WI: Alternate colonies of Leopold II

Leopold II, a highly contoversial man even in his own time for the extremes to which he is broadly considered to have taken colonial exploration, is never the less facinating in his dedication to and methoids for securing a colony for Belgium: firmly believing a nation could only grow great if it had that outlet for it's goods and a place to vent it's growing population while still keeping them loyal to and producing for the motherland. In the end, through a massive public relations campaign, strategic sponsorship of expeditions and groups, and a complex game of personal and international dipolomacy, he miraculously managed to secure personal rule of the Congo as a "Free State": probably the biggest personal gain since Cortes was granted "a province for a garden", and for over twenty years ran the territory like an unregulated, bloody minded bussinesses.

That success however, only came after a string of failed ventures from Guatamala, to the South Pacific, to attempting to buy the Phillipenes from Spain. However, let's shift the man's luck around a bit and ask what might change if he succeeded in obtaining a different, or potentially multiple, concessions. How might that effect the broader patern of 2nd wave colonialism?
 
Swapping their acquisition of Congo with the German colony on New Guinea would be interesting. More so because of what Germany would do with that large area in the center of Africa and how that would affect the African colonial era (obviously it would be significantly less brutality in Congo), but Belgium would be more likely to maintain ownership of the NG colony into the middle of the 20th century (or later) which could result in a separate country there on the northern coast of NG and on those larger islands.
 
Swapping their acquisition of Congo with the German colony on New Guinea would be interesting. More so because of what Germany would do with that large area in the center of Africa and how that would affect the African colonial era (obviously it would be significantly less brutality in Congo), but Belgium would be more likely to maintain ownership of the NG colony into the middle of the 20th century (or later) which could result in a separate country there on the northern coast of NG and on those larger islands.
It's dang near impossible to beat King Leopold's Congo in terms of brutality.
 
So could the Imperial Japanese during WW2.

Certainly... though I hestitate to draw 1-1 comparisons with occupation and colonization regimes. If for no other reason than in one case you have military brass in charge and the later civilian agents, and so you have different aspects of the domineering state's priority's policies being implimented.

Swapping their acquisition of Congo with the German colony on New Guinea would be interesting. More so because of what Germany would do with that large area in the center of Africa and how that would affect the African colonial era (obviously it would be significantly less brutality in Congo), but Belgium would be more likely to maintain ownership of the NG colony into the middle of the 20th century (or later) which could result in a separate country there on the northern coast of NG and on those larger islands.

However, this is kind of the thing I was looking for. One issue you'd run into with this scenario, though, is how Leopold II would be able to make the profits required out of region to justify taking control and keeping personal government of it, as well as get the international community to sign off on it. Its not like the region had a claim that could be bought, after all...
 
The Dutch did have a history of exploration in the area. The Belgians could have hired one of them to explore in the area and make claims. They used political leverage to gain Congo OTL (it must have been enormous as Congo is a huge swath of land). If they don't know/believe that an African plot is an option they may use that political leverage to secure their ownership of NG instead.

Belgium's colonial ambitions were mostly about pride, but the pragmatic reasons presented were for a place to send their growing population (NG presents this). The large offshore islands were able to support certain cash crop farming. Otherwise they wanted a captive market for Belgian industrial goods.
 
What about Belgium/King Leopold buying the Caroline Islands and the Northern Marianas off Spain after the Spanish-American War?
 
The Dutch did have a history of exploration in the area. The Belgians could have hired one of them to explore in the area and make claims. They used political leverage to gain Congo OTL (it must have been enormous as Congo is a huge swath of land). If they don't know/believe that an African plot is an option they may use that political leverage to secure their ownership of NG instead.

Belgium's colonial ambitions were mostly about pride, but the pragmatic reasons presented were for a place to send their growing population (NG presents this). The large offshore islands were able to support certain cash crop farming. Otherwise they wanted a captive market for Belgian industrial goods.

Um.. the Belgian government didn't really have strong colonial ambitions, or actively politically leveraged orhired explorers for the securing of anywhere. The projects were closely tied to the person of the monarch as private individuals rather than the state
 
Apologies, I was using their government and their government interchangeably. ;)

Whatever leverage the king of Belgium had must have been very impressive to be able to finesse such an enormous and important colony all to himself. The Congo is the primary drainage basin for a huge swath of central Africa. Did he have pictures of Victoria or something? :)
 
Apologies, I was using their government and their government interchangeably. ;)

Whatever leverage the king of Belgium had must have been very impressive to be able to finesse such an enormous and important colony all to himself. The Congo is the primary drainage basin for a huge swath of central Africa. Did he have pictures of Victoria or something? :)

No. From the research I'm doing for my timeline, it was the result of a huge public relations campaign about commerce and civilizing the region, as well as the fact that the region had too much potential value for any one state to get it's rivals to agree to owning it (while partition was impractical). Basically, Leopold promised to run the region as a Free trade zone and, not having a country behind him, would have neither the political compulsion ever to or means of renegading on transforming what was to be in practice as international mandate into a national colony
 
Top