American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

ACWGC Forums

* ACWGC    * Dpt. of Records (DoR)    *Club Recruiting Office     ACWGC Memorial

* CSA HQ    * VMI   * Join CSA    

* Union HQ   * UMA   * Join Union    

CSA Armies:   ANV   AoT

Union Armies:   AotP    AotT

Link Express

Club Forums:     NWC    CCC     Home Pages:     NWC    CCC    ACWGC
It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 2:18 pm

All times are UTC - 5 hours




Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 14 posts ] 
Author Message
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 3:21 pm 
What if Dishonest Abe and Uncle Jeff had been in reverse positions.....Abe the President of the Rebellion, and Jeff the Head Opressor? Could Abe have led the 2nd American Revolution to a successful conclusion or would Jeff have crushed the States Rights out of him? Regards, Hank

BG Hank Smith
Army of Georgia
Smith's Division CO
Carroll's Corp


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 3:41 pm 
Offline

Joined: Fri Nov 02, 2001 5:01 am
Posts: 564
Location: USA
The main reason the rebellion failed, imo, was they weren't willing to work as one united nation, but as a handful of states more or less working together. The only way to victory for the South was for each state to put it's own self interest aside, and lay thier entire resources at the federal, or should I say, confederal level, and allow the central government run the entire effort.

During the war South Carolina threatened to secede from the confederacy, and counties within the state threatened to even leave the state. (If I remember correctly.)

I doubt if President Lincoln could've overcome that kind support.



MajGen Al 'Ambushed' Amos
3rd "Amos' Ambushers" Bde, Cavalry Division, XX Corps, AoC
The Union Forever! Huzzah!


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 5:23 pm 
Offline

Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2003 9:52 am
Posts: 1324
After reading Doris Kearns' book A Team of Rivals, I just can't imagine Abe leading a secession. I think Abe's great strength was humility born of self-confidence, while Jeff Davis' great weakness was intransigence born of pride. But that seemed to be a common problem in the South. I think Abe's second inaugural address is one of the great speeches of all time and gives insight into his uniqueness. But one thing he showed was a willingness to switch commanders who failed, something Davis was reluctant to do. When he finally did switch leaders, Hood for Johnston, the results were similar to switching Burnside for McClellan. The difference was the North could afford such errors and the South couldn't. All of which begs the question. I think that by some strange quirk of fate the positions of Jeff Davis and Abe Lincoln been reversed, the South would have stood a better chance of winning because Jeff would have been too loyal to his friends and too vindictive to his enemies, while Lincoln would have kept trying to find someone who could do the job.

MG Mike Mihalik
1/III/AoMiss/CSA


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 5:27 pm 
Well taking into account their strengths and weaknesses, I think Linclon might have been a better manipulator of the political situation....and Davis might have alienated some needed persons up North, or perhaps left the wrong commander in charge of the AOP long enough to blow it..Basicaly I am looking for speculation on how their different personalities might have changed things? Regards, Hank

BG Hank Smith
Army of Georgia
Smith's Division CO
Carroll's Corp


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 5:05 am 
Offline

Joined: Sat May 03, 2003 7:23 am
Posts: 111
Location: USA
Gentlemen:

I think this is a mute point. The South(for the most part)seceded because of Lincoln's winning of the Election. If Jeff had won the election as you are proposing, what makes you think the war would have occured as it did? I understand what you are getting at, but without Lincoln as President, would the South have seceded?[;)]

Brig. Gen. Phil Driscoll
1st Brigade/1st Division/VCorps/AoP


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:24 am 
A point that needs to be made is that Lincoln <i>did</i> lead the 2nd American Revolution to a successful conclusion. It was the North which was fighting to establish political principles left unanswered by the original revolution and its subsequent constitution. It was the South that was fighting to maintain the original status quo. In a bizarre, but very real sense, it was Lincoln and his Yankee troops who were the real rebels.


