Gettysburg not a decisive turning point?

[CowCavalry]

A hundred or so Advisors and our backing politically on a small scale do not yet make it a "War" that the USA is involved in.

Regardless, it was the start of our involvement there, which escalated as you know. I think it illustrates the point about who would have bet on the VC and that it is easy to say, after the fact, "the south lost the war when they fired on Ft Sumter".

 

[wausaubob]

Regardless, it was the start of our involvement there, which escalated as you know. I think it illustrates my point about who would have bet on the VC and that it is easy to say, after the fact, "the south lost the war when they fired on Ft Sumter".

At the start of the escalated shooting, in April 1861, both sides were starting from zero. Confederate success could easily have been rated as a 50/50 proposition.
Two things rapidly changed the odds. By September 1861 it was clear that Missouri and Kentucky were not going to succeed.
The split was actually 21 contiguous states, plus the Pacific states, against about 10 4/5ths Confederate states. The odds have shifted to about 40/60 against the Confederacy.
Then by June 1862 the US advantage in steamships, steamboats, ferry boats, and river ironclads was deployed. The US reoccupied Nashville, New Orleans, the towns of Pensacola and Norfolk and the river city of Memphis, TN. after that the odds were no better than 33:67 against the Confederacy. It was going to take extraordinary event for the Confederate nation that existed in June 1862 to survive for long. And gaining tactical victories in bloody land battles was not likely to control the outcome of the war.

 

[CowCavalry]

A hundred or so Advisors and our backing politically on a small scale do not yet make it a "War" that the USA is involved in.

Ok, you pick a date for the "start", and then tell me that you would have given the VC a snowballs chance in Hades at that date.

 

[bayonet]

Ok, you pick a date for the "start", and then tell me that you would have given the VC a snowballs chance in Hades at that date.

Time to move on, you keep harping on a War for a different website.

 

[CowCavalry]

View attachment 470070Time to move on, you keep harping on a War for a different website.

 

[RodentRevolution]

View attachment 470071

The point is you are attempting a comparison with a very different strategic context. The USA very much did entertain the proposition that it could lose. In fact I have argued elsewhere (and do note that elsewhere) the original strategic premise was not a blind pursuit of victory but to lay down a marker to the Soviets and Chinese that the US would fight in support of its South East Asian allies. That the price of victory in a more important nation to America such as Thailand would not be worth it.

That the US for internal political and institutional reasons lost sight of that objective and dragged itself into a larger than necessary deployment is immaterial. The Vietcong were always recognised as a serious opponent.

On the other hand had you made the claim that many gave the Confederacy better odds than it deserved at the outset I think you would be on solid ground. Many state and and non-state observers had a presumption of Southern victory at the outset. It is only with the benefit of modern scholarship that we recognise how stacked the odds were against the deeply divided secessionist states pursuing a cause against the interests of its entire black population and what quite probably amounted to a plurality of its white citizens.

However the view from Washington was often that the rebellion could be crushed in an afternoon with sufficient application of willpower. Only General Scott had a realistic appreciation of both the time and resources required.

 

[GilbertFarney]

I've always thought there is only one turning point in any conflict. If there were multiple TPs then they wouldn't be TPs, right? For my money, the only turning point in the war is the naming of U.S. Grant as General-in Chief in 1864. Nothing was the same after that point.

 

[Rebforever]

Gettysburg was not the last battle on Northern Territory.
Being a little late to the dance, don't forget about Monacacy?.

 

[121st PA Vols]

The point is you are attempting a comparison with a very different strategic context. The USA very much did entertain the proposition that it could lose. In fact I have argued elsewhere (and do note that elsewhere) the original strategic premise was not a blind pursuit of victory but to lay down a marker to the Soviets and Chinese that the US would fight in support of its South East Asian allies. That the price of victory in a more important nation to America such as Thailand would not be worth it.

That the US for internal political and institutional reasons lost sight of that objective and dragged itself into a larger than necessary deployment is immaterial. The Vietcong were always recognised as a serious opponent.

