I don't see the US liking the UK enough to help much, so the chance of the CSA being courted by Germany is miniscule.
Plausibility Check of Timeline-191 (aka Southern Victory)
- Thread starter Ficboy
- Start date
Ficboy
Banned
In the case of the Confederate States I'd say that any fighting with the United States after the Civil War or another name as it's going to be called would be more indirect like proxy wars in Latin America and the Caribbean given their common interest in those places especially since Southern filibusters in the Antebellum Era eyed these places as potential new states. The Confederate States might choose to pursue a variant of the Golden Circle idea by financing uprisings and/or overthrowing existing governments in Latin America and the Caribbean.
As far as World War I is concerned (assuming there are no butterflies in the events that led to it), the United States under Theodore Roosevelt (assuming he does follow his OTL trajectory into politics) would get involved in the conflict much sooner at around 1915 after the Lusitania sinking since he already wished to join on the side of the Entente and the Confederate States under Woodrow Wilson (again assuming he does follow his OTL career) would try to stay out of the conflict but Germany in a last ditch effort to win with the Central Powers might as well court them in something like the Zimmerman Telegram but they would know that they were not prepared for this war and thus fighting does spread to North America but nothing like Turtledove portrays it.
Last edited:
Even with minimal butterflies, I find it difficult to believe that the US would want to help the UK, when in living memory they helped to split off almost half of the US. Do you think Teddy would be as Anglophilic ITTL?
I mean, in contrast the UK fought Napoleon Bonaparte for almost 20 years and had fought with France for almost the entirety of the 18th century. Then 40 years after Waterloo they allied with a Bonaparte to beat up Russia to save the Ottoman Empire and then fought alongside France in two world wars besides.
The US would have no real reason to hold some sort of uber eternal grudge against the UK. If some European power were to act as dumbly as Germany circa WWI and decide to just unilaterally sink US shipping or muck around in North America against the US wishes, why would they instead decide to hold a grudge against the UK instead of allying with them?
Well, after the Napoleonic Wars, France ended up with practically the same borders, and Napoleon was considered more expansionist by everyone than the US. The UK helped tear off half the country, which had only seceded to continue slavery after imposing its will on the Northern half of the country for decades. I feel coupled with the reasonable assumption that the US would have crushed the CSA without the North, there would be something approaching the Stab-in-the-Back Myth(though blaming the British). You are right that this would be mitigated by time and trade, but I don't think the public would be for it when there are veterans from the Civil War alive. As such, with the clearly more antagonistic relation between the UK and USA relative to OTL, I think Germany would expect that the US to stay neutral, not sending any Zimmerman message, and possibly courting the US based on a presumed feeling of hate to the US(they were that hairbrained OTL with Mexico, after all).
Ficboy
Banned
Alliances in the 19th century and the 20th century basically bounced around like a game of ping pong. The United Kingdom, France and Russia were frenemies for instance.
The Empire was dismantled, the unpopular monarchy just plopped back on the throne, and the French and English glowered at one another across the Channel and various abstract lines in Africa and Asia for the better part of a century with very real war scares popping up across the Victorian Era. The French then found a new enemy far more worringly close to home, and that enemy foolishly decided to also pick a fight with Britain which pushed two enemies into each others arms.
In a situation that the South actually succeeds, it's not reasonable past a certain point for anyone to assume that the North would have won the civil war unless someone else mucked about in their business (to people on the ground in the 1860s it still looked like a near run thing on occasion). And there'd be no need for any idea of a 'stab in the back' myth. It would very much be a 'Perfidious Albion' and 'Haughty French' thing which Americans would resent. However, they would suddenly have a much bigger problem than the US or France sitting right on their doorstep. While the US would eye Britain warily/distastefully and Anglophobia would be in vogue for a while, I really don't think the US would be quite so dumb as to try and pick a fight with both the CSA and Britain and maybe France at the same time, even with Germany as an ally.
Hell. between 1862(ish) and 1910 there'd have been 50+ years for relations to thaw and the old trade patterns to reassert themselves. Unless Britain and America found themselves at war again between that time (which I find unlikely) then there'd be very little reason for the two to pursue actively hostile attitudes towards one another.
