Epedemic Immune Americas?

North America wasn't "taken." It had a demographic collapse in the early 15th century.

It was still "taken". Having a demographic collapse doesn't change that.

Around 1600, at least 100,000 people lived in New England, and the population was growing rapidly. Europeans would occasionally come ashore to trade and grab slaves, but every attempt to build permanent settlements was defeated. In 1616 an epidemic killed 90% of the population in New England. Plymouth was founded only four years later, which started the settlement of the region by the English.

The Pilgrims were not, of course, actually soldiers. They were basically expanding into empty land, and did not have entirely hostile relations with the remnant population of Native Americans in their territory. But there was such a population vacuum in the region England had time to send over many migrants, who also had natural population increase. These yeoman farmers put pressure on the surviving tribes as the 17th and 18th centuries rolled on, which caused them to lose all their territory.
And frankly, 100,000 is less than the population of say, Finland.

But the land they held was only important enough to fight for because there were English farmers right there already. If the area was still densely settled by Native Americans, it would be as effectively useless to westerners as prime farming country in Korea was. Worse, the land would steadily be getting more useless, as New England was entering an agricultural revolution just as contact began, with maize farming becoming more central to food production.
Except that unlike Korea, it can be conquered by Europeans without too much trouble.

You know they needed state funding during this period, right? Enough miserable failures are really going to put a crimp in that.
What state funding did Cortez use?

As you pointed out, over half of it was in England, so if anything, the rest of Europe was on a per-capita level less productive than Asia.
Nope. Two thirds of the growth from 1760 to 1830, but Europe's industrial power per capita is on average on a par with China - England is slightly ahead of average per capita (comparison as of 1750, later figures get more in Europe's favor).

If you want specifics:

Europe on the whole (manufacturing output): 23.2% to 28.1% (1800) to 34.2% (1830). China goes from 32.8% to 33.3% to 29.8%.

Britain goes from 1.9% to 9.5%

Per capita levels of industrialization (relative to the UK in 1900 as 100):

Europe on the whole: 8, 8, 11 - with the UK going from 10 to 16 to 25.
China goes from 8 to 6, 6.

For comparisons to a nonEuropean society that managed to not merely survive European hyper-expansion but claw its way up into great power status - Japan:

Per capita industrialization: 7 (equal to the Habsburg Empire and slightly ahead of Russia until 1830).

Do you really think that North American societies are even close to that?

You ever hear of supply lines?
Supply lines didn't stop Europeans from campaigning further abroad than the Americas.

Honestly, European powers could easily conquer (if not hold) the East Coast eventually. But they'd need to have port cities as bases of operation to work from. And without a collapse, North America is in a weird middle ground - too dense to roll over demographically, but not developed enough to slowly buy out the way India was.
And not nearly dense enough to resist a determined attempt at conquest.

So frankly, North America is vulnerable to any organized attempt to conquer it.

No, it really isn't. The Pueblo peoples picked up horses from the Spanish in 1621. A bit over a century later, horseback riding had spread all the way to Saskatchewan. Note that not just riding was passed along, but knowledge on how to selectively breed horses, make horse-riding gear, and everything else which was needed to be a pastoral nomad. The Comanche even figured out how to do mounted archery. This is astoundingly rapid cultural change. If very small populations could adopt this rapidly, the innovation of denser groups of Native Americans could be even more rapid.
Yes, it really is.

This puts the Comanche on the same level of somewhat before AD 1000 Eurasians (I'd have to look up specifics to get a more precise date).

Going from that into the technology of the tericos and such is going to be much harder.

Can they do it, given time and no interference? Sure. But being able to have armies capable of beating any European 16th century army isn't going to do them that much good in the 1700s.


I'm sure that if their societies aren't destroyed by disease and civil war, the more organized polities have a chance - but treating them as if they can just leap across centuries of development to something like this . . . is giving them too much credit.

Comparisons to areas like Iran that were on the same level (essentially) as Europe entering into this period is of little help in understanding how much of a chance the Mexica have.
 
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How about earlier Alastrim.

Actually did something similar to that in my current timeline, having an American poxvirus cause a mild form of the disease to give Native Americans cross-immunity to smallpox.

It helps, but there's still measles, tuberculosis, influenza (it may seem like a 'minor' disease, but in a virgin population it can be pretty deadly), yellow fever, malaria, and a whole host of other diseases. A world where Alastrim gets into the Americas before Smallpox proper might allow, say, the Tawantinsuyu or the Aztecs to resist the first invasions into their land as they won't be suffering from smallpox.

