Realistic Confederate Victory map?

...The reason Arizona is included is the strong support for the Confederates there, and the fact that it turns the confederate states into a sort of buffer between any potential Mexican revanchists and the Union.
Reading up a bit on NMT, I question the "strong support" overall in New Mexico. As was the wont of the slaveholders and their supporters, they count only the interests and views of "white" people, in this context specifically English speaking ones, as the only thing that matters. As Taney said, people of color have no rights a "white man is bound to respect;" this is their motto.

But it seems to me if we count people as people, "Arizona" as the secessionists defined it (based to be sure on a traditional definition of Arizona as a region which overlapped the proposed southern splinter half of NMT and comprised about 2/3 or so of that more rectilinear section of NMT) had some inhabitants, and more importantly other peoples nearby had some vital interests in it, that would ill dispose the US Congress (which has Constitutional authority over organization of US Territories) to grant the petition of even an overwhelming local majority in key areas. Broadly speaking, the demographics of NMT amounted to Native peoples who were admittedly not friendly to either the USA or CSA; the Spanish New Mexicans, an intermarried bunch of descendants of both regional Native people and Spanish settlers centered on Santa Fe and comprising a significant population, and somewhat diverse recent Anglo settlers. Important categories of the latter, especially in the southern tier of NMT, were indeed southerners. Gadsden himself was a South Carolina railroad owner and his vision was to develop a southern transcontinental route. Looking at the topography of the modern state of Arizona it seems that for any future rail connection of the securely Union parts of NMT--initially the northeast, the highly Hispanicized Rio Grande upper course and Pueblo Indian zones; if Mexican intervention were a thing to be concerned with it might be otherwise but these zones have populations whose sympathy for the Secessionist cause would be measured in negative numbers, having had bad experiences with Texan ambitions--to the west coast would have to run through the southern tier of NMT to the west. Assuming as I do a "go in peace" scenario, the boundary of Texas is the hard western frontier of the CSA, unless one argues they would seize land from NMT (or farther north, like Colorado)--whether Indian Territory goes north or south has very little bearing here. However biased toward participating in CSA the Anglo settlers of the whole NMT are, and however concentrated in the southern "CSA Arizona" reach they might be, they are not alone--the Union as a whole has collective interests in retaining all of NMT, the Anglos from the North and midwest of the former complete Union are not secessionist, and the Spanish speaking and Native peoples of New Mexico have no secessionist sympathies. The latter have no Unionist ones either; even if my rosy hopes of a rapprochement based on more ethical standards being met by US authorities in the future toward Native peoples generally are realized, in the crucial months of presumably late 1860 and early 1861 we have to assume the Native people are on a spectrum of indifferent to hostile to both nations. But the immediate interest of Native people of New Mexico, whatever the possible attractions of secessionism and joining CSA might be among the Indian Territory residents to the east, is definitely opposed to the Texan interests that the purported lean of southern NMT is basically all about.

Looking at various maps it seems that in terms of non-Native people, the action in NMT is all concentrated to the east, with both Unionists and secessionists carrying out expeditions westward, but no substantial settlements of Anglos existing beyond lightly manned way stations to California as yet. It is not then inconceivable to me that a conciliatory US leadership might concede some swathes of southeastern NMT to the CSA, presumably conveying it specifically to Texan control, but they will most definitely not permit that concession to reach very far west.

One thing glancing at various Wikipedia pages on New Mexico in the Civil War, Confederate Arizona, Traditional Arizona, and the Gadsden Purchase bring up, is that OTL the withdrawal of US regular army troops eastward in early 1861 was a pivotal event. I cannot stress this enough--if the US government decides to adopt a no-war policy toward the secessionist states, thereby agreeing to recognize their legitimacy as newly independent states under the overarching sovereignty of the CSA, then this withdrawal eastward never takes place. At a minimum, the level of force the Federal government deemed necessary and reasonable to keep peace, order and security in the Southwest remains on station. I think that one response of the US government to secession will in fact be to raise levels of force, to call up volunteers, increase funding of regular army and navy, and reevaluate their prior estimates of force upward. Eventually then the New Mexico Territory contingents will be increased, but that might take a while--at the very least though they will not be withdrawn. It might be that the chain of command in both the Army and civil Territorial government is much infiltrated with individuals with strong Southern ties and presumably secessionist sympathies. But this cannot lead to coups purporting to hand over US territory to Texas or the CSA without others within the same structures, and various local interests, joining to reassert Union authority. The story of the Civil War fronts in the far West involved a new army moving in from Texas; if the CSA keeps the peace with the USA, that army cannot leave Texas. If it does, the CSA and Texan authorities will have to maintain plausible deniability and hold them to be lawless filibusters, and the Union can dispatch whatever level of force they deem prudent, with a much freer hand than OTL, to go in to reinforce loyal forces in New Mexico and on paper the CSA cannot object.

