Playing the United States presents a mix of opportunities and challenges. First, the positives. The United States starts with an extra unit. The United States and Brazil start with four, and Great Britain starts with five; the seven remaining players start with three. Moreover, there are three neutral centers beckoning from the North American west coast with no other power nearby them except Mexico. For U.S. players, then, there is a strong pull towards fulfilling a “Manifest Destiny” that tempts a player to move west even when it may not be strategically advisable. Finally, the United States begins with multiple maritime borders which can present early buffers during the start of the game (but also complicate defensive maneuvering later).
For the negatives, the first problem is that the United States will have to address its borders with Great Britain and Mexico immediately and find a way to grow without generating unnecessary and sometimes fatal conflict. This is especially true for Great Britain who may see the United States as their first target (after Great Britain secures Toronto and Greenland in 1841). Like Austria in traditional Diplomacy, the United States does not have the luxury of watching how alliances will form around them. Playing the United States successfully requires a player to adroitly navigate relationships with both Mexico and Great Britain from the very beginning while still obtaining the supply centers needed to be competitive. Only Chicago is nearly always seized without controversy. The other nearby centers require the right mix of finesse and force as neighbors of the United States may seek to compete for them as well.
The second negative is that achieving unity of effort amongst units is difficult because your forces are distributed between two distant fronts: one near Mexico and the other near Great Britain. Acting in a strong manner requires either leaving one front weakly defended and gambling that your diplomacy alone is effective at staving off threats, or being able to only make incremental gains the first year using more conservative maneuvers on the two fronts. Within this unity of effort issue is an attendant issue with mass. Achieving decisive overmatch against an opponent is a challenge because your split efforts make it hard to mass forces in either front even if you do play with some abandon. This means your tactics must compensate for numbers that are almost certainly comparable to your opponent in a given battle.
MAP CONSIDERATIONS
Erie Canal
With Great Britain starting off in Montreal, one of the first orders of business will be addressing Erie Canal. This Canal allows a fleet to move north from NYC to threaten Montreal or to move over to the Eastern Great Lakes. Army units are also allowed to move south from Montreal to Erie Canal. If Great Britain were to get an army into Erie Canal it would threaten both New York City and Washington D.C. Conversely, if Great Britain ever gets a fleet into the Erie Canal, the British can subsequently threaten not only those centers but entering the East Great Lakes to threaten Chicago or even begin exploiting your river system to sail for New Orleans. The multiplicity of options available from those rivers are covered in the next section in greater detail.
Rivers/Lakes
Unlike Standard Diplomacy, this map provides rivers that allow fleets the opportunity to go inland. The Mississippi and Ohio Rivers are not spaces by themselves but connect a variety of spaces that fleets can occupy. The Mississippi River starts at the junction of the Western Great Lakes, Chicago and Iowa Territory. It flows along the borders of Iowa Territory, Chicago, Missouri, and Tennessee Valley while ending in New Orleans. The Ohio River starts at the junction of Chicago and East Great Lakes flowing on the border of Chicago and Tennessee Valley before connecting to the Mississippi River. While time consuming, these rivers do allow for the transfer of fleets from the Caribbean to the Great Lakes, allowing for greater tactical flexibility within the United States.
In addition, the Western Great Lakes and Eastern Great Lakes allow for access to several Canadian regions—and ultimately out to sea via Montreal to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Of note, while fleets on the Great Lakes can convoy armies, fleets on rivers cannot convoy since the units are not located on the rivers themselves, being only enabled by the rivers to move between land provinces.
Bi-Coastal Build Options
Washington D.C. can build fleets on the east coast with access to the Atlantic, or the west coast with access to the Eastern Great Lakes. The game starts with an army in the Washington D.C., but that build flexibility does enable for quicker force projection against British Canadian centers if needed.
STRATEGIC CONSIDERATIONS
Avoiding a Mexican-British Alliance
The primary strategic objective for the United States at the start of the game is to avoid a Mexican-British alliance designed to overrun the United States. In many ways, British and Mexican cooperation is quite natural since their solo paths need not overlap. It is not uncommon for Britain and Mexico to see the Mississippi as a natural border between them if they are successful in crushing the United States. Moreover, Mexico and Great Britain do not share a border, so they lack possible points of contention. This lack of shared space, however, can also be an effective way to scuttle their relationship potential since they lack areas of coordination being initially so far apart. This gives the U.S. player plenty of opportunities to convince one, or even both, of the two parties to consider other opportunities, such as Spain in the case of Great Britain.
Limit Overall British Strength
While there is great potential for the U.S. and Great Britain to work together, the long-term U.S. interest is for Great Britain to remain generally weaker so the United States is not surprised with concerning growth in Canada at any point. This does not require direct conflict with Great Britain, but the first year Great Britain has the potential to seize Greenland, Toronto, Nicaragua, and Patagonia (to name just a few). At a minimum, limiting British growth to just one additional unit in Canada would prevent Great Britain from considering a full-scale invasion of the northern United States. This likely requires skillful diplomacy with Great Britain and manipulation of Great Britain’s other neighbors, especially Spain. Doing so can achieve both pull (conflict elsewhere to attend to) and push (your friendship setting them at ease up north) to persuade the British that their interests require builds in the Caribbean—or even the Falklands (Malvinas), if you are especially convincing.
