Okay, no beating around the bushes with this one. If Lee doesn't lose a copy of his famous order 191, how would the civil war have changed? I'm not talking about Turtledove's novels based on the fact. i'm not asking weather or not there would have been a union defeat on northern soil and the south gains foreign reckonicion and its independence.
What i want to know is this: Given everything we know about the situation in the fall of 1862 on both fronts, east and west, the personality and determination of Abraham Lincoln to reunite the country no matter the cost, what really would have happened if lee's lost order 191 never happened? Would the north have lost the war, or would have lincoln buckled down and have moved troops and materials from west to east and vise verse, including some very good union generals like Thomas, Grant, and Sherman in order to achieve victory? Would the after effects of such a atl would have ended the war sooner than latter or longer?
Would Britian and France have really sided with the south if lincoln didn't cave in (this in reference to lee beating the union army on northern soil and foreign reckonition and threats of war by britian and france and lincoln deciding that he would not give up and managing to rally the north somehow)? So many probabilties exist with this one that you could write an atl on it! Please give feed back on your thoughts, i would like to hear them and what you think! Thanks!