In Which Year Was a Confederate Victory Most Possible?

In Which Year Was a Confederate Victory Most Possible?

  • 1861

    Votes: 60 50.0%
  • 1862

    Votes: 41 34.2%
  • 1863

    Votes: 9 7.5%
  • 1864

    Votes: 9 7.5%
  • 1865

    Votes: 1 0.8%

  • Total voters
    120
Bingo, stopping the Normandy Invasion is the exact opposite of a successful Sealion. Only by near divine intervention is one side going to win it.

Since someone has already brought up Tsouras, his Disaster at D-Day is not too bad.

http://www.amazon.com/Disaster-D-Day-Germans-Defeat-Allies/dp/1848327234

In places it is just about plausible, and he manages to keep the Brit-Bashing under control (Unlike his later work).
Although there are actual factual mistakes, he certainly does a better job than some writers.
 
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For the same reasons the British didn't have a large army the US didn't have one either and you can blame Cromwell for that (and to some extent, arguable how much, left over feelings from the British occupation of Boston pre Revolution).

Cromwell? Oliver Cromwell? What has he to do with the American civil war and large armies?

But really it boils down to railroads, steamboats and the sheer size of armies. It was a relatively simple matter to move troops around, and even when an army was in serious jeopardy, reinforcements could be sent relatively quickly from hundreds of miles away. A problem that would get worse in future wars in terms of forcing decisions.

If I remember right, Europe was industrialized too in these times and is what also quite easy to move armies around over there (between Germany and France, Austria and Prussia...)
 
Cromwell? Oliver Cromwell? What has he to do with the American civil war and large armies?



If I remember right, Europe was industrialized too in these times and is what also quite easy to move armies around over there (between Germany and France, Austria and Prussia...)
The whole thing with the distrust of standing armies.Because of military rule,the English/British were heavily suspicious of standing armies.This sentimentality was transferred to the US via English settlers and was reinforced when Britain billeted troops in the 13 colonies following the 7 Years War and tried to reinforce their rule their with standing soldiers.
 
was reinforced when Britain billeted troops in the 13 colonies following the 7 Years War and tried to reinforce their rule their with standing soldiers.
Actually, billeting itself is seen as broadly positive, certainly in the British context: it forces soldiers to be part of the community instead of seeing themselves as separate. The 1689 Bill of Rights complains about "quartering soldiers contrary to law," when James's actions were linked to the Huguenot experience of dragonnades, but not the practice of quartering itself. In fact, the criticism of continental absolutist regimes in the early to mid-19th century is focused on "bureau and barrack", or, in other words, formal and centralised administrative and military regimes. As one British MP said:

There were few commemorations more interesting than those of our municipal institutions, reminding us of our Saxon ancestors, who were so jealous of the principle of local self-government, justly considering this to be the very essence of national liberty and independence. How different the English mayor of Beverley, administering independently the affairs of his borough and dispensing justice from the bench, free from any dictator influence, and a French prefect, acting under orders from one of the government Bureaux in Paris. It can never be too frequently or too strongly impressed, that centralisation is the bane of true liberty. (Hull Packet, 14 November 1862)

A broadly shared British view at the time, based on Caesar and the Roman republic, Napoleon Bonaparte and Louis Napoleon, and Cromwell and the Commonwealth, is that republics 'ultimately succumb to the iron hand of a bold and successful warrior' (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 5 November 1861 p.2). In terms of what really concerns them in the American context, though, it's more the criminalisation of dissent and the way that a long military occupation of the South might change the nature of the republic than large standing armies and conscription per se. The British are actually coming to quite like their own regular army post-Crimea/Indian Mutiny, even if they don't fully trust those of others.
 
The whole thing with the distrust of standing armies.Because of military rule,the English/British were heavily suspicious of standing armies.This sentimentality was transferred to the US via English settlers and was reinforced when Britain billeted troops in the 13 colonies following the 7 Years War and tried to reinforce their rule their with standing soldiers.

Wait - didn't the puritan colonists support the roundheads in the English Civil War? Taking into account that Cromwell was a republican, one could suspect that the Americans held him in grateful memory.
 