Actually, I think one of the biggest reaches in establishing the TL-191 alt-Great War (which has to be as similar as possible for narrative convenience) is the whole Second Mexican War. It's kind of a miracle it happens at all, and basically has the South abolishing slavery in exchange for Franco-British diplomatic/military help. It's something of a major contrivance, but it is one of the few surefire ways for the two sides to reasonably coalesce into the roughly similar 1914 Great Power alliance situation with all the butterflies there are.
It's a fine plot point for the series, but I don't regard it as extremely plausible shall we say. Good narrative though.
It's a fine plot point for the series, but I don't regard it as extremely plausible shall we say. Good narrative though.
I might have been relying too much on North v South numbers for predictions of victory, so my bad. Still, I feel that France was more exhausted after near 20 years of fighting, and with the entire continent against them, there wasn't much they could do. The focus of a balance of power leading to a relatively lenient peace(pre first coalition borders for the most part) also helps. Here, the UK intervened and helped lead to the US losing half of its land to slavers. You bring up a good point about the US being cautious, so I think the likely scenario is yellow journalism stirring up perfidious Albion more and with a more anti-UK or anti-French population. This assuming the OTL WW1 starts, means papers would likely put more blame on the British for cutting telegraph lines and a blockade relative to OTL.
While you bring up a good point about the trade thawing relations, that is not necessarily going to work. I view their relation more likely to resemble the Franco-German enmity. I believe there was much trade between France and Germany, but the populations didn't like each other much.
History Learner
Banned
I'm assuming this was meant to be directed at me and not Help?
I've provided multiple citations to show British intervention was seriously considered, the reasons it failed to occur, and laid out how such could plausibly happen. If you disagree with that, fine, but the proper response it to provide citations in retort rather than just blithely dismissing it out of hand. To paraphrase an old saying: that which is presented without evidence can be dismissed without it.
Indeed, blockading the U.S. during the Civil War would actually be fairly easy, even easier than in 1812. Why is this? The coast of the Confederacy is about 3,500 miles while the entirety of the Northeast Federal coast is about 1,260 miles and of that 20% is Maine; land a force at Portland and you've cut off the railways and thus the need to secure that portion. Next, there are only four regions the Anglo-French need to secure due to how the geography plays out: New York Harbor, Long Island Sound, Delaware Bay and the Chesapeake Bay. No other large ports, with serious railway connections, exist on the East Coast. Given this is before the Trans-Continental Railway, there really isn't much need for a Pacific force, beyond doing raiding on San Francisco to cut off Californian gold.
As for the why? Obviously shutting off the flow of trade, cutting of any arms imports and, as the last sentence in the above shows, cutting off the flow of gold from California which required seaborne transportation of such. Much has been written about late war Confederate inflation and by cutting off the gold, the Anglo-French would be inflicting this same fate upon the Union.
As I've already shown, existing lead production could not even meet Army needs, nevermind Army, Navy and civilian needs. It does not escape my notice you didn't provide any citations for the nitrates matter either.
Beyond the fact the Anglo-French fleets can handily implement a blockade-the North American squadron in 1862 alone was more powerful than the entire U.S. Navy-via their bases in Halifax, Bermuda, etc I'm not really sure how you're coming to the conclusion the British blockade would not have an effect on coastal traffic. As anybody who has been to a beach before can attest, waves do crash upon the shore, not just the tides.
Can we see some citations for your claims here?
And none of those battles could be fought without control of the sea. Did you know the British Enfield and Austrian Lorenz rifles were the most common weapons of the Army of the Potomac at Gettsyburg, for example? They didn't just magically appear in Union hands, either. Unless you're expecting the Union to somehow win with spears against Confederate bullets and shot and shell-which would be the case without British saltpeter and lead-then this point is without any merit.
By all means, provide some citations.
In reality, in September of 1862 the Russians advised the Union to come to terms with the Confederacy and the Prussians were undergoing a Constitutional Crisis while also dealing with the issue of Denmark and yet to be defeated Austrian Empire on their doorstep. There was no help coming for the Union, only misery and woe.
Last edited:
I am unaware of any important US involvement, so it would depend on the change of temperament caused by the UK and France.
How plausible would a USA-Russia alliance be after the War of Secession? That probably would’ve been interesting. Anyway, I don’t think anyone has brought this up yet but what’s the plausibility of the CSA becoming Freedomite/Nazi-esque and of the Population Reduction?