After that, though, history would go pretty much along OTL-diseases cause a demographic collapse, followed by conquest and displacement. The spread of alastrim into the Americas might allow for a larger Native American population, but in this scenario that would mean more mestizos and less whites in the tropics and more densely populated reservations in the temperate areas.
 
It was still "taken". Having a demographic collapse doesn't change that.

Yes it does, because it makes the initial cost of settlement much cheaper

And frankly, 100,000 is less than the population of say, Finland.

The Finns were never ethnically replaced, although the Swedes did settle the coast in numbers. In addition, the Eastern North American population was rapidly increasing during this period. Food was plentiful enough the first settlers all noticed how much taller and healthier Indians were. And the coastal tribes were rapidly building wooden palisades to protect against other groups.

The point is, without a demographic collapse, Plymouth would certainly have failed. The "Great Migration" of 20,000 Puritans to Massachusetts from 1630 to 1642 or so would have likely been totally impossible, as the Crown cared so little for the Puritans at this time it wasn't about to send a garrison of troops to defend them. During the same period, many other Puritans went elsewhere, such as to Ireland and the Netherlands. The would-be-Yankees would likely follow them.

Thus, we've already gotten to 1650 or so (post English Civil War) with essentially no settlement by the British in New England, making it that much harder to take out the locals. By this point Britain will be looking in other directions - places it can actually make money. Not a random land grab of an area full of hostile natives. That will come in the 19th century, if at all.

Except that unlike Korea, it can be conquered by Europeans without too much trouble.

North of the tobacco belt, it's just not worth the trouble. The southern United States and the Caribbean may well be worth the trouble, but some form of exploitative tenant system which is slowly backed into (as in Bengal) might work just as well.

What state funding did Cortez use?

Cortez was initially given a charter by Governor Velázquez, which was then revoked. So he basically mutinied. But around half his funds came through the Governor, and he seems to have borrowed some of the remainder. That credit may not have been available if he was not an agent of the Crown.

Do you really think that North American societies are even close to that?

No. The Americas don't have a chance of reaching parity. But they can get to the point that it's not worth the considerable resources which would be needed to pacify the area, at least until the Industrial era. All they need to do is be numerous and formidable enough to be troublesome militarily, but not have anything that Europe wants badly enough they can't get freely in trade. It's not that Europe can't conquer the whole of the Americas, it's that they won't want to. Sections, particularly in the tropics and subtropics, could be profitable. But this is the mercantilist era, not the imperialist era - you don't take territory just to fill out the map.

So if you thought I was saying I think that some American polities could get to European levels of development within a few hundred years, of course not - that's ridiculous. But the Americas will look a whole lot more like Africa during the same period, albeit with a a much healthier climate in places for whites.
 
Yes it does, because it makes the initial cost of settlement much cheaper

Certainly. But not in terms of whether or not it was "taken", which is what I was responding to.

The Finns were never ethnically replaced, although the Swedes did settle the coast in numbers. In addition, the Eastern North American population was rapidly increasing during this period. Food was plentiful enough the first settlers all noticed how much taller and healthier Indians were. And the coastal tribes were rapidly building wooden palisades to protect against other groups.

The point is, without a demographic collapse, Plymouth would certainly have failed. The "Great Migration" of 20,000 Puritans to Massachusetts from 1630 to 1642 or so would have likely been totally impossible, as the Crown cared so little for the Puritans at this time it wasn't about to send a garrison of troops to defend them. During the same period, many other Puritans went elsewhere, such as to Ireland and the Netherlands. The would-be-Yankees would likely follow them.
The fact there were more Finns relative to the number of Swedes than natives relative to Europeans might have something to do with that.

And if we have something significant enough to change whether or not the natives die in droves from disease - and I say this as someone who thinks butterflies from the Americas won't automatically reach Europe - the odds of OTL Plymouth and Puritans are minimal. That's a century or more of changes that will show in the European approach to "Hey, there's a place with fertile land and a temperate climate."

Thus, we've already gotten to 1650 or so (post English Civil War) with essentially no settlement by the British in New England, making it that much harder to take out the locals. By this point Britain will be looking in other directions - places it can actually make money. Not a random land grab of an area full of hostile natives. That will come in the 19th century, if at all.

No, we haven't. And this isn't a "random land grab" just to fill areas in on a map. This is an area worth taking, as OTL testifies to rather strongly.

Now, the Great American Desert is probably considerably more protected than OTL - but that area was slow to be settled OTL for reasons that still apply here, and it's more thinly populated than *New England etc.

North of the tobacco belt, it's just not worth the trouble. The southern United States and the Caribbean may well be worth the trouble, but some form of exploitative tenant system which is slowly backed into (as in Bengal) might work just as well.