Actually, billeting itself is seen as broadly positive, certainly in the British context: it forces soldiers to be part of the community instead of seeing themselves as separate. The 1689 Bill of Rights complains about "quartering soldiers contrary to law," when James's actions were linked to the Huguenot experience of dragonnades, but not the practice of quartering itself. In fact, the criticism of continental absolutist regimes in the early to mid-19th century is focused on "bureau and barrack", or, in other words, formal and centralised administrative and military regimes. As one British MP said:

There were few commemorations more interesting than those of our municipal institutions, reminding us of our Saxon ancestors, who were so jealous of the principle of local self-government, justly considering this to be the very essence of national liberty and independence. How different the English mayor of Beverley, administering independently the affairs of his borough and dispensing justice from the bench, free from any dictator influence, and a French prefect, acting under orders from one of the government Bureaux in Paris. It can never be too frequently or too strongly impressed, that centralisation is the bane of true liberty. (Hull Packet, 14 November 1862)

A broadly shared British view at the time, based on Caesar and the Roman republic, Napoleon Bonaparte and Louis Napoleon, and Cromwell and the Commonwealth, is that republics 'ultimately succumb to the iron hand of a bold and successful warrior' (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 5 November 1861 p.2). In terms of what really concerns them in the American context, though, it's more the criminalisation of dissent and the way that a long military occupation of the South might change the nature of the republic than large standing armies and conscription per se. The British are actually coming to quite like their own regular army post-Crimea/Indian Mutiny, even if they don't fully trust those of others.
Doesn't matter.Billeting was one of the grievances that the American settlers that caused the American Revolution. And the view that the army criminalizes dissent is somewhat reinforced by Cromwell's military rule and most certainly how Britain tried to enforce their rule in the colonies through military force.
 
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Doesn't matter.
Well, not if you're only bothered about the American view. If your horizons are a little wider, though, sometimes it's nice to be able to set a topic in its broader British and continental European context and to appreciate the different nuances of approaches to billeting over time. Particularly when someone might never have come across this particular topic before.

the view that the army criminalizes dissent
You're slightly misunderstanding what I said: it's actually that the Union civilian authorities appear to be criminalising dissent, in a way that builds on existing fears about the rights of minorities in a democratic society. Campbell's English Public Opinion and the American Civil War, pp. 102-10 is really good on this, or you could go to Mill's On Liberty or Tocqueville's Democracy in America for a more contemporary viewpoint.

Taking into account that Cromwell was a republican, one could suspect that the Americans held him in grateful memory.
Cromwell also argued against full democracy (the Putney debates, though contemporaries lacked the specifics of what he'd said; this might be of interest), forcibly dissolved an elected parliament (the Rump, though elected quite some time ago), installed a nominated Parliament (Barebones') which he then forcibly dissolved, dissolved a second elected parliament (First Protectorate), installed regional military governors, and appointed his son as his successor. If you're looking for a hero, there are other less morally ambiguous ones to choose.

Cromwell was a pariah figure until the mid-19th century, when Thomas Carlyle took an interest in him and attempted to redeem his reputation. Interestingly, showing the cultural cross-over, British observers often compared Stonewall Jackson to Cromwell (as well as to Havelock, the hero of the Indian Rebellion a few year earlier). If you're interested in Cromwell's legacy, Blair Worden's Roundhead Reputations is a really interesting and accessible book. Only for the British viewpoint, unfortunately.
 
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BlondieBC

Banned
I think another big problem here is lack of trained officers and staff in both armies. US has to be much more militarized and have a lot more officers available at the start of the war to be able to achieve control needed for complex maneuver. Not sure how this can be brought about

You can't really do it once the war starts. What you really have to have is states in the south investing a LOT more resources in training a good militia versus having a slave catching militia. It seems like a really hard POD to write since we did not really like taxes back then. And it has to be one side (South only) paying for funds. I guess you could get some scenario where the Texas wants a second shot at annexing parts of Mexico, or various Southern states really want Cuba in the 1850's.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
You can't really do it once the war starts. What you really have to have is states in the south investing a LOT more resources in training a good militia versus having a slave catching militia. It seems like a really hard POD to write since we did not really like taxes back then. And it has to be one side (South only) paying for funds. I guess you could get some scenario where the Texas wants a second shot at annexing parts of Mexico, or various Southern states really want Cuba in the 1850's.
Actually, it's not very hard to get at least the snipy-shooty thing inculcated in. It takes a few weeks to train a teacher, and then that teacher can handle their own entire battalion.
You could quite easily - if there was the driver for it - train a few hundred teachers, twenty at a time, and then those teachers in turn spread skilled shooting through the army.
 
as to Conroy, yes indeed he has his problems ... on the other hand you have to admit he sells a lot more books than we do, unless we have a writer (1) on this thread who routinely sells lots of mass market paperbacks and not a few hardbacks. BTW, there is a book with a scenario where the British intervene and the North loses... it is called "Dixie Victorious" edited by Tsouras. (2)

1) John (Birmo) Birmingham (The Axis of Time trilogy, the two book After America series). He hasn't posted in years, probably worried about charges of plagiarism.

