The Point of Divergence of Central World takes place just before the First World War.
Background[]
Porfirio Díaz
In 1910, the 80-year-old Porfirio Díaz decided to hold an election for another term; he thought he had long since eliminated any serious opposition. However, Francisco I. Madero, an academic from a rich family, decided to run against him and quickly gained popular support, despite his arrest by Díaz.
When the official election results were announced, it was declared that Díaz had won reelection by the slim and debatable electoral margin of 196 to 187. Upset, Madero and his party promoted allegations of electoral fraud, which ended up being too blatant for the public to swallow, and riots erupted throughout Mexico.
OTL[]
On October 4, 1910 Madero, whose wealthy father had managed to negotiate his son free movement during the day, escpaed on horseback to the United States. Upon arriving in San Antonio, Madero drafted the Plan de San Luis Potosí on November 20, 1910. In it, he called upon the Mexican people to take up weapons and fight against the Díaz regime. These actions are seen as the start of the Mexican Revolution.
Victoriano Huerta
The revolutionary leaders had many different objectives; revolutionary figures varied from liberals such as Madero to radicals such as Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa. As a consequence, it proved impossible to reach agreement on how to organize the government that emerged from the triumphant first phase of the revolution. This standoff over political principles lead quickly to a struggle for control of the government, a violent conflict that lasted more than 20 years. Although this period is usually referred to as part of the Mexican Revolution, it might also be termed a civil war. Presidents Francisco I. Madero (1913), Venustiano Carranza (1920), and former revolutionary leaders Emiliano Zapata (1919) and Pancho Villa (1923) all were assassinated during this period.
Following the resignation of Díaz and a brief reactionary interlude, Madero was elected president in 1911, only to be ousted and killed in 1913 by Victoriano Huerta, one of Diaz' generals. This coup had the support of the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Henry Lane Wilson, but not that of U.S. President-elect Woodrow Wilson. Huerta's brutality soon lost him domestic support, and the Wilson Administration actively opposed his regime, for example by the naval bombardment of Veracruz.
ATL[]
Mexican Troops in Texas.
Madero fleeing prison in a horse, is shot and killed.
American Troops returning to USA in 1918
Diaz's brutality soon lost him domestic support, and the Wilson Administration actively opposed his regime, for example the naval bombardment of Veracruz. This bombardment caused Mexico to declare war on the United States of America, and start the Second Mexican-American War. When Diaz died in 1915, Victoriano Huerta was his successor, continuing the war. America being busy in their own lands, didn't enter in the First World War. Without help of USA, the Allied Powers are defeated in the Hundred Days Offensive, achieving a Central Powers Victory. Although America managed to have victory in North America, declaring its Manifest Destiny in the Mexican States of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León, Europe was starting a new World Era . . .