WI King Leopold II dies before getting the Congo?

So King Leopold II probably created the worst colonial regime in all of colonial Africa by creating the Congo Free State. Though the French and British are strong contenders on the brutality scale, Leopold arguably crossed that with his extreme policies of rubber extraction and native exploitation.

However, let's say he dies from an accident or something about a month or two before the Berlin Conference takes place. Who will take the Congo? Will it be partitioned? If so, by whom? If not so, why not?
 
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I think Portugal will get it.

With British Egypt, I guess it will be partitioned between Portugal west and British east, in the spirit of cape-to-cairo railway. France might get some bits north of Congo River, or she might not. But it doesn't seem that the French expressed much interest for eastern banks of Congo and Ubangi rivers, and was fine with anyone besides their rivals getting them.

Without British Egypt, Portugal will contest it with Zanzibar and Tippu Tip. This can get interesting.
 
Division between France and Britain seems likely.

France already had an option on Congo basin, with Leopold having more or less agreed, if his claims were to fail due to financial lacks, to give them to France for all the basin.

I could see a french takeover of most of Congo basin, up to Tanganika Lake and Kindu or Ubundu.
Britain would probably take the third of the OTL CFS, in S-E.

Portugal could probably be granted some compensations would it be only to tie with Cabinda enclave and to not piss too much Germans.
 
Division between France and Britain seems likely.

France already had an option on Congo basin, with Leopold having more or less agreed, if his claims were to fail due to financial lacks, to give them to France for all the basin.

I could see a french takeover of most of Congo basin, up to Tanganika Lake and Kindu or Ubundu.
Britain would probably take the third of the OTL CFS, in S-E.

Portugal could probably be granted some compensations would it be only to tie with Cabinda enclave and to not piss too much Germans.

The British and the Germans backed Portugal's claims to the Congo River Basin, much to the annoyance of the French. I believe Portugal would probably take everything south of the Kasai River and East of the Lubilash (Sankuru) River. France would probably take everything North of this and Britain most likely everything to the East giving them a Cape to Cairo link.

Economically this means that Britain gains the mineral rich Katanga with its huge copper and cobal deposits, probably adding this to Northern Rhodesia. It also gains tin and gold deposits along with coffee and rubber producing regions. In OTL Katanga was sparsely populated and had a large number of European settlers working in mining, this could be a contentious area for Rhodesia.

Portugal will get the diamond mines of the Kasai region in this scenario along with more coffee, cocoa and rubber producing areas. Like northern Angola in OTL, this will mean an influx of settlers during the 1950s coffee boom in northern Angola (Uige and Zaire districts). Of course the British win with this area being Portuguese as British capital controls diamond mining in Angola (Diamang) and the railroads too.

France will seem like the big winner early on in this scenario having the richest rubber producing region. This area produces palm oil, cocoa and coffee as well. However, it is mostly lowland swamps and would probably not be developed any differently than the rest of French Equatorial Africa was in OTL (meaning very few settlers).
 
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I personally fancy the idea of Russian congo, if only to make things more exotic. But a lot of things need to be changed for that.
 
Alright, so from everyone's responses the Congo would be partitioned somewhat like this?

Ng7o7bh.jpg

I can see this being somewhat acceptable to the three powers, but what about the large space in the middle? Would it be as served as an 'International Zone' for foreign companies? What about the Germans, would they try to butt in on Katanga and the Kivus? Or would everyone just let the issue hang until an alternate World War comes along and smashes everything to smithereens?

I personally fancy the idea of Russian congo, if only to make things more exotic. But a lot of things need to be changed for that.

If I can recall, wasn't there a Russian attempt to make a colony on the Horn of Africa?
 
I would think that the border of the British area would be more or less in a straight line from where Angola and Zambia meet, meaning the French wouldn't have as much territory so far west as in your map. The empty area in your map, north of the Portuguese territory would most likely go to France as part of French Equatorial Africa.
 
Alright, so from everyone's responses the Congo would be partitioned somewhat like this?

Ng7o7bh.jpg

I can see this being somewhat acceptable to the three powers, but what about the large space in the middle? Would it be as served as an 'International Zone' for foreign companies? What about the Germans, would they try to butt in on Katanga and the Kivus? Or would everyone just let the issue hang until an alternate World War comes along and smashes everything to smithereens?



If I can recall, wasn't there a Russian attempt to make a colony on the Horn of Africa?

Yeah, in Djibouti. Ill fated from the start. It was done by the cossacks out of romanticization of Abyssinia. It's even more impossible to copy paste that attempt to the Congo, so it goes a long way to get a Russian private company carving out a Congo Free State in the area. And it won't be owned by the Tsar.