Ficboy
Banned
This is mere parallelism employed by Harry Turtledove given that he was the son of Romanian Jewish immigrants that fled to the United States to escape the Holocaust. As racist as the USA and the CSA are I doubt there would even exist a Freedom Party let alone a Population Reduction since much of the racial animus in Reconstruction in the form of massacres and violence as well as the subsequent Jim Crow segregation laws won't exist whatsoever.
Yeah, they'd rather extract as much money as they can from blacks than spend money irrationally killing them.
Which again ignores the point they made do with a similar level of consumption in 1866. There was no great disruptions or unrest then that I am aware of.
Which is false, as outlined by the posted citations. Indeed, Palmerston as PM was in favor of intervention, as was Lord Russell in charge of foreign affairs. The British intention was to step in after the Confederates had won a strong battlefield victory, upon which their mediation offer would be unlikely to provoke the U.S. from extending the conflict.
A lot to unpack and disprove here, as it seems you're attempting to throw everything but the kitchen sink. First, you're making the claim they could supply themselves with nitrates. Let's see your proof on that regard? Outside of nitrates, how about lead:
On hand in 1861: 1,302,000 lbs
Purchased to 30 June 1862: 23,057,000 lbs
Expended to 30 June 1862: 18,920,000 lbs
Purchased to 30 June 1863: 48,720,000 lbs
Expended to 30 June 1863: 31,139,000 lbs
Purchased to 30 June 1864: 12,740,000 lbs
Expended to 30 June 1864: 7,624,000 lbs
Lead imports from Britain by year 1861: 1,679,000 lbs
1862: 28,926,000 lbs
1863 5,777,000 lbs
1864 25,929,000 lbs
From June 30th of 1862 to June 30th of 1863, the Union Army alone expended 31 million pounds of lead; total production during that same space was only 28 million pounds.
Next, as for McClellan and Union resolve, that's not supported at all by the historical record. I'll let James McPherson do my talking for me in his review of Grant and Lee: Victorious American and Vanquished Virginian, The Journal of Southern History, AUGUST 2009, Vol. 75, No. 3 (AUGUST 2009), pp. 814-816:
In 1864 the high casualties of the Overland Campaign pushed the Union to the brink, with Lincoln as late as August expecting himself to lose and McClellan being in favor of an armistice without pre-conditions:
View attachment 571143
As for Prussia and Russia, they never made such sounds and actually, as outlined in The Blue and the Gray, the Russians in late 1862 were advising the U.S. to seek terms with the Confederacy; neither they nor the Prussians had any interest whatsoever in aiding the Union.
Against the combined power of the Anglo-French fleets, the Union has no chance.
Your arguments about economics take into account only one side of the ledger. Your only thinking about British, and American imports not exports. You say the British could replace American Wheat, and the Union needed British Lead, and Nitrates. What you forgetting is the British lose of exports. They were making a lot of money by trading with the Union, and war would cut that off. Business interests didn't want a war with the Union. The British may have found other sources of wheat, at much higher prices, but so would the union find nitrates, and lead at higher prices. American has lots of Batcaves, and lead was found in several areas under Union control.
In the Spring of 1863 the RN had 4 Ironclads, and the French had 6. The Union had 9, with 9 under construction, with no rush on them, Impending war with Britain would speed them up. The USN is fighting in home waters, and can build iron casement ships, or convert existing ships. Not all of the RN/FM Ironclad's would be sent over the Atlantic, neither the British or French really trusted each other, and both had other global commitments. The British Breechloading guns on their Ironclads were defective, and less effective then their 64 lb. smoothbores. The 6.5" guns of the French Ironclads proved ineffective vs. armor.
It's not 1812 the Union Navy isn't just going to run away, and hid in port, and they won't be firing with half charges ether. The USN had designed a class of fast commerce raiders to be put into production in the event of war with Britain. War with Britain would increase the proportion of resources devoted to the navy. On land Canada would be vulnerable to a Union Invasion. After Vicksburg, and Gettysburg the British would regret joining a morally indefensible, economically damaging war on the losing side.
Sure, why would you need Jim Crow Segregation Laws, and voter suppression if all the Blacks are slaves? You wouldn't need the KKK, Blacks would be kept in line by the law, that's what the CSA's was all about.
