The Great war of 1904

Jlinker613

Banned
The year is 1907. France and Russia are war with the Imperial Japanese Empire. Japan, highly structured and disciplined, is proving a persistent and admirable opponent to the two European powers. Death tolls are high on the side of the European powers; there are four Franco-Russian soldiers killed for every Japanese one. As the years have gone by, the war has forced more and more French and Russian soldiers to the front. It was expected that Japan's finances and manpower would have run out years ago, but an undisclosed American banker continues to give loans. Stress is rising between the United States and the two European powers over the issue. Japan continues to fund and supply militias in French Indochina and French India, promising a greater degree of home rule as part of the Japanese Empire. France and Russia are not only facing war abroad, but strife in the battle of public opinion.

Britain, though uneasy with France declaring war on its ally in the far east, makes up for its breaking of alliance by allowing Japan to use British ports and cutting off all trade with France and Russia. It is rumored that the British government is sending ammunition, food, and finances to Japanese soldiers on the Russian front. The French and Russia economies have been slowing. When all trade with the British Empire is cut off, you lose 350 million potential consumers, a loss France and Russia are finding difficulty coping with. Tariffs have also been placed on French and Russian goods going to the United States; a sign of the tense relations between the two European powers and America.

Japan meanwhile has recently entered talks with two speculate new allies across the world: Mexico and Italy. With such a massive amount of French forces located in east Asia, the French homeland and other parts of its empire have been neglected to in terms of defense.

December 18th 1907: Mexico receives a telegram from Italy and Japan proposing a simple plan: Bait and attack. Mexico's limited military capability will be entirely focused on capturing French Caribbean territories, and bunkering down. French defenses in the region are miniscule, as it was deemed by the French government to be a relatively stable region where large international conflicts were unlikely to occur. Mexico, still resenting French occupation some 50 years prior, sends a telegram to Rome and Tokyo.

March 12th-March 22nd 1908: Mexico declares war on France. The entire nation of Mexico is pulled into total war. Ships rapidly launch from Veracruz towards French Caribbean territories, French Guiana, and Clipperton Island. French forces are caught entirely by surprise, and as such are overtaken quite easily. Mexican naval forces turn the islands into fortresses, and militarize the Guianan coast. The jungles of french Guiana are perfect for Guerrilla warfare, and as such the central military government of the territory is located deep inland. It will takes weeks for the French Navy to arrive, and in that time Mexico's ship production will produce massive amounts of patrollers and frigates. If the Mexican navy cannot overtake France in sheer brawn, they can hope to overtake them with a massive amount of inexpensive and rapidly built ships. The United States, mindful of events occurring south of its border, stands ambivalent. Tensions with France have lead to an American policy of ambivalence in all things related to the war.

May 6th - July 18th: French naval forces do combat with their Mexican counterparts. They prove far more persistent than expected. A French naval commander messages to Paris:
"The enemy is proving to be more infuriating than previously foreseen. Their many small ships pick away at our fleet over time. If we destroy 10 ships in one week, 15 come to take their place the next. Every Mexican captured island is a fortress, and as such are difficult to bring back under our sovereignty. When we have attempted to capture Guiana, we suffer heavy losses on the beach, and by the time we secure ourselves, the enemy retreats into the jungle where we cannot touch them. We have tried, but they ambush our men, and few return. We have seen terrible things done to dead bodies left to be found. In Guiana our beachheads only last for days at a time, as they ambush us every night, and sabotage whenever possible. When day comes they repel us. We have been pushed off four times. What difficulties we have bared in Guiana have been nothing more than a small irritation compared to our attempts to breach the Mexican homeland. Not only do we fight through jungle, but we must climb mountains as well. The Mexicans are killing us slowly. They cannot deliver a decisive blow, but neither can we. The only difference is that their supply lines are far shorter than ours, which happen to be far less secure than expected. We fear for the pride of France, the idea of our defeat at the hands of these savages... it as all too realistic."