So it remains a question of forces on the ground when various states, most importantly for this frontier, Texas, secede. Despite the possibility of disloyalty of certain numbers of officers and men, I think the balance of armed authority in NMT, assuming no general withdrawal of regular Army eastward, is plenty to constrain the local sentiment among Anglos for joining the CSA to strictly legal channels. People here note that various legislatures, in California and in NMT, adopted measures to split their bailiwicks north and south, implying a very strong Confederate sympathy in the southern bits that would require major military action to override, and more importantly implying that the Unionists among them were indifferent to losing those southern tracts. But while I would like to learn more about the alleged amicable divorce of southern California from its northern reaches, I have already read and noted that Congress rejected the proposal for a southern Arizona on the grounds of the population of the proposed Territory (then of the USA, this being 1858 and '59) being too small to justify it. Considering the interests of the northeastern inhabitants of NMT as a whole, I think insofar as Congressional approval is required--and even with much larger numbers involved, it always is Constitutionally (consider the situation of Puerto Rico for instance) the answer from the Union capital wherever it might move to would be "no." My reading implies that the later (1863) formation of a different Arizona Territory, comprising the modern state plus tracts that went to Nevada ultimately, in an east west division, had something to do not only with a different concept of the salient regions to be administered but also a formal requirement to avoid appearing to retroactively endorse the rejected north-south division previously proposed, which the CSA OTL presumed to try to implement--not limited to that; the forces invading from Texas also sought to secure control into Colorado.

No one here is bound as I am binding myself to think only of no-war scenarios; if there is a brief civil war followed by Union coming to terms short of reconquest, that is a whole other sheaf of possibilities, and in it, with USA forces necessarily siphoned off east and a free hand for whatever force might accomplish, the prospects depend on the balance of those forces, with the Union handicapped in the region, at least in the short run, which is all a short Civil War gives them. But holding to the premise that both secessionists and unionists are led by people who prefer to avoid a full on civil war for expedient reasons, I think we can discount this secessionist interest in NMT as being trumped by the regular Army that remains, reinforced by local anti-secessionist interests especially when we don't restrict our consideration to just the intramural posturing of Anglo settlers.

The USA has zero positive reason to want to alienate any of NMT; at most it might find it prudent to throw the Texans a bit of concession to shut them up but I doubt even that can be allowed. Looking to the future, the then currently settled core of loyalist NMT is in the modern state of New Mexico's north, and if they are not to be a dead end, they need to retain access to the topographically desirable Gadsden Purchase zones for access to California by rail, whereas the secessionists, however numerous in the regions near El Paso, were nowhere on the ground out there, or no more so than others. The Union does not owe the CSA any concessions save for reasons of expedience and the CSA has no leverage without risking general war in the west.

The situation in southern California might be worthy exploring more; I know OTL there were pitched battles fought there in OTL. But again, regular US Army forces being withdrawn east might account for the ability of the secessionists to organize the army contesting Union authority OTL which again would not apply here.

The notion that the Union would want to throw any section of NMT or any other territory to the CSA to buffer off Mexico strikes me as downright absurd; clearly bordering CSA is much more problematic than bordering Mexico! The USA wants the former border as short as possible; the latter is much more easily managed.
 
I really don’t think you could get a rump Confederacy. Possibly they lose parts of Virginia and maybe East TN, but I think by far the likeliest scenario are the 11 states and not an inch more.
 