And as for the map, I'm still sticking giving the empty space to Portugal.
 
Perhaps some of you are correct about Portugal getting more in the Western half of the Congo. I did find that before the establishment of the Congo Free State, Portugal claimed the territory as far north as the Equator on the East Bank of the Congo River or Zaire River as the Portuguese called it. Attached is link to a map from 1881 showing Portugal's claims in Africa.

Note that this map shows some interesting borders. Prior to 1886 Portugal claimed the territory as far south as Cape Frio, they ceded the territory between Cape Frio and the Cunene River to Germany in return for Germany's recognition of Portugal's claim to Central Africa (modern Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Malawi). Also in 1886, the Portuguese ceded the Cassamance region in Portuguese Guinea to France in return for French recognition of Portugal's claim to central Africa. Also interesting is that Portugal claimed the region east of Lake Malawi (Lake Nyasa) in modern-day Tanzania.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Zy2D3xQbcrE/TaWYpNE4kXI/AAAAAAAAA48/I6_4iTq0_J0/s1600/Mapa_Cor_de_Rosa-01.jpg
 
Bumping for any more info!

Perhaps some of you are correct about Portugal getting more in the Western half of the Congo. I did find that before the establishment of the Congo Free State, Portugal claimed the territory as far north as the Equator on the East Bank of the Congo River or Zaire River as the Portuguese called it. Attached is link to a map from 1881 showing Portugal's claims in Africa.

Note that this map shows some interesting borders. Prior to 1886 Portugal claimed the territory as far south as Cape Frio, they ceded the territory between Cape Frio and the Cunene River to Germany in return for Germany's recognition of Portugal's claim to Central Africa (modern Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Malawi). Also in 1886, the Portuguese ceded the Cassamance region in Portuguese Guinea to France in return for French recognition of Portugal's claim to central Africa. Also interesting is that Portugal claimed the region east of Lake Malawi (Lake Nyasa) in modern-day Tanzania.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Zy2D3xQbcrE/TaWYpNE4kXI/AAAAAAAAA48/I6_4iTq0_J0/s1600/Mapa_Cor_de_Rosa-01.jpg

Huh, never expected Portugal's claims to be so huge. I've also found out that Zanzibar was under British Protection prior to the Berlin Conference and that King Leopold actively led a campaign to never let Portugal have the Congo, inadvertently starting the Scramble for Africa. With him out of the line, I can see greater effort by the Portuguese to get their 'Pink Map', which might come into conflict with the British.

Also, considering that Zanzibar was under British protection prior to Berlin, could be a chance for Cecil Rhodes to focus his 'Cape to Cairo' railway to the east, thereby giving Portugal Katanga instead?
 
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Wait a sec, I just remembered that Spain also had a foothold in Equatorial Africa through Spanish Guinea. Could there be a chance of a part of the Congo going to Spain instead France or any other power? Say there wasn't a leak of Leopold's plans and the French didn't take Congo-Brazzaville as a result, could there be a chance of a Spanish Congo/ Spanish Equatorial Africa?
 
The British clamped down on Portugal's pink map dreams quite hard thanks to their domination of investment in Lisbon's colonies.

I think Britain would demand Katanga and split up the Portuguese and Germans by back Portuguese claims in the basin. This would be opposed by France but Berlin would probably also rather see Lisbon controlling the coast and basin and chuck Paris the northern Congo.

At this stage Bismarck wasn't keen on colonies so bar some token gains, guarantees and economic influence the Germans probably wouldn't care to much
 
Wait a sec, I just remembered that Spain also had a foothold in Equatorial Africa through Spanish Guinea. Could there be a chance of a part of the Congo going to Spain instead France or any other power? Say there wasn't a leak of Leopold's plans and the French didn't take Congo-Brazzaville as a result, could there be a chance of a Spanish Congo/ Spanish Equatorial Africa?
They're not on a very advantageous geographic position. They can nibble a strip in the Northwest but that's probably it.

The French are already settled in coastal Gabon. The Spaniards can beat them inland but if they contiguously expand all the way south to Brazzaville they'll certainly clash with the French.

At most, I can see them elongate Rio Muni towards what's now Northern Gabon and Northern Congo and - who knows - Northwestern DR Congo. It'd be an extreme implementation of the pattern that exists throughout the Bight of Benin of thinly coasted entities that elongate inland... Only without a river to cover most of that length, yaiks!

Needless to say that getting the bulk of the Congo basin through (i.e. thanks to) a hardly accessible strip of land is implausible. While a Spanish Congo is possible they draw very little advantage from controlling Rio Muni when compared to other middle powers.
 
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