August 1st - 12th of 1908: The French homeland suffers from a surprise invasion by Italian forces. The Italian-Japanese-Mexican coalitions plan: bait enough forces away from France to allow for a successful Italian invasion of France, has succeeded. The Italian military, in a rather blitzkrieg fashion, has occupied and bunkered in Savoy and Nice. The Italian navy has also occupied the port at Tunis, and managed to gain a foothold on Corsica. French lines to Corsica are also being harassed, and the only way any ammunitions or rations can be delivered to Tunisia is through Algeria and over the mountains to the Tunisian coast. France was caught entirely by surprise. French Somaliland has also easily fallen under Italian control. Superior Italian positions in Eritrea, Italian Somaliland, and French Somaliland have caused French overseas supply lines to the Far east have been cut entirely. All of the Franco-Russian coalitions supplies and rations travel on a single route. Weapons are produced mainly by French factories and shipped to the port at St. Petersberg. From there they are taken by train through Siberia to the front against Japan. Japanese forces stop any supplies from reaching French Indochina or French India.

September 17th -29th 1908: The entirety of French Indochina, French India, French and Russian portions of Tientsin, and Kwang-Chou-Wan have fallen under Japanese control, and Japanese naval forces have begun shelling New Caledonia, Wallis Island, Futuna Island, and French Polynesia.

October 7th 1908: All French forces are either captured or withdrawn from the Caribbean.

October 18th 1908: Japan has captured New Caledonia, Wallis Island, Futuna Island, and French Polynesia.

December 11th 1908: Italy has captured all of Tunisia and Corsica.

December 14th 1908: The Siberian railroad is bombed and no more supplies can reach the Siberian Front. Kamatchka and the Kurils have been lost.

December 17th 1908: Russia collapses into revolution and civil war.

December 23rd 1908: The French government, unable to bear another Christmas in an unwinnable war, signs an armistice.

January 21st 1909: Italy, in an attempt to increase its own power in the black sea, captures the Crimea. It was barely defended as Russian forces were far too preoccupied with the the revolution at home.

Italy, with massive forces in Tunisia, Crimea, and Sicily, is perfectly poised for its next expansion against the Ottoman Empire.

The citizens of France have suffered a great loss to their pride. Their glorious nations have been defeated in a long, painful, dreadful war. Millions of men have been lost, resources have been used, and finances have been spent. The French Empire has lost its sense of prestige and the French people have become resentful. Resentful of the government that could not defend their sense of pride, and resentful of the Italians, seen as the savage invaders to the east who came and took their land. Furthermore, they despise the very idea that non-European nations like Mexico and Japan could have ever posed a threat to the might of France. There is talk of a massive social revolution in France, the indebted nation is on the verge of being lost to radicals in the ballot box and the public mind.


Japan: Gains French India, Sakhlain, the Kuril Islands, French indochina, Kwang-Chou-Wan, New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Wallis Island, and Futuna Island.
Mexico: Gains St. Barthelemy, Guadeloupe, Saint Martin, Martinique, French Guinea, and Clipperton Island.
Italy: Gains French, Russian, and Japanese districts in Tientsin, Corisca, Savoy, Nice, Tunisia, and French Somaliland.
France is forced to pay off all of Japan's debts to the American Banker.

Edit: So I made a few changes, I hope they helped.

So how's the timeline? Any issues? Should I expand it into WW1?
 
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Jlinker613

Banned
Bacause Japan offered and its easy pickings. Plus I'm pretty sure Japan and Mexico had cordial relations by this point in OT.
 
Did Mexico have the military capacity to assist Japan in any meaningful way? Furthermore I highly doubt France is going to leave itself that weak in Europe, recovering Alsace-Lorraine will definitely take higher priority over defending Indochina.
 

sharlin

Banned
A good idea but if France declared war on Japan during the Russo-Japanese war then the UK would have been obliged by treaty to step in on Japans side. Also Mexico was militarliy a non-entity at the time, no navy to speak of and an army that was barely out of the 1800s.
 
This may be nitpicky, but by this time the US was already formulating "what if...?" plans for a naval war against Japan (see War Plan Orange, for example). Thus, why would some US financial interests back Japan?

Further, how is it that the French are involved? If it's the result of some clause of the Franco-Russian alliance, how was the alliance invoked?

And in all of this, what are the British up to given that the British were allies of Japan at the time?
 
