WI: Spanish Gibraltar

Imagine that Général Bonaparte does something smart: noticing that there is no Suez canal yet, he does not waste an army in Egypt. Instead, according to a secret clause in one of the Franco-Spanish treaties, the French expeditionary corps helps the Spanish take Gibraltar. For example, the corps embarks at Toulon, hugs the coast and disembarks at Malaga. The French army is good at manoeuvre and artillery and manages to catch the British mostly off-guard and take the fortress. (In effect, the POD has saved the Armée d'Orient, the squadron, and Kléber, and has made them do something useful of themselves.)

Now the Rock itself is quite safe for the time being: it is probably out of direct reach from the British Isles, and even if the British manage to bully Portugal and use Lisbon as a stepping-stone, the fortress is likely to be extremely well defended by the Franco-Spanish. As the French come as genuine Spanish allies, they will not experience the guerilla problem. Spain can also probably be the bigger of the two bullies as far as Portugal is concerned...

So the British are cut off from the Mediterranean for some time. The Minorca garrison, if already present, is isolated; let's say it manages an heroic escape, by night, and evades to Lisbon and later Britain (like OTL Denis Decrès escaped from Malta, except the British have better ships and captains).

The other victim will probably be Austria: while the sea lanes between Britain and Austria are cut, the Armée d'Italie will enjoy friendly seas at its back; in particular, Masséna will welcome the relief in besieged Genoa. Moreover, Corfu is in French hands at the time, and probably quite safe without British support, as long as the French don't aggravate the Turkish too much (OTL the French garrison was expelled by a joint Russian-Turkish attack, which is a diplomatic almost-ASB; if the French don't do something stupid such as attacking Egypt, there is no way the Turkish let a Russian fleet through the Bosphorus); the French forces there are quite minor, but could be a minor nuisance in the Adriatic (again, to the great pleasure of the Grand Turk).

Assuming the French can keep the Turks content, the main nuisance will be the Barbary pirates; instead of an Egyptian Expedition, we could see, a few years later, an Algerian one, as both the French and Spanish have interests here. Probably not outright conquest (too soon, and manpower is needed in other places) but maybe the capture of a few key ports/fortress, if only to deny their use to the British. As this almost coincides with the Barbary War, the Franco-Spanish will find themselves almost co-belligerent with the United States...

Or maybe Spain instead tries to grab the old Aragonese possessions of Naples, Sicily or Sardinia. Assume Sardinia as it is probably the easier target, being the less populated, and continental Savoy being under French occupation. As Sardinia is under raiding from the Barbary pirates at the very same time, this could actually be the spark that decides for the Barbary expedition of the above paragraph...

The Treaty of Lunéville will probably happen, and may be slightly more pro-French in Italy. Maybe Austria does not get Venice: the Republic is instead turned into an Austrian buffer state. So North Italy is split in two buffer zones, without either direct French or Austrian control; it is slightly less of a powder keg than OTL. Southern Italy is probably at least under Spanish influence. Austria is compensated in Illyria (and Corfu if the French are reasonable). North of the Alps, the Rhine is the border as OTL.

The treaty of Amiens is slightly more complicated, but a basic “English out of Gibraltar and (random Spanish colony)” vs. “Franco-Spanish out of Portugal (and maybe Netherlands)” deal is possible.

On a longer term, the French navy is able to use the Mediterranean as a training ground and partially solve its crew problem. As in OTL, the Marine Nationale has a few correct ships and shipyards and some competent admirals, not enough to be fully on par with the Royal Navy, but probably enough to be, locally, a serious opponent. So the situation seems stable, with the British controlling the Atlantic, and the French and Spanish controlling the Mediterranean.

Any long-term French ambitions will probably be set on (northern) Italy. The French can implement a lightweight Continental system; if we want to remain in the theme, we can call it the Mare Nostrum system. (btw, this sounds like a cool TL name. Dibs on it.) The British Isles themselves are not threatened. If the British are angry at French meddling in Italy and declare war, it would still take an extraordinarily stupid French ruler to try and invade Britain; note that this does not mean that they will not try...
 
And Joseph I as King of Spain despite the efforts of redneck Spaniards? Yes, that's a good PoD ans a TL to develop. I'll be very pleased to read it, may it be written and a helping hand as far as I could.
 
I think these things could work:
1-Nappy as emperor of France(yeees, I know you wanted it! ;) ) but with late XVIII century frontiers. If he wanted so less trouble, better became King...
2-Joseph I as king of Spain is hardly to sustain, but not as Two Sicilies and Naples king. He was very respected, so be it.
3-Ferdinand VII is the WORST king of Spain and Nappy knew it. And Infante Carlos, well, he was more absolutist than Ferdinand, so...WTF, leave Joseph I as King of Spain and the rest...
4-Leave Portugal alone...so far(Iberian Kingdom? It sounds nice ;) )
5-Stop messing in Central Europe, you have an empire/kingdom to rule (and some brothers to teach them how to rule...)
All right, some things may have little plausability(or even ASB), but it's a starting point.
 
