PC: Spain wins S-A War?

So I've read that both the US and Spain were extremely tactically incompetent in the war, and that Spain may have won if they weren't even dumber than the Americans.

If I'm not mistaken, Cuban rebels already held a good portion of the island when the Americans landed, so would Spain have lost Cuba later on anyway? If Cuba were lost and became independent, would beating the Americans make up for it for the Spanish morale?
 
I can't say much other than Cuba was already fighting and bitter enough that yes, even if they have to slog through a good bit more Spain is probably going to be losing it.

Puerto Rico, though, a Spanish officer complained that the Puerto Ricans went from 'fervently Spanish to enthusiastically American' in but twenty-four hours, so I doubt they'd mind staying as some *dominion of Spain.
 
Maybe Puerto Rico becomes an actual part of Spain, like what French Guyana is now and the Netherlands Antilles soon will be?
 
Maybe.

I've been considering my next timeline after I finish the one advertised below, and I've settled on this POD. Spain fights off US forces, but eventually loses Cuba. When, I'm not sure.
 
The armies on both sides were pretty incompetent, the U.S. because it was a bunch of volunteers, though Spain doesn't have that excuse. The Navies on both sides were alright, though not the best, but Spain's position there was hopeless. Their ships were too old, too underfunded, too few, and too immersed in the failed Jeune Ecole that gave them a bunch of low quality armored cruisers too slow to outrun American battleships, and sure as hell unable to stand against them in battle.

In other words, it'll take a miracle for Spain to win on the seas without PODs a decade earlier so that the Navy's rot could be cleaned out, and given the nature of the war, losing its fleet lost Spain the war. It's an interesting fact that the Spanish Navy's command knew it was hopeless, and officers were sending out final letters and wills and testaments under the expectation that they would all die.
 
When did French Guyana become part of Spain? :confused:

Two years ago, French Guyana held a referendum to ask if they wanted to become independent, remain part of France or become part of various other countries, including Brazil, Surinam, Guyana and Spain. 35% of the people voted to become part of Spain. After some negotiations French Guyana is Spanish since the first of june this year.
 

Fun fact-the Spanish Navy funded some of the earliest submarines in the 1880s-the things were way ahead of their time. Having a more extensive focus on the submarines, and maybe some other projects (rather like the CSN's strategy in the Civil War) along with the rotten navy could bring the inequality down to a manageable scale.
 
So I've read that both the US and Spain were extremely tactically incompetent in the war, and that Spain may have won if they weren't even dumber than the Americans.

If I'm not mistaken, Cuban rebels already held a good portion of the island when the Americans landed, so would Spain have lost Cuba later on anyway? If Cuba were lost and became independent, would beating the Americans make up for it for the Spanish morale?

Spain would only lose Cuba permanently to the rebels if they decided to - they'd fought Cuban revolts for decades, and it wasn't really an era when countries just decided to let their colonies become independent. Around this time, for example, the Dutch were conquering Aceh to complete their hold over Indonesia.

Many in the US immediately before the war thought highly of the Spanish fleet because they looked at statistics, and many were afraid that the Spanish would attack the US coast. Even though their shiips were not as was feared, I am not sure why the Spanish seemed to have had no offensive plan.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
Fun fact-the Spanish Navy funded some of the earliest submarines in the 1880s-the things were way ahead of their time. Having a more extensive focus on the submarines, and maybe some other projects (rather like the CSN's strategy in the Civil War) along with the rotten navy could bring the inequality down to a manageable scale.
Perhaps, though it would have to be at the start of the war to begin with. The Spanish fleet by that point was crap compared to the burgeoning American one (as the Battle of Manila showed).
 
Given the time needed to develop submarines and the years it took to get the very first ones into a condition considered suitable to be commissioned, as opposed to be suitable for testing but not formally in the navy, the odds of Spain being able to do this in the 1880s is pretty much nil.

A much wealthier and industrialized society...wouldn't be able to do it either.

The first submarine would not enter service until the 20th Century and that first sub, tiny with poor speed and range, miserable conditions and a single torpedo tube, needed an additional 3+ years of work before the US Navy would declare it a navy ship.

You might notice that the Peral submarine was not a success despite several years and generous funding. Go to the link for the sub as the first Wiki link is lacking in details and has some very strange jumps in the material.

Had several been built you would then have a class of submarines which had to be towed or carried to Cuba, no facilities in Cuba to support them, with extremely limited combat ability, too slow to catch any ship in motion and whose existance would certainly be well known.



The Spanish navy was not rotten, except for the antiques in Manila Bay, it was simply woefully outgunned with an American battleship for every Spanish cruiser and the one Spanish battleship undergoing work.




Grey Wolf, the Spanish Army in Cuba made no real effort to resist the Americans so perhaps that was why the Spanish Navy felt the need to make a stand at Cuba instead of raiding operations which would seem far more sensible for a woefully inferior fleet?

As I've mentioned before, had the Spanish massed the 5000 soldiers available in the province where the Americans landed a disaster for the US would have been certain. Indeed, historians have noted that the 300 Spanish actually on the spot could have raked the Americans as they pleased.
 
The French had operational submarines at the end of the 1890s. These would probably have been able to achieve something in coastal waters as their crews consistently performed well in wargames.

Russia had operational submarines at Vladivostock in 1904/5 and they almost attacked a Japanese warship :)

The Ottomans even had a couple of submarines, IIRC

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
The Spanish could have certainly given the Yankees a bloody nose, as mentioned a more determined resistance in Cuba could have ruined the American volunteer expedition.

If the Spaniards even somehow managed to hold off, ultimately Cuba is going. Personally I think the best thing Spain could have ever done was make the island a dominion in the 1890s both to release cost of fighting the guerillas and the threat of a US invasion. Afterall Maine or no, both sides were aware one spark could set something off.
 
Cuba is going to be lost regardless. I can see Puerto Rico becoming a dominion, a more or less independent nation with the King of Spain as its head of state.
 
I think that PR would be an actual part of Spain, like the Canaries.

Would beating the Americans help build up Spanish morale?
 
The Spanish navy was not rotten, except for the antiques in Manila Bay, it was simply woefully outgunned with an American battleship for every Spanish cruiser and the one Spanish battleship undergoing work.

The Spanish Navy was not rotten in the sense of being corrupt or incompetent, but budget cuts had completely destroyed its ability to fight. Saying the Pelayo was undergoing work is enormously understating what poor condition the ship was in, and she was never more than a glorified coast defense ship to begin with.

And the rest of the Spanish fleet, while slightly better off than the Pelayo, had boilers so poorly maintained and hulls so fouled that they had no chance whatsoever of success in raiding, despite that being the whole point of building a fleet of cruisers instead of a balanced fleet. And even if their condition had been better, they were still old and outdated compared with the new American cruisers with the exception of the Cristobal Colon which didn't even have its main guns installed a year after commissioning!
 
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