Of course, access to the Pacific would be something desirable for the CSA.
Yes indeed it would be. In a scenario that does not exclude open war between the US and CS governments, the secessionists might think it worthwhile to divert some expeditionary force westward to secure it.

Given though that they did try to do all this OTL and it failed, I would not rate their chances of success too highly. Even in a Trent war scenario the USA managed OTL to suppress the secessionists in the west with auxiliary resources, whereas there were deeper resources to dig into (including many people who sat the war out OTL, who might very plausibly be called to the Union cause if it involves defending against a British attack as well) to cover the surge of demand in the east, that would not compel stripping off those forces that were raised in the West to replace the regular Army units historically pulled east initially. Would the CSA be far better able to support a stronger western expedition that would overwhelm these Unionists? Would Britain be able to land in California and seize it, or selected bits, overwhelming Unionist means of defending the western coast? In a Trent war scenario controversy rages to be sure, but at any rate here we go far astray from the language of the tropes brought into play by people who speak glibly of the supposed Native American support for CSA, or the alleged strong interest of New Mexico Territory settlers from the South, or the implied willingness of Californians to let part of their state be split off by secessionists.

I think we should bear in mind that most of the popular culture conventional wisdom about Southern assets has probably been grossly distorted by Lost Causer rehabilitation of the nature and purpose of the secession OTL. We know that a massive effort to obscure the gross fact that secession was in fact all about slavery, and failed to command the enthusiasm of millions of "white" southerners, and replace it with a narrative of Northern arrogance, aggression and greed. In this context I too probably am reacting more emotionally than factually because I think this gives us every grounds to be skeptical of little claimed factoids favoring the Lost Cause; probably there is some truth to them, but out of context we might be grossly misled to accept them uncritically. We need information of kinds and detail that are not really forthcoming here, whereas when I do, admittedly with a bias favoring the viability of the Union cause, take a look at more detail it seems that the alleged assets of the secessionist cause are indeed qualified, in ways that help explain the failure of these schemes OTL.

Returning to the presumption that US and CSA avoid open war and therefore neither one violates the territory of the other in the short run of the immediate crisis, with any open war and territorial readjustments happening later, another way for the Confederacy to get Pacific access eventually is to seize more land from Mexico instead, say so as to acquire Sonora and Baja California and of course some corridor between them and Texas which would give them access to the sheltered Sea of Cortez, which if they hold Baja is a long slog for US fleets sortieing out of San Diego to sail down before reaching the Colorado River mouth ports.

In a scenario with no war with the USA getting a complete corridor however narrow from Texas all the way to some stretch of the California coast out of the formerly shared US western territories and California is a ludicrously unrealistic goal; they are limited to trying to gouge something out of Mexico, and Mexico in the 1850s made short work of William Walker's attempt to set up a filibuster Republic of Sonora that in practice turned into focusing mainly on holding a base in Baja California. With the CSA weighing in to reinforce such adventures, they can hope for better success--but meanwhile I think the USA would react by aiding Mexico.

The US interest does not want a port for a power that the USA might be at war with someday soon to complicate the defense of the California and Oregon and Washington Territory.

Will the British put their thumb on the scales in favor of the CSA? I really think not, not even if a brief Trent War of some kind puts them fighting side by side. To support their secession and right to exist, thereby troubling and checking and diminishing the USA, maybe--though we must not forget that this was a polarized political issue in Britain; the classes with the vote and other forms of privileged influence being more favorable to the Confederate cause than average, but the level of effort necessary to check the Union's advantages should the Union decide or feel forced to fight would make the greater popularity of the American republic among lower classes come into play despite their disfranchisement. Whereas if there is no civil war in America whatsoever I suppose the lower classes will be somewhat dismayed and lack a relevant domestic issue to organize around while the narrative in the upper classes will be more conclusively clustered around the ideas that the USA as a whole was complicit in slavery--which we certainly were, in terms of outcomes of process anyway--therefore Britain might as well look to her interests. Even seen through that cynical lens, the desire to do harm to USA is checked by countervailing interests in the USA as profitable field for investment. But if the US leaders do not take the decisive steps Lincoln did OTL, and condone the persistence of American slavery by washing their hands of the Southern states completely, complicity is frozen in stone for all generations to come and indeed, without slamming the door on US relations completely, the CSA is no more and no less legitimate to treat with--in cold blooded British interest.

