Historically, Britain had a large iinterest in gaining a foothold in South America both for trading purposes and as a potential colony or protectorate. The closest this came was the British Invasion of La Plata in 1806-1807, which failed completely. Due to Spain in a weak position, having lost a war to Napoleonic France and now being essentially a vsssal state, being in turmoil politically because the king and his son were in dispute over the high influence of the Spanish prime minister over the weak king, Napoleon himself sent troops to take control in Spain. All this left Spanish colonies largely to fend for themselves.As a result, the main resistance for the British was local soldiers, and local militia. The. British expected to be greeted as liberators and did not send that many troops, intending only to capture the cities of Buenos Aires and Montevideo, assuming this would mean victory and the rest of the region would submit.Instead they faced HEAVY resistance, poor knowledge of local geography made it difficult to counter attack. They managed to occupy the cities (Buenos Aires for 46 days, Montevideo for 7 months) but continual urban warfare and reinforcements from the rural areas made the swituwtiin untenable, the British eventually losing both cities in battles and surrendering.These victories, withiut Spanish help. Were a major factor in the formation of independence campaigners, the fight for independence against Spain and the formation of Argentina and Uruguay not long after.
With that context, how about some alternate history?>Britain succeeds in its invasion of the La Plata region in 1806-1807>they simply A) send more troops instead of expecting to:n welcomed B) Instead of landing directly in Buenos Aires, they should have secured surrounding rural areas firstC) Controlling rivers, ports, and smaller towns would have cut off supplies and reinforcements to the city, making urban conquest easier.D) enact a naval blockade to prevent the Spanish resupplies and late reinforcementsE) gain alliances with some local elites to wide with you for later positions under British rule, plus locals to guide troops who know the geographyWith this, the British would have conquered Buenos Aires and Montevideo, and the region would become a British colony. No idea what they’d have called it.What would be the consequences of this?Pic related is an AI made flag of Albion, the British dominion that consists of the areas we know of as Argentina and Uruguay. It’s an Anglo-Latin country where English is only a slight majority of speakers in 2026. Dominating the cities, while rural areas lean towards Spanish. Bilingualism is common.
