WI: Santa Anna is executed?

Deleted member 96212

I was at the Alamo today, looking around, and heard that after the Battle of San Jacinto, the Texans threatened to kill Santa Anna if he didn't sign a peace treaty. If true, what would be the reprococions if the Texans decided to have him killed?
 
I guess coup and struggle for power in Mexico, sending it into chaos as General after General try to take power and become the new lider of Mexico. You know, the usual...
 
First, you will actually have to deal with the fact that Santa Anna was executed by a band of traitors. Now, with this in mind, Generals Vicente Filisola and José de Urrea are going to set onto destroying the rebellion for good this time around, as both were actually more competent on fighting the Texan rebels before Santa Anna (and his gigantic ego) decided to micromanage the whole war. So, the Texians are screwed, big time, this time around.

But now, a few years down the line, with Santa Anna gone, the Mexican-American war is going to be very different.
 
Indeed. People tend to forget that SA didn't have his whole force with him, and there were ~2000 men (IIRC) under arms still, and most of the Mexican staff officers still around. Urrea was likely the best commander on either side present. The Mexicans did have some issues with logistics/supplies, but if they can iron those out, they can smash Houston. Which Houston knew well, which is why SA wasn't executed in the first place. I think you'd have to have Houston incapacitated/killed to get SA lynched...
 
Indeed. People tend to forget that SA didn't have his whole force with him, and there were ~2000 men (IIRC) under arms still, and most of the Mexican staff officers still around. Urrea was likely the best commander on either side present. The Mexicans did have some issues with logistics/supplies, but if they can iron those out, they can smash Houston. Which Houston knew well, which is why SA wasn't executed in the first place. I think you'd have to have Houston incapacitated/killed to get SA lynched...
Simple then. Santa Anna kill him on San Jacinto amidst all the ruckus. The enraged Texians kill him, then Urrea rains lead on the slavers.

The bigger question is... would Old Hickory jump to strike at the Mexicans then and there?
 
Simple then. Santa Anna kill him on San Jacinto amidst all the ruckus. The enraged Texians kill him, then Urrea rains lead on the slavers.

The bigger question is... would Old Hickory jump to strike at the Mexicans then and there?
slavers? :neutral:

Either SA or Houston could easily have died during the battle... Houston had two horses shot out from under him; adjust the trajectory of either bullet a bit, and down he goes. SA might have been killed during the slaughter after the battle if he'd been found earlier...
 
slavers? :neutral:

Either SA or Houston could easily have died during the battle... Houston had two horses shot out from under him; adjust the trajectory of either bullet a bit, and down he goes. SA might have been killed during the slaughter after the battle if he'd been found earlier...
Yes, slavers. The Texians. The Southerners who migrated illegally into Tejas and then started their independence to reclaim their state's right, with their precious "peculiar institution" an important part of it.

Alas, back to the topic. If Houston bites it and Santa Anna gets killed, the Texians will face the other, VASTLY more competent Mexican generals. So my question, once again, is the wild card that is Andrew Jackson and the fact Houston was his protege. This could spark an earlier war with Mexico.
 

scholar

Banned
Yes, slavers. The Texians. The Southerners who migrated illegally into Tejas and then started their independence to reclaim their state's right, with their precious "peculiar institution" an important part of it.
The migrants were not illegal, for illegal migration did not really exist in formalized contexts at the time. In fact, Mexico invited Americans into the region, but upon the understanding that they would convert, learn spanish, and be loyal to Mexico. They did none of this, and brought in slaves garnering protest, but the region was remote enough that it didn't immediately start problems. That would happen a couple years later.
 
The migrants were not illegal, for illegal migration did not really exist in formalized contexts at the time. In fact, Mexico invited Americans into the region, but upon the understanding that they would convert, learn spanish, and be loyal to Mexico. They did none of this, and brought in slaves garnering protest, but the region was remote enough that it didn't immediately start problems. That would happen a couple years later.
Mexico forbade immigration from the U.S. in 1830. They just ignored it and kept coming, to the point quite a number of Texians who signed the declaration of Independence from Mexico were mostly illegal and had come after the ban.
 

scholar

Banned
Mexico forbade immigration from the U.S. in 1830. They just ignored it and kept coming, to the point quite a number of Texians who signed the declaration of Independence from Mexico were mostly illegal and had come after the ban.
The Texians took up arms two years after the ban because of a military overthrow of the Mexican government, and had its rebellion two years later. Most of the damage by immigration was before that. Also, it is important to remember that while Slavery was abolished under Hidalgo, it remained common place in the countryside well after that. The Mexican government needed to reiterate a ban on slavery in 1829, because the prior one had limited effects on the rural areas. The Texians were slavers acting in violation of Mexico's laws, but they come off as a handy scapegoat to simplify the situation whereby one can make Texian independence just as much a war of slavery as the confederate secession.
 