On the other hand had you made the claim that many gave the Confederacy better odds than it deserved at the outset I think you would be on solid ground. Many state and and non-state observers had a presumption of Southern victory at the outset. It is only with the benefit of modern scholarship that we recognise how stacked the odds were against the deeply divided secessionist states pursuing a cause against the interests of its entire black population and what quite probably amounted to a plurality of its white citizens.

However the view from Washington was often that the rebellion could be crushed in an afternoon with sufficient application of willpower. Only General Scott had a realistic appreciation of both the time and resources required.

Great point on Gen. Scott who doesn't get near the credit he deserves in my view.

I'll enter the thought again since there are new people on the thread. Have any of you considered categorizing the question? Obviously, you're getting nowhere here jumping from Jackson to New Orleans to Antietam/Proclamation (guess that's really two) and so forth.

 

[OpnCoronet]

For convenience sake I usually lump Gettysburg and Vicksburg together a the turning point of the war, i.e., when full advantage of the superior attributes of winning modern wars, would be applied without ceasing until the ending of the Rebellion.
To me, it happened that the the Union's material advantages essentially peaked at the same time that the South had exhausted its offensive and defensive powers. Both marked by the more or less symbolic victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg.

 

[wausaubob]

The point is you are attempting a comparison with a very different strategic context. The USA very much did entertain the proposition that it could lose. In fact I have argued elsewhere (and do note that elsewhere) the original strategic premise was not a blind pursuit of victory but to lay down a marker to the Soviets and Chinese that the US would fight in support of its South East Asian allies. That the price of victory in a more important nation to America such as Thailand would not be worth it.

That the US for internal political and institutional reasons lost sight of that objective and dragged itself into a larger than necessary deployment is immaterial. The Vietcong were always recognised as a serious opponent.

On the other hand had you made the claim that many gave the Confederacy better odds than it deserved at the outset I think you would be on solid ground. Many state and and non-state observers had a presumption of Southern victory at the outset. It is only with the benefit of modern scholarship that we recognise how stacked the odds were against the deeply divided secessionist states pursuing a cause against the interests of its entire black population and what quite probably amounted to a plurality of its white citizens.

However the view from Washington was often that the rebellion could be crushed in an afternoon with sufficient application of willpower. Only General Scott had a realistic appreciation of both the time and resources required.

In terms of land combat, at the start of the US Civil War, the Confederacy had resources. The problem is that observers in 1861 were not remembering that the US had already proven the power of steam powered naval vessels to project force in the US/Mexican war.
And the French and English had proven that even over great distances, steam powered vessels could cut the cost of war logistics and make sustained campaigning affordable.
As soon as the application of steam naval powered vessels was demonstrated in 1862, with engines having become more powerful and more efficient, and naval guns becoming much more powerful, both the observers and the historical chroniclers should have down graded the Confederacy's chances.
Since nearly every major town or city in the Confederacy was a coastal port or a river city, and since steamboats had powered the growth of the southern agricultural economy, it was obvious, whether it was recorded or not, that the Confederacy was vulnerable to naval power.

 

[wausaubob]

For convenience sake I usually lump Gettysburg and Vicksburg together a the turning point of the war, i.e., when full advantage of the superior attributes of winning modern wars, would be applied without ceasing until the ending of the Rebellion.
To me, it happened that the the Union's material advantages essentially peaked at the same time that the South had exhausted its offensive and defensive powers. Both marked by the more or less symbolic victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg.

The resources expended by the Confederacy in the Pennsylvania campaign were not available elsewhere. Within 60 days the US occupied Battery Wagner, Burnside was in Knoxville, Rosecrans was in Chattanooga, which was an enormous gain for the US war government in Tennessee, the US occupied Vicksburg and Port Hudson, and Steele I believe made it to Little Rock.
Within two more months the US demonstrated its power when it reversed the results of the tactical defeat at Chickamauga and sent the Confederate army into a hurried retreat from Missionary Ridge.
After that the Confederacy continued only because of the extreme sacrifice of the soldiers and the citizens.

