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Post by Middlesex_Toffeeman on Apr 4, 2020 19:30:41 GMT
Well the CSA could go into Mexico and invade it after the French withdrawal in 1867, that is if the French do that here, if not, then the French will be gone by 1870, leaving the CSA to go in if they want to expand.
Mexico was strongly against slavery inside its territory. That was one of the reasons for the Texan rebellion in the 1830's as the colonists had broken agreements not to import slavery into the area. Ditto even if the north wasn't willing to oppose this Britain is very likely to, by force if necessary. Ditto with ideas of some southern groups to conquer areas such as Haiti or Cuba which would provoke British opposition.
As I've said, French and Spanish colonies declared that mixed-race people could be freed and French-influenced areas (read - Louisiana) had a mixed-race middle class. This is not likely to mesh well with the ”one-drop rule” of the South and I'd feel that a Confederate conquest of Cuba or Haiti would be a headache for the Confederacy. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 4, 2020 19:42:17 GMT
Mexico was strongly against slavery inside its territory. That was one of the reasons for the Texan rebellion in the 1830's as the colonists had broken agreements not to import slavery into the area. Ditto even if the north wasn't willing to oppose this Britain is very likely to, by force if necessary. Ditto with ideas of some southern groups to conquer areas such as Haiti or Cuba which would provoke British opposition.
As I've said, French and Spanish colonies declared that mixed-race people could be freed and French-influenced areas (read - Louisiana) had a mixed-race middle class. This is not likely to mesh well with the ”one-drop rule” of the South and I'd feel that a Confederate conquest of Cuba or Haiti would be a headache for the Confederacy. But in many TLs where the CSA survives they do invade Cuba and make it part of the CSA. |
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Post by Middlesex_Toffeeman on Apr 4, 2020 19:47:45 GMT
As I've said, French and Spanish colonies declared that mixed-race people could be freed and French-influenced areas (read - Louisiana) had a mixed-race middle class. This is not likely to mesh well with the ”one-drop rule” of the South and I'd feel that a Confederate conquest of Cuba or Haiti would be a headache for the Confederacy. But in many TLs where the CSA survives they do invade Cuba and make it part of the CSA. The issue with that is that French and Spanish colonial society was much more of a melting pot than the Confederacy ever was. I don't see any attempt to classify gens libre de couleur as ethnically black going down well, nor do I see the CSA trampling over the casta and that going well with the mestizos. Simply put, French and Spanish colonies had a mixed-race middle class that owned property and (in some cases) slaves. The CSA would have regarded this class as ”n****rs” and trampled over their rights to property - likely causing a rebellion. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 4, 2020 19:48:44 GMT
likely causing a rebellion. Wich the CSA would try to crush with heavy force. |
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Post by Middlesex_Toffeeman on Apr 4, 2020 19:49:32 GMT
likely causing a rebellion. Wich the CSA would try to crush with heavy force. You'd end up with a Confederate Vietnam. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 4, 2020 19:52:07 GMT
Wich the CSA would try to crush with heavy force. You'd end up with a Confederate Vietnam. Ore what happened to the French in Mexico. |
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Post by Middlesex_Toffeeman on Apr 4, 2020 19:55:02 GMT
You'd end up with a Confederate Vietnam. Ore what happened to the French in Mexico. Either way, the Confederacy can't hold Cuba or Haiti due to the fact they'll always be fighting either a slave revolt or a white landowner's revolt. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 5, 2020 11:54:25 GMT
Actually the book itself, see p14-15 says that cotton was native to the river valleys of the semi-arid borderlands but it wasn't commercially important until the union blockade of the rebel south created a global cotton shortage and turned northern Mexico into a nexus of the global cotton economy. This is presumably not going to happen in TTL, at least not for the moment.
On p25-26 its mentioned that despite major efforts by the Mexican government cotton production failed to take off and while a fair amount was spent on constructing textile plants most of the cotton they used was imported from the US. The book, from a quick skim through gives only comparative information on production rather than detailed figures.
On p27 it mentions the serious cotton shortage generated by the USCW and northern blockade prompted by 'England' a scramble for supplies form Egypt and India and a search for longer term alternatives - which may have been a fact a few decades later in British investment in cotton cultivation in the northern Mexican borderlands. It also suggests that the shortage of cotton and desire for control/influence of an alternative source was a factor in the French attempt to establish a friendly government in Mexico in the early 1860's. Goes on to say that the holdout of the more liberal Juarez government in the north and major revenue generated by smuggling of southern - largely Texan - cotton via the area prompted a considerable build up of funds and experience in trade in the region which again are less likely to occur without a USCW. . It mentions how the money from this was invested in local cotton production, but unfortunately again giving no figures.
