Full Blown US Colonization of Latin America

kernals12

Banned
The US is widely accused of imperialism towards Latin America (and yes we have in many unfortunate cases, although never as much as the cynics would have you believe), so what if the US went all the way and conquered everything from Mexico to Chile (excluding all the British, French, and Dutch possessions)?

When I say colonization, I don't mean statehood, or even something akin to Puerto Rico where people are all considered US citizens. I mean something more akin to Europe's control of Africa. How would this impact Latin American culture? And how much would the US be boosted in world power status?
 
The US is widely accused of imperialism towards Latin America (and yes we have in many unfortunate cases, although never as much as the cynics would have you believe), so what if the US went all the way and conquered everything from Mexico to Chile (excluding all the British, French, and Dutch possessions)?

When I say colonization, I don't mean statehood, or even something akin to Puerto Rico where people are all considered US citizens. I mean something more akin to Europe's control of Africa. How would this impact Latin American culture? And how much would the US be boosted in world power status?

Good luck trying to colonize the empire of Brazil. While it is not impossible to do it using the resources of the USA, the public never would allow the necessary mobilization to pull it off to take place, unless the USA turned into some very authoritarian dictatorship, and that is talking about Brazil alone, if all LA united against the USA the chance is impossible, the US most likely gets bogged down in Mexico, central america and Colombia. They could capture the coastal regions and try to kept it, but there would be a economical drain similar to the generalplan ost.
 
After the Mexican-American War, there was a little known movement called the All of Mexico Movement. The reason that the US only took the northern states from Mexico was because it was largely uninhabited. And Congress felt that the cultural divide was to large between the Protestant White US and the Latin Catholics in Mexico. Say that the All of Mexico Movement gains more support and that the US annexes Mexico, assuming that they can put down any revolts quickly enough, it would have drastic impacts on US history. The first thing ir changes is no civil war. Annexing Mexico gives the south some of the most fertile land on the planet. And if the US keeps electing expansionist presidents and that the people are on board, then I can see the US taking Cuba, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico from Spain sometime in the 1860s or1870s. I don't see the US expanding pass Columbia as that falls out of the Golden Circle. In the original US though we would see the South have the power in the Nation instead of the North. Most likely the Democrats hold power from 1850-1910ish.
 

kernals12

Banned
After the Mexican-American War, there was a little known movement called the All of Mexico Movement. The reason that the US only took the northern states from Mexico was because it was largely uninhabited. And Congress felt that the cultural divide was to large between the Protestant White US and the Latin Catholics in Mexico. Say that the All of Mexico Movement gains more support and that the US annexes Mexico, assuming that they can put down any revolts quickly enough, it would have drastic impacts on US history. The first thing ir changes is no civil war. Annexing Mexico gives the south some of the most fertile land on the planet. And if the US keeps electing expansionist presidents and that the people are on board, then I can see the US taking Cuba, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico from Spain sometime in the 1860s or1870s. I don't see the US expanding pass Columbia as that falls out of the Golden Circle. In the original US though we would see the South have the power in the Nation instead of the North. Most likely the Democrats hold power from 1850-1910ish.
The All of Mexico movement was never going to succeed. If you consider the hand wringing that occurs today over the trickle of Mexicans over the border, consider how people felt about absorbing all of Mexico in 1848.
And as I said, I'm not talking about annexation, I'm talking about colonialism where the President would appoint Viceroys to manage each of these countries. My guess is it would make the US into a naval power rivaling Britain. It would also give America control over much of the world's supply of copper, nitrates, and rubber.
 
You would need to have a completely different U.S in order to have a chance at this, and even then I doubt the U.S could colonize the entirety of Latin America. The best case scenario for the U.S is that it's capable of conquering and holding down Mexico + Central America + The Caribbean. It certainly had the capability to do it since the later 1800's and onward, but lacked the political and domestic will to pull it off.
 

Deleted member 67076

Thats not happening. The US has tried very hard since the 1830s to today to hide its historical empire, with a place this big its impossible to due so. Its just a complete break from the historical conception of American political identity.
 
The US is widely accused of imperialism towards Latin America (and yes we have in many unfortunate cases, although never as much as the cynics would have you believe), so what if the US went all the way and conquered everything from Mexico to Chile (excluding all the British, French, and Dutch possessions)?

When I say colonization, I don't mean statehood, or even something akin to Puerto Rico where people are all considered US citizens. I mean something more akin to Europe's control of Africa. How would this impact Latin American culture? And how much would the US be boosted in world power status?

Decades of Darkness is about this.
 
Thats not happening. The US has tried very hard since the 1830s to today to hide its historical empire, with a place this big its impossible to due so. Its just a complete break from the historical conception of American political identity.

Yeah - if you're going to see full-blown colonization of Latin America by the US, it's going to have to move very gradually and hidden behind numerous figleaves that correspond with the American conception of itself.
 
Did the US ever have the population to do that? It's not like you can just bounce your armies from one country to the next... you'd have to leave garrisons behind as you go. Some would be pretty big (how many troops to garrison Mexico or Brazil?)…
 
Even if an ASB have the US the motivation to do this, and it would have to be an ASB, it’s just impossible.

The only reason it was possible in Africa is because the continent was severely under populated, and had a very limited number of states almost all of which were technologically inferior and diplomatically isolated.

The same is not true for Latin America. It couldn’t be done.
 
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