What are people's predictions of what date the CSA will officially surrender? Let's make a bit of a game out of it.
Pick a date and whoever is closest to the actual date
without going over (like how "the Price is Right" works) wins a prize! Well, not a real prize, just bragging rights. But still!
I'll start: I was originally going to say 11/11/1916 but thought that would be a bit too on the nose. Instead, I'll say 10/16/1916 for a few reasons.
1 - That's my birthday so why not?
2 -
This update mentions how Nashville was "a preview for further battles in Tennessee and Georgia over the following year and a half." Nashville ended 5/15 so 18 months means the war won't end before roughly late October/early Nov, so IMO a surrender date in August or thereabouts is out.
3 - American generalship has been quite frankly pretty poor lately. There's
an update about how a Confederate general used cavalry of all things to stop an American offensive post-Nashville for example. That's a pretty damning indictment of American leadership that they lost to horses in a trench warfare setting. But, American political leadership (loathe as I am to admit it) has rounded into form while Dixie's leadership is quite bad and will only get worse. So what's the point? My point is the CSA is
far more likely to fire a general for "defeatism" or "cowardice" when he "only" inflicts 2x as many casualties and withdraws to the next set of trenches. So the American generals can learn from their defeats and improve while the CSA will keep firing guys which is a recipe for disaster in the medium and long terms. Eventually the CSA will run out of good or even mediocre generals and only the bad or the craven will be around to lead Dixie's armies.
4 - The Confederate economy is probably hanging by a thread. Home front stability and cohesion are also falling apart. Once that stuff goes, it causes cascading effects. It is like a boulder rolling down a hill - it starts slowly at first then goes faster and faster. I predict that we won't
really start to see the effects until summer 1916.
If you are interested, post your date and I'll keep track and when we get to Armistice Day (which I can for sure see being a holiday in the USA a al Veterans Day) we can circle back.
