General Lee, 1863

I voted for Vicksburg. I think it was more important for the South to avoid being rolled up from the West than it was for it to try to obtain conquests in the East.

Psychological factors are also important, especially because the South’s main hope of victory was to convince the North that a) the war was unwinnable, and b) that trying to win would merely result in rivers of blood being shed. If by the end of 1863, everything was exactly as it had been at the start of the war, Northern voters might have said, “we have achieved nothing in exchange for several years of bloodshed.”

Also, if I were Jefferson Davis, I would have heavily looked into the possibility of obtaining needed war supplies via trade with Mexico. Not that Mexico was necessarily a manufacturing hub for guns and cannons. But with its long coastlines on both the Atlantic and Pacific, it would have been hard for the Union to blockade. Allowing the Union to chop the Confederacy in half would–among other disadvantages–have defeated any plan for the eastern Confederacy to obtain anything via Mexico.

The overall strategy for the south - in my opinion was poor.

Anytime you commit to a strictly defensive outlook, you’re doomed.  They didn’t have a plan to “defeat” the union, their plan was to “stay alive until the union goes away.”

Worse, when you say your grand battle plan is to play the defensive game until your opponent gives up, citing that you simply have better resolve.  Than you better not surrender first.

Now I’m not Jefferson Davis, or General Lee, and they KNEW what they were doing. And in “theory” did all that they could do - the way they thought best.  But it should be noted - that both Davis and Lee originally opposed secession, then fought the north, suffering no ill punishments for treason after losing the war.

I would have attacked Washington, or a major U.S. target, I would have sent assassins or whatever I could have, after the top leadership of the army of my opponent, I would also focus my efforts to make it so that the Confederates were liberators, not oppressors, as the war was over state rights/ and not slavery.

But hey, I wasn’t around…

Strike at DC! …

@Gargantua:

I would have sent assassins or whatever I could have, after the top leadership of the army of my opponent

Considering how incompetent most of the Union generals commanding the Army of the Potomac were before they finally put Grant in charge, it would have been less productive for the Confederacy to assassinate them than to leave them in comand. Lee is reputed to have said that his big worry was that, if the generals in charge of the Army of the Potomac kept getting sacked, Lincoln would eventually find a general that Lee didn’t know how to beat.

Yea it was better to keep the Union Generals around for the south, because they were all horrible ( except Sheridan and a few lower ranked Generals) . The South should have assassinated the Union army instead.

The only thing that kept the South in the war was terrible union leadership that wasted all the extra men and material they had. If the South made one mistake the material advantage of odds would exact punishment every time and whittled down the Southern armies.

@Imperious:

Yea it was better to keep the Union Generals around for the south, because they were all horrible ( except Sheridan and a few lower ranked Generals) . The South should have assassinated the Union army instead.

The only thing that kept the South in the war was terrible union leadership that wasted all the extra men and material they had. If the South made one mistake the material advantage of odds would exact punishment every time and whittled down the Southern armies.

I think what Gargantua meant was that he’d send assassins after the most competent Union generals, while leaving the least competent ones alone. That being said, I completely agree with the points you’ve made in your post. In particular, your point about how the South needed to display better generalship than the North, always, because of the North’s ability to use its overwhelming advantage in men and industrial capacity to punish any mistakes.

The above situation is reminiscent of the war between Germany and the Soviet Union. In the spring of '41, the German Army consisted of 150 divisions. By the fall of '41, the Red Army consisted of 600 divisions. In 1942, the Soviets outproduced the Germans on a 3:1 or 4:1 basis in every major land weapons category, and even produced nearly twice as many military aircraft as the Germans. Given those odds, the Germans simply could not afford to exchange soldiers with the Soviets on anything remotely close to a 1:1 basis. Even at the battle of Stalingrad the Germans still lost fewer men than the Soviets. But it was close enough to a 1:1 ratio to make it the most crushing Soviet victory of the war.

Okay so I don’t know much about the Civil War (sad I know right? I’m American! But I’m also Missourian!) but I’d have gone for Washington. If it fell then so would the Union (well not fell but would have given Confederate demands etc. etc. whatever you now what I mean!).

Pierre would have messed that up. He was not one of the Souths best commanders. Ive seen him ranked in the middle of the pack for confederate generals.

if they took the capital it would probably been a Pearl harbor moment and really solidified the northern states into more ruthless course of action. So if they took Washington, the North would get it back and really make an effort and cause the promotion of men like Phil Sheridan to exact a painful retribution against the South.

I believe thast the reason why the ANV went north in '63 was that they needed to attempt to force some type of favorable outcome as the south knew well that they could not defeat the north in a prolonged affair. This was the last time that they could mount some sort of sustainable offensive.

Get between Meade’s army and Washington on good ground and force the yankees to attack. Similar to Fredricksburg. Rein in Stuart and use him to scout the rear of the union lines looking for a place to counterattack and watch for federal flanking moves. If the yankees failed to attack then move on Washington before the provisions ran out.

I think he should have re-taken New Orleans.  Give the British a reason (the possibility of renewed cotton exports) to enter the war; or at least break open the naval blockade.  This would also open the west again and make the Union attack on Vicksburg of minor (rather than critical) importance.

However, Lee needed to stay in, or near, Virginia to ensure the Union wouldn’t/couldn’t take the confederate capital of Richmond and the rest of Virginia; really the heart of the Confederacy was Virginia.  Not sure that the South would have dared allow a lesser general to take command of this region to enable Lee to march on New Orleans.

@ABWorsham:

Only 8 voters? Wow, thought this topic would cause more talk than it’s has.

Maybe because this thread is for WWII history. Maybe it would do better under general discussion.

@CWO:

@Gargantua:

I would have sent assassins or whatever I could have, after the top leadership of the army of my opponent

Considering how incompetent most of the Union generals commanding the Army of the Potomac were before they finally put Grant in charge, it would have been less productive for the Confederacy to assassinate them than to leave them in comand.

McClellan was a poor field general, but an excellent ‘builder’ of an army. The AoP was McClellan’s army, he built it, he trained it, the only thing he couldn’t do was lead it in the field, because McClellan continually managed to convince himself the South had far larger armies than they did. Also, Meade at Gettysburg had Lee pretty well sussed out and predicted the outcome. Only his failure to pursue Lee more vigorously (I believe he still had a whole corps in reserve) which could have been done I think, cost him effectively his job (he was allowed to stay at the AoP, but Grant as the new General in Chief was the effective commander of the AoP). Grant just decided to make it a battle of attrition which he knew he would win. Grant also promoted the idea of coordinated attacks all over the South, attacking with all armies at the same time so reinforcement could not be sent by the Confeds from one to another theatre.