CanadianCanuck
First Sergeant
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2014
It's a statement that can be read a few different ways, that's for certain.
Foote's right --and he's wrong. He's right in the sense that the Confederacy was outmatched in nearly every material category that mattered in the winning of wars, and, provided the Union stayed committed to reunion, their chances of success were not great.
He's wrong in the sense that the Union's commitment to reunion was in no way a guaranteed, inevitable thing; it only looks inevitable after the fact.
I agree with this. It's very easy to look back in hindsight and conclude that things were destined to go the way they did, and people will often commit the historians fallacy and conclude that is the case. While I personally maintain that some events are very difficult to change, I also maintain that very little is outright impossible to change in history.