"The Anglo-German Blockade of Venezuela 1902-03" Topic

"I lived for several years in Maracaibo, Venezuela's second city, which today was a population of 1.3 million. It lies at the western side of the short waterway that leads from Lake Maracaibo – the largest lake in South America – to the Caribbean Sea. It was founded, quite surprisingly, by German settlers in 1529 and was initially known as New Nurnberg. Attacks by local tribes led to its abandonment but it was re-founded by the Spanish in 1574. It was to be the target on several occasions of attacks by buccaneers, including by the notorious Henry Morgan in 1669, followed by an equally devastating assault by the French buccaneer de Gramont nine years later. A century and a half later the Battle of Lake Maracaibo in 1823, in which Spanish naval forces clashed with those of pro-independence republicans, resulted in a Spanish defeat which, after their routing on land in the Battle of Carabobo two years earlier marked the end of Spanish power on the South American continent.

Given the importance of Maracaibo, and its location which controlled passage into the 100-mile long lake, and access to the lands beyond, it was inevitable that measures would be taken to defend the waterway. The most appropriate place for a fortification that would dominate the approach channel at its narrowest point was on the island of San Carlos, 20 miles north of the present city. Here, in 1623, the Spanish built a large limestone fort on the then favoured "star" pattern". Just how impressive this structure was – and is – can be seen from the image below lifted off Google Earth (if one goes to the location detailed on the image many photographs can be seen of it as it is today). It is big – from one star point to that diagonally opposite is about 120 yards. Having expended what must have been a fortune in its construction, it is surprising that it was not manned or armed effectively enough by the Spanish to hold back the buccaneer attacks later in the same century.

Let's now look forward in time and widen our focus. A common occurrence in the 19th and early 20th Century was that what are now described as "developing countries" demonstrated a marked addiction to borrowing vast sums from European lenders without any realistic chance of ever repaying them. Given the instability, and usually the primitive economies, of these debtor nations, and the serious risk of non-repayment, the terms under which the loans were granted usually involved very high rates of interest. It was not uncommon for the interest of the early years of the loan to be deducted directly when originally granting it, such that the actual sum coming into the coffers of the recipient government were significantly lower than the loan's face-value. Egypt, the Ottoman Empire and numerous Latin American countries fell into this trap and in many cases failure to sustain repayments resulted in foreign intervention. Egypt's inability to sustain payments led to the need to sell its shares in its most important asset, the Suez Canal, to Britain in 1875. Mexico's indebtedness to France led to massive French military intervention in the 1860s, the installation of a puppet "emperor" and a brutal war that impoverished the country still further. And Venezuela's debt-addiction was to trigger an international naval blockade in 1902 which was to have much longer term strategic implications for the Western Hemisphere…"
Full article here
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Amicalement
Armand

Thanks for that Armand! A cracking little 'what if', of which I have never heard. One to ferret away for future campaign ideas…

Wiki page here:

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Nick

This is why I've been painting German and Italian predreads to go with my British and American recently……

A votre service mon ami!. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

The excellent rules "Fire When Ready" by our own David Manley include a fictional scenario based on the assumption this became a shooting war.