Spain might not be able to stay out of the Second World War as they hold such a strategic port.
I don't think so. After SCW, Spain as long as Spanish Army was so broken that it couldn't even help Axis powers. If you don't butterfly away SCW and WWII just like IOTL, you have the same scenario: a decimated country and army.
 
Spain might not be able to stay out of the Second World War as they hold such a strategic port.

If the Spanish hold Gibraltar at the close of the Napoleonic Wars, presuming they end basically the same way, which I don't think would happen, history will have changed so much in a century that there wouldn't be a similar Alt-First World War, much less a second one.
 
Spain might not be able to stay out of the Second World War as they hold such a strategic port.

Ignoring for a moment the likelihood of a POD around 1800 butterflying away WW2 as we know it, but Gibraltar really isn't that strategic for Spain - it wouldn't do anything for them that Algeciras or especially Cadiz (or for that matter, Ceuta) doesn't do better. It's a vital post in British hands, but in Spanish hands it's just one of several ports near the Mediterranean entrance, and not the best.
 
Ferdinand may have been a very weak reed as an ally, but deposing a Spanish king, and putting in his brother? That was one of Napoleon's stupidest decisions ever (along with 'lets attack Moscow').

Let's turn a weak and not very functional ally into a massive bleeding ulcer...
 
Ferdinand may have been a very weak reed as an ally, but deposing a Spanish king, and putting in his brother? That was one of Napoleon's stupidest decisions ever (along with 'lets attack Moscow').

Let's turn a weak and not very functional ally into a massive bleeding ulcer...

I think the problem wasn't putting a brother as king(commoners didn't care who was the monarch), but putting THAT brother(he didn't want the throne) and sending 100000 french troops across the Pyrenees. For the populace it was an outright invasion...
 
I think the problem wasn't putting a brother as king(commoners didn't care who was the monarch), but putting THAT brother(he didn't want the throne) and sending 100000 french troops across the Pyrenees. For the populace it was an outright invasion...
When Napoleon screwed up, he screwed up big time.
 
I think the problem wasn't putting a brother as king(commoners didn't care who was the monarch), but putting THAT brother(he didn't want the throne) and sending 100000 french troops across the Pyrenees. For the populace it was an outright invasion...

Weren't most of Napoleon's brothers useless though? What better choices were there?
 
Weren't most of Napoleon's brothers useless though? What better choices were there?

Ya, some. Not the one in the Netherlands, though. In the Netherlands we fondly remember Louis as our king, he was called Louis the Good. He cared and he tried to do his best, even going as far as to learn Dutch and demand his ministers speak Dutch. He once said in a speech ''Ik ben de konijn van Olland'', I am the rabbit of Holland. He meant to say koning, king.

Anyway, he tried his best but Napoleon wanted a puppet, so when he tried to prevent Napoleon from damaging the Dutch economy and sending Dutch troops to die in Russia he was dethroned and the Netherlands were annexed into France. He returned once in 1840 and when people found out, a whole crowd greeted him with cheers in front of his hotel.

Damn Napoleon.
 
Honestly I question whether or not Napoleon would be able to take Gibraltar. He was a good battlefield general, but Napoleon was no expert in siege warfare. Plus there was four different Spanish sieges of Gibraltar from the time it fell it Britain and they always failed. The British would be able to resupply their garrison from sea, so unless a Franco-Spanish fleet is able to successfully blockage the rock I don't see how the British can lose.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
This is the key point:

Honestly I question whether or not Napoleon would be able to take Gibraltar. He was a good battlefield general, but Napoleon was no expert in siege warfare. Plus there was four different Spanish sieges of Gibraltar from the time it fell it Britain and they always failed. The British would be able to resupply their garrison from sea, so unless a Franco-Spanish fleet is able to successfully blockage the rock I don't see how the British can lose.

1) Even with French assistance, can Spain take Gibraltar from Britain in this period? Given the results of the naval battles between the RN and French revolutionary navy, it seems - doubtful.

2) Even IF the Franco-Spanish can accomplish this task, there is the possibility of the British seizing a comparable base/bation on the south side of the straits - and, given the problems the North African states posed to European/Western commerce generally, I can see the British finding both a justification and potential allies. Consider Eaton, Preble, et al.

Best,
 
Easy: the first one who REALLY wanted the throne. ;)
Believe me, even a chimpanzee would've been better king than Ferdinand VII :D

Ironically, it was a french army who returned him the absolute powers in 1823 after a liberal uprising had forced him to (re)accept the 1812 constitution. A constitution, by the way, ennacted by the same people who was commanding the resistence against Napoleon.