The year is 1907. France and Russia are war with the Imperial Japanese Empire. Japan, highly structured and disciplined, is proving a persistent and admirable opponent to the two European powers. It was expected that Japan's finances and manpower would have run out a year ago, but an undisclosed american banker continues to give loans. Stress is rising between the United States and the two European powers over the issue. Japan continues to fund and supply militias in French Indochina and French India, promising a greater degree of home rule as part of the Japanese Empire. Britain, though uneasy with France declaring war on its ally in the far east, makes up for its breaking of alliance by allowing Japan to use British ports and denying such access to France or Russia. Japan meanwhile has recently entered talks with two speculate new allies acrfoss the world: Mexico and Italy. With such a massive amount of French forces located in east asia, the French homeland and other parts of its empire have been neglected to in terms of defense.

August 1st - 12th of 1908: Mexico has declared war on France and has occupied French west indies, French Guiana, and clipperton Island. France has been forced to divert even more of its forces at home abroad in order to defend the empire. The United States, mindful of events occurring south of its border, stands ambivalent. Tensions with France have lead to an American policy of ambivalence in all things related to the war. Mexican naval forces have begun to ship off to support military operations in French Indochina.

On September 8th Mexican naval forces have arrived in French Indochina supporting the offensive against France. Japanese forces begin to withdraw to attack French Polynesia and new Caledonia.

On October 22nd - 31st 1908, Italy joins Japan and Mexico in their war against France and Russia. Italian forces overrun french Tunisia, French somaliland, Corseica, Savoy, and Nice, and rapidly establish defenses to prepare for French retaliation. The Italian navy's presence in the red sea cuts French and Russian supply lines to the Eastern front. All supplies must now go overland through Siberia.

On March 19th-26th 1909, Italy has occupied the Crimea and has begun shelling near empty Russian ports on the Black Sea.

June 12th 1909: The Russian Empire has collapsed into Revolution. Russian forces withdraw from the war to fight rebellion at home.

July 9th 1909: France signs an armistice with the coalition powers. Portions of its overseas empire is divided amongst the victors.

Japan: Gains French India, Sakhlain, the Kuril Islands, French indochina, Kwang-Chou-Wan, New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Wallis Island, and Futuna Island.
Mexico: Gains St. Barthelemy, Guadeloupe, Saint Martin, Martinique, French Guinea, and Clipperton Island.
Italy: Gains French, Russian, and Japanese districts in Tientsin, Corisca, Savoy, Nice, Tunisia, and French Somaliland.
France is forced to pay off all of Japan's debts to the American Banker.

So how's the timeline? Any issues? Should I expand it into WW1?
well what mexican navy? how is mexico able to capture all those islands? How is Itall able to capture the Crimea?
 
The British should get those few remaining bits of French India. The Japanese would have little incentive to try to establish their own administrations and garrisons that there, and it'd be far more lucrative to hand them over to the British in exchange for favorable trade dealings or something like that.
 
The Japanese seek out the Mexicans as allies?! I think both the US and Britain would put a stop to any soap box flotilla the Mexicans can put together.

I think limiting to the where it is would prevent the contagion from spreading.

The longer the war goes on the greater the likelihood of Japanese defeat. The Japanese will face physical exhaustion sooner no matter what additional financial backing they get.
 
Interesting!

I COULD see Mexico achieve this by a complete and utter coup de main, but only that. If the French get any warning, the Mexicans are quite literally sunk. There's no way France has all its fleet in action against the Japanese, or even at home waters worrying about the British, and Mexico has a pretty pathetic navy for a Latin American power. If we assume the French West Indies do fall to a perfidious and very well executed surprise attack, the conquerors will soon be the besieged, and the French will be back in force, not to mention bombarding the shit out of Veracruz

Unless we are presuming a way-back POD here (if you are, sorry, its not obvious) then whatever Mexican naval forces on the Pacific side would be spare to head off to Indo-China would probably be blasted apart by the first French (or Russian) cruiser that finds them. I'm not at all sure, that Russian AMCs would not be an equal counterpart to this force.

The same applies to Italy - they COULD just about, assuming secrecy, excellent command and control, and a bolt from the blue, obtain something like the immediate results you postulate, but the majority of the French fleet is going to be nearby - even if they have focused the battleships in the North against the British, successive French governments play a constant game of moving the ships around and basing them elsewhere, anywhere from Cherbourg to Marseilles, so moving them en masse is not going to present any sort of logistical problem.

