Wild North America 1846

Panama is an important base of the Royal Navy in Central America. There are 1,350 Marines stationed daily, which accounts for almost 1/3 of the entire Navy's standing force (note; specifically refers to the Marine Corps). It is the largest overseas military base.

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This round of large-scale military expansion did not benefit the Navy at all, which made Lieutenant General Pan Hengchen very unwilling. He always wanted to make some noise to show His Majesty that the Navy was not a freeloader.

Think about it

Lieutenant General Pan Hengchen set his sights on the two Central American countries adjacent to Panama Province, one is Costa Rica and the other is Colombia.

Costa Rica was originally part of the United Republic of Central America. It has a total population of 143,000 and a land area of ​​more than 50,000 square kilometers. The residents are mainly Indo-European whites, accounting for more than 95%. It is an out-and-out small Central American country.

nation.

The area that formed the United Republic of Central America became a Spanish colony after the 16th century, collectively known as the "General Viceroyalty of Guatemala".

The revolution that restored the constitutional system occurred in Spain in 1820, triggering a wave of independence in the Spanish colonies in the Americas. A turbulent independence movement also broke out in the Viceroyalty of Guatemala.

After Mexico declared independence in 1821, liberals in the Viceroyalty of Guatemala drafted the first Declaration of Independence on September 15, advocating union with Mexico and joining the Mexican family to stay united.

Unfortunately, after the founding of Mexico, it fell into endless internal struggles for power. Extreme political corruption and a dark rule with no hope made the union fragmented.

When the "Emperor of Mexico" Iturbide abdicated, the region could not bear it anymore, so it convened the "National Constitutional Convention" of Central America and issued the Second Declaration of Independence on July 17, 1823, adopting the "

The name of the country is "United Provinces of Central America", which includes five "administrative areas" originally belonging to the governor of Guatemala, namely Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.

Not long after the good days, conflicts began to arise among the five administrative regions again. As if it was the fate of the countries in Central and North America, they always started endless internal fighting. This is also the disadvantage of the introduction of American democracy.

The mutual fighting eventually led to the disintegration again in 1841, and El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala successively declared independence.

Now, the two regions of Costa Rica and Nicaragua are in a state of independence but not independence. The three Central American partners have left, and the alliance has broken down.

But now they still have the name "United Republic of Central America" ​​on their heads, but they go their own way, and this so-called "United Republic of Central America" ​​has long existed in name only.

If history does not change

Next year, Costa Rica will declare its third independent state. The first time is to embrace Mexico, the second time is to embrace the United Republic of Central America, and the third time there is really no thigh to embrace, so it can only go out alone.

Flies don't bite seamless eggs. It is precisely because of the chaos in various regions of Central America that Lieutenant General Pan Hengchen is eyeing Costa Rica.

Colombia is only an alternative consideration. This country has a population of nearly 800,000, a total area of ​​1.14 million square kilometers, and a long history of development. It is not a target that the navy's armed forces can handle.

Yes, Lieutenant General Pan Hengchen just wanted to use his naval power to solve the problem and was unwilling to let the army intervene, so he could only choose a target that the navy could swallow, and that was the Costa Rica region.

So why doesn't the Navy include Nicaragua?

This is because Nicaragua is mainly made up of Central American Indians, with a total area of ​​140,000 square kilometers and a population of 336,000. They are completely different from the Indo-European whites in Costa Rica, with different skin colors, different languages, and different religious beliefs. Look at these thirty-six people after independence.

We know from years of history that there are so many contradictions between them that it is basically impossible to integrate them.

In addition, Costa Rica does not have an army, only a militia with less than 700 people.

Nicaragua is different. The region has a regular army of 5,660 people, divided into six infantry regiments and two cavalry regiments, as well as an artillery battalion. In addition, there are local volunteer militias. Its military strength cannot be underestimated.

"...

Our goal is to take advantage of the chaotic regional situation to capture Costa Rica. This operation will focus on Marine Corps raids to capture the region in one fell swoop.

In order to achieve the above-mentioned combat goals, the naval fleet will fully cooperate and mobilize an 860-man infantry regiment from the Kingdom's mainland to go south to strengthen the military strength of the Marine Corps.

Furthermore I request;

Among the Chinese immigrants who arrived in Panama, a militia of 3,000 people was formed and a fully closed military training was carried out in the base, which will serve as a reserve force for naval operations.

This operation is named "Project Dawn". The Naval Staff Headquarters has high expectations for this plan. We hope that all of you here will be united and work together to complete the combat mission and restore the glory of our Kingdom's navy.

The kingdom's military expansion in Central America will be led by the navy..."

Lieutenant General Pan Hengchen stood at the top of the conference room, trying his best to boost the morale of the officers attending the military meeting. His face glowed with a different kind of red light, and his expression was extremely exciting.

The gathering of nearly 5,000 troops (including 3,000 militiamen) was an unprecedented undertaking for the Royal Navy, and it was also the most important military operation to date. The Naval Staff Headquarters attached great importance to it, and he personally commanded it.