There is also mention, p29 that before the war attempts by the provincial governor of Nuevo Leon, Vidaurri encouraged the growth of legal commerce but failed to kick-start a local cotton production industry of any size. Juarez's supporters effectively destroyed much of Vidaurri's work and brought new instabilty into the region while the end of the USCW meant an end to the lucrative cross border trade in cotton. It was only in the 1880's when Diaz secured power and brought stability to the region that things took off but again no figures quoted.
As such it sounds inaccurate to say that N Mexico was a major producer of cotton in the 1860's. It was a centre for transporting Texan cotton around the union blockade but local cotton production only really got organised in any scale some decades later.
One other factor that is mentioned is the high demand for seasonal labour for cotton cultivation, especially but not solely in the picking of the cotton buds. The 1st centre in northern Mexico was around Laguna and it mentions that the population increased about 400% between 1880 and 1910, p31. This caused a lot of social problems because you had a large labour forces dependent on periodic employment. I'm guessing that your expecting the south to not only gain control of the area and then use slaves for this workforce but that presents problems in itself. Apart from the discontent of local populations about being displayed the labour demand is seasonal. In the old south slaves not needed currently on the plantation can be hired out for other uses but in a arid and fairly barren area such as N Mexico there is going to be a lot more difficult.
It took quite a lot of capital to develop the region with the necessity of building railways and developing irrigation systems which again are possible but will take time and be expensive and in this case you won't get local Mexican capital and are less likely to any much from outside the CSA.
As such if the CSA was to get the region in some way and maintain control of it then it could develop a rival cotton cultivation to its existing production but it will be expensive and time consuming.
Corn - by which I assume you mean Indian corn/maize rather than wheat - may be the largest crop by volume but how much export trade goes it provide? I suspect a lot would go to feeding the local population, including all those slaves that the CSA is somehow getting its hands on and relatively little is going for export in this time period. Most of that probably to the US I expect.
You may think education is unimportant for modern technology but I suspect your in a very small minority in that view. Even in the early stages of the Industrial revolution self made men such as Hargraves and Watt while largely self educated depended on a good knowledge of what they will doing and the ability to read and write were very important especially as it enabled them to find out about and incorporate/modify developments elsewhere. A major reason why Britain fell so far behind in the last decades of the 19thC compared to primarily competitors were because general education was under-valued and partly due to squabbles between religions groups widespread education in Britain was delayed by several decades. I remember reading once that it was in the period just after the USCW that the government mandated widespread education and was to benefit greatly from it, as well as from immigration of many well educated people from Europe. [In the latter stages many migrants were poorly educated and they did provide cheap labour, until they [or their children] gained a better level of education.
One other thing with your population projections I forgot to mention earlier. The domination of the economy by large plantations in the old and deep south especially meant that they controlled the vast bulk of the best farming lands as small independent farmers couldn't compete with them. Even before the war they were leaking population as people migrated north and later west because there were limited opportunities for them in the south. This is likely to be a continued issue in an independent CSA while the latter is dominated by slave owning planters.
Before we continue, I think it would be beneficial-so as to have a mutual understanding of the specifics of the scenario at hand-to decide when and how the Confederates win their independence. Now, I can propose several different scenarios if you like or would you like to pick it? We could also agree upon a generic sort, such as "Trent War" or "McClellan elected in 1864".
Belated apologies, I missed your post above  and only saw it this morning because the thread became active again. Will read the latest posts then try and respond.
Steve
PS After quickly skimming through the thread to refresh my memory I would say that the best option for the CSA to seek to expand slavery would be a pretty short and relative cheap war due to Lincoln underestimating British determination over Trent Incident and intervention with devastating impact on the union war effort. The latter is forced to make peace by late 1962 and possibly the south making major territorial gains. There is a good TL on the AH site called "If they won't meet us on the Sea" by the author Saphroneth. He is currently writing a modified version on the USCW Site site while after a long pause has started again. [Possibly one benefit of the current pandemic as a lot of people have more time on their hands?] A link to the 1st post on the latter is Trent War 1st post/. Please note that I consider the sizeable gains for the CSA are rather excessive and as he says are largely due to another major mistake by Lincoln, requiring him thinking that Britain and the CSA are fighting as allies and hence coming to terms with Britain means also accepting southern independence. One possibly big down-side of this scenario of course is that the north is unlikely to be happy with the forced separation and while some of that anger is going to be directed - unjustly - at Britain the south would be an easier target for revanchment.