Meanwhile, the Italians will have logistical problems in spades - even IF the Italians in Tunisia pose as pro-Ottoman pro-Tunis liberators (and thus avoid local resistance), they are still going to be facing the French army out of Algeria. Even if we allow for a large part of this to have been siphoned off to fight the Japanese, there are still substantial levies, reserves and garrison troops to at the very least pen the Italians in the coastal regions of Tunisia they might have seized.

More likely, within a month the French navy will have fought the Italians off the sea, and French reservists would have flooded from France itself to help the forces from Algeria drive the Italians in Tunisia back into the sea.

To be honest, it gets a bit silly for Italy after that - unless it can offer some massive incentive to the Ottoman Empire it cannot either blockade the Straits (cos it would piss the Turks off) or pass any troops through them, and the idea of Italy, of all people, being able to land and occupy the Crimea is not anything realistic at all, unless you have a whole back-story of alternate history predating 1907.

An irony of this timeline is that Germany is probably pro-French! In OTL it allowed the Hamburg-Amerika Line to coal Rozhestvensky's Russian fleet on its way East, and the Kaiser did sign a quickly-annulled-by-the-politicians treaty with the Tsar. Given the limit and scope of Japanese ambitions out East, it would most definitely not be in France or Russia's interests to alienate Germany, and both are probably very willing to concede some important points, eg Morocco, to keep Berlin on side. Furthermore, there was, contrary to what post-WW1 propaganda would have people believe, a fairly large body of opinion in France that believed that accommodation with Germany made sense, that sure one day maybe they would get their come-uppance, but until that time they had to deal with them on a real politik basis, and that Germany was no more of a hereditary enemy than was Britain.

In the scenario of the war you outline, Britain has killed any warming of relations with France. Some in Paris might recognise the difficulties of the British position vis-a-vis the Japanese, but most will remember the Niger Crisis and Fashoda, a scarce 8 or 9 years back, and reckon that recent words of warmth from London were but politicking, and that in the current crisis when it comes to choosing between London or Berlin, Berlin makes more sense. In fact, the German merchant fleet is probably also co-operating with French interests.

To be honest, the dynamics of your story would work better if instead of Mexico and Italy you substituted the USA and Britain, whilst bringing Germany and Austria into the French camp. Italy would probably do as per OTL, shout "Oh my God!" and watch to see what happens.

I don't think you could do it all in one go, tho. I mean if Washington and London both declared war on France and Russia together, Germany would go "Oh well, haha, never mind then...we got Morocco :)"

There's definite possibilities in this period, and I do like the idea of a wealthy American financier keeping the Japanese alive to fight the French and Russians, but it needs a lot more careful thinking out.

It also needs Mexico and Italy to behave more sanely.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 

Jlinker613

Banned
Anybody know how industrialized Sweden was by this point? I'm thinking about incorporating them into the timeline. Do you think that the United States would become involved on the side of Mexico, Japan, and Italy? Would the Ottomans possibly join the Mexico-Japan-Italy Camp? I'm thinking they would want to expand farther north into the caucus or take ports on the Ukraine. Germany also seems likely to want to take advantage of a weakened French and Russia position, but I'd think it would likely risk Britain joining the conflict on France and Russia's side, as they wouldn't want a German dominated Europe.

Also there are a few flaws in your critique that I did edit out. Mexico does not contribute any forces towards the Indo-Chinese War effort, and Britain is secretly funneling supplies to Japan in its fight against Russia. I also focus on how Mexico understands that in sheer brawn in has no chance in defeating the French Navy, so it overcomes this with a cheap and replaceable army. Also Mexico essentially turns the little islands into fortresses with cannons on every hill top, and French Guiana's Jungles are great for guerrilla warfare. Also to invade the Mexican core is to both go up a mountain and trek through jungles filled with guerrilla units. Mexico is used to draw even more forces away from the French homeland to make an Italian attack viable.
 
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Why is France in the war at all?

As others have pointed out in similar threads, the Franco-Russian alliance only involved defense against the Triple Alliance, not against Japan. France has nothing to gain from the Russo-Japanese war.

Also, I think that sharlin is correct that the UK would have been obligated by the Anglo-Japanese alliance to enter the war on Japan's side if France intervenes. Japan at war with two powers = British intervention.
 
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