So why does British interest support CSA aggrandizement, seizing Cuba, adventures in Central America perhaps, building a big navy, and seizing a Pacific port somehow, somewhere? I think it clearly wants none of these things. For the Confederacy to exist, yes. For it to threaten the USA and pin down its potentials just by existing so extensively along borders that antebellum OTL and postbellum OTL were the deep secure interior of the USA, absolutely. But Britain is in the business of mastering the seas and world trade and effectively capturing its productive potentials for herself; within this system the CSA serves her purpose again just by existing as a plantation colony. I do not credit the individuals who toyed with the idea of actively aiding the CSA in Britain OTL with any right to claim moral depth to their professed disdain of slavery--but as a shallow, casual thing it was real enough, and connected to revulsion with deeper roots among their less cynical compatriots. Any CSA expansion, in the immediate generation after secession anyway, is an expansion of slave power. Britain can dominate in Mexico and Central America and the Caribbean without any need for that. In a scenario where the US lets the CSA go in peace, the Confederates might follow their own choleric star without asking permission of the British, but if they act without British blessing and interested support, they face US counterinterests. If the CSA acts fast and pounces on Mexico immediately, perhaps they can overwhelm and absorb the whole country and subordinate it--this adventure would leave them potentially vulnerable on their northern border though so their hands would be tied a bit if they were to prudently leave that guarded. Or avoiding the need to subordinate the core of Mexican population focus just on the north to get that corridor to Sonora and Baja California--if they can crush Mexican resistance that easily, that would leave the authority of the Mexican state in disarray in Mexico's far northwest as CSA conquest advances westward and perhaps with the connivance of a desperate Mexico City regime in collapse, perhaps ignoring their wishes, the USA might preempt the Sonoran option by moving into Baja and Sonora itself. But Mexico has more Pacific coast; with some sea power and the British sitting back not interfering, perhaps the project might be to seize Yucatan and Chiapas, or bypass Mexico and indulge in Central American adventures instead...but the farther afield from what the British self interest would regard as CSA's proper sphere in the former USA south the more these ambitions actively clash with British interest. I don't think the British will want to see the CSA get a Pacific port more than the US Yankees would; if Pacific bases convenient to check Yankee ambition on the Pacific beyond British Columbia and I think probably Hawaii are wanted, it will be the British Empire herself seeking to secure them by suitably influencing the existing Latin American governments; diplomatically winning over Mexico herself perhaps (thereby checking CSA expansion at that nation's expense, however weak Mexico might be in her own power) and thereby gaining access to Mexican Pacific ports to flank the possible expansion of the USN that way. Trading the Yankee devil they know for Johnny Reb they don't know--but surely incorporating just about everything they disliked about the Yankees in the first place, where even a ramshackle and degenerate CSA domestic regime has more depth to willfully resist British guidance and control than the Latin American republics they had ample experience of indirect rule over (going back to before these republics seceded from Spanish control in the first place) hardly seems like what Britain would be happy to see and while it might be difficult to actively check willful CSA adventurism, we have to evaluate those potentials solely with CSA capabilities entirely on her own hook, with no backing from Britain.

In no scenario then will the raw desire for a Pacific port among the Confederates lead easily to their actually getting one; their best chance of surviving to fight another day is if the Union leaves them alone to their Atlantic confinement, and then they have zero prospect of seizing anything from the west of the USA; coming to blows in the future the USA will be stronger relatively than it was in 1860 (which is why of course a "go in peace" scenario is so improbable, indeed the fire eaters wanted with some reason to strike while the iron was hot); Mexico might not be such an easy nut to crack as Lost Causer influenced tropes suggest (particularly bearing in mind these tropes have deeply racist roots, whereas I think I am reasonably sober in my admittedly romance-rooted suggestion the USA will come to Mexico's aid, with increasing effectiveness as the years after secession elapse) and Britain has no interest in abetting these filibustering ambitions and some in actively checking them.

I can't utterly rule it out, but the prospect hardly seems like a slam dunk either, no matter how much desire burns in Confederate leaders for the glittering prize. It will be resisted.
 