It is quite worth the trouble. I don't know how Massachusetts compared to Virginia, but British North America was a big deal.

And an exploitative tenant system is not mutually exclusive with extensive white settlement - unlike India, that's actually feasible (even if it's not as depopulated as OTL), and probably worth cultivating.

Lots of mixed bloods, maybe, but certainly not just a thin layer of white rulers over vast numbers of natives.

Cortez was initially given a charter by Governor Velázquez, which was then revoked. So he basically mutinied. But around half his funds came through the Governor, and he seems to have borrowed some of the remainder. That credit may not have been available if he was not an agent of the Crown.

Why not?

No. The Americas don't have a chance of reaching parity. But they can get to the point that it's not worth the considerable resources which would be needed to pacify the area, at least until the Industrial era. All they need to do is be numerous and formidable enough to be troublesome militarily, but not have anything that Europe wants badly enough they can't get freely in trade. It's not that Europe can't conquer the whole of the Americas, it's that they won't want to. Sections, particularly in the tropics and subtropics, could be profitable. But this is the mercantilist era, not the imperialist era - you don't take territory just to fill out the map.

Who said anything about taking territory to fill out the map? The area is just as valuable as OTL.

And it would be rather hard for them to be numerous or formidable enough when they're so divided. If "the natives of *New England" were one entity, that would be one thing. But playing tribes off against each other - heck, tribes seeking allies among the whites, and feeling confident in their strength - is far from impossible, and I'm not even sure it would be difficult.

Obviously you can't just walk in and plant a colony quite so easily as OTL (practically ideal), but that's not the same thing as "not at all".

So if you thought I was saying I think that some American polities could get to European levels of development within a few hundred years, of course not - that's ridiculous. But the Americas will look a whole lot more like Africa during the same period, albeit with a a much healthier climate in places for whites.

I still disagree. Polities like the Aztecs? Maybe. But the inhabitants of the OTL US? Not so much. The natives are not strong enough to resist a determined attempt at European conquest, and there is no reason for the European powers to find controlling North America less desirable present.

Having a much healthier climate is a significant incentive for there to be settlement.
 
unlike the Europeans, they'd done the calculations, and they knew enough about the circumference of the world to know that the fabled shortcut across the ocean just wasn't there.

I think you're wrong about the Europeans. Most Western scholars of Columbus' day had a fairly accurate conception of the circumference of the world. Columbus was a bit of a crank.

But I've never thought about what the Chinese believed about the Earth's circumference. It sounds interesting. Could you give me more information or point me to a source?
 
And if we have something significant enough to change whether or not the natives die in droves from disease - and I say this as someone who thinks butterflies from the Americas won't automatically reach Europe - the odds of OTL Plymouth and Puritans are minimal. That's a century or more of changes that will show in the European approach to "Hey, there's a place with fertile land and a temperate climate."

Note that various European powers (the British, French, and Portuguese) all attempted to settle before the plague, and they were expelled, either through open violence or implicit threat thereof (e.g., showing up armed at the settlements and kindly asking the settlers to all get back on their ships).

Do I think it's plausible? Yes. But if anything, a "full Americas" will slow down initial interest considerably outside of places where trading posts are quite profitable. There were many early Indian wars which were almost losses. Jamestown almost fell in the 1620s. New England almost had British settlement expunged. New England faced down a roughly equal Indian force in King Phillip's War in the 1670s. They won, but only through attrition, with Indian casualties much higher than their own. About 8% of New Englanders of draftable age died, compared with 30% of Indians. New France fought many wars with the Iroquois, which several times came close to outright sacking Montreal. With more manpower on the Indian side, all of these could have ended with the extirpation of the colonies.

No, we haven't. And this isn't a "random land grab" just to fill areas in on a map. This is an area worth taking, as OTL testifies to rather strongly.

What made New England profitable was the human capital that the settlers (who came from the English middle class) provided - skills such as distilling, glassmaking, and shipbuilding. Without those settlers, it's not the same place. Even the farmland wasn't all that good outside of the Connecticut River valley, which is why almost all the farms were abandoned once better land opened up in the Midwest.

And an exploitative tenant system is not mutually exclusive with extensive white settlement - unlike India, that's actually feasible (even if it's not as depopulated as OTL), and probably worth cultivating.

To some degree perhaps. Still, some degree of native involvement would be needed, which would mean technologies and practices would jump into non-European hands.


Are you serious here? If you're going to a bank asking for a loan to pay for some mercenaries and ships, you don't think you'll be more likely to get it if the lender thinks you are an agent of the crown, who will back up your debts if your expedition goes under?

