redlightning
Banned
What if the Confederacy had managed to win independence during the American Civil War, how long would this government have lasted afterward?
WI: Confederate States of America Gets Independence: How Long Does It Last?
- Thread starter redlightning
- Start date
How long does it last? Probably not long. It has a hostile country to the north that produced more in one city than they did in their entire country, huge internal class divisions (both slaves and poor whites) that are set to explode sooner or later, and an economy based around cotton production that will face a nasty upset once boll weevil hits.
You also had the British cultivating alternate cotton sources in India and Egypt meaning the CSA was not the only game in town.
Also, the cash crops the CSA grew are hard on the soil. The CSA (and slavery) had to expand in order to remain viable. That is a big part of what touched of the blooming war in the first place - whether or not new states admitted to the Union could be slave states. The South new that forbidding slavery in new states and territories was a death sentence for their way of life.
50 years tops. Or more accurately however long it takes for them to get into a serious military confrontation with their Northern neighbor. My best estimate is they can hold off the world of hurt for about a generation before the Northern Colossus rolls over them with all the might of a modern industrial army.
Best comparison is Congo "Free" State. Just the same exploitation of black slave labor, even if the Congolese method was more genocidal and thus less sustainable. Leopold II's toy dystopia was heavily criticized by public opinion from 1900 on, and in 1908, the Belgian king had to sell his colony to Belgium. This proves that public opinion was an issue in 19th and 20th century, and that the South will maybe have to end slavery (or even its own existence) due to international pressure.
Slavery was just not viable any more in these times, also due to the disruption of slave trade. Brazil abolished slavery in 1888, the CSA would've followed some years later.
Spengler
Banned
It would have been longer. Brazil wasn't formed to be a slave state. THe CSA was explicetley formed. It will be like Rhodesia, explicetley formed to be a state for men fantasizing about living on plantations. And like Rhodesia it will be eliminated properly from the face of the earth.
Slavery was completely viable as an economic system; it's more productive in both agriculture and industry, especially since the south's slave population was self sustaining. The problem is international pressure, both violent and diplomatic. What would interest me is investigating the prospects for Confederate acquisitions in the Spanish main, and if the founding of a slave republic in the Western hemisphere would reinvigorate slave power in Brazil.
Spengler
Banned
Lets see here, no it wouldn't it would appal the western sensibilities make the CSA a pariah state and see it properly invaded and eliminated with slavers getting lynched by the tens of thousands. I mean I would like to think you have created a better world in the snese there is no ost cause instead there are lots of unmakredgraves in the Free republic of Mississippi recognised by the reformned USA.
Pariah states tend not to have powerful economic connections with the largest industrial powers in the world, which any rational reading of the world economic situation in 1865 would tell you the CSA would likely establish. Second, there's not going to be a slave rebellion in the post war CSA, because there wasn't one in the prewar south, and the slaves wouldn't be a majority like they were in Haiti. Practically every white (and even free black) southerner benefitted from slavery, and had a highly militarized society that could keep slave revolts from gaining traction.
Spengler
Banned
You do understand that alot of nations in the 19th century and early 20th century were not rational right? Or else ww1 wouldn't have happened. Italy wouldn't have wanted Venezia, France wouldn't have fought Prussia, Russia wouldn't have foguht Japan. It seems like you are assuming all nations in the 19th century acted like a logic computer rather then human beings.
WWI was a calculated gambit; the respective nations didn't just blunder off to war on accident. There are risks and uncertainty in international politics, but major political moves don't happen on accident (or because a TL author just wants things to turn out a certain way, regardless of self interest). The British and French and Northerners certainly didn't have a problem accepting the products of massed slave labor before the war, and if as you suspect Southern victory would come from British intervention, it's be astonishingly stupid for them to intervene and then not cultivate a solid economic-political relationship with the south.
Spengler
Banned
Yes ist was so calculated that the west and the south turned into utter stalemates, Austria Hungary ended up seeing its armies anhilated by both Serbia and Russia without the help of the Russians, the Russians ended their empire. Likewise it was caused by a irrational naval buildup by Germany which they knew would cause the UK to view them as a enemy. Soudns like real rational players there doesn't it? Maybe, just maybe most people are not as rational as you think. Also there were boycotts of veofre the ACW what makes you think there won't be afterwords?
Spengler
Banned
Anyways where is the capital to come for the south industrializing? You need a educated workforce toindustrialize which msot slaves are not, some poor whites who will not work with slaves are,a nd the north still has plenty of. Also the expansion of cotton growing in the old world is going to see cotton prices collapse as will the price of slaves so now the south aso doesn't have the capital to inustrialize internally.
The South had a growing and educated middle class, with tons of private military academies to teach the principles of technology and engineering; furthermore, slaves turned out to be perfectly capable of skilled labor, and absent the Union blockade, would still handily outcompete Egyptian and Indian cotton.
And just because the decision to go to war was a rational calculation doesn't mean that all military operations will proceed perfectly, that's silly. The Germans saw themselves caught between two great powers, and wanted to crush one of them before Russia became too powerful to defeat. The only way out of that situation was war, and the sooner the better. Likewise, Russia needed to prop up the last pro-Russian state in the Balkans or risk its strategic position utterly collapsing, and the Austrians needed to crush them before they became too powerful and threatened the integrity of their multiethnic empire. They all had rational reasons for the war, it was the generals that miscalculated in drawing up the operations in the west.
And just because the decision to go to war was a rational calculation doesn't mean that all military operations will proceed perfectly, that's silly. The Germans saw themselves caught between two great powers, and wanted to crush one of them before Russia became too powerful to defeat. The only way out of that situation was war, and the sooner the better. Likewise, Russia needed to prop up the last pro-Russian state in the Balkans or risk its strategic position utterly collapsing, and the Austrians needed to crush them before they became too powerful and threatened the integrity of their multiethnic empire. They all had rational reasons for the war, it was the generals that miscalculated in drawing up the operations in the west.
Spengler
Banned
How could they out perform it? I mean just saying "they'll out perform" it is fine but you have to explain yourself. Also having the plantation class and the few lawyers go to military school is fine but it doesn't give the South the capital necessary for large scale industrialization. Also it was irrational for Germany if it faced Russia and France to go piss of the UK but they did anyways. Likewise it was irrational for Austria Hungary to continue to expand and risk more pissed off minorities but they did so anyways. its almost like the nations were not rational at all.
They can outperform free labor because the brutality of the slave system is good for productivity; you can get a lot more work out of a slave every day than a free worker. It's pretty well attested in the literature that slave labor was highly productive and profitable, and the South's cotton industry supplied a frankly gigantic portion of the UK's imports.
And the risk of ruling over some extra minorities was less risky than external nations trying to crush it in war; better to get the Serbs out of the way while they're still weak than letting them strengthen themselves in concert with Russian military reforms, so even the Germans can't bail them out. When nations go to war, they do it after having weighed the risks vs rewards (not always correctly, but they don't just go to war just because).
And the risk of ruling over some extra minorities was less risky than external nations trying to crush it in war; better to get the Serbs out of the way while they're still weak than letting them strengthen themselves in concert with Russian military reforms, so even the Germans can't bail them out. When nations go to war, they do it after having weighed the risks vs rewards (not always correctly, but they don't just go to war just because).
Because reactionary aristocrats ruling over oppressed slaves/serfs have a great track record of achievement from the mid 19th century onward.