2) Even when Tsouras wrote a Union Victorious novel (Gettysburg), in which the North wins the war at Gettysburg, he can't resist spending the whole nine chapters of the book describing Johnny Reb kicking Billy Yank ass. The Union doesn't pull off its victory until the last couple of sentences in the final chapter, leaving an epilogue depicting (with little explanation of what happened) Longstreet surrendering the Army of Northern Virginia. IOW, more fap material for the Neo-Confederates, save for a last moment of coitus interruptus.:p

I think this is probably the best bet. Maybe have war take longer to start so the side that has this advantage has time to train properly.

The English Civil War took some time to really get rolling. In the American Civil War, everybody (except Winfield Scott and William Tecumseh Sherman) thought it would be over in six weeks. So why bother preparing when the other side was only going to run away from our tremendous numbers/fighting spirit?:rolleyes:

I think another big problem here is lack of trained officers and staff in both armies. US has to be much more militarized and have a lot more officers available at the start of the war to be able to achieve control needed for complex maneuver. Not sure how this can be brought about

The Antebellum South was an armed camp by 1860, between the building pressures of an institution of slavery (reinforced by the Fugitive Slave Law and the Dred Scott Decision) and the sense of separation already building between the two very different societies, North & South. Laws openly embraced allowing regular censorship of all mails (to combat the Underground Railroad), constant patrolling against runaways day and night, laws mandating that all White men away from their homes always be armed...Yeah.

I have never been surprised by all the many tactical victories the South enjoyed. Particularly early in the war. The vast majority of officers in the US Army were Southerners, and many more people in the South (per capita) chose to join the army/militia. Add on the advantage of the interior lines...which is why they never got the Arizona Territory, Kentucky, West Virginia, Missouri, or Maryland. There, they didn't have interior lines. And in the cases of Arizona and West Virginia, their LOCs were horrible.

Since someone has already brought up Tsouras, his Disaster at D-Day is not too bad.

http://www.amazon.com/Disaster-D-Day-Germans-Defeat-Allies/dp/1848327234

In places it is just about plausible, and he manages to keep the Brit-Bashing under control (Unlike his later work).
Although there are actual factual mistakes, he certainly does a better job than some writers.

As a matter of fact, not speaking to his work on D-Day, but from another. I had a guy who for years regaled me with his insistence that the Allies deliberately held off landing in France until the Soviets and Germans had bashed each other enough to "control them postwar".:rolleyes: He then did a massive study on his own and realized (as he said to me) "My God, if there had been seven straight days of bad weather starting on the day after the Allies landed, they would have been in the sea!"

The whole thing with the distrust of standing armies.Because of military rule,the English/British were heavily suspicious of standing armies.This sentimentality was transferred to the US via English settlers and was reinforced when Britain billeted troops in the 13 colonies following the 7 Years War and tried to reinforce their rule their with standing soldiers.

Yeah, and British military pay back then was astonishingly low. They had to work in the civilian workplace to supplement their income, competing with locals for a drastically depressed economy, exacerbated by British demands for additional tax revenue. So the potential (and eventual causing) of great friction was there. (1) The Americans were well aware that thanks to newly rigidly enforced anti-smuggling laws by the British, a massive trade imbalance between the Colonies and Britain was in place.

Unfortunately, all that revenue was flooding into the coffers of private British commercial interests, so as far as Whitehall was concerned they had yet to see a brass farthing. The more they screamed for taxes, the madder the colonists got. And with the mercantile system in place, and those same British men of capital getting ever richer, they didn't want anything changed.

1) The colonists weren't fooled by any nonsense that the troops were there to protect them. The Natives were long gone from the coastal areas, the French Navy was prostrate and in no position to threaten the American coastline, and privately the decision-makers in London itself admitted that having troops there would be advantageous for the purpose of quelling any chances of rebellion. Which tells me they were already preparing for the results of their brand new "get tough" post Seven Years War colonial policy.

Wait - didn't the puritan colonists support the roundheads in the English Civil War? Taking into account that Cromwell was a republican, one could suspect that the Americans held him in grateful memory.

Actually, American's opinions on Cromwell varied greatly depending on where you were in the Colonies. Generally, the further south you went, particularly in Catholic areas, the more notorious his name became. Cromwell caused a flood of refugees into the Southern and Central colonies, but it was the Restoration that forced many puritans to flee to New England.

Actually, it's not very hard to get at least the snipy-shooty thing inculcated in. It takes a few weeks to train a teacher, and then that teacher can handle their own entire battalion.
You could quite easily - if there was the driver for it - train a few hundred teachers, twenty at a time, and then those teachers in turn spread skilled shooting through the army.

