How Would An 1840s Anglo-American War Go?

[Thoresby]

The RN isn't the force it was in the Napoleonic Wars, its strength was greatly reduced.

No it's a smaller but more sophisticated force. Widespread use of steam means it is much easier to maintain a blockade as you are no longer dependent on favourable winds. It also still has a huge number of ships laid up in ordinary, the worlds largest merchant fleet by an enormous margin enabling rapid expansion via pressing trained men, the world largest and most sophisticated ship building industry enabling vast new construction and finally the institutional ability to put all of this together.

Although there was no major war with a European power, they needed to watch the French, and maintain a superior fleet in the Channel.

No they don't, relations with the July monarchy were good.

They needed to provide fleets in the Mediterranean, and Indian Ocean, fight the slave trade, and the first Opium War.

Yes the RN does have worldwide commitments but they have the resources to cover them. Depending on the timing the Opium War might be over and while suppressing the slave trade is important an active war is more important.

They just don't have the ships or men to do what you're talking about. They can't have a close blockade of NYC, Boston, the Delaware, Chesapeake Bay, Wilmington NC, Charlestown SC, Savannah GA, Pensacola FL, Mobile AL, and New Orleans LA, and have roving squadrons to catch any leakers. They were never able to do that in earlier wars and would be unable to ever do that.

They maintained close blockades over many more French and French aligned ports for 20 years while also fighting all over the world, including against the US for a period.

Yes, they could raid small towns along the coast, but that's not a war winning strategy just an annoyance.

I agree you're not going to win the war by raiding 2nd and 3rd rank ports but you're going to tie up an enormous amount of US resources and damage political willingness to keep on a hopeless fight.

Not really. The British have no great advantage there. They really didn't have a reserve system, so they'd have to raise whole new units, and draft levies of new men to fill up pre-war units.

They had militia and yeomanry units which were one of the main routes for the provision of trained manpower into the regular army during the Napoleonic Wars. Also via the regimental system they had an effective and practised route for the provision of trained cadres for new units by raising additional battalions of a given regiment.

The Americans would need to get the militia in shape, expand the regular army, and raise volunteer regiments. All of these things are big jobs that will take time.

Absolutely. The US can get bulk numbers into the theatre of war more quickly than the British thanks to geography. The qualitative advantage will lie with the British however simply because they have more trained men pre war.

 

[Belisarius II]

That's just not true, the vast majority of officers by 1840 in the army were at best mediocre and deeply ill suited for a fast decisive campaign due to West Point being a very defense and engineering oriented academy that neglected both Cavalry and Infantry, many of the better officers got better due to how formative of an experience the Mexican American War was for all of them, without that prior experience most middle officers in the army would be at best medicre and at best deeply incompetent.

I think you should do a little research on the state of the British army, and officer Corps of the period before you write off the West Pointers. Then take a look at the proof of the pudding in the next round of combat. The American officers performed mostly pretty well in the Mexican War, fighting some battles against heavy odds. Armies operated successfully over difficult terrain, and vast distances with shoestring logistics, yet managed to sustain themselves. Sometimes just surviving takes good leadership.

Scott's campaign against Mexico City was considered brilliant. It involved some extremely hard, and bitter fighting including a vicious counter insurgency against a heroically hostile population. Scott was outnumbered, in difficult terrain, and had to overcome fortified defenses, and he did that by avoiding almost all frontal assaults. He managed to consistently outmaneuver the enemy time and again, and kept his army supplied, and under discipline.

The Duke of Wellington's comment after Scott left Veracruz was "Scott is lost." Later the Duke had nothing but praise for Scott saying he never would have tried such a risky operation. The USN's landing of the Army in Veracruz was an amazingly large, and well pulled off operation, with no prior experience of large-scale amphibious warfare. It was the largest American amphibious operation before WWII. The USN of the 1840's was a serious navy that knew it's job well.

So, then look at the British Army in its next major encounter the Crimean War. Although it fought with its usual valor it didn't cover itself with much glory. The war was an organizational mess with an ossified top officer Corps that refused all attempts at reform and was rigidly fixed in time at the Battle of Waterloo. Officer commissions were still being purchased, and only those lowly engineering, and artillery officers had real professional training, but were held back from promotion because of the rigid seniority system. Of course, you could buy a vacancy for the next highest spot because everyone knows a gentleman with money will make the best colonel or general.

War always separates the good leaders from the poor ones, and experience teaches valuable lessons that good leaders improve on. West Point prepared the young officers of the U.S. Army for Mexico, which inturn prepared them to be senior leaders in the Civil War. The British Army officer training system didn't improve until it became more like West Point. A professional army can't buy commissions and live in the glory of the past.

 

[GenghisKhanfan]

The 1840s saw a couple of problems arise between America and Britain- the Oregon Dispute, Paulet's expedition to Hawai'i, the Maine Dispute, and any other random problem on the border neither government might've cared enough to write down. So let's say that one of those disputes (probably Hawai'i, since it was a prime strategic area for either power,) blows up, and in 1843, the US declares war on the British Empire in order to 'liberate' the islands, no matter that London didn't authorize the invasion. How does the war go?

At this point, the US hasn't started the MexAm war yet, and it's not exactly renowned for its military power, but it does still massively outnumber Canada even this early on. but at the same time, this is like, the height of the Pax Britannica, the royal navy is untouchable, and London's not distracted by beating up a funny Italian man and his french empire anymore.

Despite where the war started, I suspect that the Caribbean will be the primary naval theater and that for a few years, the US economy is gonna be strangled by Britain. The question is- does the US have the means to build the navy to end it while at war? The country is certainly big enough to have those resources.

And army wise, would the US's invasion of Canada go any better than 1812? I can't really imagine it going too much worse since the front is a lot smaller without Tecumseh, but Canada (probably) wasn't run by idiots, and fortifications would have to at least be able to slow the states down, right?

In the event of an american victory, we know that the US would take the chance to get as much of Oregon, Maine, and Hawai'i (as a protectorate under the monarchy) as possible, but what about a British win? Would they push past the Columbia river in Oregon? What about hawai'i- they weren't happy about Paulet's attack on a sovereign monarchy they actually almost respected, but london would be stupid to give up that kind of position in the pacific

As you said, the Mexican-American War hasn't happened yet. But I would be willing to gage that there is already tension between Mexico and the US, most especially over the question of California (though the territorial claims of Texas could also be a sore point). Should a war break out between Britain and the US, while its very likely the Caribbean and Pacific (Hawaii) would be the main theaters, Britain would be foolish not to see the danger of an American invasion of Canada. They might try and reach out to Mexico for alliance, promising them the restoration of Texas to their rule and advantageous trade. Having Mexico invade from the south would mean that Britain would buy time to build up forces in Canada (because, let's be realistic, the Mexican War of Independence had already drained the country of valuable manpower, so even if they agree to a diversionary invasion, the US would beat back the invasion, then launch a counterinvasion to knock Mexico out completely, and gain territory from them should they win the bigger war against Britain). I suspect that even if Britain won the war, Mexico would be the ultimate loser as Britain would likely not support Mexico-having gotten what it wanted, and leave it to the not-so-tender mercies of the US. But it would mean that any future US expansion would be blocked to the north by a fortified Canada.

One variable that I don't think has been mentioned (if it has, I apologize for being an echo-chamber) is the intervention of the Bear..by that I mean Russia.
In the 1840s OTL, Britain and Russia were set to engage in colonial rivalry in Asia known as 'the Great Game'. Add to this the fact that Russia would still have ambitions in the Dardenelles straits, which would destroy the Ottoman Empire and the fact that Britain (along with Austria and France) would prefer an intact-if weak-Ottoman Empire to a Russian presence in the Mediterranean Sea. Russia would want a way to distract Britain overseas while they expanded further into Asia and possibly the Middle East. An Anglo-American War would be to Russia's advantage because Britain would be so focused on the "upstart Americans" that it would likely fail to see Russia's moves in the Balkans until it was too late (as its also likely Austria could be bought off with a share of Ottoman Balkan territory and France would be rendered incompetent by the constant revolutions and changes of government there) Russia could, in theory, ally with the US as a means of nullifying the Anglo-Mexican alliance and provide further distractions to British efforts in the Pacific and Canada (with a fleet threatening Vancouver, for instance)

One thing would be made painfully clear to Britain: Even though most of the other European powers didn't regard the US as anything but an upstart with delusions of importance and would in all events not care what happened to the US (in Spain's case, they might even welcome the humbling of America by Britain as it would mean the US couldn't threaten their remaining colonies in the Caribbean), because the Congress of Vienna which ended the Napoleonic Wars was influenced in large part by Britain, and because as a result Britain attained a power that even Louis XIV in his day could never achieve without igniting global war, its very likely that the distraction of a war with the US would allow powers such as Spain, France, Prussia, Russia and even Austria to increase their efforts to alter the terms of the Vienna Final Act to their exclusive advantage. All Britain could possibly do to prevent/slow down this process would be economic measures such as embargo or even a naval blockade.Ultimately, this would hurt Britain worse than it would the target nation because most of their fleet would be diverted to the Caribbean, Eastern Seaboard and Pacific theaters and their Mediterranean squadron would be needed to prevent a Russian descent on Constantinople.

 

[Diego]

The bolded bit is a good point. During the ACW, the Confederacy had some 74,000 troops on coastal defence IIRC, and a united US will need even more.

Yes, and just like the Union did in New Orleans the UK would be able to pierce through this line of forts probably wherever they want if they commit to it. If they choose to do it in New Orleans the US will not only lose one of its biggest cities but also have its mississipian soft belly exposed.

 

[Diego]

Sorry for the double post

As you said, the Mexican-American War hasn't happened yet. But I would be willing to gage that there is already tension between Mexico and the US, most especially over the question of California (though the territorial claims of Texas could also be a sore point). Should a war break out between Britain and the US, while its very likely the Caribbean and Pacific (Hawaii) would be the main theaters, Britain would be foolish not to see the danger of an American invasion of Canada. They might try and reach out to Mexico for alliance, promising them the restoration of Texas to their rule and advantageous trade. Having Mexico invade from the south would mean that Britain would buy time to build up forces in Canada (because, let's be realistic, the Mexican War of Independence had already drained the country of valuable manpower, so even if they agree to a diversionary invasion, the US would beat back the invasion, then launch a counterinvasion to knock Mexico out completely, and gain territory from them should they win the bigger war against Britain). I suspect that even if Britain won the war, Mexico would be the ultimate loser as Britain would likely not support Mexico-having gotten what it wanted, and leave it to the not-so-tender mercies of the US. But it would mean that any future US expansion would be blocked to the north by a fortified Canada.

Mexico is fighting against the Republic of Rio Grande and other rebellions, they can't really help with a diversionary attack against the US since there is the Republic of Rio Grande and the Republic of Texas in the. About the US being able to invade Mexico, if you take your time to research the logistics of the Mexican-American War you will see that most of the logistics were made by sea, since Britain controls the Sea the US would be obligated to send the Army and Supplies through land and that will limit the force of the invasion to no more than a couple thousand, also any force sent would be exposed to Britain cutting its supply routs by atacking any supply node in their rear. But, like I said it is past the point because Mexico will not enter the war before it solves its own problem of internal rebellions.

 

[edgeworthy]

I think you should do a little research on the state of the British army, and officer Corps of the period before you write off the West Pointers. The British Army officer training system didn't improve until it became more like West Point. A professional army can't buy commissions and live in the glory of the past.

And I think you need to do a little research on the state of the British Army yourself.

It was perfectly possible to become an Officer, and rise all the way to Field Marshal, without buying a commission. And for an Engineer to become a General. And RMA Woolwich graduated on average four times as many cadets each year as West Point. As the faculty at this point included Michael Faraday, and the man who literally wrote the book of mathematical tables that everyone used until the invention of the electronic calculator, there was nothing wrong with their training. And the additional post graduate training at the Royal Engineers School, Chatham, that also trained the Other Ranks, something the US Army lacked altogether, was regarded as the finest in Europe.

RMC Sandhurst did exist, although attendance was not mandatory. Which also housed the British Army's Staff College, another thing the US Army lacked altogether.

 

[Belisarius II]

Yes, and just like the Union did in New Orleans the UK would be able to pierce through this line of forts probably wherever they want if they commit to it. If they choose to do it in New Orleans the US will not only lose one of its biggest cities but also have its mississipian soft belly exposed.

Since you seem to know something about the Civil War you may recall that the Union Navy was able to capture New Orleans because there was no army to protect it. The Confederates had pulled almost everything out to join Albert Sidney Johnston's army to attack Grant at Shiloh up in Tennesse. In this situation if a British fleet ran past the forts there would be an army there. But even before that unless this war is a little later in the 1840's the RN has sailing ships and can't run past the forts because of the currents. If they drop off any troops, they have with them to first take the forts there'll be American field troops to back them up making it a much tougher job.

The idea that a British invasion of America would be a simple matter is just a sort of dreamlike mirage. The closer you get to it the further it seems away from you.

 

[Belisarius II]

And I think you need to do a little research on the state of the British Army yourself.

It was perfectly possible to become an Officer, and rise all the way to Field Marshal, without buying a commission. And for an Engineer to become a General. And RMA Woolwich graduated on average four times as many cadets each year as West Point. As the faculty at this point included Michael Faraday, and the man who literally wrote the book of mathematical tables that everyone used until the invention of the electronic calculator, there was nothing wrong with their training. And the additional post graduate training at the Royal Engineers School, Chatham, that also trained the Other Ranks, something the US Army lacked altogether, was regarded as the finest in Europe.

RMC Sandhurst did exist, although attendance was not mandatory. Which also housed the British Army's Staff College, another thing the US Army lacked altogether.

If you read what I wrote I said the engineer, and artillery school grads were the only professionally trained officers, so what are you complaining about? Unfortunately, those officers were generally looked down on by their social betters. From Wiki on the British Army of the Victorian Era.


The system of Sale of commissions determined the selection and promotion of officers in the infantry and cavalry. Once officers gained their first commissions through a combination of recommendation and purchase, subsequent promotion was nominally determined by seniority, with officers purchasing their successive ranks. The purchase system and widely condoned abuses of it worked against either the proper training of officers or any consistently applied career structure. Some impecunious officers who had served as subalterns at Waterloo were languishing in the same rank decades later, while wealthy officers such as the notorious Lord Cardigan could rapidly become the commanding officers of regiments, and subsequently become generals from their seniority as colonels.[11]

During the Napoleonic Wars, a combination of large-scale expansion of the army and intensive campaigning resulting in heavy casualties had resulted in many officers being commissioned from the ranks or from middle-class backgrounds. Afterwards, such possibilities of gaining commissions became increasingly rare. In 1845, the army of Sir Hugh Gough lost so many officers during the Battle of Ferozeshah that Gough granted immediate commissions to five Warrant Officers, under his authority as Commander in Chief in India. He nevertheless was forced to defend his action before a board of enquiry.[12]

The purchase system also generated snobbery on the part of wealthy infantry and cavalry officers towards the more studious artillery and engineer officers, who learned their "trade" at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and whose promotion depended rigidly on seniority. No artillery officer was appointed to general command of a field army until 1842, when Sir George Pollock led the army that relieved Jellalabad.

At least in the American Army of the period the engineering, and artillery officers were considered to be at the top of the food chain, and not the bottom.

 

[Pauh the federalist]

this is the only bit i really disagree with, since AFAIK, Britain wasn't particularly expansionist in that region

while the states were pushing for BC and Vancouver island, I'm pretty sure the brits only really wanted what's now western Washington

The area seen to the south represents the most extreme British claims (it even says so on the map at the 42 axis) the moderate British position at the time that british politicians favored was to divide the tarritory between both partys at the columbia river with the British taking the north side and the amaricans taking the south (the extream claim was largly based around taking the full colobia river system). The british otl offered the more moderate division along the river as it was thought to be acceptable to the amaricans as a compromise. If war breaks out and the British win it, although still possible it's not guaranteed they will continue to offer a plan that was already seen as a comprimise to the amaricans pre war if post war they can just enforce thier full claim in a treaty depending on the scale of amarican defeat (if the war ends with amarican forces being pushed out of the north west) there is also the idea of satisfying the post war public for national losses that would become more relivent if the war escalates to a amarican invasion of Canada that needs large scale british land commitment to eject.

 

[Belisarius II]

No it's a smaller but more sophisticated force. Widespread use of steam means it is much easier to maintain a blockade as you are no longer dependent on favourable winds. It also still has a huge number of ships laid up in ordinary, the worlds largest merchant fleet by an enormous margin enabling rapid expansion via pressing trained men, the world largest and most sophisticated ship building industry enabling vast new construction and finally the institutional ability to put all of this together.

So, all the British have to do is go back to fleet mobilization levels of the Napoleonic Wars. Start pressing men from the merchant fleet into the RN and build new paddle wheel warships as fast as shipyards can build them. That's so easy no one will have a problem with it.

No they don't, relations with the July monarchy were good.

No. The British would never trust the French with naval superiority in the Channel no matter how good their temporary rations were with them. France was always the potential major enemy even when they were allies like in the Criema war, and nothing changed that until the 20th Century.

Yes the RN does have worldwide commitments but they have the resources to cover them. Depending on the timing the Opium War might be over and while suppressing the slave trade is important an active war is more important.

No one has unlimited resources.

They maintained close blockades over many more French and French aligned ports for 20 years while also fighting all over the world, including against the US for a period.

France, and the rest of Europe are close to England which is both why it was more important, and easier to operate against. Eropean waters also have bottlenecks that can be controlled to make it easier to blockade. America is across the Atlantic and has fewer bottlenecks. A fleet needs bases near the scene of action which is why the RN was never able to have a close blockade of the U.S. in ether the ARW, or 1812.

I agree you're not going to win the war by raiding 2nd and 3rd rank ports but you're going to tie up an enormous amount of US resources and damage political willingness to keep on a hopeless fight.

It wasn't a hopeless fight in the Revolution or 1812 why would it be in 1840?

They had militia and yeomanry units which were one of the main routes for the provision of trained manpower into the regular army during the Napoleonic Wars. Also via the regimental system they had an effective and practised route for the provision of trained cadres for new units by raising additional battalions of a given regiment.

Again, you make it sound so simple, and inexpensive in financial, and political costs. Just what are the British going to get out of this all-out war?

Absolutely. The US can get bulk numbers into the theatre of war more quickly than the British thanks to geography. The qualitative advantage will lie with the British however simply because they have more trained men pre war.

Absolutely. Because it's easy to see that 1 British soldier can train another man, and together they can beat 3 Americans.

 

[Fabius Maximus]

Not really. The British have no great advantage there. They really didn't have a reserve system, so they'd have to raise whole new units, and draft levies of new men to fill up pre-war units. The Americans would need to get the militia in shape, expand the regular army, and raise volunteer regiments. All of these things are big jobs that will take time.

Having a decent-sized army means that you can, e.g., transfer experienced officers and NCOs into your new units to provide a core of military experts. One of the major problems both sides in the American Civil War had was that the pre-war US army wasn't big enough to do this, meaning you had entire regiments where nobody had anything more than a theoretical understanding of war. This isn't a problem the British would have, at least not to anything near the same degree.

Why do you think it was no problem? The 20,000 men that fought in the First Opium War mostly came from India, and the British had a very hard time assembling the army. They fought a coastal war closely tethered to the RN. Sure, they could send an army to Canada, but everything happening at the same time would cause a terrible strain on the strategic, and operational levels. The British were not omnipotent.

Why do you think it would be any harder to sail from Britain to Canada vs. from India to China?

So, then look at the British Army in its next major encounter the Crimean War. Although it fought with its usual valor it didn't cover itself with much glory. The war was an organizational mess with an ossified top officer Corps that refused all attempts at reform and was rigidly fixed in time at the Battle of Waterloo. Officer commissions were still being purchased, and only those lowly engineering, and artillery officers had real professional training, but were held back from promotion because of the rigid seniority system. Of course, you could buy a vacancy for the next highest spot because everyone knows a gentleman with money will make the best colonel or general.

The British nevertheless managed to keep their army in fighting state throughout the campaign, and in much less favourable circumstances than they'd be facing in Canada (where they'd have proper ports to unload in, friendly locals, etc.). Logistical difficulties aren't going to save the Americans here.

Also, it's simply false to say that the British officer corps "refused all attempts at reform"; the British launched a major overhaul of their logistics system while the war was still going on. Despite what history memes may have taught you, the British army of the 19th century was plenty willing to implement reforms when necessary.

In the 1840s OTL, Britain and Russia were set to engage in colonial rivalry in Asia known as 'the Great Game'. Add to this the fact that Russia would still have ambitions in the Dardenelles straits, which would destroy the Ottoman Empire and the fact that Britain (along with Austria and France) would prefer an intact-if weak-Ottoman Empire to a Russian presence in the Mediterranean Sea. Russia would want a way to distract Britain overseas while they expanded further into Asia and possibly the Middle East. An Anglo-American War would be to Russia's advantage because Britain would be so focused on the "upstart Americans" that it would likely fail to see Russia's moves in the Balkans until it was too late (as its also likely Austria could be bought off with a share of Ottoman Balkan territory and France would be rendered incompetent by the constant revolutions and changes of government there) Russia could, in theory, ally with the US as a means of nullifying the Anglo-Mexican alliance and provide further distractions to British efforts in the Pacific and Canada (with a fleet threatening Vancouver, for instance)

Do the Russians have the force projection necessary to threaten Canada? Maybe they do, but I don't remember them making any such moves during the Crimean War, so I doubt it. Whilst America and Russia may have a common enemy ITTL, they aren't really in a position to offer each other anything other than moral support, seeing as how they're separated by thousands of miles of ocean and waging war against the world's foremost naval power.

So, all the British have to do is go back to fleet mobilization levels of the Napoleonic Wars. Start pressing men from the merchant fleet into the RN and build new paddle wheel warships as fast as shipyards can build them. That's so easy no one will have a problem with it.

It would be easier for Britain to ramp up military production than for the US, because it's starting from a higher base, isn't going to be blockaded (and even a somewhat leaky blockade could seriously affect the US economy and ability to supply its armies), and can launch attacks on US soil whilst the US has no way of striking Britain.

 

[The Gunslinger]

Again, you make it sound so simple, and inexpensive in financial, and political costs. Just what are the British going to get out of this all-out war?

This goes both ways, what does America have to gain?

America was defaulting on loans and on the verge of bankruptcy in the beginning of 1815 and was probably going to default by April (this is on top of the complete sweep of her merchant navy from the seas, a serious inflation crisis and a gold crisis to boot). In 1861 there was a run on the banks at the mere threat of war with Britain during the Trent Affair. Why is America so willing to engage in a complete and total war over (I'm guessing) Hawaii and the Oregon Country?

 

[James Ricker]

Europe were a lot more worried about each other than the UK, plus the small matter of the home fleet. Of the four main players, Prussia can't do anything as it would have to worry about Russia and France. France can't do anything because of Prussia, Austria can't get anywhere

You forgot about the Ottoman Empire

 

[Belisarius II]

This goes both ways, what does America have to gain?

America was defaulting on loans and on the verge of bankruptcy in the beginning of 1815 and was probably going to default by April (this is on top of the complete sweep of her merchant navy from the seas, a serious inflation crisis and a gold crisis to boot). In 1861 there was a run on the banks at the mere threat of war with Britain during the Trent Affair. Why is America so willing to engage in a complete and total war over (I'm guessing) Hawaii and the Oregon Country?

Not much, which is why I keep saying in all these Anglo/American War threads that the war doesn't make much sense. That's why after 1815 it never happened. If something got out of hand and actual fighting started there would be every reason to bring it to a quick conclusion. The British never thought control of Hawaii was important to them, and Oregon was a distant wilderness that would soon be filling up with thousands of American settlers, were they only had a few hundred trappers living in. Nether was worth a war.

Sure, at the beginning of 1815 the U.S. Government was having a credit crisis, but no country ever lost a war because it had a credit crisis. The problem in 1812 was the U.S. decided to pay for the war by loans rather than tax increases. What Congress needed to do was raise taxes. Painful yes, but taxes at the time were very low. As a % of GDP the U.S. Debt was tiny next to that of the larger British GDP. The Americans were not going to agree to unfavorable terms of peace to end the war. The British had no expectation that the Americans would quit anytime soon so they dropped all their punitive demands and ended the war on pretty much a return to a prewar status.

Why wouldn't there be a run on the banks during the Trent Affair? War is usually very bad for business. The worst time ever for an Anglo/American war to breakout was during the Trent Affair. The Union would be in a desperate fight. From a British point of view, it wouldn't be a walk in the park ether. It wouldn't have done their economy any good, and what would they gain from it? Having a Slave Republic as an ally? Longterm bitterness from the Union? Great, that really advanced British interests.

 

[cerebropetrologist]

it's easy to see that 1 British soldier can train another man, and together they can beat 3 Americans.

The British would mostly be fighting behind fixed defences, so strictly speaking it'd be more like 2:6.

West Point prepared the young officers of the U.S. Army for Mexico, which inturn prepared them to be senior leaders in the Civil War.

Imagine that: the combination of West Point and Mexico looks really good in a war where the most experience any officer has is West Point and Mexico. Not only do we have no evidence for how American officers would perform in a war against other types of experience, but there are plenty of examples to show that West Point and Mexico did not always in fact prepare young officers to be senior leaders: Theophilus Holmes, George Pickett, Braxton Bragg, Irwin McDowell, John Pope, Edwin Sumner, Joseph Hooker, Samuel P. Heintzelman, Dixon Miles, and so on. Moreover, even American presidents overlook men with West Point and Mexico experience to appoint men like Banks, Butler, Polk...

Using the Mexican War for an example of what the U.S. could do is more relevant to a discussion then endlessly rehashing the defects of 1812.

The primary reason those defects don't arise in the Mexican-American War is because the United States is only raising a tiny force. When people suggest the US will raise a large force, we are absolutely right to look both back and forward to point out the problems that they will encounter in doing so.

That didn't happen in the ARW, 1812, or the ACW.

You'll need to explain what you were trying to say here:

• That the British didn't use emancipation as a weapon in 1775, 1779 and 1814
• That Nat Turner's rebellion of 1830 doesn't represent a watershed moment for the South's anxiety about rebellions of enslaved people
• That New England militia should have been sent to the Confederacy during the American Civil War

No statement makes much more sense than any of the others, but we may as well have clarity as to what you intended.

Using the word hypothetical in talking about a possible future situation is a normal way to talk about it. I really don't even understand what the heck you mean by saying my statements are mutually exclusive.

The enemy wasn't hypothetical ('Involving or of the nature of hypothesis; conjectural'); it was Britain. Your statements are mutually exclusive because you tell us that the British would find attacking ports extremely difficult, and then immediately afterwards tell us that the defences intended to protect against hypothetical British attacks were inadequate.

The officers who gave those reports were doing their jobs of think out worst case scenarios.

But that wasn't their job. Their job was to assess the situation based on realistic scenarios and propose realistic actions to mitigate those risks. Royal Navy planners in 1889 proposed the Two Power standard because there was a realistic scenario in which they went to war with France and Russia simultaneously. When the risk of war with France and Russia declined and the risk of war with Germany increased, they proposed a one power plus 60% standard. They didn't look at a "worst case scenario" in which Britain went to war with every European power because there was no point doing so.

In the same respect, the United States engineers took their most likely scenario of war with Britain; they looked at the wealth of publicly available information about Britain's strength (you don't seem to be able to find it, but I can and they could); they coupled it with their own knowledge and experience, and they asked the politicians to build the defences that would keep the country safe. As we've seen, however, the politicians then didn't build those defences, but instead starved the engineers of funds. What you ask us to do is to ignore the absence of the defences that the engineer officers you laud so highly said were essential to protect the country, and just assume that the British task is as difficult as it would be if those defences existed.

If the British attacked, what do you think they would do, give up? No, they'd make do with what they had.

What they'd actually do is lose: history is full of officers who warned their superiors about pending disaster but were overlooked until it was too late. Officers like Robert E. Lee, who in 1842 was busy highlighting the gap in the defences of New York which meant 'the enemy might be able to pass his ships up the Narrows, undisturbed by the fortifications on the opposite side.'

Respectfully you're nitpicking and missing the point.

Not really: you keep making big statements like 'The USN of the 1840's was a serious navy that knew it's job well' or 'In 1840 Boston would be defended by a lot more than 6 pounders' without providing any sort of evidence for your claims. Under these circumstances, that you couldn't find out (or chose not to check) something as simple as where Robert E. Lee was in 1840 - let alone that Lee highlighted gaps in the New York defences in 1842 - goes directly to the key question of competence. It's therefore worth pointing out, for the benefit of people who might be tempted to trust what you say.

Sure, they could land a few thousand men in some remote area and keep themselves tied up defending it.

Did the Union invasions of the South tie up more Union soldiers than Confederates? If not, why should British invasions of the South tie up more British soldiers than American ones, when the southern rail network is even less developed than it was in 1860?

Ireland is a special case.

Oh, of course it is! The last Irish rebellion was in 1803, and the next in 1848 was suppressed by 50 members of the Irish constabulary. In 1830 South Carolina envisaged taking military action against the federal government, and by 1861 the whole country was at war with itself. So naturally, the British can't move a soldier out of Ireland without the whole country erupting in flames, while the South will wholeheartedly and enthusiastically go into a war that threatens to add five free states to the currently equally-balanced union. Does anybody actually buy this line any more, or is it just something the American side feel they have to trot out every time the debate comes up?

The Irish Catholics were an occupied people always looking for a chance to be free. The English understood that and always feared a new revolt in Ireland. I think you're not understanding the situation in Ireland, or the English sensitivity to it.

I find it absolutely fascinating that you would talk about Ireland being "Irish Catholics" versus "the English" and in the same breath inform me that I don't understand the situation in Ireland.

The British were able to fortify several places in Canada, but most of the country was open to invasion.

None of it matters, though. The whole history of the invasion of Canada has been a struggle for key strategic points - Kingston, Montreal, Quebec - all of which, as you notice, the British have thoroughly fortified by the 1840s. If the United States wants to repeat its error of 1812-13, in which "for the sake of distracting the defence, they invaded, or attempted to invade, the frontier at too many points, with too many columns," I'm not sure why it should turn out any better for them this time round.

The Americans had several possible lines of advance, and Canada would be strained to cover them all...You're also making an illogical assumption that the defense can concentrate, but the attacker can't. That makes no sense.

I'm somewhat unsurprised that you've failed to understand one of the fundamental strategic principles, which particularly applies in this case: the possession of interior lines gives the defender an advantage in concentration. As the US Army explains:

The British enjoyed the advantage of interior lines of movement, communications, and supply, facilitated by control of the waterways. They were thus able to shift their limited forces from one threatened theater to the next to defeat each of the unsynchronized American threats in turn.

The circumstance of this hypothetical war, and how it would affect the balance between free & slave States is unclear.

No it isn't. The question of how recently-annexed Mexican territory would affect the balance of free and slave states was unclear, and it paralysed American politics for two years - revolvers drawn in Congress, fights and duels between representatives, Southern speakers contemplating secession - until a compromise was arrived at in which the possibility of admitting those territories as slave states was admitted. But there's no prospect of admitting the territories annexed as a result of a war with Britain as slave states; you can't grow cotton in Quebec. As we've seen, elements in the South feel themselves "bound to do all she can to stave off the acquisition of such a majority by the annexation of free territory... any encroachment upon her rights will be met by the thunders of war, and thousands of swords will leap from their scabbards, gleaming fiercely upon the field of her honor." How much clearer can they make it for you?

the war is not going to be fought by 90-day militia

Really. When Lincoln raised 75,000 volunteers to conquer the South - a task you say was "a massive undertaking that under the best of circumstances would take 3 years to achieve" - how long did he call them out for?

 

[Naval Aviation Fan]

That's not really a good analogy, since Pearl Harbour was a sneak attack carried out by a nation with whom the US was currently at peace. There's no reason to suppose the US would be similarly outraged over an attack by a country with whom the US was already at war

A better, and more clear cut analogy is needed then, right?

Still using the Japanese in the 1940's, the Japanese thought that they could win a war with the USA, who have more people, industry, and a larger fleet, because the Japanese had a larger army, and were on the far side of the Pacific Ocean, if only they could defeat the USN, and take the Philippine islands. In less than four years, the USA was in a position to, save for the Japanese surrender, to launch an invasion of their home islands. The Japanese misjudged the American People, and thought that they could get us to accept peace on Japanese terms. At no time did the Japanese bring ground warfare to the US mainland.

Now this hypothetical thought experiment takes place roughly 100 years sooner, in 1843.
Canada, with a population of 1.3 million, thinks they can 'win' a war with a USA that has 17+million people, if only they can inflict enough damage, and make the United States accept peace on Canadian terms, and this damage is going to be in the American heartland, not some faraway islands, and will not be targeting US military forces exclusively, while they, the Canadians, share an indefensible land border 1000's of miles long.

We know that the Canadians historically considered a quick strike, right at the outset of hostilities, against whatever targets that would potentially serve to allow the US to support an invasion of Canada, in a series of spoiling attacks, followed by running back to their own territory/defensive positions, in order to forestall and delay the inevitable invasion of Canada by the United States, and count on the RN and British army to keep the US from throwing their weight against them. The RN has already historically been known to perform Copenhagenization attacks, so the likelihood of this threads timing is probably a result of trying to keep California from the USA in/by 1850 with 300,000 settlers in place.

Because of that, combined with the lack of readiness of the USA to be able to invade Canada due to no real professional army at the start of hostilities, I find the cause of this war to be far more likely a British/Canadian attack, than one launched by an unready USA. I also think that what I am on about is a war that lasts like the RW did (1775-1783) rather than like the war of 1812 (~2.5 years in length), so once the fighting starts, there is going to be an initial time where the USA is at a disadvantage, then a time where the USA is building up, and then the final phase where the USA is going on the offensive, which results in all of the north american west coast ending up as part of the USA from then on. Say this war ends in 1851, and the USA rules from modern day US/Mexican border to Alaska/Russian north america. Considering the California alone got 300,000 settlers in more or less this time frame, and that the forces used in the Mexican-American war were tiny in comparison to this posited war, the USA in the ATL is going to be both far more militant and better armed, I cannot see the USA accepting just OTL's Canadian west coast at the peace table.

Will this USA march north on a line from the great lakes up to Hudson bay, and claim all the lands to the north and west? Or would they also take parts of Canada east of this, as well?

(perhaps even, depending on how the TL goes, a war that the US had started)

The US is fixated on reaching the Pacific Ocean at this time, and historically everything from Texas to California is taken by 1850, and the forces needed to make this happen are not beyond OTL, so I don't see it as likely that this war somehow is started by the USA.

-- and indeed, I'll note that the burning of Washington DC didn't result in a fanatical determination to fight a l'outrance, although you'd think that burning down the nation's capital would get the country far more riled up than attacking naval base.

Washington DC had only been the seat of congress since 1800, so a city 14 years old, while still a stinging blow to US pride, isn't really on a par with PH, where 1,000's died in a single day. In this thread, some posters have been on about how all the coastal cities in the US would be bombarded off the face of the earth, and while this isn't going to happen, even the far less damage that would take place is going to be far and away more enraging than the fires set in DC in 1814. For instance, if Detroit Mi, and/or Buffalo Ny are burned in 1843, this isn't going to just be a few government buildings, right?

No it's a smaller but more sophisticated force. Widespread use of steam means it is much easier to maintain a blockade as you are no longer dependent on favourable winds.

On this, you are completely and incontrovertibly wrong. In order for you to really take the lesson to heart, I'll leave it to you to figure out what the UK government knew about this issue back then, and why it precluded any attempt at blockading the US coast, at all. When you learn the reason the British government knew this wouldn't work, come back and announce it here in this thread, hopefully before someone else explains it.

It also still has a huge number of ships laid up in ordinary, the worlds largest merchant fleet by an enormous margin enabling rapid expansion via pressing trained men, the world largest and most sophisticated ship building industry enabling vast new construction and finally the institutional ability to put all of this together.

And despite all of that, it still cannot maintain a tight blockade of the entire US coastline. What it can do, at great expense and effort, is patrol the coastline, and blockade a few key ports, and what it cannot do is blockade European ports that are not actively at war with Britain at the time, so US ships that make it to a neutral port, can still conduct trade. And keep in mind, the neutral port need not be in Europe, as the Caribbean ports of European powers work just as well.

No they don't, relations with the July monarchy were good.

The UK must always be mindful of Europe's powers, and not just because one nation or another might decide to go against them, but because historically, collations of such have from time to time been know to bad together in the past, right?

Yes the RN does have worldwide commitments but they have the resources to cover them.

Not and attempt to fully blockade the entire US coastline at the same time they don't.

Depending on the timing the Opium War might be over and while suppressing the slave trade is important an active war is more important.

Not sure why this is here, to be honest?!?!

They maintained close blockades over many more French and French aligned ports for 20 years while also fighting all over the world, including against the US for a period.

Which and how many French ports, exactly? And how far were these from the home islands?

I agree you're not going to win the war by raiding 2nd and 3rd rank ports but you're going to tie up an enormous amount of US resources and damage political willingness to keep on a hopeless fight.

Hopeless fight? Hardly. Once Canada is defeated, and even before US forces take Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, the most die hard British hawks are going to come to the peace table. When the USA first won it's independence, and was a coastal country stuck between the sea and the appalachian mountains, that would have far greater effect, in 1812, a lesser effect, and in 1843, not all that much.

They had militia and yeomanry units which were one of the main routes for the provision of trained manpower into the regular army during the Napoleonic Wars. Also via the regimental system they had an effective and practised route for the provision of trained cadres for new units by raising additional battalions of a given regiment.

Absolutely. The US can get bulk numbers into the theatre of war more quickly than the British thanks to geography. The qualitative advantage will lie with the British however simply because they have more trained men pre war.

I think I'm finally starting to see the incorrect assumptions that drive the anti-US opinions and thought processes in this thread.

Premis, in 1843, the USA has not yet settled California with 100,000's of Americans, and has not yet defeated Mexico in the Mexican-American war, so what if an Anglo-American war could be fought, and the USA defeated, and it's national goal of "Manifest Destiny" could be prevented from coming to pass?

Historically, the United States easily wins the M-A war with a military operating on just a shoestring budget. What if, that same weak ass military was somehow forced to fight a larger war, and one they couldn't win?

The problem with this thought process is, that it presupposes that the USA will not mobilize to a higher degree than historically in this new situation, which is the only way for the USA to lose such a war. That flawed thinking is why we see so much denial of plain facts. Historically, the USA achieved a pacific coast without the need for a huge war, nor a huge military, but just 20 years later, the USA has millions of men taking up arms in the civil war.

