Confederate Expansion
- Thread starter Snowstalker
- Start date
@LA: You're ignoring quite a few important facts. Europe doesn't want slavery to spread. The USA doesn't want slavery to spread. Mexico doesn't want slavery to spread. And the Mexican republican forces were quite generously supported by the USA. Which despite losing a war is still more powerful and richer than the CSA. Nor can Yucatan be conquered. Mayans don't want to be slaves again. They killed plenty of Yucatecos, Mexicans, and US Marines to make that point. Nor will Europeans stand for their islands being conquered by some poor, shoeless Rebs who want slavery to expand.
Yes, it is cliche. Yes, It is annoying and historically implausible. That is why I can only picture the South buying land with their Cotton money, not a successful war.
Those parts of land were the parts Maximilian had the hardest time exerting authority over, as most of his armies were trying to keep the more populated regions under control. Now, if Maximilian's regime falls... you could probably expect some kind of war between the liberated mexico and the CSA, a war the South has a good chance of losing...
Central America is to heavily populated for the CSA to hold for any reasonable amount of time. I only said northern Mexico because it was so sparsely populated at the time.
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It doesn't matter at all want the USA and Europe want, it matters if they'll step in to stop it, which isn't a sure thing. And while the Yucatan and European controlled islands are hard to conquer, Central America is not.
Im thinking the best chance for Confeds to expand would be into Central America by use of fillibusters, followed by actual state support.
Of course actually holding the territories would be a different story. Especially since nearly everyone in the region would hate them, i would imagine the CSA being quite fond of sending mercenaries and fillibusters to install a friendly government at the slightest sign of a chance for success as to secure themselves.
Of course actually holding the territories would be a different story. Especially since nearly everyone in the region would hate them, i would imagine the CSA being quite fond of sending mercenaries and fillibusters to install a friendly government at the slightest sign of a chance for success as to secure themselves.
Panama was owned by Colombia. That's definitely a no-go. And the rest of Central America is still gonna be damned difficult. The USA and various European powers are more likely to curb Confederate imperialism than they were OTL to stop various imperialists because the Confederates are both weaker than most colonizing powers and have an ideology that repulses everyone else except for Brazil. And Spain and Portugal. But none of them are likely to help the CSA for no gain. The CSA simply has no allies in the event they wish to expand, only enemies.
None most likely, but if they're going to conquer someplace it'll be either northern Mexico or Cuba.
It's not truly expansion, but is it possible that capitalists in the CSA establish economic ties and end up owning plantations in Nicaragua or Honduras or something, eventually establishing a puppet state of sorts? Nicaragua might be helpful if they want to build the canal.
But what if the POD for the Confederate victory is European intervention in the ACW? Or if the USA is hostile, as IOTL, to the French puppet in Mexico? Then by the idea of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend', the European powers would support the CSA as to make a counterweight to the USA. This support would vanish within a few decades as slavery become more of an issue, but that's more than enough time for CSA expansion. Honestly, I don't think Europe will be as hostile to slavery as you say they'll be, since both the French and British acted pragmatically in that period. They came close to fighting on behalf of the CSA during the Civil War. If they wanted to recolonize the New World themselves, or are hostile to the USA, they'd overlook slavery and let the CSA expand into parts of Central America. Spain, for example, tried in that period to expand its' influence in South America and the Caribbean, so there is, in fact, much to be gained for Spain to help the CSA. Even if the European powers don't help the CSA, I can't see them stopping the CSA from invading Central America. The only question is if the USA has the political will to intervene.
I'm sure the Confederacy would like to expand, (they still want to get to the Pacific Ocean), but having the means to do so is another matter. The most likely scenario is Northern Mexico, but any expansion would have to wait until some of the war debt is paid off, slavery is abolished and Texas establishes a strong cattle industry. It is possible, but not likely.
Everything depends on the how and why of a CSA victory. With help from France/Mexico then maybe Northern Mexico sold to the CSA, giving them a port on the Sea of Cortez. Help from GB then maybe a take over of Cuba (war with Spain, GB helping) Help from ASB then maybe they get all the southwest all the way to San Diego. Victory by curb stomping the North then any thing is possible. If the north is not beaten but a settlement reached between north and south then it would be hard to see the CSA expanding towards Mexico unless France still in charge.
Maybe the CSA set's up a new Black state next to Liberia so as to have a new way to bring slaves into the CSA.
Snake Featherston
Banned
More than possible, it's quite likely in fact. Given the CSA would keep slavery intact I daresay Mexico has suddenly a *very* convenient booster above and beyond what it would already have. An 11 state (or 12 state) Confederacy is not the kind of society that did win the Mexican-American War. In that case the Confederacy would get a stalemate at the best option.....
mowque
Banned
More than possible, it's quite likely in fact. Given the CSA would keep slavery intact I daresay Mexico has suddenly a *very* convenient booster above and beyond what it would already have. An 11 state (or 12 state) Confederacy is not the kind of society that did win the Mexican-American War. In that case the Confederacy would get a stalemate at the best option.....
Interesting. If you'd care to, how do you think such a war could go? Also, mind explaining the bolded? I think I know what you mean, but making sure.
Snake Featherston
Banned
The full United States of 1846 had the ability to raise and equip an army and to accomplish the conquest of the West and toward Mexico City at the same time, doing so entirely from scratch. The Confederacy, while having that legacy (as the 19th Century army much like the present one was very heavily influenced by the South) has 11/12 states that would have major domestic problems, to say nothing of preserving the institution of slavery which Mexico had ditched before the 1846 war. In that case Mexico would actually be both in the right as defender against the aggressor and able with much less scruples than the North to wield the abolition weapon against the Confederacy.
Too, Mexico was strong enough to give France a great deal of trouble, this at a point when the British and French Empires were matches for the entire unified USA of the time. The Confederacy would have limited manpower, more limited ability to pay for the war, a great deal of people who would not *want* that war either to happen or to be won, and of course the Union potentially getting involved, too.
I think such a war would also run aground against the problem that presuming some Porofiriato analogue the Mexicans will have a much more stable government than the Confederacy would. So the Confederacy would find some pretext, declare war, and find itself quickly running into an enemy who is rather more united to defend itself against an aggressor and with a lot more veterans used to military service.
The initial defeats are followed by outright routs of the extremely inexperienced volunteer units, whose poor discipline and no doubt being incululated in the cult of the offensive (as assuming the CSA wins despite Lee his tactics will become the standard) even when common sense would say otherwise leads it to being given repeated defeats by Mexican troops.
Emboldened by this, the Mexicans start attacks into Texas itself, promising abolition marches with the Mexican Army, thereby placing the CSA's internal problems further into the question. By this point the question becomes what the USA does.
Without a consistent scenario as to the how or the why the CSA wins that would have a major impact on what the alternate USA would see here. Presuming the USA decides to prevent Mexican grabs of what would no doubt be considered America Irredenta the Confederacy is no more and is defeated by the US-Mexican alliance.
Snake Featherston
Banned
That doesn't always work. Something tells me against the prospect of a victory by a slaveholding Anglo power that Mexico's feuding factions would put aside the civil war, stomp the Confederacy, and resume internal infighting after that. Worked for the Somalis......
If the CSA just holds, I imagine that........realistically at least, it might be able to hold about as much territory as it managed to in TL-191, perhaps maybe even a little more eventually{like say, the Yucatan and maybe one or 2 of the Central American countries, i.e. Nicaragua}, but probably no more, I would think.