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 3:02 am 
Well Gentlemen,
I see nobody wants to take on the extremely hypothetical question I proposed. I am aware that had Lincoln not won the election the South would not have seceded.....I was asking the question of whether, had their personalities and operating styles remained the same, but their political beliefs and corresponding positions been reversed would Linclon have done a better job than Davis did historically and visa versa. As for the Yanks being the real Rebels.....interesting rationalization.....Well I am out of here, heading to Maryland to go battlefield hopping. I guess I'll finally be meeting some of you.
Regards, Hank

BG Hank Smith
Army of Georgia
Smith's Division CO
Carroll's Corp


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Aug 18, 2007 4:06 am 
I don't think it would have made any difference in the outcome. The war hinged on logistics, not leadership. No matter how well led, the south could not compete with the Northern industrial base, not to mention the greater population, so aside from absolute incompetance the North was bound to win. The only real hope the South ever had, was that the people of the North would cave in and not accept the casualties. That didn't happen, so logistics came into play, and that made it clearly inevitable.

Image

Willie Davis
1st LT
3rd Bde, 1st Div
XIX Corps, AoS


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Aug 18, 2007 4:31 am 
Offline

Joined: Sat Jul 14, 2001 12:13 am
Posts: 335
Location: USA
The South certainly could have won the war, and you point to one of the ways it could have happened. Winning a war is more often than not a political distinction, not a military one.

There were three ways the CSA could have won the war (Won being defined as obtaining their primary war goal: Independence).

1) Outright Military Victory. I'll agree, the simple numbers game makes this option almost impossible. The South could not do enough to fundamentally destroy the North's Warmaking ability.

2) Foreign Intervention: The great Chimera of the war. Because of the nature of European politics, highly unlikely, but still concievable. If France and England do take a hand, the South wins.

3) Breaking the Will of the North. Notice, this is not the same as breaking their ability to fight. A nation can still have lots of men, lots of guns and the ability to fight, but if the national support for the war goes away, the other side can still win. Look at Vietnam. This is by far the most realistic of the three "ways" for the CSA to win, and one that arguably, they came quite close to. If Bragg had been better in his pursuit after Chickamauga and broken up the Army of the Cumberland... The morale effects in the Union would have been pretty severe. The East was the same old stalemate, the west was the only region of progress, and having such an extreme setback in TN? Likewise (and less likely), if one of Johnston's proposed counterattacks in the Atlanta Campaign had worked as planned, even if only to knock Sherman back to the TN border. The groundswell for McClellan and the Copperheads was strong enough in early 64 as it was... We may well have seen the chaos which ensued when a War Democrat was elected by Copperheads...


As to the original question, I'm not entirely sure how to answer it. Lincoln's nature is such, I find it impossible to imagine him in that situation, so I'm getting a mind cramp.


<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by WillieD13</i>
<br />I don't think it would have made any difference in the outcome. The war hinged on logistics, not leadership. No matter how well led, the south could not compete with the Northern industrial base, not to mention the greater population, so aside from absolute incompetance the North was bound to win. The only real hope the South ever had, was that the people of the North would cave in and not accept the casualties. That didn't happen, so logistics came into play, and that made it clearly inevitable.

Image

Willie Davis
1st LT
3rd Bde, 1st Div
XIX Corps, AoS
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Major General Gary McClellan
1st Division, XXIII Corps
AoO,USA


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Aug 18, 2007 7:40 am 
Sirs,

I agree with General McClellan wholeheartedly, and the numbers bear it out. A Lincoln re-election was made possible by the fall of Atlanta in the Summer of 1864. Had the Union suffered any serious reverse which would have led to Atlanta not falling prior to the election of 1864, General McClellan (not Gary [8D])would have been President.

The Will'o'the Wisp of European Intervention would never have happened.

Great Britain would never have interevened. Whig MPs representing the Industrial North of England would have forced a General election if Palmerston ever moved in that direction, breaking up his coalition which had allowed him to head the government for 10+ years and he knew it.

So for those looking to play out the pivot point of the war, play Atlanta not that tired old maid Gettysburg. High water mark my foot! If Gener'l Lee had pulled it off there, there just would have been a Battle of Harrisburg. Followed by the Battle of <enter new town name here>burg. [:p]

To quote General Jim, <i>The West is the Best</i>.

