The plan should have never been to win militarily: the traitors might have had a chance of independence if the Union forces had sustained publicly unacceptable losses and political pressure forced them into a ceasefire.
If the traitors wanted to win they should have fought it like a guerilla insurrection.
If the traitors wanted to win they should have fought it like a guerilla insurrection.
Considering the patron saint of this community and the overwhelming war fervor in the Union that manifested over the course of the war, I'm not sure that would have worked out better for them.
Fair point, nothing is certain in war but considering the overwhelming economic and military size the traitors were up against it's still the most viable option if they did it quick enough, in my armchair general opinion.
I mean how does one expect to win a war when your primary industry of cotton exports get completely blockaded. And you're dumb enough to exclude your slaves from fighting when you're short on man-power.
The rebellion was a dumb idea from the start and they only had a moon-shot way of essentially calling a draw.
I think they were in fact hoping for political pressure - of the international kind. As I recall, the rebels had envoys in England and France who were trying to get those countries to pressure the US to let the south secede. But that task would be much harder if the rebels were conducting a guerilla insurrection, as opposed to trying to set up a government and army. Appealing to foreign powers not that crazy of an idea; a large part of how the US gained independence was that the French were persuaded to intervene on our behalf.
A friend once told me that the South could never have won due to the industrial superiority of the North. I said that sounds like wisdom in English, but it's a joke in Vietnamese.
I mean, they're right, industrial superiority just also requires the will to keep the war going for as long as necessary, and with whatever casualties necessary. For "Shitty war that violates another country for reasons we ourselves aren't entirely clear on", the will is generally lacking; for "A third of our country was just taken by traitors because they decided they only like democracy when they win", there's generally plenty of will.