History Learner
Banned
By all means, do provide us citations for all of this.
This too, given we know in 1861 the Royal Navy had Terror, Glatton, Trusty, Thunderbolt, Erebus, Aetna, and Thunder. That's seven off the top of my head, so I honestly have no idea how you have the idea there was just four. I also have no idea how you have the idea their cannons are bad, given the 68 pound is the main armament on the Warrior, for example, and had better penetration than the 11" Dahlgren.
One wonders how the Union is able to fight those battles without bullets, gunpowder or, ironically, guns themselves. In reality, Canada would see up to 100,000 British and Canadians troops, able to best any force the Union sends to them while the Federal navy is confined to port due to dearth of gunpowder and their innate inability to even damage the British ironclads; tests performed with the 11" Dahlgren found that, even with double charge, it could not pierce 4.5" forged plate backed by 20" of oak. Warrior, however, did not even use forged plate but, instead, rolled plate, making its armor even more effective.
This is your quote
One wonders how the Union is able to fight those battles without bullets, gunpowder or, ironically, guns themselves. In reality, Canada would see up to 100,000 British and Canadians troops, able to best any force the Union sends to them while the Federal navy is confined to port due to dearth of gunpowder and their innate inability to even damage the British ironclads; tests performed with the 11" Dahlgren found that, even with double charge, it could not pierce 4.5" forged plate backed by 20" of oak. Warrior, however, did not even use forged plate but, instead, rolled plate, making its armor even more effective.
[/QUOTE]
Belisarius II said:
Your arguments about economics take into account only one side of the ledger. Your only thinking about British, and American imports not exports. You say the British could replace American Wheat, and the Union needed British Lead, and Nitrates. What you forgetting is the British lose of exports. They were making a lot of money by trading with the Union, and war would cut that off. Business interests didn't want a war with the Union. The British may have found other sources of wheat, at much higher prices, but so would the union find nitrates, and lead at higher prices. American has lots of Batcaves, and lead was found in several areas under Union control.
Your quote
By all means, do provide us citations for all of this.
My Reply
Don't you think the Americans were paying for what they were buying? You do understand supply, and demand? If American Wheat was cheaper then European Wheat, and then is taken off the market what would happen to the price of imported wheat in Britain? Nitrates were found in West Virginia, and Kentucky, and was imported from Chile. Lead was mined in Missouri, Idaho, and Illinois.
ZINC AND LEAD DISTRICTS OF ILLINOIS. Zinc and lead minerals are found in two widely separated districts in Illinois. One of these occurs in the extreme southern portion of the State and includes portions of Hardin, Pope, and Saline counties. It forms part of the Kentucky-Illinois fluorspar, lead, and zinc field, and for convenience may be referred to as the Southern Illinois district. The other occurs in the- extreme northwestern portion of the State and includes a part of Jo Daviess County. It is included in the upper Mississippi Valley zinc and lead field and may be conveniently referred to as the Northwestern Illinois district. This district forms the subject of this paper. . Southern Illinois district.—The Southern Illinois district has never yielded zinc in commercial quantity, though small amounts of both blende and smithsonite have been found at a number of points. From that part of the field which occupies the adjacent portion of Kentucky zinc ore has for several years been shipped. The ore has been found- in quantity at only one or two points, and up to the present nothing has been found north of the Ohio which would warrant development. Lead has been mined More or less steadily since 1842, but for some years the output has been small and irregular. Probably the maximum production . was in 1866-67, when 176,387 pounds were shipped by the Fairview mine. The principal ore of the southern district is-fluorspar, and the production of lead is incidental. A separate discussion of the fluorspar deposits is now in preparation, and it will be sufficient to indicate here the author's opinion that important amounts of zinc and lead ores are not likely to be found in
My reply
Your quote
This too, given we know in 1861 the Royal Navy had Terror, Glatton, Trusty, Thunderbolt, Erebus, Aetna, and Thunder. That's seven off the top of my head, so I honestly have no idea how you have the idea there was just four. I also have no idea how you have the idea their cannons are bad, given the 68 pound is the main armament on the Warrior, for example, and had better penetration than the 11" Dahlgren.
