Can Texas be this large?

NomadicSky

Banned
As an independent Republic. Even better if most (even all) of it's population is English speaking. Without a genocide of the Mexican people.

I was also thinking in TTL that the Yucatán Peninsula is a US territory.

Texas.PNG
 

Keenir

Banned
NomadicSky said:
As an independent Republic.
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yes.

Even better if most (even all) of it's population is English speaking. Without a genocide of the Mexican people.
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in that case...

wait, maybe I don't have to take back my earlier answer.

maybe the Hidalgo Revolt split the country...and one of the Mexicos is labelled (on US maps) as "Texas".

I was also thinking in TTL that the Yucatán Peninsula is a US territory.
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hm.
 

Roberto

To me, this map screams "Mexican War gone huge". Considering that the Americans ripped of a lot of territory during said war, I could imagine this happening. But the war was started by US annexing Texas, which obviously never happened. So how about another dispute? Texas invading the Republic de Rio Grande?
 

David S Poepoe

Banned
NomadicSky said:
As an independent Republic. Even better if most (even all) of it's population is English speaking. Without a genocide of the Mexican people.

I was also thinking in TTL that the Yucatán Peninsula is a US territory.
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There could be english speaking Mexicans living there. The population balance of Texas never favored the Anglo-Saxons until after annexation. I don't see the size as being unreasonable, the idea that it would be predominately english speaking does sound unreasonable.
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
That size is completely unrealistic. An independent Texas would need decades (perhaps 40-50 years) to just control the territory it claimed at it's independence (if it can at all).

The only way for it to happen is for Texas to stay independent that long (which won't happen if the US asks Texas to join) and then to tag team Mexico with the US (will be tricky making them allies without Texas outright joining) around 1900 or so. The US then takes what it wants (California and Yucatan for what ever reason) and lets Texas have some spoils as well.
 

M79

First Texas has to stay independent, perhaps with the British negotiating the $5million settlement for the Republic around 1840. Then you get the Republic of the Rio Grande in 1845 or so, they decide to join Texas as a means to a united front as the US takes California. Texas becomes a refuge for many of the top Confederates after the Civil War, who turn their plantation mindsets into business and cattle ones. Texas eventually expands by population with the 1866 conflict with Juarez becoming wider, Texas having allied with France over their installation of Maximillian and claiming much of modern Arizona, New Mexico, Sonora, and Chihuahua in the process. By 1900, "Texas" now controls the whole of northern Mexico and all of the US as we know it in the picture. Poncho Villa tries to raid into the north but is defeated and Texas invades Mexico for "its own protection", causing the Yucatan states who never liked Mexico anyway to split off and become an independent US protectorate. The Baja Peninsula, barren of all but a few natural resources and too remote to defend easily, is sold to the US as a means of raising money for the "Tamapulias War" that Mexico ultimately loses. In the 1950s they crash-industrialize under a very socialist government and have a highly productive workforce that is climbing its way to the top of the 3rd world, with an average income of $12,000 per capita. Texas relocates its capital to Santa Fe after the development of SLBMs makes them think that Austin is too close to the Gulf, this way they have a few minutes warning in case the opposition tries to atomize them.
 

Douglas

The entire United States besides what Texas has is, well, united, so you would need a reason for Texas to be withheld from the Union, as well as for Mexico and the US to go to war while keeping Texas independent.

My best guess is that the United States guaranteed Texan independence (but didn't admit to keep slave state/free state balance), and then Mexico decided to invade. Nationalists argued that the US needed to save Mexico, and in the process America took California, and Texas took New Mexico. An independent Rio Grande Republic lasted until the Civil War analogue took place, when Texas cut a deal with France (assuming same Mexican intervention) to annex the backwater republic that was proving to be a hideout for so many Mexican republicans.

Within the next 100 years, a majority of the inhabitants are going to speak English, although the case might be true that a majority of *Texans speak Spanish as well.

To possibly explain one further thing, the capital (which was pitched around five different locations during the Republic's existence OTL) was located in Galveston until the 1900 hurricane wipes the city out, killing 10,000 in the process. Due to some political finagling, key politicians outside of Texas proper lobby for Santa Fe to be made the new capital in exchange for low/high tariffs/taxes/support for a bill continuing slavery etc., since the US happens to build a transcontinental railway through the city.
 
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Roberto

Well, for one it was Texas that wanted to get annexed, not the US. In fact the US refused to annex it for a dozen years.
 

Max Sinister

Banned
"First Texas has to stay independent, perhaps with the British negotiating the $5million settlement for the Republic around 1840."

That's an idea: The Brits see this as an opportunity to form a counterweight to the US.
 

Dean_the_Young

AHFanatic said:
Well, for one it was Texas that wanted to get annexed, not the US. In fact the US refused to annex it for a dozen years.
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However, that was in part because Britain had been placing pressure to keep the US from annexing Texas, and Mexico had been threatening war should the US annex it. I think it was a break in British-Mexican relations that drove back British opposition, but then I doubt Polk would have cared anyway after both Texas and Congress agreed to it.

Max Sinister said:
That's an idea: The Brits see this as an opportunity to form a counterweight to the US.
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:confused:
How does a country that requires loans of millions to simply balance the books, can't control its home territory, and certainly doesn't have the power to invade and divy up Mexico (both bigger and much more populated than Texas), count as a "counterweight" to the US? Especially with the cultural ties they have? The map is ASB at a minimum. There is no way that Texas could control that much land, north south or west. Too much from too few, unless you'd also argue that the 13 colonies could have invaded and conquered Britain in the War of 1812.
 

Dean_the_Young

Max Sinister said:
OK, counterweight isn't the right word - but at least they could curb the expansion of the US in one way.
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Not really. The US could colonize Texas in the fashion it colonized much of the West; move in illegally and settle faster than Texas could consolidate its hold, same as it did against Mexico. And if Texas tries to eject settlers by force, there's a caussus belli for attacking American citizens. There's no real natural border for Texas, even rivers don't count much against settling across the plains.
 

Douglas

Dean_the_Young said:
Not really. The US could colonize Texas in the fashion it colonized much of the West; move in illegally and settle faster than Texas could consolidate its hold, same as it did against Mexico. And if Texas tries to eject settlers by force, there's a caussus belli for attacking American citizens. There's no real natural border for Texas, even rivers don't count much against settling across the plains.
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But Texas doesn't have any good farming land at all in this scenario...dusty backwater Mexican provinces and Arizona and New Mexico, which were so settler-friendly that they waited until 1913 to become states.
 

Analytical Engine

fenkmaster said:
But Texas doesn't have any good farming land at all in this scenario...dusty backwater Mexican provinces and Arizona and New Mexico, which were so settler-friendly that they waited until 1913 to become states.
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Wait, isn't part of Texas in the Grain Belt?

Not to mention, northeast Mexico is good for some types of crop production.
 

Tyr

You just say most of the population are English speaking- not native English.
Easy to have it all native Spanish but just have education standards be on Dutch levels. :p
 

David S Poepoe

Banned
Leej said:
You just say most of the population are English speaking- not native English.
Easy to have it all native Spanish but just have education standards be on Dutch levels. :p
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Actually, you raise a good point. There is no indication from the initial post the Texas was suppose to be settled by Anglo-Americans. There is a distinction between Mexican, Hispanic, Latino, Californio and Texian. Heck, this could be a territorial holdout of the Holy Roman Empire or an independent Spanish viceroyalty.
 
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