And it would be rather hard for them to be numerous or formidable enough when they're so divided. If "the natives of *New England" were one entity, that would be one thing. But playing tribes off against each other - heck, tribes seeking allies among the whites, and feeling confident in their strength - is far from impossible, and I'm not even sure it would be difficult.

Perhaps, perhaps not. The Inca were a very recent empire, but they were already putting into place systems which would have formed a unified cultural identity across their whole realm.

Hrrm...talk of political divisions makes me think of another parallel - Ireland.

I still disagree. Polities like the Aztecs? Maybe. But the inhabitants of the OTL US? Not so much. The natives are not strong enough to resist a determined attempt at European conquest, and there is no reason for the European powers to find controlling North America less desirable present.

There's a significant disincentive to colonize compared to IOTL, and plenty of attractive (in some ways, more attractive) trading options in Africa and Asia. That doesn't mean there would be no interest, but it would be more evenly divided between all three realms.

Presuming that some European country does get a largish chunk of North America, and the Industrial Revolution happens, I wonder what the ramifications will be. Steel and Coal will be very useful, and due to the sheer cost transport, pressure will be high to create finished products with them on site. However, this means using native labor to a great degree, which means you're talking about largely industrializing the Indian peasant class, rather than sending in European workers for anything but the skilled crafts. Socialism and national liberation would have a strong congruence indeed.
 
Note that various European powers (the British, French, and Portuguese) all attempted to settle before the plague, and they were expelled, either through open violence or implicit threat thereof (e.g., showing up armed at the settlements and kindly asking the settlers to all get back on their ships).

Note also when those settlements occurred. That the first settlements failed is pretty predictable whether the natives are a threat or not - colonizing NA is hard.

But far from beyond the means of Europeans, even if *New England's population is topping 100,000.

Do I think it's plausible? Yes. But if anything, a "full Americas" will slow down initial interest considerably outside of places where trading posts are quite profitable. There were many early Indian wars which were almost losses. Jamestown almost fell in the 1620s. New England almost had British settlement expunged. New England faced down a roughly equal Indian force in King Phillip's War in the 1670s. They won, but only through attrition, with Indian casualties much higher than their own. About 8% of New Englanders of draftable age died, compared with 30% of Indians. New France fought many wars with the Iroquois, which several times came close to outright sacking Montreal. With more manpower on the Indian side, all of these could have ended with the extirpation of the colonies.

Except that if there's more manpower on the Indian side, there's probably more military manpower sent to the New World.

What made New England profitable was the human capital that the settlers (who came from the English middle class) provided - skills such as distilling, glassmaking, and shipbuilding. Without those settlers, it's not the same place. Even the farmland wasn't all that good outside of the Connecticut River valley, which is why almost all the farms were abandoned once better land opened up in the Midwest.

It's still worth settling. Not as much as say, Ohio, but if I had to choose between being poor in England or migrating as Benedict Arnold (the ancestor of "the" Benedict Arnold) did, it's still worth it.

To some degree perhaps. Still, some degree of native involvement would be needed, which would mean technologies and practices would jump into non-European hands.

No more than OTL, which is hardly enough for the natives to be on a par with the Europeans.

Are you serious here? If you're going to a bank asking for a loan to pay for some mercenaries and ships, you don't think you'll be more likely to get it if the lender thinks you are an agent of the crown, who will back up your debts if your expedition goes under?

I am being serious here. Sure, all things being even being an agent of the crown is useful. But that doesn't mean that Cortez needed that to acquire money.

Perhaps, perhaps not. The Inca were a very recent empire, but they were already putting into place systems which would have formed a unified cultural identity across their whole realm.

The Inca, sure. The tribes of *New England? No.

Hrrm...talk of political divisions makes me think of another parallel - Ireland.

Why do you keep insisting on using "parallels" from far more developed societies?

There's a significant disincentive to colonize compared to IOTL, and plenty of attractive (in some ways, more attractive) trading options in Africa and Asia. That doesn't mean there would be no interest, but it would be more evenly divided between all three realms.

The land's just as valuable as OTL. And having to fight isn't a particularly strong disincentive.


Presuming that some European country does get a largish chunk of North America, and the Industrial Revolution happens, I wonder what the ramifications will be. Steel and Coal will be very useful, and due to the sheer cost transport, pressure will be high to create finished products with them on site. However, this means using native labor to a great degree, which means you're talking about largely industrializing the Indian peasant class, rather than sending in European workers for anything but the skilled crafts. Socialism and national liberation would have a strong congruence indeed.

However, this means assuming minimal white settlement, for I have no idea what reasons.
 