My reply
The vessels your referring to were floating batteries, what I'm referring to are ocean going ironclads. I didn't say the 64 pounder was a bad gun, I said the breechloaders were. The 11" Dahlgren's using half charges nearly broke the armor plates lose from their wooden backings on the CSS Virginia. The Passaic Class Monitors carried 1 or 2 15" Dahlgren's, or Rodman's, firing a 440 lb. solid shot. The glaring fault of first generation British Ironclads were their unarmored forward, and aft ends. Only the gun deck was armored, protecting a little over half the length of the ship, 213' of Warrior's about 380' along the waterline, 420' overall. If Warrior had ever entered combat she could have suffered serious damage.
In 1861, the population of ‘Canada’ was 3,295,706 people. Based on the 1861 Census and the Newfoundland Census of 1858, the fastest-growing province was Upper Canada, or Ontario, at a rate of 4.34% a year, followed by the Colony of New Brunswick, at 2.60%.
My comment
Almost 1 million of these were French Canadians. The British dispatched 11,000 troops to Canada in 1861. It's hard to imagine Canada had 90,000 troops in 1863. The British didn't consider Canada very well defended, or defensible.
My source
s. In the fall of 1863, Lieutenant Colonel W!.F.D. Jervois of the Royal Engineers visited Canada and prepared an extensive report on the defences of Canada. The major centres of fortification were at Quebec and Kingston but there were British troops scattered 1n garrisons further west. Jervois felt t hat it would be impossible to achieve naval superiority on the Upper Lakes and on Lake Erie and that it would only be possible on Lake Ontario if the canals were enlarged to allow ironclads to co me up the St. Lawrence. Without control of Lake nta~io, no defence of Canada West could be possible and the garrisons should be withdrawn to Canada East and concentrated at Montreal. lbe defence of Montreal was essential to Canadian defence for the capture of the city, only a few score miles from the American border, would sever communications with the interior and cut off the retreat of any forces stationed there.
Canadians were largely opposed to slavery, and Canada had recently become the terminus of the Underground Railroad. Close economic and cultural links across the long border also encouraged Canadian sympathy towards the Union. Between 33,000 and 55,000 men from British North America enlisted in the war, almost all of them fighting for Union forces. Some press and churches in Canada supported the secession and some others not.[2] There was talk in London in 1861–62 of mediating the war or recognizing the Confederacy. Washington warned this meant war, and London feared Canada would quickly be seized by the North.[3]
The Civil War period was one of booming economic growth for the BNA colonies. The war in the United States created a huge market for Canada's agricultural and manufactured goods, most of which went to the Union. Maritime ship builders and owners prospered in the wartime trade boom.
My comment
Canadians had no interest in a war with the United States, for the Confederacy.
One wonders how the Union is able to fight those battles without bullets, gunpowder or, ironically, guns themselves. In reality, Canada would see up to 100,000 British and Canadians troops, able to best any force the Union sends to them while the Federal navy is confined to port due to dearth of gunpowder and their innate inability to even damage the British ironclads; tests performed with the 11" Dahlgren found that, even with double charge, it could not pierce 4.5" forged plate backed by 20" of oak. Warrior, however, did not even use forged plate but, instead, rolled plate, making its armor even more effective.
[/QUOTE]
Belisarius II said:
Your arguments about economics take into account only one side of the ledger. Your only thinking about British, and American imports not exports. You say the British could replace American Wheat, and the Union needed British Lead, and Nitrates. What you forgetting is the British lose of exports. They were making a lot of money by trading with the Union, and war would cut that off. Business interests didn't want a war with the Union. The British may have found other sources of wheat, at much higher prices, but so would the union find nitrates, and lead at higher prices. American has lots of Batcaves, and lead was found in several areas under Union control.
Your quote
By all means, do provide us citations for all of this.
My Reply
Don't you think the Americans were paying for what they were buying? You do understand supply, and demand? If American Wheat was cheaper then European Wheat, and then is taken off the market what would happen to the price of imported wheat in Britain? Nitrates were found in West Virginia, and Kentucky, and was imported from Chile. Lead was mined in Missouri, Idaho, and Illinois.
