That suits the Confederate/Bloc Sud position generally, above and beyond merely at Nashville
Cinco de Mayo
- Thread starter KingSweden24
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It doesn't seem like the Americans are heading straight for Nashville, but rather passing it to the East, but the point of closest approach is close enough that the defenses of Nashville can't really be reset. And once Nashville falls, the Union has almost an embarrassment of Riches in choosing the next target down the road (Tupelo, Birmingham or Chattanooga/Atlanta)
This is something we’ll get into (in the sequel thread of course) about the strategic debate of southwest, south or southeast from Nash once the city has fallen.
I’ve spoiled how that debate winds up going I think but still
*Any* of them are better than still being at the gates of Nashville. And the Confederacy has devoted so much effort in static defenses that once the US can get out into open areas, the war will start shifting much more quickly.
My feeling on Lenihan is "That's one way to get out of a transfer".
Unfortunately, Sherman's march to the sea can't be done in quite the same way as a 1910 era army will have a larger logistical tail than an 1860s. We'll see if the USN manages to make it safe for Supply ships to meet with the Army in Savannah (or nearby)
Alternatively, one can see Lenihan as “I’ve done it once and ILL DO IT AGAIN”
It doesn't appear that Lenihan did anything wrong. He'll stay in the midlands until the US has to pause to consolidate its gains. I'm not sure if that equals when Nashville is entirely under US control or at some other point, but, at least for now, the higher brass is not going to pull him out of the theatre. At *worst*, he'll find himself with a higher ranking officer governing the push as the size of the forces increase. (He can still be the point of the spear, but not the entire spear)
Oh no, that's not what I meant to imply at all. Lenihan (along with Pershing) are the two officers with the most direct experience actually sustaining genuine success in their theaters - Pershing for his bold move from Yuma to Mesilla and then repeating such at Hermosillo to Chihuahua, and Lenihan with his Kentucky River Offensive, followed on by punching his way down to the Tennessee border through the hollers, and then being the best tactical commander in the Nashville theater for Farnsworth to rely upon
Making Sense of the Senseless: The Great American War at 100
"...both President Smith and General Scott had, at different times near the start of the war, quite infamously boasted that the Confederacy would "never require" the imposition of conscription upon its male population, for two reasons that seem absurd in hindsight. The first was that the martial bravery and noble cavalier society of the Confederate man would result in such mass volunteering that there would never be a lack of willing men to head to the front; the second, of course, was the assumption that the war would be over within six months in the absolute worst case scenario.
By late April of 1915 - nearly twenty months later, not six, with no end to the war in sight - it was obvious that both of these assumptions were grievously incorrect. This was not to say that Confederate men were shirking their duty, simply that the rate of volunteers had slowed down dramatically after the heady early days and the number of deserters had ballooned. This was no longer the age of exciting, gallant breakthroughs such as plunging through Maryland to march on Philadelphia but a grim slog that every soul south of the Ohio had heard about in excruciating detail from survivors, even if civilians often had a hard time understanding what exactly was happening on the front and still had a disproportionately positive about the war, even as Confederate public war aims narrowed further to simply pushing the Yankee out of their territory (wholly possible in Virginia, at least) and keeping their rights on the Mississippi.
Unspoken regarding conscription, already imposed in Mexico and Argentina and now being actively debated in the United States for the first time, was a fear in the Confederate hierarchy that it was an admission of weakness, but now the political dynamic in Richmond had shifted markedly with the rise of the Alliance for Victory in the Senate as the chief power base in January and its slow spread to the House and then state legislatures; Thomas Martin's soft putsch had been a striking success in that effect. Martin was a canny political operator who in the space of a matter of months managed (with a great deal of help from the newspaper empire associated with ultra-hawkish Secretary of State Hoke Smith, who effectively abandoned the President as a political ally) to recast the entire conversation around the war. Conscription was no longer cowardly; it was now declared by Martin and his mouthpieces that it had been cowardly not to impose it, and not demanding further dedication to the war effort from the public through a general draft was what was costing Dixie the victory she had been due. It has often been remarked upon in academic studies of Confederate political culture that it is enormously consensus driven (Martin's political movement was, after all, called the National Consensus), but that said consensus can often change rapidly and suddenly, to the point of appearing to shift overnight. In part, this is because the high-consensus nature of the system itself threatens the political careers and sometimes even lives of those who go against it. It is much easier to change one's mind on an opinion that was held the day before than be out of a job, even if one's new opinion is the polar opposite of what one believed the day before. [1]
The position in support of conscription thus shifted enormously in the first three months of 1915 from being essentially a fringe position to passing overwhelmingly at Martin's behest, carried by huge bipartisan margins in Congress, and Smith, the lamest of lame ducks, quietly acceded to it. Since volunteer numbers were not that low, just not sufficient to sustain the Confederate Army's necessary size, conscription was initially pitched as a way to "top-up" the Confederacy's forces; disastrously, its implementation was left largely to the states to backfill their State Militias, but at the demand of the national government.
This meant that the success of Confederate conscription largely depended on how favorable towards Richmond any given state Governor and legislature was. Most states, regardless of if they were controlled by ex-Tillmanite Democrats, by Bourbons, or in most cases some hybrid of the two, were amenable, with one major exception - Texas. The Texas Party that controlled that state's legislature was already in an all-but-declared political war against its Alliance governor, James "Pa" Ferguson, as well as its Bourbon Senator, Charles Culberson, over patronage appointments. The decision to impose conscription upon a state that already felt ignored compared to its vast population and economic importance to the Confederacy outraged and radicalized the Texas street; while there were draft riots in many cities, the worst were the Dallas Draft Riots, in which six people were killed and dozens of businesses destroyed. The decision of the Texas Legislature to seek independence later in 1915 can be largely traced to the conscription decision, especially as news emerged later in the year of the sons of wealthy planters who had refused to volunteer paying their way into a draft deferral by way of hiring poorer men to "go to die" in their place, further casting the whole ordeal as a rich man's war fought at the yeomanry's expense..."
- Making Sense of the Senseless: The Great American War at 100
[1] Notice this with OTL Southern politics. One day, much of the South just woke up and went "Yup, we're not Democrats anymore" and within a few years the old Dixiecrat hegemony was gone; some states went from supermajority D legislatures to supermajority R legislatures in the span of a few cycles. Notice this also with segregation; Southern pols fought tooth and nail to preserve segregation, then ten years later were appointing lots of Black patronage positions. (George Wallace in the 1960s versus George Wallace in the late 1970s/early 1980s is an infamous example of this). A lot of them claimed there was some "come to Jesus" moment, but c'mon.
By late April of 1915 - nearly twenty months later, not six, with no end to the war in sight - it was obvious that both of these assumptions were grievously incorrect. This was not to say that Confederate men were shirking their duty, simply that the rate of volunteers had slowed down dramatically after the heady early days and the number of deserters had ballooned. This was no longer the age of exciting, gallant breakthroughs such as plunging through Maryland to march on Philadelphia but a grim slog that every soul south of the Ohio had heard about in excruciating detail from survivors, even if civilians often had a hard time understanding what exactly was happening on the front and still had a disproportionately positive about the war, even as Confederate public war aims narrowed further to simply pushing the Yankee out of their territory (wholly possible in Virginia, at least) and keeping their rights on the Mississippi.
Unspoken regarding conscription, already imposed in Mexico and Argentina and now being actively debated in the United States for the first time, was a fear in the Confederate hierarchy that it was an admission of weakness, but now the political dynamic in Richmond had shifted markedly with the rise of the Alliance for Victory in the Senate as the chief power base in January and its slow spread to the House and then state legislatures; Thomas Martin's soft putsch had been a striking success in that effect. Martin was a canny political operator who in the space of a matter of months managed (with a great deal of help from the newspaper empire associated with ultra-hawkish Secretary of State Hoke Smith, who effectively abandoned the President as a political ally) to recast the entire conversation around the war. Conscription was no longer cowardly; it was now declared by Martin and his mouthpieces that it had been cowardly not to impose it, and not demanding further dedication to the war effort from the public through a general draft was what was costing Dixie the victory she had been due. It has often been remarked upon in academic studies of Confederate political culture that it is enormously consensus driven (Martin's political movement was, after all, called the National Consensus), but that said consensus can often change rapidly and suddenly, to the point of appearing to shift overnight. In part, this is because the high-consensus nature of the system itself threatens the political careers and sometimes even lives of those who go against it. It is much easier to change one's mind on an opinion that was held the day before than be out of a job, even if one's new opinion is the polar opposite of what one believed the day before. [1]
The position in support of conscription thus shifted enormously in the first three months of 1915 from being essentially a fringe position to passing overwhelmingly at Martin's behest, carried by huge bipartisan margins in Congress, and Smith, the lamest of lame ducks, quietly acceded to it. Since volunteer numbers were not that low, just not sufficient to sustain the Confederate Army's necessary size, conscription was initially pitched as a way to "top-up" the Confederacy's forces; disastrously, its implementation was left largely to the states to backfill their State Militias, but at the demand of the national government.
This meant that the success of Confederate conscription largely depended on how favorable towards Richmond any given state Governor and legislature was. Most states, regardless of if they were controlled by ex-Tillmanite Democrats, by Bourbons, or in most cases some hybrid of the two, were amenable, with one major exception - Texas. The Texas Party that controlled that state's legislature was already in an all-but-declared political war against its Alliance governor, James "Pa" Ferguson, as well as its Bourbon Senator, Charles Culberson, over patronage appointments. The decision to impose conscription upon a state that already felt ignored compared to its vast population and economic importance to the Confederacy outraged and radicalized the Texas street; while there were draft riots in many cities, the worst were the Dallas Draft Riots, in which six people were killed and dozens of businesses destroyed. The decision of the Texas Legislature to seek independence later in 1915 can be largely traced to the conscription decision, especially as news emerged later in the year of the sons of wealthy planters who had refused to volunteer paying their way into a draft deferral by way of hiring poorer men to "go to die" in their place, further casting the whole ordeal as a rich man's war fought at the yeomanry's expense..."
- Making Sense of the Senseless: The Great American War at 100
[1] Notice this with OTL Southern politics. One day, much of the South just woke up and went "Yup, we're not Democrats anymore" and within a few years the old Dixiecrat hegemony was gone; some states went from supermajority D legislatures to supermajority R legislatures in the span of a few cycles. Notice this also with segregation; Southern pols fought tooth and nail to preserve segregation, then ten years later were appointing lots of Black patronage positions. (George Wallace in the 1960s versus George Wallace in the late 1970s/early 1980s is an infamous example of this). A lot of them claimed there was some "come to Jesus" moment, but c'mon.
Enlistment numbers not being that bad and the CSA previously using a Pals Battalion system means that there's probably whole towns with no men left alive between the ages of 16 and 60.
There can't be that many fighting age men left in the CSA overall. We're getting close to Atlanta being defended almost exclusively by old men and young boys. What's Dixie for "Volkssturm?"
There can't be that many fighting age men left in the CSA overall. We're getting close to Atlanta being defended almost exclusively by old men and young boys. What's Dixie for "Volkssturm?"
It looks like the last few months of 1915 are going to be WILD for the Confederacy. There's going to be a Presidential electon going on, Texas starts agitating for independence (either with, or without, initial Union support - but I doubt the Union is going to pass the chance to support Texas in that case), and the start of poor whites grumbling about how they are being asked to carry the burden of the war while the planter class manages to skate through with less problems.
Perhaps not *quite* that bad, but you’re going to get to a point where most of the defenders are either fresh conscripts or Ray Wise and Jack White from Cold Mountain (basically Soviet commissars and the reprobates attracted to such a job)
🎶The wheels on the bus fly off and off… 🎵
It’s going to get very, VERY rough, and no matter how bad it is just remember that 1916 will be worse
*grabs popcorn*
In all honesty, I'm expecting near societal collapse at this point, somewhat akin to Germany in the immediate aftermath of WW1. You're going to have the poor turning against the rich planters who got them into the war and then 'sold them out.' (actually, rather interesting if the stabbed in the back myth is focused on the upper class and not a racial minority), the Union liberating slaves where and whenever they find them, the steamrolling of major cities, and likely there's going to be famine before this war has ended.
What I'm really interested in is the Confederate eletions of 1915 - I know I'd initially thought that some poor general would try to rescue the situation by running and then still losing. But now it's looking more like that this new Alliance for Victory is going to foist some schmuck upon the people and, without a major opposition party, who ever they nominate is going to just ... win, because there's no one else running against them. So this just adds to the whole 'planters stabbed us in the back' narritive. I hope the Union gives him a good security detail because I don't see the man surviving long after the peace treaty is signed.
So what you’re saying is somebody is going to get the Full Erzberger 🙃
I really feel for the poor guy who's gonna be elected in 1915. Feels like it is better than even money he won't serve out his full term due to some sort of political violence.
Also, I like how the CSA has revised its goals downward. From "complete domination of North America, especially the Caribbean" to "hey, maybe we should have ratified Bliss-Blackburn after all!"
Also, I like how the CSA has revised its goals downward. From "complete domination of North America, especially the Caribbean" to "hey, maybe we should have ratified Bliss-Blackburn after all!"
Forgot that Lenihan had prior successes. Makes me hope (though the author has decided otherwise) that Lenihan would be the one headed through Atlanta to the sea. As an additional note, I can't see the US Army contracting after the GAW nearly to the same level as it did after OTL WWI, so hopefully he won't lose his General's star as he did iOTL (not due to anything he did wrong, just due to shrinkage of the military)
Also, I'm still thinking of where the treaty that ends the USA/CSA portion of the war should be negotiated/signed. Would the US go full Foch's Railway car (Compiègne Wagon) and go for Havana? If not, I think Madrid and San Juan might be candidates. Unfortunately, I doubt the USA and CSA would be going back to Niagara given some of the notes about the area in flashforward.
Every time someone says "Atlanta" General Sherman vaporizes a Confederate in hell.
Im sure it was discussed earlier in the thread but i cant for the life of me remember. In terms of military uniforms what are we looking at ITTL? Are the US and CS still defined by the colors they wear? or have they moved to more muted colors more like the US uniforms in WW1?
I am also very much looking forward to the "finding out" stage of "f around and find out" coming to full fruition for the CSA
I am also very much looking forward to the "finding out" stage of "f around and find out" coming to full fruition for the CSA
Hi. Still catching on, getting to 1895.
So, on French politics under Napoléon IV in the 1880s and 1890s, a few more remarks.
I read that you had Freycinet as Foreign Minister during the Sino French war ITTL, being a moderate republican that eventually switched. While that's not impossible, I don't think it natural.
I don't know much on Freycinet, except that he was an engineer by trade, and his political carreer had basically begun as a helping hand to Gambetta in his efforts organizing French resistance and efforts after Sedan. Without Gambetta and without the war happening as badly as it did IOTL, I surmise Freycinet would not have had the occasion to rise above the fray and he have probably stayed in either an administrative office or landed at some private job.
The thing, given the repressive turn of 1867 ITTL and then the corporatist, proto integralist constitution of Napoléon IV, there is no much room left for the republican or liberal opposition to be coopted. Basically anyone who was a republican before 1848, who remembered the days of the Second Republic or was born early enough to be a student and radicalize with republican ideas under Napoléon III (so any republican, moderate or republican born before 1850), would not have gone along with either "Les Trois" or Napoléon IV TTL project. They would have gone with the OTL parliamentarian system set up by the constitution of 1870 under Ollivier (when Ollivier negotiated the formation of his government, Gambetta was sounded out and rather than rejecting it, was "open" to it, though that meant he demanded the powerful Interior Ministry ) if it had survived the 1870 war, but the authoritarian system under Les Trois, and the powerless parliament under Napoléon IV, would have been anathema to republicans, even those decried as "opportunistic" (coined by the radical republicans I believe, but that should be understood as "pragmatic"). Their participation would have required some political concessions, not empty ones, I think. You might have looked to the OTL program of Belleville for instance, Gambetta's plank for 1869 elections.
Instead, for Napoléon IV, I would have looked more towards conservative-liberal monarchists, especially Orléanists. Broglie, which you briefly mention as having occupied several positions, Decazes, or even Gramont if still alive (a carreer diplomat, and not utterly discredited by the war of 1870 ITTL), each of them serving at the Quai d'Orsay at some point IOTL, either under Napoléon III or MacMahon, and also all dukes. Otherwise, on more domestic matters, after Rouher, I would like into figures among the OTL monarchists and bonapartists that eventually rallied the republic in the late 1880s or 1890s, like Mackau or Bardi de Fourtou, or among those who supported the wannabe Boulanger putsch.
On the Panama scandal also, Eiffel's scapegoating seems logical. I'd say it would be even more logical, considering that Lesseps was a relative, albeit distant, of Dowager Empress Eugénie, and putting too much blame on his shoulders could have tainted Eugénie and through her, Napoléon IV. I don't recollect reading much on Lesseps' connection with Eugénie, and I guess harsh press censorship could have avoided it, but did you use that plotline in any way? I just think the connection is too tempting to make for the regime opponents to use it against Napoléon IV and the imperial regime.
That's sad for Eiffel in this TL though, since the whole scandal stemmed from Lesseps' stubborn refusal to budge from a sea level canal and the technical issues with it that were near impossible to overcome, leading to financing issues and schemes that brought about the OTL scandal, while Eiffel, an engineer by trade, advocated for locks, like would be done by the Americans not long after, but arrived in the project far too late to save it. In a thread of mine, I even discussed the possibility of removing Lesseps from the picture (getting conveniently dead), giving the reins of the project to Eiffel from the beginning, giving a working canal in the 1890s, and no scandal.
So, on French politics under Napoléon IV in the 1880s and 1890s, a few more remarks.
I read that you had Freycinet as Foreign Minister during the Sino French war ITTL, being a moderate republican that eventually switched. While that's not impossible, I don't think it natural.
I don't know much on Freycinet, except that he was an engineer by trade, and his political carreer had basically begun as a helping hand to Gambetta in his efforts organizing French resistance and efforts after Sedan. Without Gambetta and without the war happening as badly as it did IOTL, I surmise Freycinet would not have had the occasion to rise above the fray and he have probably stayed in either an administrative office or landed at some private job.
The thing, given the repressive turn of 1867 ITTL and then the corporatist, proto integralist constitution of Napoléon IV, there is no much room left for the republican or liberal opposition to be coopted. Basically anyone who was a republican before 1848, who remembered the days of the Second Republic or was born early enough to be a student and radicalize with republican ideas under Napoléon III (so any republican, moderate or republican born before 1850), would not have gone along with either "Les Trois" or Napoléon IV TTL project. They would have gone with the OTL parliamentarian system set up by the constitution of 1870 under Ollivier (when Ollivier negotiated the formation of his government, Gambetta was sounded out and rather than rejecting it, was "open" to it, though that meant he demanded the powerful Interior Ministry ) if it had survived the 1870 war, but the authoritarian system under Les Trois, and the powerless parliament under Napoléon IV, would have been anathema to republicans, even those decried as "opportunistic" (coined by the radical republicans I believe, but that should be understood as "pragmatic"). Their participation would have required some political concessions, not empty ones, I think. You might have looked to the OTL program of Belleville for instance, Gambetta's plank for 1869 elections.
Instead, for Napoléon IV, I would have looked more towards conservative-liberal monarchists, especially Orléanists. Broglie, which you briefly mention as having occupied several positions, Decazes, or even Gramont if still alive (a carreer diplomat, and not utterly discredited by the war of 1870 ITTL), each of them serving at the Quai d'Orsay at some point IOTL, either under Napoléon III or MacMahon, and also all dukes. Otherwise, on more domestic matters, after Rouher, I would like into figures among the OTL monarchists and bonapartists that eventually rallied the republic in the late 1880s or 1890s, like Mackau or Bardi de Fourtou, or among those who supported the wannabe Boulanger putsch.
Unless Napoléon IV reinstated them, France did not have any property requirements since the overthrow of the July Monarchy in 1848. The Order Party under Thiers had though replaced it with a more permicious requirement on residency that eliminated a third of the electoral corps in 1850 (you needed to reside in the same place for three years to be able to vote, so if were an itinerant worker looking for job from a city to another...); that law had been a pretext used by Napoléon III to launch his coup the next year, reinstating universal male suffrage. Universal male suffrage subsisted under the Second Empire, though it was "guided" with the "Official candidacy" system. There was even secret ballot, from what I could gather, enshrined in the 1848 constitution, and though Napoléon III considered removing it, he ultimately kept it, though in its application, I read it was anything but thorough.
On the Panama scandal also, Eiffel's scapegoating seems logical. I'd say it would be even more logical, considering that Lesseps was a relative, albeit distant, of Dowager Empress Eugénie, and putting too much blame on his shoulders could have tainted Eugénie and through her, Napoléon IV. I don't recollect reading much on Lesseps' connection with Eugénie, and I guess harsh press censorship could have avoided it, but did you use that plotline in any way? I just think the connection is too tempting to make for the regime opponents to use it against Napoléon IV and the imperial regime.
That's sad for Eiffel in this TL though, since the whole scandal stemmed from Lesseps' stubborn refusal to budge from a sea level canal and the technical issues with it that were near impossible to overcome, leading to financing issues and schemes that brought about the OTL scandal, while Eiffel, an engineer by trade, advocated for locks, like would be done by the Americans not long after, but arrived in the project far too late to save it. In a thread of mine, I even discussed the possibility of removing Lesseps from the picture (getting conveniently dead), giving the reins of the project to Eiffel from the beginning, giving a working canal in the 1890s, and no scandal.
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