The reason I think something like this might be best for slavery in the south is that while there's enough bloodletting to cement a separate southern identity its not enough to prompt serious pressure for social reform with the influence of the plantocracy being challenge. Also it avoids major deaths and the economic devastation of much of the south, hence making it probably the strongest in terms of its position. Also note what happens in the finished version on AH when a RN ship visits Charleston, South Carolina after the war.  Plus one reason why Palmerston was so eager for war and an independent south was because he viewed it as the best way of ending the African slave trade as the south would be more easily to pressurise without the north behind it as well as a sneaky trick he had at the peace which gave him an excuse to search CSA ships for slaves. On the 1st of those two while the US formally banned the slave trade they refused to allow any other nation the right to search US flagged ships for slaves. Hence American ships - often from the north apparently - were often able to continue the African slave trade unimpeded by the British anti-slavery squadron unless one of the few US ships on anti-slavery patrol were nearby and could be called in to search the ship.
A situation where much better leadership by the south leads to secession with little/no fighting, while difficult might be possible but, as I've said in previous posts its unlikely to include states such as Virginia and Tennessee, possibly a few others and none of the territories the south desired to include. Also without a short war there might not be such a sense of national identity.
Some sort of scenario in which the south outlasts the north psychologically and wins a broken back peace is not going to be good for it. Its going to lose a lot of territory and much of the rest could be badly damaged economically while many slaves would have fled and a lot of whites have died or been crippled. Plus the human costs of the war is likely to mean a desire for some payback by the bulk of the whites against the power of the plantocracy in terms of greater economic and political power. Again on the USCW site see thread confederate-populist-backlash, which has some discussion of the problems an independent CSA would face after such a long war.
Anyway that's my thoughts on the question you asked and some interesting reading for you [and anyone else] possibly.
Apologises again for missing your previous post.
Steve
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 5, 2020 12:06:08 GMT
As I've said, French and Spanish colonies declared that mixed-race people could be freed and French-influenced areas (read - Louisiana) had a mixed-race middle class. This is not likely to mesh well with the ”one-drop rule” of the South and I'd feel that a Confederate conquest of Cuba or Haiti would be a headache for the Confederacy. But in many TLs where the CSA survives they do invade Cuba and make it part of the CSA.
To be blunt just because an author writes a TL doesn't mean it will be realistic. Apart from the issue of British and possibly Union - whatever name the rump US state it would be called - intervention to prevent such an extension of southern power, or the Spanish for that matter - Middlesex_Toffeeman, raises good points about how unpopular southern control would be and how expensive to maintain it. You could end up with TTL's equivalent of the 1898 Spanish-American war being some power, again probably Britain or the Union intervening against the brutal oppression of southern rule in Cuba even if for whatever reason they accepted it initially.
Also Vietnam would be a good comparison. Maintaining a large army suppressing dissent in Cuba, let alone Haiti if they took that would cause a lot of social tension in the south. How long are the bulk of the white population going to be willing to bleed for the benefit of a small group of very rich planters?
Steve
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Post by EwellHolmes on Apr 7, 2020 15:29:34 GMT
Before we continue, I think it would be beneficial-so as to have a mutual understanding of the specifics of the scenario at hand-to decide when and how the Confederates win their independence. Now, I can propose several different scenarios if you like or would you like to pick it? We could also agree upon a generic sort, such as "Trent War" or "McClellan elected in 1864".
Belated apologies, I missed your post above and only saw it this morning because the thread became active again. Will read the latest posts then try and respond.
Steve
PS After quickly skimming through the thread to refresh my memory I would say that the best option for the CSA to seek to expand slavery would be a pretty short and relative cheap war due to Lincoln underestimating British determination over Trent Incident and intervention with devastating impact on the union war effort. The latter is forced to make peace by late 1962 and possibly the south making major territorial gains. There is a good TL on the AH site called "If they won't meet us on the Sea" by the author Saphroneth. He is currently writing a modified version on the USCW Site site while after a long pause has started again. [Possibly one benefit of the current pandemic as a lot of people have more time on their hands?] A link to the 1st post on the latter is Trent War 1st post/. Please note that I consider the sizeable gains for the CSA are rather excessive and as he says are largely due to another major mistake by Lincoln, requiring him thinking that Britain and the CSA are fighting as allies and hence coming to terms with Britain means also accepting southern independence. One possibly big down-side of this scenario of course is that the north is unlikely to be happy with the forced separation and while some of that anger is going to be directed - unjustly - at Britain the south would be an easier target for revanchment.
