"What if the US continued their expansion into Mexico... " Topic

…during Manifest Destiny?.

"The US is a bit limited here. They could have taken and occupied the Baja Peninsula, Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Durango, Sinaloa, and Nuevo Leon without too much trouble due to those areas being sparsely populated at the time of the Mexican-American War. The military would be heavily over extended in those areas though and would spend a lot of time dealing with Mexican bandits. Tamaulipas would be easier to occupy and hold due to having coastal access but the population starts to pick up there. Anything further south and you going from the low hanging fruit that is sparsely populated territory to the more populous states of Central Mexico.

Militarily, the US could keep going south and occupying lands but occupying territory is a heavy drain on resources and spurs resentment. Those territories and Mexican states could be annexed as states but then you have a bunch of Spanish speaking Catholics voting in a federal government dominated by English speaking Protestants. I'm not saying that people at the time period were racist, but… actually, yes, that's what I'm saying, slavery still existed, they were super racist. The US is regularly referred to as an empire but this would be true imperialism and I don't think it would have flown at the federal level at the time.

After the Civil War, the US could use military and economic pressure to push Mexican states to join the Union or drive the federal Mexican government itself to disband and join the US but it's unlikely that the US would want that since its more money to go to people who don't speak and who don't practice the same faith while the Confederate states still need to be rebuilt.

To sum up, Mexico's Northern territories, no problem, all of Mexico, unlikely but possible"
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Armand

I agree with this reasoning broadly although having a distinct population inside your borders doesn't guarantee them voting rights, look at Native Americans and slaves. In fact, weren't there plans for the Confederacy to expand south if the Union was defeated and Southern independence established?

They could certainly have taken more land if they had wanted. After all, Mexico "owned" this land because the Spanish had drawn lines on maps, not because they had extensively occupied it or built much infrastructure to speak of.

You're right that it would have been hard to take central Mexico. I don't think they would even have wanted central Mexico. "Manifest Destiny" was a vision of securing democracy by having the US spreading to the Pacific Ocean, over lands that were considered barely inhabited, not taking over other sovereign states.

BTW the US did immediately grant voting rights and full citizenship to all Mexicans in the territories the US bought from Mexico (at gunpoint). They also confirmed all private property ownership, so no Mexicans lost their land.

Really, it would have been impossible, practically speaking, to incorporate Mexico into the US. One thing the US isn't very good at is ruling without the consent of the governed. I would be surprised to find that anybody wanted to take it all aside from a few wackos, but I'm open to look at some new evidence.

You don't take into account the Mexican pride… (smile)

Amicalement
Armand