As a matter of fact, that's exactly how Major General von Steuben did it with the rebel army in the American Revolutionary War. His genius was in determining that psychologically Americans were different from their European counterparts, and his breakthrough discovery that allowed him to succeed where so many other Europeans sent to train and lead American troops had failed.

His discovery? To get Americans to obey orders as quickly as Europeans, just make sure that they know the "why" of their orders. That is, "why" the need for close order drill, marching in step, complex small unit formation march orders, firing in volleys as opposed to as fast as you could shoot, and so on. The rest of their training could then follow.

Steuben took a very small company of sergeants, trained them as you described, and then they followed suit with their own companies. His "little blue booklet" of rules and regulations for army training became the standard until 1818, and AIUI the US Army's manual of regulations is today still called "the Blue Book".

Steuben's tale is why it is the winter spent at Valley Forge that is so often remembered, despite that other places for Washington's army to winter over in the war were worse. At Valley Forge the American Continental Army became the United States Army.:cool:
 
Since someone has already brought up Tsouras, his Disaster at D-Day is not too bad.

http://www.amazon.com/Disaster-D-Day-Germans-Defeat-Allies/dp/1848327234

In places it is just about plausible, and he manages to keep the Brit-Bashing under control (Unlike his later work).
Although there are actual factual mistakes, he certainly does a better job than some writers.

I'll give Tsouras credit in that he at least tries to make it plausible. Still short of divine intervention D-Day wasn't going to fail. As I've mention up-thread the best the Germans could hope was to delay the breakout and even that is inevitable once Operation Dragoon happens.
 
1) John (Birmo) Birmingham (The Axis of Time trilogy, the two book After America series). He hasn't posted in years, probably worried about charges of plagiarism.

2) Even when Tsouras wrote a Union Victorious novel (Gettysburg), in which the North wins the war at Gettysburg, he can't resist spending the whole nine chapters of the book describing Johnny Reb kicking Billy Yank ass. The Union doesn't pull off its victory until the last couple of sentences in the final chapter, leaving an epilogue depicting (with little explanation of what happened) Longstreet surrendering the Army of Northern Virginia. IOW, more fap material for the Neo-Confederates, save for a last moment of coitus interruptus.:p



The English Civil War took some time to really get rolling. In the American Civil War, everybody (except Winfield Scott and William Tecumseh Sherman) thought it would be over in six weeks. So why bother preparing when the other side was only going to run away from our tremendous numbers/fighting spirit?:rolleyes:

.:cool:

interesting about Birmingham. I enjoyed his Axis of Time series (with its problems) because it was generally a fun read.

I have "Gettysburg" by Tsouras myself and have read it a few times. It definitely shows Tsouras has problems with endings, which also is a problem in his "Britannia Fist" series (especially book 3). Too much middle and beginning, not nearly enough wrapping up to explain what happens after the climax

Another reason for the antipathy toward billeting troops is that is a direct tax on homeowners. You have to feed (both food and beer) the troops placed in your home, provide bedding and the extra fuel needed for heat, and of course displace people in the home to make room for them. That is a real hardship in pre industrial Europe and North America, as food costs were the majority of household budget costs, as food was far higher in price, currency was rarer (in the Colonies especially) and as troops are generally quartered in urban areas, it isn't as if you can just expand the garden.

Add in the general distrust for soldiers in general who are going to be beneath you in class terms if you are a tradesmen or merchant (officers generally got quartered in the homes of the well to do), and of course if you have daughters the issues built into that and there is most definitely a reason why we have an amendment in the Constitution specifically forbidding it.

It really boiled down to the states of the early modern period being unable to raise enough cash to pay for things like barracks and all too often food for their troops, and while things got better in the late 18th Century, they still were stingy about building barracks when they could quarter their troops cheaper (for the state) in peoples homes.

This book (which in spite of the title takes you to about 1730)
http://www.amazon.com/Furies-Europe..._UL160_SR105,160_&refRID=0YHRV827K7XY7V3A319H

goes into detail of what quartering actually meant to the civilians and why it wasn't popular at all

Another issue for the Civil War armies is that like practically everyone else at that time they focused on discipline and movement first (getting people to march in step and stay in ranks) as it is fundamental to controlling troops of the time. Musketry training was in the available time after that. The point was to get troops into the field reasonably battle ready quickly. The finer points of musketry just were not a priority for anyone. As a large number of the troops in the first couple of years in the war had adequate weapons but not first rate rifles, focusing on rifle accuracy would have been pointless any. It was more about volume of fire and well timed volleys not long distance sniping

Although the Union and Confederacy did field snipers, in some cases by the regiment
 
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