Problem with Joseph is not a matter of names (the same for Ferfinand, since even absolute kings didn't governed independently of social structures, power networks and factions and in a smaller scale, cabinets. His father fate is a good example) It's a matter of institutional legitimacy. So for the commoners this was important, because the traditional dinasty, as a symbol of the kimgdom and its laws was the garantee they had their rights would be redpected and juridical security was assured. In a way, a modern briton should understand this better than most people, since in a country without a written constitution (the tool that took this same role) the monarchy still plays a bit like that, mutatis mutandi, of course. Pre-liberal monarchies were the embodiment of the kingdom's constitution. Napoleon understood this, but for some reason he thought the spaniards wouldn't. It was probably cultural contempt and total ignorance of iberian juridical tradition. But well, like ithers he preferred to justify himself and his blatant agression assumming it was because hillbillies and the such. In the iberian case, there is also a complicating turn ( the same for the colonies)Under those juridical tradition, the sovereignity is lent to the monarch by the ssubjects, who are the actual owners if severeignity(certainly it's not a concept unique to Iberia) So, when Napoleon kidnaps the royal familly he was acting bsically with the same knowledge of what he was actually doing as a monkey pressing the triger of a machinegun. I the absence of the monarch, the legitimate one accepted by the Cortes etc, the sovereignity naturally returns to those hillbillies and not to a corsican guy who sais he is the king by the grace of his brother and his 100.000 soldiers pillaging and raping around the country. This sovereignity is exerced from the local level upstairs, so the Juntas de Defensa etc. From this basis you can have a way to understand the spanish uprising, but also the conflicts in the colonies that ended with their independence. In a time of liberal agitation and nstionalist awakening also, these ideas, which in many ways are proto-liberal, are easily coopted or adapted to the liberal cause. But liberals or absolutists, the fact is that putting Joseph in the spanish throne couldn't work without a lot of blood for deeper reasons that have not much to do with abilities or Ferdinand's lack of them. Imsgine for a moment that a foreing power dictates who has to be the POTUS and what ammendments have to be done tonthe constitution. Would you mind wether the new POTUS is better thsn the former and the new constitution is more functional? Or would you be primarilly worried because somebody you never called for is stealimg your sovereignity?

Sorry for the rant.

In order to have a spanish Gibraltar at the time of the napoleonic wars, there is an easier scenario. Simply avoid the british taking it during the War of Spanish Succession. Today it would be as internationally known as the Ifach rock, and I guess most people reading this is wondering what the hell is that Ifach thing. Of course, this probably would mean butterflies snd differences in the way Britain thinks her foreing aims during the 1700's, so perhaps we don't have napoleonic wars...
 
Ironically, it was a french army who returned him the absolute powers in 1823 after a liberal uprising had forced him to (re)accept the 1812 constitution. A constitution, by the way, ennacted by the same people who was commanding the resistence against Napoleon.

Problem with Joseph is not a matter of names (the same for Ferfinand, since even absolute kings didn't governed independently of social structures, power networks and factions and in a smaller scale, cabinets. His father fate is a good example) It's a matter of institutional legitimacy. So for the commoners this was important, because the traditional dinasty, as a symbol of the kimgdom and its laws was the garantee they had their rights would be redpected and juridical security was assured. In a way, a modern briton should understand this better than most people, since in a country without a written constitution (the tool that took this same role) the monarchy still plays a bit like that, mutatis mutandi, of course. Pre-liberal monarchies were the embodiment of the kingdom's constitution. Napoleon understood this, but for some reason he thought the spaniards wouldn't. It was probably cultural contempt and total ignorance of iberian juridical tradition. But well, like ithers he preferred to justify himself and his blatant agression assumming it was because hillbillies and the such. In the iberian case, there is also a complicating turn ( the same for the colonies)Under those juridical tradition, the sovereignity is lent to the monarch by the ssubjects, who are the actual owners if severeignity(certainly it's not a concept unique to Iberia) So, when Napoleon kidnaps the royal familly he was acting bsically with the same knowledge of what he was actually doing as a monkey pressing the triger of a machinegun. I the absence of the monarch, the legitimate one accepted by the Cortes etc, the sovereignity naturally returns to those hillbillies and not to a corsican guy who sais he is the king by the grace of his brother and his 100.000 soldiers pillaging and raping around the country. This sovereignity is exerced from the local level upstairs, so the Juntas de Defensa etc. From this basis you can have a way to understand the spanish uprising, but also the conflicts in the colonies that ended with their independence. In a time of liberal agitation and nstionalist awakening also, these ideas, which in many ways are proto-liberal, are easily coopted or adapted to the liberal cause. But liberals or absolutists, the fact is that putting Joseph in the spanish throne couldn't work without a lot of blood for deeper reasons that have not much to do with abilities or Ferdinand's lack of them. Imsgine for a moment that a foreing power dictates who has to be the POTUS and what ammendments have to be done tonthe constitution. Would you mind wether the new POTUS is better thsn the former and the new constitution is more functional? Or would you be primarilly worried because somebody you never called for is stealimg your sovereignity?

Sorry for the rant.

In order to have a spanish Gibraltar at the time of the napoleonic wars, there is an easier scenario. Simply avoid the british taking it during the War of Spanish Succession. Today it would be as internationally known as the Ifach rock, and I guess most people reading this is wondering what the hell is that Ifach thing. Of course, this probably would mean butterflies snd differences in the way Britain thinks her foreing aims during the 1700's, so perhaps we don't have napoleonic wars...
I totally agree with you: the main error was kidnapping the Royal Familly(even knowing Fernando was who was) and sending French troops to Spain. And yes, Nappy was a GREAT general (and to some extent a stateman) but not so good "emperor".
 
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