The CSA fighting and winning a war against Mexico in the 1860s is not realistic. Given French support for Maximillian the CSA would be hard pressed to move much by sea to Mexico, this means everything goes through Texas, and frankly it is Northern Mexico and access to the Sea of Cortez that The CSA would want. Essentially everything except food for any Confederate invasion of Mexico is going to have to be transported from east of the Mississippi to Texas, then across Texas to the border. There are no railroads to do this west of the Mississippi so this means wagon trains, or at best coastal shipping in the face of French naval involvement. Even in a no war scenario where southern infrastructure has not been devastated, this is a huge burden. Furthermore essentially all major military supplies are going to have to be purchased, and if France is supporting Maximillian will Britain be aiding the CS expansion, and if so I expect they'll want cash or very steep interest. In addition the British rules about supplying warring countries may apply if there is no UK-CS alliance.

OTL the USA post ACW was in a position to invoke the Monroe Doctrine with regard to French support for Maximillian. Here I think the USA would prefer to see the French support Mexico to thwart CSA expansion, giving the French a free pass. It is worth noting that while there was certainly peonage in Mexico, slavery had been abolished and so any territory the CS acquired would need that re-introduced. While the USA might not be pleased with Maximillian and the French influence, ITTL that would be preferable to seeing CS expansion at least to the Sea of Cortez and expanding the length of the US-CS border almost to the California border with Mexico, and perhaps all the way if the CS took Baja. With regards Baja if the CS did not take it but did acquire some of Northern Mexico I could see the USA buying Baja (now detached from Mexico proper) to help hem in the CSA.
 
Here I think the USA would prefer to see the French support Mexico to thwart CSA expansion, giving the French a free pass.
Why not support Juarez, which is what Lincoln and Seward as post-assassination effective foreign policy honcho in the Johnson administration did? American democratic republicans should stick together, especially as OTL it was the populists rallying to Juarez who won. With a general surge in US military recruitment as prudential to guard a suddenly problematic CSA border, the USA should have capabilities quite large on American scales to give aid and comfort to Mexican populists, even without committing to actual intervention of uniformed and declared US forces in Mexico. Why favor a monarchist invasion of dubious legitimacy?
 
Of course, access to the Pacific would be something desirable for the CSA.

The Confederates clearly wanted access to the Pacific in OTL, but they failed miserably. After seizing New Mexico, the Confederates realized they had no chance of advancing west to California, so they tried going north in a disastrous attempt to annex Colorado. During the war, almost 16 thousand men from California served in the Union army, while only a few dozen served in the Confederate army.
 
The CSA fighting and winning a war against Mexico in the 1860s is not realistic.

But once Mexico gets rid of their Emperor, the Europeans might egg CSA on the ambitions. Slavery was seen as morally wrong in Europe by then, but Realpolitik can override decision making.
 
Found an old discussion from 2012 that may somewhat help a bit, along with maps about a Peace Treaty signed in 1865 with a lot of wishful thinking by the OP, but the analysis itself is interesting in its appraoch.

Unless the Confederacy has pushed the Union out of the entirety of its lands, or captured DC or something (Both VERY unlikely), its too late a sign date to get everything mentioned in the treaty.

Tennessee, Arkansas, and Louisiana already have been "reconciled" and have fully functioning Union governments and almost no confederate presence, why on earth would the union give it up?

Here is my map for a late treaty:
View attachment 173763

View attachment 173763

I still can't comprehend how the CSA managed to hold those borders after 4 years of war.

There isn't an outside intervention force, otherwise they would be mentioned in the treaty.

If the CSA does a much better job, they might be able to split the states that reconciled with the Union.

View attachment 173779
 

I agree about the wishful thinking by the OP in that thread. As I noted at the time, the hypothetical treaty involved a lot more concessions by the Union than by the Confederacy. Like most Confederate independence timelines, the Union treaty negotiators appear to be hopelessly inept.

OTOH, the maps by AStanley are some of the most credible Confederate independence maps I have seen, though the Confederacy would probably get to keep Indian Territory.
 
