in other words before 1779), Britain would try to make the same deal they did to Spain as they did in the Seven Years War?

Patriots morale is sinking fast, while the Loyalists are going to come out of hiding.

Indeed, in OTL Howe found that New York and New Jersey had quite a number of Loyalists. However, they were meek. Few joined up Loyalist militias. Not too many even showed their support in the day. But historians knew they were Loyalists since a large number of them gave provisions to the Regulars at heavy discounts and offered intel that, with hindsight, we know was accurate. What kept them hiding was that even between the British Victory at New York but before the American one at Trenton, a lot of Loyalists feared they would be at the mercy of the Patriots once the Regulars left. In the same year Howe got thousands of New Jersey and New York Patriot militia (or ex-Patriot since they were now neutral) to give up their arms and give up in exchange for pardons, the Loyalists were still pessimistic about the war.

But in TTL with the Albany campaign putting a new victory, at least the New York Loyalists should be more heartened now right?

Think Arnold would be able to do something about Patriot morale? On a tactical level, TTL Saratoga was still a British victory, but the battlefield losses much less catastrophic than the Quebec Campaign (which the aftermath could be summarized as "we still have an army left?") and Arnold was able to keep the spirits of the survivors up as they limped back to Ticonderoga. In other words, he was able to inspire men after a much worse defeat who were at the mercy of nature much worse
 
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