Zion on the Cape: A Different South Africa

I like it, through in my suggestion the 15000 soldiers included their families. But there are a few reason for the high amount of soldiers, in Europe you were usual able to call burgher militias up in case of war, here with such a large Jewish population you the state aren't willing to do that except among the Dutch, free Baster and Christian Mulatto. So a bigger than usual force are needed.
I would personal put it 5-7000 soldiers 3-4000 wives and the rest children. Beside a significant part of the soldier population hjasn't brought wives from Europe with them and have married local womens, they are usual included in the Mulatto, Baster, Ladino and population, even through their children will be included either in the Baster or Dutch population (after colour).
In economical terms I would say that the soldier are urban workers, while not being training, guard or campaign, they usual work in skilled (a significant number of the asoldier are former journeymen)or unskilled works, this are a important extra income. Their wife too works in these kinds of work. This make the soldier and their families a important part of the garrison towns economy. In many way breaking the local guilds monopol and in some of the more isolated towns the main workers in these kind of trades. As such they are important for the development of the different garrison town into local trade hubs, where the local farmers can trade raw material and crude manufactoried goods for more developed ones

I am still not sure that this is realistic, although 7000 certainly is more so than 15000. The main issues are cost and willingness/ability of the local taxpayers to afford that level of year on year commitment. I would think that outside of a quite nasty war, the colonists would not want to make that commitment.

To give you more points of comparison, the US Army numbered about 16,000 immediately before the Civil War (so far as I can tell from a brief online search) and the size quickly reverted to the mid 20,000s after the war finished.

Now, admittedly the US and indeed NZ/Australia were never very willing to pay for large peacetime standing armies during the colonial period, which seems to be something they inherited from the British, but I still don't see why the Capelanders would be willing and able to do so, outside of a long war.
 

Valdemar II

Banned
I am still not sure that this is realistic, although 7000 certainly is more so than 15000. The main issues are cost and willingness/ability of the local taxpayers to afford that level of year on year commitment. I would think that outside of a quite nasty war, the colonists would not want to make that commitment.

To give you more points of comparison, the US Army numbered about 16,000 immediately before the Civil War (so far as I can tell from a brief online search) and the size quickly reverted to the mid 20,000s after the war finished.

Now, admittedly the US and indeed NZ/Australia were never very willing to pay for large peacetime standing armies during the colonial period, which seems to be something they inherited from the British, but I still don't see why the Capelanders would be willing and able to do so, outside of a long war.

There are significant difference, in case of war USA could call militias up, here there are no potential militias, so they have to upkeep a garrison big enough to both keep the locals down and discourage invasions. While this in precent of the population are significant bigger than most colonial garrison*, it guard a strategic important point and they won't be able to call up auxillity troops among local allies. 7000 are also not more than the Cape would be able to pay on it own, ensuring it's not a money loss for VOC or the Dutch state.

*the Dutch colonial garrison in East Asia in the same periode was around 30 000, but they often had local auxillity troops.
 
Well you are writing this, so if you think the economy and colony can cope with it, then it is up to you.

One other implication to consider is that even if Capeland can afford it and let us assume they can for your story, it will be a huge percentage of their government budget. There will also be a large number of people who are professional soldiers or who are dependent upon the military economy, all of whom will no doubt have some thoughts on government. I would think this would mean a higher risk of coups once the Dutch home government retreats, if they ever do
 
A great ATL but there are a few things that, unfortunately, you don’t seem to have considered.

Well, the Bantu actually never penetrated western South Africa, due to its climate not being suitable for their crops (see this map). The native inhabitants of that area were divided into migrant pastorialist tribes (known as Khoikhoi) and nomadic hunter-gatherer tribes (known as San), who didn't farm, and thus had a very low population density and were overwhelmed by white settlement. TTL Capeland's borders will not include most of eastern South Africa (I'll cover it, along with the broader Scramble for Africa, in the next update)

This is true, however, the primary occupation for farmers in those areas of the Cape (or Capeland if you like) outside the immediate fertile “Mediterranean” zone would be stock farming. It is the most logical form of agriculture available to settlers in a context of available land, cheap cattle and labour shortage. As this form of stock farming would involve cattle (rather than sheep or goats) the dominant economic factor for an expanding settler population (like you have in the late 18th and early 19th century) would be land shortage. Stock farming requires a lot of land, and as the population grows this would push your settlers to expand eastward towards the highrainfall regions. Pioneering settlers (whether Sephardic Jews, Ashkenazi Jews, Dutch Christians or Jewish Mulattos) could not maintain an extensive system of stocking farming in the arid land to the north of ‘Capeland’. This is more of less what happened OTL with the Afrikaner settlers and the later British arrivals. The result would be predictable: intense conflict with the large body of Africans –Xhosa speakers –living in the eastern regions. OTL Afrikaner stock farmers blamed their British governors for not protecting their interests against the Xhosa and this is one of the causes of the Great Trek (in your ATL a similar situation could logically emerge between Portuguese-Jews and their Dutch governors). Indeed, I see no reason why your Cape colonists (who would be more numerous than the OTL Cape colonists) would not push east into Bantu territory in the early-mid-19th century leading to a series of wars for control of the Eastern Cape and Natal (or KwaZulu-Natal if you prefer) if not the entire South African Plateau.

My earlier allusion to the Great Trek, of course, brings me conveniently to the second thing you have unfortunately not considered: slavery. As every non-Afrikaans-speaking historian acknowledges one of the primary causes of the Great Trek was slavery. Indeed, the Dutch were great slave traders (as were the Portuguese) and OTL South Africa had a large slave population (mostly from Malaysia and Indonesia) in the late 18th and early 19th century. In your ATL, there is no reason to assume that the Capeland slave population is not equally as large if not larger. However, you make no mention of slavery or the political turmoil that the debate over the banning of slavery (and the slave trade) would create in the Colony. On that note: on one hand Brazil kept slavery alive until the late 19th century but then the Dutch Monarchy in the 19th century was more liberal than the Brazilian Monarchy and may try to ban slavery earlier. The issue of slavery would certainly play a role in the political revolution you describe in the 1850s.

The banning of slavery brings me conveniently to the third thing you have unfortunately not considered: the labour shortage. In OTL labour shortfall was an acute problem for the Cape Colony–created in part by the banning of the slave trade and then the banning of slavery but also by the economic demands of an expanding economy. How were these labour shortages solved OTL? Answer: the conquest and political subjugation of the Xhosa-speaking people. Conquest allowed the British government of the time to impose taxes (and other hardships) on the Xhosa which forced them to work in the mainstream economy and sell the produce of their agricultural activities to the colonists. How will your ATL colonists’ solve the labour shortage problem?

Just some thoughts on the economic rationale behind European settlement in South Africa in the 18th and early 19th century.
 
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