Electoral hex redux and African colonialism

At Gil Kalai's blog I came across a map in which counties which voted Democratic in some election are colored blue, and counties which voted Republican are colored red. (It is not the 2008 presidential election map, or at least it doesn't match Mark Newman's map.)

Anyway, Kalai suggests "hex voting" -- like the game of Hex, the Republicans win if there's a continuous path in red counties from north to south, and the Democrats win if there's a continuous path of blue counties from east to west. (In the map he gives, the Republicans win, but only barely -- there are some places where the red region is only one county wide.)

It turns out that the British and French played a similar game in Africa early in the last century; here's a map of European claims to Africa in 1913, in which the British were attempting to create a continuous path of red (British) colonies from north to south, and the French were attempting to create a continuous path of blue (French) colonies from east to west. (At least, that's how the Wikipedia article on Cecil Rhodes puts it.)