Simple then. Santa Anna kill him on San Jacinto amidst all the ruckus. The enraged Texians kill him, then Urrea rains lead on the slavers.

The bigger question is... would Old Hickory jump to strike at the Mexicans then and there?

Almost certainly, he was short tempered and an expansionist. He would jump at the excuse.
 
Almost certainly, he was short tempered and an expansionist. He would jump at the excuse.
Thus we get an earlier US-Mexican War... I'd say without Santa Anna things will be fairly more even...

I wonder if Jackson would be insane enough to ride to battle himself...
 

Deleted member 96212

Thus we get an earlier US-Mexican War... I'd say without Santa Anna things will be fairly more even...

I wonder if Jackson would be insane enough to ride to battle himself...

Not while President, surely?
 

scholar

Banned
Thus we get an earlier US-Mexican War... I'd say without Santa Anna things will be fairly more even...

I wonder if Jackson would be insane enough to ride to battle himself...
Andrew Jackson rejected the Texan's appeal to join the United States because he did not want to anger and cause tensions with the North. I doubt he would start a war with Mexico with any intent for territorial acquisition.
 
Yes, slavers. The Texians. The Southerners who migrated illegally into Tejas and then started their independence to reclaim their state's right, with their precious "peculiar institution" an important part of it.
well, some were. Others were not. Houston's force (and the force at the Alamo) were scarcely a carbon copy of later ACW confederate forces. The men who made up Houston's force were a mixture of local Texans (including a fair number of Tejanos), volunteers from around the USA, immigrants from Europe, and deserters from the US Army just across the border. While there are no hard numbers anywhere on the subject, it's likely that slave owners were a pretty small number in the army...
 
The Texians took up arms two years after the ban because of a military overthrow of the Mexican government, and had its rebellion two years later. Most of the damage by immigration was before that. Also, it is important to remember that while Slavery was abolished under Hidalgo, it remained common place in the countryside well after that. The Mexican government needed to reiterate a ban on slavery in 1829, because the prior one had limited effects on the rural areas. The Texians were slavers acting in violation of Mexico's laws, but they come off as a handy scapegoat to simplify the situation whereby one can make Texian independence just as much a war of slavery as the confederate secession.
in a rather striking parallel to the ARW, the Texans also rebelled because they had been receiving special exemptions from taxes and customs duties that Santa Anna threatened to remove. As for slavery... yes, it was technically illegal, but that was widely ignored both by Texans and by wealthy Mexicans who out and out owned 'house slaves' (although these tended to be Native Americans stolen as children, not blacks). The ban was also bypassed by the existence of 99-year indentured servant contracts (this little known fact was briefly referenced in the last movie on the Alamo). SA made a lot of noise about freeing the slaves in his campaign in TX, and the Texans made a lot of noise about it right back, but it didn't seem to be a major issue on either side. From what I can tell, SA freed exactly one slave directly (Joe, Travis' slave at the Alamo), although a lot of others took advantage of the fact that their white owners fled their homes after the fall of the Alamo and went to Mexico...
 

Mrstrategy

Banned
Someone write a small timeline or drable of what a Mexican -American war be like and also about the Mexicans destroying Texas rebellion for killing Santa Ana
 
to get the Mexicans still in TX to go after Houston (or his successor, if he's killed), there would need to be two things happen:
First, the Mexicans' rather ghastly logistics have to be improved... they need more food and military supplies. Not a huge POD if we can assume that the Mexicans' rather lackadaisical supply line managed a surge and kept up with the advancing troops, at least enough to fight one battle.
Second, Filisola might have to go. He suffered from the problem in OTL of being not native to Mexico and very unsure of his position; historically, he felt he didn't have the authority to do anything. If he is sidelined somehow, the Mexicans have Urrea on hand, and he's one of the best in the field ATM...
 
I dunno, he strikes me as the type to do just that. He is that crazy.


I wouldn't chagrin a president for having the thought or motivation to lead, especially one who was a vet but yeah the political reality is that even Jackson understood his role as executive given his responses to other domestic threats as in S.C. for example. Still ... "that" crazy isn't the worst thing in the world.
 
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