 

[wausaubob]

It was decisive and the war should have ended then. There was a 0% chance that the Confederacy that existed on July 10, 1863 would survive 5 years. And there was only a slight 5% chance that it could survive 2 more years, which it did not.
It was the Confederate government that was willing to see the southern farmland destroyed and southern manhood sacrificed in what became a contest in killing and dying. Just because the Confederacy stumbled on for 21 months does not mean they weren't strategically defeated and operationally outclassed by US naval and industrial logistical power.

 

[wausaubob]

I think the in the context of how the British had constrained Napoleon's options through naval victories, what the US had demonstrated in the US/Mexican war, and what the British and French had shown about how steamships could eliminate supply lines and drastically cut the cost of sustained campaigning, it should have been obvious that the Confederacy was vulnerable. I think that context was ignored by observers in the 1860s and that blindness has passed into history.

 

[wausaubob]

Gettysburg was decisive as a land battle. But Alfred Thayer Mahan's three stages occurred. The US was prepared with a small but professional navy, including a few steam engine experts. The US won critical naval battles at New Orleans, Vicksburg and Fort Fisher, each time with a supporting combined arms component.
And with the sea lines open, and the rivers available, the US cut the cost of campaigning, as had already been demonstrated.

 

[Jantzen64]

The OP refers to a "decisive turning point" generally and does not limit it to a battle. I think the decisive turning point was the 1864 re-election of Lincoln. Despite Little Mac's lukewarm efforts to repudiate the peace plank of the Democratic Platform, had he won, there would have been great pressure to find some negotiated resolution to the conflict. This dynamic, coupled with the type of "Hail Mary" short term victory referred to above (or even the prolonged casualty lists), could have seriously changed the outcome of the war. Lincoln successfully made his case to the Republic that maintaining the principles of Union as applied in a democratic republic were worth the cost of the war. Armed with public approval (though by no means unanimous), Lincoln could bring the full might of the North to bear and persist in bringing the war to a successful conclusion.

 

[Irishtom29]

Had Lincoln lost the election Lincoln, Grant and Sherman could've pretty well crushed the rebellion by the time of McClellan's inauguration.

As I said earlier, I think there was no turning point---never a time the rebellion was on a road to victory and seldom a time the United States wasn't.

 

[atlantis]

Despite the losses at Gettysburg victory for the confederacy was still possible. The age of conscription could have been lowered to 16 and raised to 60. The war dept. could have purchased slaves in sufficient numbers to conduct a massive construction program of fortifications, roads, railroads. And women could have been conscripted to replace men in the factories making war material.
The confederacy went part the way to war economy going to full mobilization would have improved the odds for victory.

 

[Jantzen64]

Had Lincoln lost the election Lincoln, Grant and Sherman could've pretty well crushed the rebellion by the time of McClellan's inauguration.

As I said earlier, I think there was no turning point---never a time the rebellion was on a road to victory and seldom a time the United States wasn't.

I don't disagree that they could have, assuming Lincoln didn't change his war strategy as a lame duck. But the Blind Memorandum suggests he would have deferred to McClellan as President Elect, had he lost. If the public had essentially repudiated Lincoln's policy in favor of the Democratic Platform, I don't think Lincoln as lame dark would have just stayed the course on how he was prosecuting the war. As is often said, war is an extension of politics. In that spirit - and not to take anything away from Grant, Sherman and other Union generals at all - Lincoln's ability to persuade the North to stay the course and see the war through, despite the heavy cost, guaranteed Union victory.

 

[Tom Hughes]

I read an article today in the Civil War Monitor about Presidential speeches at Gettysburg which contains the statement that "most historians argue that Gettysburg was not a decisive turning point in the war", noting that Lee was able to "retreat without harassment" and the war continued for 2 years. I am curious what others think of this opinion. Does it accurately express a current historical perspective?

I think there were two turning points in the war and both culminated in July 1863:
1. Vicksburg
2. Gettysburg
Because of the strategic importance of Vicksburg on a large scale to the success or failure of the Confederacy, I believe it trumps Gettysburg.