For some reason, the anti-US folks in this thread think this is going to be a short war, and America easily defeated. I, on the other hand, think that this war is going to be more like a second revolutionary war, which saw fighting over an 8 calendar year timeframe, so something like:

1843-1846
Canada/Britain have the initial advantage, attack without warning, cause much damage in the opening months of the war. After initial losses, on both sides, but heavily favoring the British/Canadian side, things settle down, with less and less incursions into the USA, and costing the invaders more and more, while achieving less and less.

1847-1849
The USA mobilizes enough troops (the notional 600,000 I mentioned up thread) to fight and win the M-A war, as a minor side show, while taking all of the "Oregon Territory" and securing the entire western coastline of North America between modern day Alaska/Mexico. Do the British/Canadians make peace on America's terms at this point? If not...

1850-185?
The USA, with the west coast firmly in US hands (and actively, massively settled by americans), start marching back east, starting from former British Columbia, now American Columbia, and takes all of what would have been Canada, from the OTL US border to the pole, and from the Rockies to the Hudson bay, northern Quebec and on to the Atlantic coast. If still no peace, all the remaining heavily populated lands of Canada are taken, in the bloodiest fighting of the war, and the Atlantic provinces eventually fall as well, and the UK ends up getting kicked all the way out of North America.

Of course, this only happens if the British still think they can stop the USA from it's manifest destiny, and attempt to fight a war to this effect.

 

[Fabius Maximus]

Now this hypothetical thought experiment takes place roughly 100 years sooner, in 1843.
Canada, with a population of 1.3 million, thinks they can 'win' a war with a USA that has 17+million people, if only they can inflict enough damage, and make the United States accept peace on Canadian terms, and this damage is going to be in the American heartland, not some faraway islands, and will not be targeting US military forces exclusively, while they, the Canadians, share an indefensible land border 1000's of miles long.

Except it's not Canada, it's the British Empire -- you know, the biggest empire, with the biggest navy, and the biggest industrial base, of any nation in the world -- of which Canada is but a province. Treating this as an America vs. Canada thing is like treating Pearl Harbour as Japan vs. the State of Hawaii. It's either completely disingenuous or literally insane, and either way it casts serious doubt on the cogency of your position.

Because of that, combined with the lack of readiness of the USA to be able to invade Canada due to no real professional army at the start of hostilities, I find the cause of this war to be far more likely a British/Canadian attack, than one launched by an unready USA.

War of 1812, Mexican-American War, American Civil War... Having no real professional army doesn't seem to have stopped 19th-century Americans from starting wars.

Of course, this only happens if the British still think they can stop the USA from it's manifest destiny, and attempt to fight a war to this effect.

Erm, you do know that "Manifest Destiny" was just a slogan, right, and that America wasn't literally destined to achieve its present size come what may?

 

[Ambusher11]

No they don't, relations with the July monarchy were good.

Not always, in 1840 relations deteriorated when Britain allied with the other Great Powers in expelling France's ally Muhammad Ali from Syria.

 

[TrickyApe]

No it's a smaller but more sophisticated force. Widespread use of steam means it is much easier to maintain a blockade as you are no longer dependent on favourable winds. It also still has a huge number of ships laid up in ordinary, the worlds largest merchant fleet by an enormous margin enabling rapid expansion via pressing trained men, the world largest and most sophisticated ship building industry enabling vast new construction and finally the institutional ability to put all of this together.

The topic here is vague on when the hypothetical war takes place. At the beginning of the decade steam was still in its infancy in the British and all other navies. It wasn't until 1846 that the first British screw powered battleship (converted from sail) was completed. I believe there were only four by the end of the decade. Steam engines were heavy and consumed fuel inefficiently, so supplying a blockading fleet in the North Atlantic would be a challenge. The majority of any blockading force in the 1840's will still be sail, while small and short range steamships could come out from the blockaded ports and challenge it.

I would not be sanguine about forces based in Halifax and the West Indies trying to maintain a close blockade of the US seaboard during this decade. The coast of France was a lot easier to cover in the Napoleonic Wars. Things had already changed by the Crimean War and that was was fought on much more forgiving seas than the North Atlantic.

 

[A_simple_pilgrim]

I'd be very interested in hearing what people think the long term outcomes of such a war would be in the coming decades, from either perspective.

Do the British supporters think that long term economic damage might be caused by the blockades? Would this reduce the amount of immigration to the US, which greatly picked up during the 1840s and 50s. Would the US develop differently, and spend more on the military and navy compared to earlier? How would this funding be acquired? Would taxes be raised and a greater percent of the GDP be devoted to military spending? Would this have an impact on a future Mexican American war, if one occurs. Would a humiliated US take more land from Mexico?

For those who think the US will dominate, what parts of Canada, if any, would be added to the US. Would the victorious war lead to a more jingoistic US with more interventions and invasions of neighboring countries? Does the US military instead become critically underfunded as it's clearly good enough? What impact would this have on the British Empire? Would there be some resistance from dominions or colonies to participate in future conflicts if the UK is humiliated? What impact would this have on their domestic politics?

And something that occurs in either a victory, draw, or defeat, how would future Anglo-American relations evolve. Would trade between the two countries become permanently stunted? Would the US support anti-British forces internationally in the 19th and early 20th centuries? How would domestic US politics be impacted by this war, especially in regards to slavery? Would the US and its institutions be willing to lend large quantities of money and war materials in some future major European war?

I don't know enough about this particular period to answer any of these questions, but I think they are a bit more impactful than the minutia of particular coastal defenses in 1840.