WI: Britain declares war on Spain in 1761

I'm not aware so. Britain tried to take the River Plate in 1806, but that was because by then, the Spanish had lost or were about to lose most of their empire, and they wanted it for the trading supremacy. The Welsh often colonised Patagonia, but this was without the permission of the Spanish (fairly obviously) and without the support of the British government, even if they may have perhaps received tacit support if the Patagonians had requested it (which I'm not sure they ever did OTL).

Didn't the Welsh only went to Patagonia in the 1860's, as a plan of the Argentine government to settle the area with Europeans? I can't remember reading about Welsh colonies in Argentina during the colonial period.
 
I believe that the British had actually already fought the Battle of New Orleans after the Peace of Ghent was signed (I think you're getting confused with the Treaty of Paris 1783, which ended the ARW, and the Treaties of Paris 1814 and 1815, which ended the Napoleonic Wars), so yes ;)


Fair play. My knowledge of the South Sea Company extends to that they caused the South Sea Bubble and financial collapse of 1720, and ceased to exist. Still, the only attempt the British ever made to capture the River Plate was 1806-7 as far as I am aware, so it can't have topped their priorities...



Yes, true, Louisiana was. I mentioned it as a kind of "across all eras" answer where in this specific situation, yes it wouldn't have been a Spanish territory.

An attack on Lima is probably unlikely unless the Spanish really were in collapse as the Spanish could resupply it far, far easier than the British could (it's really not easy to resupply a military campaign on the Pacific coast of the Americas by sea, especially when your enemy commands the crossing points).

An attack on Cartagena is more realistic, and in 1758 the British did blockade it causing a major sea battle, and in 1741 a British force laid siege to the city and tried to capture it, but on neither occasion was the city actually captured by the British.

With Cartagena you have to bear in mind that it is the kind of location where there are a lot of diseases and marshland conditions that European (read: British) people are not used to, so while Britain may want to capture it, they don't want to have to hold it - it's the kind of location you attempt to take to force an end to a war. Also, while the British would surely love to capture it, taking the Viceroyalty of New Granada would give the British a huge land border with the Spanish empire to defend, so - it kind of depends when exactly you are talking about. At some times, it would be a tempting target, at others you have to admit that the time isn't right and just use it as a barter point. It's a bit hard to call IMO.
In fact the 1741 defeat was really terrible for the british.

In 1780 a convoy of more than fifty english ships was captured by the Spanish Navy.

And you are writing about taking huge slices of Spanish possesions...
 
In fact the 1741 defeat was really terrible for the british.

In 1780 a convoy of more than fifty english ships was captured by the Spanish Navy.

And you are writing about taking huge slices of Spanish possesions...

Are we? The consensus so far seems to only be a couple of Caribbean islands over what the British achieved in our timeline.
 
Also a problem for the british to decide for installing permanently in Cuba are the diseases, according Daniel R. Headrick in his book "Power over Peoples" : "En 1762 admiral George Pocock took La Haban with 14000 men after a siege of nine weeks in which died the 41 per cent of his men and another 37 per cent got ill, letting only a 1/5 part in conditions for the combat" -I am translating this to english from the spanish translation of the book (In Spain named el Poder y el Imperio), so sorry if this is not exactly the same text than in the original in English-.
The yellow fever mades practically impossible for the british to attempt to expand his control over the rest of Cuba.
I think this is a factor that makes easier for Great Britain to decide exchange La Habana for the entire Philippines.

A British Philippines would provide an important post in the Pacific Ocean near China,Japan, Indochina and the Spice Islands, with the presence of the british in India and the Philippines they could in a future to conquest permanently the Dutch East Indias (The Java and other dutch possessions would be between two british possessions) a thing that also could be logistically important to assure a permanent link between India and the Philippines.
 
A British Philippines would provide an important post in the Pacific Ocean near China,Japan, Indochina and the Spice Islands, with the presence of the british in India and the Philippines they could in a future to conquest permanently the Dutch East Indias (The Java and other dutch possessions would be between two british possessions) a thing that also could be logistically important to assure a permanent link between India and the Philippines.

What would be the impact of a British Philippines on relations with China? They'll have a head start over other European powers, no?
 
I think initally the thing in reference to China would follow a similar path than in OTL, in any case in OTL even without having the Philippines the Royal Navy could mount a succesful operation against China in 1839-42 (although naturally she had bases in Malaysia and with technology like the Nemesis it was easy to crush the chinese forces).

So I think that in this case the path until the First Opium War could be similar (this not means identic only similar), once that the hostilities has begun with the british in possesion of Philippines and could be of the Dutch East Indias (principally Java and Malaca) Taiwan could be also an interesting objective for the british, a possible operation for the occupation of Taiwan could be possible and the island apart of the strategic situation has a prosperous agriculture with plantations of sugar, tea and rice (during the emperorship of Daoguang during the period 1821-1850 it is known the exportation of 140000 mesures of rice each year to the port of Tientsin).

The british could also offer to the local inhabitants of Taiwan a politic of better prosperity an even a considerable degree of autonomy, in this aspect Taiwan could be a large Menorca in the China Sea (Menorca in the XVIII century during the british occupation was an island better governed than under the Spain monarchy, in fact the menorquins remember with pride the period of british governance).

This also could follow a politic of indirect rule wisely applied by the british in different parts of their empire.

All this would change the face of Asia a lot, with the british in possession of India, Java, Malaca, Singapore, Philippines and Taiwan there a lot of probabilities than Japan could be opened by the Royal Navy, diplomatic treaties with Vietnam and Thailand could be signed, with a greater british presence in the Southeast Asia the politics of France towards Vietnam simply could never happened (at the end there are a lot of british bases in this zone and probably the United Kingdom not considers a french presence in the area necessary or advisable), even Thailand could receive a part of the burma cake being an ally of the United Kingdom in an ATL version of the Burma Wars.

In all the politic of the United Kingdom in Southeast Asia could combine direct rule with indirect rule and some kind of finlandization or great degree of political influence towards some of the political entities of the zone (Vietnam, Thailand, Sulu sultanate, Aceh)

The United Kingdom would be probably the hegemonic power in the Indian Ocean, the Southeast Asia and the Far East Asia.
 
I highly doubt that the UK would take Indonesia in a skewed timeline, firstly it was only really conquered by the Dutch in the latter part of the 19th century before then they just had some of the islands. Secondly Britain had occupied all the Dutch possessions in Indonesia in the Napoleonic Wars and handed them back, even though Singapore was unimportant then and Britain had no toehold in China. Basically put British interest was India first and foremost, unlike other nations they didn't need to look at the Chinese market because they had a strangehold on the Indian. China was secondary in their considerations and remained so until the 1830s/1840s when more interaction with China lead to the Opium Wars and HK.
 
I highly doubt that the UK would take Indonesia in a skewed timeline, firstly it was only really conquered by the Dutch in the latter part of the 19th century before then they just had some of the islands. Secondly Britain had occupied all the Dutch possessions in Indonesia in the Napoleonic Wars and handed them back, even though Singapore was unimportant then and Britain had no toehold in China. Basically put British interest was India first and foremost, unlike other nations they didn't need to look at the Chinese market because they had a strangehold on the Indian. China was secondary in their considerations and remained so until the 1830s/1840s when more interaction with China lead to the Opium Wars and HK.

Imperial policy is set by those in the colonies rather than by the centre. The reason why there wasn't a big push for keeping the Dutch possessions is because there wasn't a big lobby group to push for it. If there was a large corporate interest already based there, that might change things.
 
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