ZINC AND LEAD DISTRICTS OF ILLINOIS. Zinc and lead minerals are found in two widely separated districts in Illinois. One of these occurs in the extreme southern portion of the State and includes portions of Hardin, Pope, and Saline counties. It forms part of the Kentucky-Illinois fluorspar, lead, and zinc field, and for convenience may be referred to as the Southern Illinois district. The other occurs in the- extreme northwestern portion of the State and includes a part of Jo Daviess County. It is included in the upper Mississippi Valley zinc and lead field and may be conveniently referred to as the Northwestern Illinois district. This district forms the subject of this paper. . Southern Illinois district.—The Southern Illinois district has never yielded zinc in commercial quantity, though small amounts of both blende and smithsonite have been found at a number of points. From that part of the field which occupies the adjacent portion of Kentucky zinc ore has for several years been shipped. The ore has been found- in quantity at only one or two points, and up to the present nothing has been found north of the Ohio which would warrant development. Lead has been mined More or less steadily since 1842, but for some years the output has been small and irregular. Probably the maximum production . was in 1866-67, when 176,387 pounds were shipped by the Fairview mine. The principal ore of the southern district is-fluorspar, and the production of lead is incidental. A separate discussion of the fluorspar deposits is now in preparation, and it will be sufficient to indicate here the author's opinion that important amounts of zinc and lead ores are not likely to be found in
My reply
Your quote
This too, given we know in 1861 the Royal Navy had Terror, Glatton, Trusty, Thunderbolt, Erebus, Aetna, and Thunder. That's seven off the top of my head, so I honestly have no idea how you have the idea there was just four. I also have no idea how you have the idea their cannons are bad, given the 68 pound is the main armament on the Warrior, for example, and had better penetration than the 11" Dahlgren.
My reply
The vessels your referring to were floating batteries, what I'm referring to are ocean going ironclads. I didn't say the 64 pounder was a bad gun, I said the breechloaders were. The 11" Dahlgren's using half charges nearly broke the armor plates lose from their wooden backings on the CSS Virginia. The Passaic Class Monitors carried 1 or 2 15" Dahlgren's, or Rodman's, firing a 440 lb. solid shot. The glaring fault of first generation British Ironclads were their unarmored forward, and aft ends. Only the gun deck was armored, protecting a little over half the length of the ship, 213' of Warrior's about 380' along the waterline, 420' overall. If Warrior had ever entered combat she could have suffered serious damage.
In 1861, the population of ‘Canada’ was 3,295,706 people. Based on the 1861 Census and the Newfoundland Census of 1858, the fastest-growing province was Upper Canada, or Ontario, at a rate of 4.34% a year, followed by the Colony of New Brunswick, at 2.60%.
My comment
Almost 1 million of these were French Canadians. The British dispatched 11,000 troops to Canada in 1861. It's hard to imagine Canada had 90,000 troops in 1863. The British didn't consider Canada very well defended, or defensible.
My source
s. In the fall of 1863, Lieutenant Colonel W!.F.D. Jervois of the Royal Engineers visited Canada and prepared an extensive report on the defences of Canada. The major centres of fortification were at Quebec and Kingston but there were British troops scattered 1n garrisons further west. Jervois felt t hat it would be impossible to achieve naval superiority on the Upper Lakes and on Lake Erie and that it would only be possible on Lake Ontario if the canals were enlarged to allow ironclads to co me up the St. Lawrence. Without control of Lake nta~io, no defence of Canada West could be possible and the garrisons should be withdrawn to Canada East and concentrated at Montreal. lbe defence of Montreal was essential to Canadian defence for the capture of the city, only a few score miles from the American border, would sever communications with the interior and cut off the retreat of any forces stationed there.
Canadians were largely opposed to slavery, and Canada had recently become the terminus of the Underground Railroad. Close economic and cultural links across the long border also encouraged Canadian sympathy towards the Union. Between 33,000 and 55,000 men from British North America enlisted in the war, almost all of them fighting for Union forces. Some press and churches in Canada supported the secession and some others not.[2] There was talk in London in 1861–62 of mediating the war or recognizing the Confederacy. Washington warned this meant war, and London feared Canada would quickly be seized by the North.[3]
The Civil War period was one of booming economic growth for the BNA colonies. The war in the United States created a huge market for Canada's agricultural and manufactured goods, most of which went to the Union. Maritime ship builders and owners prospered in the wartime trade boom.
My comment
Canadians had no interest in a war with the United States, for the Confederacy.
Last edited: