Confederate Industrialization and Imperialism

Delta Force

Banned
I am writing a CSA victory timeline for a nation sim that starts in 1950. In the timeline the CSA expands to include the Southwest, Indian Territory, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware, and DC. Virginia also brings the "secessionist counties" of West Virginia back under its control. The Confederacy manages to win its independence without the direct intervention of foreign powers in the conflict, but it does have a better diplomatic outreach effort during the war and thus has higher foreign diplomatic and material support.

I was wondering how the CSA would go through the process of industrializing since the war showed the danger of relying on sales of raw materials to foreign nations for the hard currency with which to purchase finished goods, especially of a military nature. The CSA constitution prohibited funds raised in one state from being used to fund infrastructure development in another state, so things like railroads are going to require interstate agreements or private investment. However, the federal government would likely fund the development of important defense industries such as arsenals and shipyards, the industries traditionally being federally run in the US during the period.

Also, how would the system of slavery change (and eventually be phased out) with the independence of the CSA, especially over time? Might they be used in factories and other semi-skilled professions as the country industrializes?

Lastly, how would the CSA go about imperialism? Is it possible that the CSA would go about imperialism through methods like purchasing Cuba from Spain, or would it more likely have to go about it through invasion? Would the CSA ever try to go outside of the Americas, or would it be mostly confined there?
 
I am writing a CSA victory timeline for a nation sim that starts in 1950. In the timeline the CSA expands to include the Southwest, Indian Territory, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware, and DC. Virginia also brings the "secessionist counties" of West Virginia back under its control.

How does the CSA control all that? Black Magic? The CSA will control Deleware the day after Hell freezes over and not before. KY is barely doable (and only with an early POD) and DC is the Twilight Zone. When the CSA tried invading the Southwest it got its butt BADLY KICKED. In fact every time it invaded Union Territory it wound up as a disaster. So how did it pull that off in the first place?
 
How does the CSA control all that? Black Magic? The CSA will control Deleware the day after Hell freezes over and not before. KY is barely doable (and only with an early POD) and DC is the Twilight Zone. When the CSA tried invading the Southwest it got its butt BADLY KICKED. In fact every time it invaded Union Territory it wound up as a disaster. So how did it pull that off in the first place?

With an early enough POD (1862) the CS has the Indian Territory, Kentucky and the secessionist counties of West Virginia firmly under it's control, so those alone are doable. We still have a rump West Virginia, but it certainly doesn't resemble OTL's WV, in fact it's smaller and still has it's OTL western borders.

At this point the CS has a friend down in Mexico, who is a puppet of Napoleon III, so I wonder how that turns out.
 
With an early enough POD (1862) the CS has the Indian Territory, Kentucky and the secessionist counties of West Virginia firmly under it's control, so those alone are doable. We still have a rump West Virginia, but it certainly doesn't resemble OTL's WV, in fact it's smaller and still has it's OTL western borders.

At this point the CS has a friend down in Mexico, who is a puppet of Napoleon III, so I wonder how that turns out.

It still won't get DC, Deleware, Maryland and the Southwest. Kentucky was by no means under firm CSA control in 1862. It was neutral leaning Union until Sept and was soon kicked out of most of the state by Grant.
 
It still won't get DC, Deleware, Maryland and the Southwest. Kentucky was by no means under firm CSA control in 1862. It was neutral leaning Union until Sept and was soon kicked out of most of the state by Grant.

As I recollect, around 2/3 of Kentucky was under CS control in the Fall of 1862. Much of West Virginia was under CS control at the same time, as was Oklahoma.

No DC, no Arizona, no Maryland, no Missouri, no Delaware.
 
As I recollect, around 2/3 of Kentucky was under CS control in the Fall of 1862. Much of West Virginia was under CS control at the same time, as was Oklahoma.

No DC, no Arizona, no Maryland, no Missouri, no Delaware.

KY declared for the Union in Sept 1861, was out of Bowling Green by Feb 1862, AS Johnston's line in KY collapsed entirely in June 1862 and was pushed out of the Cumberland Gap, Bragg then invaded and never got past Perryville. This is hardly a record of the state being under firm CSA control!
 
KY declared for the Union in Sept 1861, was out of Bowling Green by Feb 1862, AS Johnston's line in KY collapsed entirely in June 1862 and was pushed out of the Cumberland Gap, Bragg then invaded and never got past Perryville. This is hardly a record of the state being under firm CSA control!

After many of the state's voters protested the 1861 election.

During Bragg's invasion of the state, 2/3 of Kentucky sat under Confederate control. If Lee can pull off a successful victory in the East in time for Bragg to sit on Kentucky long enough, then the Bluegrass State ends up in the CSA if he is able to run down the clock after a British/French recognition.
 
After many of the state's voters protested the 1861 election.

During Bragg's invasion of the state, 2/3 of Kentucky sat under Confederate control. If Lee can pull off a successful victory in the East in time for Bragg to sit on Kentucky long enough, then the Bluegrass State ends up in the CSA if he is able to run down the clock after a British/French recognition.

It was hardly firm control. He made it to Perryville and had to retreat for lack of supplies. If it was under firm control or the CSA was strong in KY he could have gotten supplies from Kentuckians eager to help him kick out the Yankees but that didn't happen. He went into KY with about 20,000 rifles to give to those that would rally to him and all he got was around a couple of hundred volunteers.
 
I was wondering how the CSA would go through the process of industrializing since the war showed the danger of relying on sales of raw materials to foreign nations for the hard currency with which to purchase finished goods, especially of a military nature. The CSA constitution prohibited funds raised in one state from being used to fund infrastructure development in another state, so things like railroads are going to require interstate agreements or private investment. However, the federal government would likely fund the development of important defense industries such as arsenals and shipyards, the industries traditionally being federally run in the US during the period.

One of the biggest problems is that the Southern culture of the time wasn't very conducive to industrialization and establishing (and operating) major businesses. Doctor Thomas Sowell wrote a book on some of the effects that local culture had on the economy of the South, and he's far from the only one. What little productive industry existed (even more complex agricultural fields such as cheese or wine making) tended to be established and run by Yankees, or foreign emigrants, such as Jews or Germans.
 
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There was a thread on Confederate Industrialisation not too long ago that had a lot of interesting things to say from Jared. I recommend reading the thread here. Except because your Confederacy has a lot more territory, presumably it'd be slightly different/better going than Jared's scenario.
 
Here is something that might be relavent, lord knows i always love a good debate about kentucky.

The map i attached showed the population centers presently, but in the time of the civil war it was roughly the same proportions. While Bragg made it all the way to Perryville, he never took control of a major population center (although Lexington did change hands several times, and the capital was taken). While the confederates had fair amount of land covered, they didn't exactly control it, and then got kicked straight out. They never had even a decent chunk of the population under their control.


And to answer the Op's question, my guess is that they wouldn't gradually phase out slavery. It would take on an industrialized form, with brutal labor practices being used to expand as much as possible. But, i don't know enough about economics to guarantee it. I've read it was becoming unprofitable before the war. As far as spreading territory, they'd use force whenever diplomacy didn't work. Assuming that is, that they're stable and cohesive.

Kentucky_population_map.png
 

Delta Force

Banned
How does the CSA control all that? Black Magic? The CSA will control Deleware the day after Hell freezes over and not before. KY is barely doable (and only with an early POD) and DC is the Twilight Zone. When the CSA tried invading the Southwest it got its butt BADLY KICKED. In fact every time it invaded Union Territory it wound up as a disaster. So how did it pull that off in the first place?

It might not be the most realistic scenario, but the CSA does need to be powerful enough to keep the US in check. The timeline is being made for a nation simulation so it is not exactly "hard" alternate history, World War I still happens around the same time and people who would have been butterflied away still exist. People are going to be more interested in reading about what Joe McCarthy or Strom Thurmond or the kaisers are doing than what some random anti-communist or Southern politician or Germanic leader are doing.

One of the biggest problems is that the Southern culture of the time wasn't very conducive to industrialization and major businesses. Doctor Thomas Sowell wrote a book on some of the effects that local culture had on the economy of the South, and he's far from the only one. What little productive industry existed (even more complex agricultural fields such as cheese or wine making) tended to be established and run by Yankees, or foreign emigrants, such as Jews or Germans.

So basically the CSA is likely to end up as the biggest banana republic economy ever? I guess in this timeline it would end up being called a cotton or petroleum republic then.
 
So basically the CSA is likely to end up as the biggest banana republic economy ever? I guess in this timeline it would end up being called a cotton or petroleum republic then.

No. I would consider it, from what I've seen, to probably be somewhere along the lines of a slightly better Canada in terms of power.
 
It might not be the most realistic scenario, but the CSA does need to be powerful enough to keep the US in check. The timeline is being made for a nation simulation so it is not exactly "hard" alternate history, World War I still happens around the same time and people who would have been butterflied away still exist. People are going to be more interested in reading about what Joe McCarthy or Strom Thurmond or the kaisers are doing than what some random anti-communist or Southern politician or Germanic leader are doing.

So you need an unrealistically strong CSA for an improbable scenario so that people who can't appreciate Inherit the Wind will be interested.

Okay, I can follow that. But at that point, what's the point of asking what the CSA would do in a realistic universe?
 

Delta Force

Banned
So you need an unrealistically strong CSA for an improbable scenario so that people who can't appreciate Inherit the Wind will be interested.

Okay, I can follow that. But at that point, what's the point of asking what the CSA would do in a realistic universe?

Plenty of other timelines have done that to make their plots more interesting or simply to explore unusual circumstances, in this case it is both those reasons as well as game balance considerations. My nation sim timelines may have some unusual PoDs and minimization of butterflies, but that is a matter of artistic choice. I like to have detailed backstories to allow for responses realistic to the circumstances of the timeline (even if some of the events are unlikely), so just making a Golden Circle CSA where slave reigns forever is just silly. That, and the research on how things would turn out after a CSA victory is interesting in its own right.
 