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Why? All their markets are in Europe and England.
Just extravagant filibustering greed I imagine--no more ignoble than USA ambitions but less wrapped in layers of pale gray hypocrisy I guess. They wants it, wants it wants it, Precious! I've come down pretty hard on the idea they are likely to be able to get it, not nearly as easily as a lot of people seem to think. Nor does anyone else have any reason to want to help them get it.

If they did, improbably, get such a window on the Pacific I suppose there are opportunistic adventures they might consider going on, if they are pretty reckless about overextending themselves when they have such ominous potential threats to attend to at home. Let relations relax with the USA (less likely if they somehow glommed onto Southern California, or went on another rampage at Mexican expense to get Sonora and Baja California and a corridor of some kind to them, thus presumably replacing the Mexicans on the US southern border which can't be relaxing in the least) and they develop confidence their have their domestic time bombs well under control, and maybe they can pick up some islands here or there...but of course let them come into conflict with some major European power or God forbid the USA and they will find these ambitions hard to sustain against serious opposition! I've suggested the USA enjoyed some indulgence by the British which made our other conflicts more manageable. But I can't imagine why the British would be thrilled with the idea of CSA forces roaming around the Pacific on their own hook, nor would they have to tolerate it the way the USA was kind of dangerous for them to tangle with; the CSA is quite easy to put into her place. If Yankees can't be turned against them, I imagine Mexicans can.

I don't actually think a plausible CSA will in fact get a window on the Pacific. The Union can block them from getting any of California--if anyone can take part or all of that away, it will be the British, and why should the British give it then to the Confederacy. Perhaps I underestimate how easily Mexico can be beaten up and robbed again, but I do think the USA will help Mexico in such circumstances--conceivably in a pretty hypocritical way by perhaps preemptively seizing BjC and Sonora ourselves, perhaps under a fiction of holding it in trust for redemption by a hypothetical stronger Mexico in the future. One way or another the CSA is liable to remain confined to the Gulf and Atlantic coasts.

And so if they were rational--which your remark assumes with a charmingly kind indulgence not so well merited by the character of the relevant leadership in antebellum and Civil War history OTL--they'd roll with that, maybe focus on gaining control of Cuba or other Caribbean islands up for grabs. I really don't think the British will be happy with any CSA adventurism whatsoever though, in any hemisphere.
 
Why? All their markets are in Europe and England. They are essentially raw cotton exporters to England, France, etc. So it's not like they have or need a significant Asian trade.

Southern political leaders strongly believed in Manifest Destiny. The Gadsden Purchase of 1854, adding part of what is now southern Arizona and New Mexico, was done to provide a route for a far south transcontinental railroad. The New Mexico Campaign had originally planned to march west and invade California. I'm not sure how much of that was seeking Asian trade. I expect being able to exploit California's mineral wealth had a lot to do with it as well; the Confederacy had very little gold or silver.
 
There was basically nothing the CSA was going to export that had a market in China or Japan (just recently opened up). The gold strikes in California were more northern than southern, and it was Southern California that a significant pro-slavery minority - occupying the gold fields would mean dealing with a hostile population with basically no local support. The "southern" version of manifest destiny was about acquiring areas where slavery could be expanded. As a practical matter the territories of the Great Plains and the far west were simply not suitable for plantation slavery, and in any case were being settled by immigrants not "slave friendly" or northerners very much more than southerners.

The plans for transcontinental rail were being done before the ACW, and the preferred first route was the UP/SP route that was eventually built after the war. This opened up vast agricultural areas for settlement. The southern rote (which was the reason for the Gadsden Purchase) was politically important to the south so as to have their "own" railroad not going through "northern" territory. Unlike the UP/SP "central" route, the southern route traversed a great deal of territory that was simply unattractive to large scale settlement - so the financial incentive for the RR. A very large percentage of the financing of the transcontinental RR came from the RRs getting land grants along the way which they could then sell to settlers. The route of the southern transcontinental RR through Southern California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas had very little land that was not encumbered in some way in Texas (open range etc) and the rest of the way was generally not suitable for large scale settling and/or possibly owned via Spanish land grants.

Thereis a very low probablity of the CSA getting some of New Mexico,and basically zero of getting any of Arizona or California.
 
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