Turning South before Swinging East: Geopolitics and Geopolitical Imagination in the Southwestern Caribbean after the American Revolution

Abstract

On July 21, 1786 a secret meeting took place in the office of the Spanish ambassador in Paris, Count of Aranda. The ambassador, aided by the Irish abbot O'Sullivan (who acted as translator), met John Brooks, a British captain who introduced himself as a loyalist veteran of the American Revolution. Brooks had come to Paris from London, all expenses covered by the Spanish government, to inform Aranda of an expedition projected in Britain to invade the northern coast of South America in the vicinity of the port of Cartagena. According to Brooks, Juan Blommart, a French veteran of the American Revolution, was the leader of the projected expedition. With official British backing—Brooks declared that the Marquis of Buckingham was sponsoring the expedition—and the participation of military adventurers John Cruden and Francisco de Miranda, the expedition was scheduled to sail before the end of the year. After receiving Aranda's report, the Spanish Ministry of the Indies sent the information across the Atlantic to New Granada's Viceroy Antonio Caballero y Góngora for him to make all the necessary preparations to face this potential threat.