Plenty of other timelines have done that to make their plots more interesting or simply to explore unusual circumstances, in this case it is both those reasons as well as game balance considerations. My nation sim timelines may have some unusual PoDs and minimization of butterflies, but that is a matter of artistic choice. I like to have detailed backstories to allow for responses realistic to the circumstances of the timeline (even if some of the events are unlikely), so just making a Golden Circle CSA where slave reigns forever is just silly. That, and the research on how things would turn out after a CSA victory is interesting in its own right.

Plenty of other timelines are crap. This does not mean that your timeline is by definition crap - I'm just saying that "plenty of others have done this" doesn't mean it's a good idea.

And the problem with "responses realistic to the circumstances of the timeline" is that the timeline's circumstances themselves have quite actively averted realistic developments in order to have things like McCarthy and Thurmond in (apparently) basically OTL roles - which is to say, if realistic responses were made to and by an independent CSA, those wouldn't exist.

It's not even about random sperm, it's about things like how the course of things that lead OTL Thurmond to a political career don't exist because for instance, this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clemson_University will be significantly impacted by an entirely different than OTL course of politics, which means Thurmond isn't going to go to school there (because it might not even exist) and he won't be a part of the 82nd Airborne because even if that unit exists it'd be for a foreign country, which changes his post-war career (assuming a WWII on OTL's schedule too), which changes his political career . . .

It is just jarringly inserting figures from one world into another. It's practically the same as putting Brady ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inherit_the_Wind_%28play%29#Cast_of_characters ) into a Retrospective Political Election thread, in terms of how out of place the person is.

In my less than humble opinion.
 

Delta Force

Banned
Plenty of other timelines are crap. This does not mean that your timeline is by definition crap - I'm just saying that "plenty of others have done this" doesn't mean it's a good idea.

And the problem with "responses realistic to the circumstances of the timeline" is that the timeline's circumstances themselves have quite actively averted realistic developments in order to have things like McCarthy and Thurmond in (apparently) basically OTL roles - which is to say, if realistic responses were made to and by an independent CSA, those wouldn't exist.

It's not even about random sperm, it's about things like how the course of things that lead OTL Thurmond to a political career don't exist because for instance, this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clemson_University will be significantly impacted by an entirely different than OTL course of politics, which means Thurmond isn't going to go to school there (because it might not even exist) and he won't be a part of the 82nd Airborne because even if that unit exists it'd be for a foreign country, which changes his post-war career (assuming a WWII on OTL's schedule too), which changes his political career . . .

It is just jarringly inserting figures from one world into another. It's practically the same as putting Brady ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inherit_the_Wind_(play)#Cast_of_characters ) into a Retrospective Political Election thread, in terms of how out of place the person is.

In my less than humble opinion.

Thurmond and McCarthy were just some period appropriate examples of what I am likely to do with prominent personalities in the timeline, not something that I necessarily plan on having happen with the timeline. That said, I am interested in your view on how you would go about handling it. I am trying to keep the timeline something that is not too long (no more than a dozen or two dozen pages), not exactly to write a novelization.
 
Thurmond and McCarthy were just some period appropriate examples of what I am likely to do with prominent personalities in the timeline, not something that I necessarily plan on having happen with the timeline. That said, I am interested in your view on how you would go about handling it. I am trying to keep the timeline something that is not too long (no more than a dozen or two dozen pages), not exactly to write a novelization.

Well, the same can probably be applied to most OTL figures, over the course of ninety years since the POD.

As for how I'd handle it, I'd start by figuring out how the CSA won. In brief:

1) Early (1862)

2) Late, exhaustion (Lincoln loses with a POD in 1864)

3) Late, better performance (Lincoln loses with a POD in 1863)

Any of those work well enough to get going. For your project, I think the first is best - less Union success in the West, enough Confederate success in the East for recognition, and the CSA is in a position for the Union's war effort to be seriously weakened.

The next thing would be figuring out how much changes outside North America up to 1914.

Then, taking that and events within North America into consideration, I'd see how the Great War occurs (assuming it still does).

And after that and the aftermath are settled - well, I don't know how that would be settled so I don't know what next.

But a tremendous amount of the 1950 world will be shaped by what does (and doesn't) happen in the 1890-1920 period, and what the next war is - if there has been one yet.

The timeline proper doesn't have to detail all of this, but you need a good idea of how the major wars and major geopolitical clashes worked here, and it won't just be "OTL but with the CSA watching". The CSA's presence complicates USA politics too much for that, and the USA is very relevant to the Great War.

I'm not sure off the top of my head what to suggest on specifics, but I hope this helps gives some basis for seeing what OTL events might be more or less the same barring pesky chaotic butterflies, and what would be not the same just because you've changed the circumstances that they happened in.
 
Er, but, but didn't we just go through this very thread, just recently, except you were specific about your POD, which I told you a few problems with?

Were you hoping we'd forgotten?

And, haven't we already recently explained at least five times recently that even if you did figure how to get Confederate survival, which you haven't, their fate would be to not industrialize and lose to whomever they tried to grab?
 
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