Caribbean Confusion
While the United States is not an early Caribbean player, ultimately any solo attempt will require the United States to tap into the lucrative supply center count found in the Caribbean. Therefore, to start, it is in the United States’ interest to foment unrest in the Caribbean so no one power gains the upper hand before the United States is strong enough to engage. Not only does Caribbean confusion prevent Spain from racing to threaten the U.S. Atlantic coastline, but if affords a wealth of opportunities to build alliances as the Caribbean cannot be captured single-handedly. This is especially true for cooperation with New Granada and Venezuela who usually present little threat to the United States and indeed make rather natural partners.
TACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS
Gulf of Mexico
The criticality of this province is often overlooked. The Gulf of Mexico touches four bodies of water and five supply centers, including the home centers of three powers (Mexico, the United States, and Spain). A unit there can support up to ten surrounding provinces and has direct convoy options into the territory of all three powers. This makes its possession by any of those three powers an influential stepping stone for future operations.
Chicago
Any opening strategy must include the capture of Chicago. It is the only center that the United States can be assured of, so either the army in Charleston or Washington D.C. must seize it. With Great Britain likely taking Toronto, it also serves as a defensive point to prevent further British army incursions.
Erie Canal
The United States must be assured that under absolutely no circumstances will the British army in Montreal end up in Erie Canal after the first turn. Use any method to prevent this: diplomacy, a pre-arranged bounce, or simple aggression. A British army in Erie Canal threatens two U.S. centers pinning down a large number of U.S. forces, which would be outright disastrous at the beginning of the match.
Texas/Gulf of Mexico
Texas is the other center (besides Chicago) that the United States is most likely to acquire in the first year. U.S. occupation of Texas is un-opposable in the spring; however, holding it in the fall requires a successful negotiation with Spain or Mexico. Spain may be open to bouncing Mexico from the Gulf of Mexico to safeguard Texas in the fall from a 2v1 attack by Mexico or, alternatively, the United States may be able to persuade Mexico not to contest Texas despite having a military advantage against it if Mexico does enter the Gulf of Mexico in the spring.
The primary problem with U.S. control of Texas is its proximity to the underbelly of Mexico, Chihuahua. Were Texas not located adjacent to that territory, its settlement may be simpler but this reality frequently leads to conflict between the United States and Mexico. How Mexico and the United States work that out often determines both of their fates, so this issue should be approached with the utmost care.
Atlantic Maritime Provinces
It is highly unlikely that any country will try to move into the Atlantic Maritime Provinces the first year. While Spain could move to Sargasso Sea on the first turn, Spain will be much more tempted to go after neutral supply centers in closer proximity to Britain first (both to protect their current holdings and to keep those neutral centers out of British hands). Having said that, U.S. defensive considerations should factor in the need to protect these locations, especially Gulf Stream. That may require a buildup of Atlantic fleets to patrol these waters combined with diplomatic efforts to distract other powers to head in different directions.
West Coast
Like a bright shining object, these three neutral centers on the west coast beacon to the U.S. for seizure. It should absolutely be a U.S. objective to seize at least two of these centers, but the question is really about timing. It is essential that the United States first build a solid foundation at home before racing to the West Coast. Having too many forces so far from home threaten to invite foreign partners to take advantage. It also precludes the development of positive relations with Mexico even more than holding Texas. If the United States ventures to the west early, they must likely accept that a positive relationship with Mexico will be difficult to generate in the future without cession.
VICTORY CONSIDERATIONS
The United States has two natural paths for a solo victory. The first is a North American strategy which looks to seize all of North America, Mexico and the Caribbean islands to reach 24. In this scenario, no units would have to touch South America. The second strategy is an Atlantic strategy which focuses on North America, Caribbean, Venezuela, and portions of Brazil. While the seizure of a Brazilian center seems ambitious at first, it should be noted that Sao Salvador is the same number of moves (4) from Washington D.C. as is Oregon or California. The ability to move between NAO/MAO/SAO allows much greater mobility between the northern and southern hemispheres and should be taken into consideration when mapping an alliance structure and path to victory.
Overall, for the United States to be successful, a player must prevent a British/Mexican alliance from forming to survive the first year. They must limit British growth, so the U.S. is not overwhelmed by an invasion from Canada. That means seeking out friends who can hinder British advancement and encouraging them to take advantage of British geographic dispersion. While this does not foreclose direct cooperation with Great Britain, it does seek to weaken them enough so a U.S. move into Canada later in the game is viable. Finally, the United States should encourage division in the Caribbean long enough for the U.S. to grow strong enough to enter into the Caribbean equation. The worst outcome is a strong alliance between Great Britain and Spain which allows Great Britain to grow in the Caribbean unmolested while Spain pushes north to Bermuda and the Atlantic and Gulf coastlines.
Upcoming Articles: Great Britain and Brazil