Pat

<center>Image</center><center><font size="3"><b>Major Patrick Q. Mullen</b></font id="size3">
<font size="2"><font color="orange">Officer Commanding:</font id="orange">
<font color="limegreen"><b>Mullen's Fenian Cavalry </b>(4th Bde)</font id="limegreen">
<font color="yellow">1st Division/II Corps
Army of Mississippi
Western Theater
CSA</font id="yellow">
<font color="red">ACWGC</font id="red"></font id="size2"></center><font color="limegreen"><i>The West is the best; get here and we'll do the rest</i></font id="limegreen"><b>------General James "Jim" Morrison</b>


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Aug 18, 2007 11:41 am 
War is always about economics....always! [:)] This war is/was no exception.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> The Will'o'the Wisp of European Intervention would never have happened.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Eau contraire mon frere. It very nearly did happen. The reason it didn't is just the same as why McClellan never got elected. England was skittish of coming to Southron aid because it was already stretched quite thin and frankly was still reeling from previous naval embarrassments from earlier forays. But the biggest reason they held off throwing their support behind the Southron cause is/was economics. Many Confederates aptly stated that Europe would only become involved when the war was already determined. From what I understand Napoleon junior was more likely to jump in than was mr. powdered whig but still they held off till they had a good guess who would win. A couple of military reverses and they would have thrown their support in. Why? Simple, for the same reason the war started....economics.... which is to say how can we profit from others' loss?.

The west was just opening up and its natural resources being pillaged in full swing. Europe was chomping at the bit for those resources and the limp wristed yankee shipping magnates [:D] were all too happy to get them to the European ports at quite a price of course. This is because they owned the Lincoln administration and controlled the tariffs. Had the South been allowed to secede, much less had they won, those same rich natural resources, freshly plundered, would have shipped from Southern ports and without the federal tariff. Horace Greely's editorials offer a great deal of insight here and demonstrate the shift of yankee opinion right after secession and up to Lincoln calling up troops.

Now, for the original question the scenario doesn't play because Lincoln couldn't have gotten elected without the yankee newspapers, period. No opinion here just the facts ma'am. There was an excellent book put out a year or two ago called "Lincoln's Wrath" which clearly demonstrated this. Furthermore, Jefferson Davis, who certainly had his faults, would not bend over and take one for the team as it relates to being owned by the greedy New Englanders. So, they would have killed him and we'd be talking about another dead president.

How's that for erudite pontification? [:p]

Maj. Gen. Mike Smith
Army of Georgia
Commanding
[url="http://www.acwgc.org/acwgc_admin/phpbb2/index.php?f=28"]Miss Clarissa's Tavern
[/url][url="http://convolutedmuse.com"]ConvolutedMuse[/url]


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sun Aug 19, 2007 5:04 am 
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Michael Smith</i>
<br />War is always about economics....always! [:)] This war is/was no exception.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> The Will'o'the Wisp of European Intervention would never have happened.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Eau contraire mon frere. It very nearly did happen. The reason it didn't is just the same as why McClellan never got elected. England was skittish of coming to Southron aid because it was already stretched quite thin and frankly was still reeling from previous naval embarrassments from earlier forays. But the biggest reason they held off throwing their support behind the Southron cause is/was economics. <snip spurious 20-30 year plan macroeconomic reasons GB would have supposedly wanted to split up the US><hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

The Liberal Government under Palmerston (who favored screwing the USA over) tried just that in 1862 over the Trent affair and found that:
1.) There wasn’t as much money involved anymore, as the Cotton supply the South provided to British Factories was now being provided at ½ that price by new Egyptian cotton markets.
2.) The electoral reform laws enacted by under Robert Peel’s government in the 1840s were now taking effect. No more rotten boroughs. The Middle class were now adequately represented in Parliament. The upshot? A Majority of MPs in the Liberal government which made up Palmerston’s government were now *fanatically* anti-CSA over the slavery issue. Palmerston backed away from war during the Trent affair when a vast majority of his own party informed him that they would bolt to the Conservatives, toppling his government with a vote of no confidence. Political suicide? No thank you. and Louis Napoleon would not have intervened without British cooperation, as he made clear several times.
3.) The Macro "western resources" arguement is just spurious at best. There were no grand puppet masters sitting in back rooms in Whitehall in the 1860's playing a grand game of Risk for what would be Utah copper mines 20-30 years from then....