The purpose is to swallow Costa Rica in one bite.

Judging from the favorable situation of the current wave of Chinese immigrants in Central America, annexing and digesting Costa Rica is a piece of cake without too many consequences.

It’s just a small area with a population of over 140,000, so what does it count?

Your Majesty is well aware of the Navy's wishful thinking. With Your Majesty's all-pervasive and strict control over the Kingdom's military, it is impossible for the Navy to conceal this from Your Majesty if the Navy wants to mobilize a large scale of troops southward.

To mobilize an 860-man Marine Corps infantry regiment, His Majesty's royal approval must be obtained and the transfer order must be personally signed. Otherwise, Lieutenant General Pan Hengchen's small stature would not be able to bear such a heavy responsibility.

Facing the chaos and rapid deterioration of the situation in North America, the Tang Kingdom is now in an extremely favorable situation. If the North and the South start a war, the Datang Kingdom will swallow the meat that the Americans put on their lips as soon as possible.

That is the Tijuana area now occupied by the United States. This area is adjacent to the south of Los Angeles and is only more than a hundred kilometers away. It is an isolated enclave of the United States on the Pacific side.

The Americans have focused on the construction of the Tijuana area and Mexicali in recent years, mainly in the military port. They have built seaside forts, naval docks and towns in Tijuana. The two places have a total of more than 100,000 residents, more than 60% of whom are white Americans.

migrant.

Through this move, the United States attempts to retain its military presence in Tijuana and use its relatively powerful naval power to threaten the soft hinterland of the Tang Kingdom, thereby winning the right to speak in North America.

The idea is beautiful, but the reality is cruel.

The U.S. Navy does have three powerful sailing frigates, especially the USS Constitution. However, these old sailing warships mainly operate in the Atlantic Ocean near New York. It is impossible to bypass the Cape of Storms in South America and take a long circuit of tens of thousands of kilometers to reach Tibet.

Warner State, came to fight in the Eastern Pacific.

Let’s not mention whether the U.S. Navy’s sailing fleet is that powerful. The task itself is almost a fantasy.

The Tang Kingdom is an advanced country heading towards industrialization. Its navy has ten armored destroyers with a displacement of 1,550 tons to 1,880 tons, as well as a larger number of armored patrol ships and seven sail frigates. It is the most powerful navy in the entire American region.

Not an easy person to deal with.

Moreover, Tijuana is close to the increasingly prosperous Los Angeles metropolitan area of ​​the Tang Kingdom. There are heavy army troops stationed there. Once a war breaks out between Tang and the United States, the American Tijuana will be a piece of meat on the lips of the Datang Kingdom at any time.

They can all be swallowed in one bite.

Trying to contain the Tang Kingdom by relying on a mere enclave is tantamount to wishful thinking.

When top U.S. federal officials realized this, they had already invested a large amount of money in Tijuana, creating a situation that was difficult to recover from.

The U.S. state of Tijuana is the former Mexican state of Baja California Norte and Baja California Sur. It is a long and narrow peninsula shaped like a baguette, with a total area of ​​about 153,000 square kilometers. The main cities are Tijuana and Mexicali.

and La Paz.

The state was one of the territories ceded by the United States from Mexico through postwar treaties after the Mexican-American War in 1848.

As an enclave far away from the United States, the state's greatest role was to check and balance the development of the Tang Kingdom, and as the only base of the U.S. Navy in the Pacific, it played an irreplaceable and important role in realizing America's two-ocean dream and the dream of a great power;

The original idea was good, but it was very difficult to implement it.

It is relatively easy to build coastal forts and docks, but Tijuana is only a hundred kilometers away from Los Angeles and even closer to Palm Springs. The border between the two countries is unobstructed. How to prevent the powerful cavalry troops of the Tang Kingdom from raiding has become a problem.

An intractable dilemma.

If a defense line were to be built on the border between the two countries, it would be necessary to build a circular defense line with a total length of more than 360 kilometers, which would be an extremely costly project and is obviously impossible.

Los Angeles is only more than a hundred kilometers away from Tijuana on the Pacific coast, and only 304 kilometers away from Mexicali, an important city in the state. A field division of the Tang Kingdom is stationed in Palm Springs, only 43 kilometers away from the border between the two countries.

The cavalry regiment under it was trained daily on the border between Tang and the United States. This put great defensive pressure on the US territory of Warner State, and had to form a volunteer militia cavalry team of more than 2,300 people. In normal days,

A game of "you stare at me, I stare at you" is played here, and friction always occurs in the border areas.

When the situation between the North and the South became tense, these volunteer white militiamen who daily patrolled the US border immediately disappeared.

They all retreated to the periphery of the city and gave up the border confrontation to avoid giving the Tang Kingdom cavalry an excuse to start a war. In fact, they gave up and hid.

These Americans knew very well that with Tijuana's weak military strength, the possibility of blocking the attack of the Tang Kingdom's army was extremely slim.