For the record, I am also of the opinion that if 16th c. Europeans REALLY wanted to conquer North America even at peak population, it could be done. The Spanish colonists used mediaeval technology all the way to the end of the 17th c. especially on the frontiers (and I really mean mediaeval, as in padded armour, bronze scale, targes, knightly longswords, occasional crossbows. There's very few examples of firearms or plate harness anywhere outside the richest areas of Mexico) ... and generally came off the better in any conflict.

But the key here is that the costs would be very high and the returns not worth it, especially if the gold that was lying out in the open already got looted and there's nothing else left to loot.

I am also not so sold on southern Argentina being an early settlement spot! It's exactly the kind of place (like Chukotka or Arizona) where a determined and adaptable migratory culture can give small numbers of Europeans a lot of trouble. Look at the Mapuches for example.

My participation in this thread was mostly a reaction to the idea that Europe as a whole was not highly productive (no, by the 16th c. even very backwards parts of Europe like Sweden or Russia were exporters rather than importers of manufactured goods outside intra-Europe trade) and that all of Europe benefitted from the New World conquest (disagree).

I am ambivalent if Mercantile colonization was necessary to get a leg-up into Imperialism and how it relates to the new world. Perhaps it's true, but Europeans weren't just colonizing the New World, so it could still happen, just differently.
 
For the record, I am also of the opinion that if 16th c. Europeans REALLY wanted to conquer North America even at peak population, it could be done. The Spanish colonists used mediaeval technology all the way to the end of the 17th c. especially on the frontiers (and I really mean mediaeval, as in padded armour, bronze scale, targes, knightly longswords, occasional crossbows. There's very few examples of firearms or plate harness anywhere outside the richest areas of Mexico) ... and generally came off the better in any conflict.
When the natives didn't have their numbers drastically depleted by disease they beat the Europeans pretty damn often. The first large scale battle on the mainland against Europeans ended in a resounding Spanish defeat. Many of the first several colonies were wiped out, starting with Vinland, La Navidad, and most of Virginia. To say that the Europeans can easily beat any native force without diseases dramatically depopulating them isn't just twisting the truth, but ignores the historical record.
 
When the natives didn't have their numbers drastically depleted by disease they beat the Europeans pretty damn often. The first large scale battle on the mainland against Europeans ended in a resounding Spanish defeat. Many of the first several colonies were wiped out, starting with Vinland, La Navidad, and most of Virginia. To say that the Europeans can easily beat any native force without diseases dramatically depopulating them isn't just twisting the truth, but ignores the historical record.

Seriously, we've no real idea what happened to Vinland (the Norse farmers probably up and left because there wasn't enough population pressure to sustain growth, especially since the Norse slaughtered more of each other than the natives did), the English colonists were spectacularly hapless because they were urban dissidents rather than soldiers or farmers, and I'm talking about a different period altogether in regards to the Spanish.

I did not say easily; I said with determined effort, starting from a colonizable springboard ... not barging in with a handful of guys right into the heart of the most populous state on the continent. So this is a scenario where someone is expanding from, say, Patagonia or St.Lawrence or as allies of this or that native state.

The best analogy I had was the frontier wars, which were very, very difficult for the Spanish, but who were ultimately able to defend and expand even into complete wasteland, using medieval technology, despite the fact that their opponents, being also very clever and practical people, picked up horse riding and metalwork as well. All it shows is that qualitative advantage matters and was there even using essentially mediaeval tools of war.

And "resounding Spanish defeat"? Okay, sure. It definitely was a defeat, and strategically significant. But as always whenever this comes up, I invite people to compare the quality and quantity of Spanish troops involved in the New World against the men they wasted on fighting over Tripoli (like the fleet that got wrecked off Djerba, for example).

It was a completely peripheral theatre and got the appropriate amount of attention and the appropriate quality of soldiers.

Which, if anything strengthens both your perception of disease being key and my original point: technically it's possible, practically it will cost too much. Without disease to make it possible, the conquest cannot happen on a shoestring.
 
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I'm not sure on it costing too much, but it would certainly be a considerably more involved project - especially against societies like the Mexica.

But the idea that say, a quarter million *New England natives represent a solid barrier to any attempt to land . . . I disagree. There's a huge gap between the difficulties involved between there and down south, and if New England was that undesirable as a place to farm and harvest we wouldn't see people establishing colonies through out it as opposed to heading for New York and southward.

Still, even at worst for the natives, their numbers are going to be far more significant as a part of the population of areas in the New World - which has some pretty dramatic impacts, although I doubt it's comparable to Algeria or something like that.
 
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