Pat


<center>Image</center><center><font size="3"><b>Lieutenant Colonel Patrick Q. Mullen</b></font id="size3">
<font size="2"><font color="orange">Officer Commanding:</font id="orange">
<font color="limegreen"><b>Mullen's Fenian Cavalry </b>(4th Bde)</font id="limegreen">
<font color="yellow">1st Division/II Corps
Army of Mississippi
Western Theater
CSA</font id="yellow">
<font color="red">ACWGC</font id="red"></font id="size2"></center><font color="limegreen"><i>The West is the best; get here and we'll do the rest</i></font id="limegreen"><b>------General James "Jim" Morrison</b>


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sun Aug 19, 2007 5:36 am 
That's funny Pat....risk....good one. Spurious is thinking England or any other nation then or now would pass up great financial opportunity. Politics, "social issues" no matter. Money my friend it's always about the money. Cotton btw wasn't the only poke in the fire though I'm sure the revisionists would have everyone believe so. That's funny stuff too but another argument.

Southern goods including tobacco, sugar, rice, hemp, coal oil, and more accounted for over half the United States' exports. Now, add the percentage of yankee graft to that in the name of protective tariffs and you start getting closer to the truth. The truth is ALWAYS where the money leads you, always. Now, in addition to the exports the plantations were a very important market for products of yankee industry and played a critical role in the national economy. In this light it's really no wonder at all mr abe wouldn't want that to leave.

Now, I said that to point to those resources previously mentioned. I don't know about this utah mine you mention and will leave that for bathroom literature. :-) Europe was hurting for natural resources. Need proof? Do a basic study on the immediate post war years and you'll find the South's resources plundered beyond belief. Millions of acres of virgin timber gone, poof, see ya, no longer there. Where did it go? Hmm, well it wasn't to Hoboken New Jersey. The sad part is lumber only accounts for a small part of the rape of Southron resources. The west similarly saw it's resources gobbled up. These valuable assets went, for the most part, overseas by way of yankee shipping magnates; making the wealthy even more wealthy.

We can go on and on here Pat but we still will come down to socio-political versus economic and frankly the latter always counts more. Even in our highly 'evolved' state of human development today, it's still about the benjamins. It's an interesting discussion but political or social issue fanatics never trump economic concerns. They never have nor will and that's where the rubber meets the road. Hmm, I wonder if I used enough cliches?

Maj. Gen. Mike Smith
Army of Georgia
Commanding
[url="http://www.acwgc.org/acwgc_admin/phpbb2/index.php?f=28"]Miss Clarissa's Tavern
[/url][url="http://convolutedmuse.com"]ConvolutedMuse[/url]


Top
  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sun Aug 19, 2007 5:40 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Feb 21, 2006 1:36 pm
Posts: 384
Location: Russell, Kansas USA
<center>One might argue that Marse Abe would've tipped the scales favorably
towards a successful <font color="yellow">War for Southern Independence</font id="yellow">,
simply from the standpoint of the relative skills possessed by each Gentleman
at working with other Politicians balanced against
the reality of <font color="red">how close the Confederates came anyway</font id="red">.

My compliments Suhs! <salute></center>

<center><font size="3"><font face="Comic Sans MS"><font color="black">Major General Tom Phillips, CSA</font id="black">
<font color="red">The Brus</font id="red"></font id="Comic Sans MS">
<font color="yellow"><font face="Times New Roman">II Corps</font id="Times New Roman">
<font face="Century Gothic">Army of Georgia
</font id="Century Gothic">
</font id="yellow">
</font id="size3"> </center>


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 14 posts ] 

All times are UTC - 5 hours


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 119 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Search for:
Jump to:  
cron
Powered by phpBB® Forum Software © phpBB Group