The reason I think something like this might be best for slavery in the south is that while there's enough bloodletting to cement a separate southern identity its not enough to prompt serious pressure for social reform with the influence of the plantocracy being challenge. Also it avoids major deaths and the economic devastation of much of the south, hence making it probably the strongest in terms of its position. Also note what happens in the finished version on AH when a RN ship visits Charleston, South Carolina after the war. Plus one reason why Palmerston was so eager for war and an independent south was because he viewed it as the best way of ending the African slave trade as the south would be more easily to pressurise without the north behind it as well as a sneaky trick he had at the peace which gave him an excuse to search CSA ships for slaves. On the 1st of those two while the US formally banned the slave trade they refused to allow any other nation the right to search US flagged ships for slaves. Hence American ships - often from the north apparently - were often able to continue the African slave trade unimpeded by the British anti-slavery squadron unless one of the few US ships on anti-slavery patrol were nearby and could be called in to search the ship.
A situation where much better leadership by the south leads to secession with little/no fighting, while difficult might be possible but, as I've said in previous posts its unlikely to include states such as Virginia and Tennessee, possibly a few others and none of the territories the south desired to include. Also without a short war there might not be such a sense of national identity.
Some sort of scenario in which the south outlasts the north psychologically and wins a broken back peace is not going to be good for it. Its going to lose a lot of territory and much of the rest could be badly damaged economically while many slaves would have fled and a lot of whites have died or been crippled. Plus the human costs of the war is likely to mean a desire for some payback by the bulk of the whites against the power of the plantocracy in terms of greater economic and political power. Again on the USCW site see thread confederate-populist-backlash, which has some discussion of the problems an independent CSA would face after such a long war.
Anyway that's my thoughts on the question you asked and some interesting reading for you [and anyone else] possibly.
Apologises again for missing your previous post.
Steve
You're fine with forgetting! To be honest, right now I'm trying to look over the thread to figure out what the differences in opinion originally were. In total, I'd expect a Trent Affair War CSA to rapidly emerge as a Great Power, as it could've secured the the Border States and from there would definitely have the population and industry to challenge anyone. Mexico and Cuba would be likely acquisitions, and profitable too in addition to everything else. |
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Post by EwellHolmes on Jun 15, 2020 21:18:42 GMT
A timeline idea I've played around with is an 1863/1864 victory for the CSA. They have over a decade to get the debt paid off and rebuild, while E.P. Alexander is able to get Richmond to buy up the British Armstrong guns when the UK begins to sell them off. Meanwhile in the United States, as a consequence of the war, West Point is shut down; there was a movement to do this IOTL due to the high number of ex-cadets that joined the CSA. By 1875, the C.S. Army has the better officer corps (The Citadel and VMI) as well as better trained infantry (Slave Patrol Militia system) and the more modern artillery due to the Armstrongs. The U.S. meanwhile has the larger overall force, in both Army and Navy, and the better small arms due to their larger industrial base.
Anyway, in 1876 the Emperor Maxmillian dies without issue or a designated heir (He never had one IOTL and was likely infertile). The Mexican Liberals have long been defeated but the loss of the Monarchy leaves Mexico unstable and in a power vacuum. The Confederate States thus steps in and annexes the country, due to its ties to local strongmen like Santiago Vidaurri as well as heavy influence on the Mexican military and economy. This emerges as a campaign issue for the upcoming 1876 Election in the U.S. and the incumbent Presidency attempts to use it to his advantage, with this resulting in both nations blundering into a war. The U.S. has the numbers and logistics, so it gradually is able to advance into the CSA steadily but at great cost, due to the quality of the C.S. Army and its advantage in artillery.
Ultimately, between the increased demands of the war on railway traffic and political dissatisfaction at the high casualties being taken for an unpopular cause, the 1877 Railway Strikes spark off and are worse than IOTL. With the collapse in their logistics system, the U.S. Army comes to a halt in its advance and the Confederates are able to encircle and destroy several elements in their own ATL Sedan. Adding to the woes of the American military is the need to divert formations to put down communes in cities like Pittsburgh, Chicago and others. In the end, Washington is forced to sue for peace, ending the war with the Confederate annexation of Mexico recognized. From there on, both the C.S. and the U.S. seek to achieve and maintain good ties, as the cost of war for both is recognized as just not worth it.
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and only saw it this morning because the thread became active again. Will read the latest posts then try and respond.
Plus one reason why Palmerston was so eager for war and an independent south was because he viewed it as the best way of ending the African slave trade as the south would be more easily to pressurise without the north behind it as well as a sneaky trick he had at the peace which gave him an excuse to search CSA ships for slaves. On the 1st of those two while the US formally banned the slave trade they refused to allow any other nation the right to search US flagged ships for slaves. Hence American ships - often from the north apparently - were often able to continue the African slave trade unimpeded by the British anti-slavery squadron unless one of the few US ships on anti-slavery patrol were nearby and could be called in to search the ship.