It's a good hypothesis that I have also wondered about as I have often wondered if Davis and the confederate people didn't have unrealistic expectations. Initially they thought they could win independence bloodlessly. All the appeasement produced by their bullying left them with confused notions. They thought the blood from the war would fit in a thimble. They thought the Northern men were cowards and poltroons who wouldn't fight, etc.
Such claims were the work of newspaper journalists and party platforms.
Davis, a former Secretary of War of the United States, was aware a war would be tremendous in scale and bloodshed. In his speech of January 10, 1861 in the US Senate he warned the opponents of the Southern democracy in the US Government that interfering with the secession of the South would lead to a Civil War on a scale they couldn't imagine.
Several weeks into the war, in June, 1861, Mary Chesnut discussed the situation with him as Confederate President. In her diary she says the war was already too long. Davis, she said, suggested and long and painful struggle against the manhood of the North.
Davis was evidently not a "secessionist per se." In other words he was not inclined to the theoretical metaphysics of the arch-secessionists, who were convinced the north was paralyzed by political factions and divisions, etc. and would not take up the gauntlet, etc. But at the head of the Southern Confederate government, he was charged with defending its territory in the manner outlined by its ruling party. He pressed that program to its conclusion.
Live to fight another day is a good strategy for someone who doesn't want to be conquered. The problem, the real problem was slavery. If the Southern Confederacy had done away with slavery they had a chance, but of course the preservation and extension of slavery is what they were fighting for ("their way of life" the cornerstone of their society).
Northern armies advancing untrammeled everywhere resisted only in opportunistic ambushes sounds fine in theory except that these armies were wrecking slavery and the southern home front wherever they went.
Indeed. As mentioned the situation of the Southern Confederacy was distinct. The Confederacy officially declared itself as NOT
revolutionary, but a functional de facto territorial government from inception, determined to defend its lengthy borders to prove it (recall Davis each year kept pressing the armies to, and beyond, the border States).
They were particularly determined to maintain their internal security entire, not only to defend the institutions, but to ensure the Europeans that they were a de facto authority; and thus a somewhat safe investment for the banks and businesses of Europe; and encourage foreign recognition. The British remained neutral but somewhat accepted the Confederate's claim of de facto status for their own purposes (for example at the close of the war they sequestered and secured Confederate property, accounts, etc. in Britain rather than turning them over to the USA). The US Government never conceded the Confederacy was a de facto government; having never abandoned its forts in the secession crisis, and keeping troops therein to "enforce the laws of the Union" etc. From the British view:
From Shortridge v. Mason, 1868, the US courts noted the USA never conceded the Confederacy was a de facto government, excluding its jurisdiction by force of arms from the South.
Long story short, had the Confederacy been less determined to seek foreign alliances, and approval at home and abroad, and as a territorial authority struggling to establish itself as a de facto government, over the region to protect its institutions, people, and property entire, perhaps it might not have expended manpower and resources in such quantity to defend its vast borders, and its cities in the way it did.
Had the Confederate resources been employed instead in a strictly
revolutionary policy, Johnston's fabian strategy might perhaps have been much more advantageous; perhaps somewhat in the mode of General Washington's in the 1700s, or Garibaldi recently in Italy. But again, that would have been in opposition to the ruling party, and its "statesmen, philosophers and philanthropists" as VP Stephens noted later.
If Johnston personally was unable to fight campaigns unfettered by orders to defend fortified cities to the last, he was at least able to keep ancillary forces afoot in mobile warfare. For example General Forrest. Johnston as department commander in the west from late 1862 through July, 1864 who encouraged his free reign as a "cavalry corps" commander. From Wyeth on Forrest:
You can imagine how a suggestion to "give up" the defense of Mississippi went over in Davis' mind. But again, as Confederate President, he understood his job was to defend territory
at all costs.
Because Johnston never had the full trust from Davis it's difficult for me to judge him fairly, and I also don't know him enough. The men respected him, he was supported among the soldiers. After the war there were famous generals who spoke well of him. That's about all I can say. The generals in the west were all defeated. Johnston did well enough to not be defeated, not get in fights he didn't have the best chance of winning. Did he have the support of Bragg? No. I need to read more to from a better opinion.
The Confederate soldiers loved Uncle Joe Johnston like none other. I say this because, the enthusiasm and dedication ascribed to him was in spite of the lack of battlefield victories beyond Manassas, etc. But that might be part of the point, He was not trapped in the "Shiloh" cycle of pitched battles. Phil Stephenson of the Washington Artillery noted at Dalton in 1864 how Johnston transformed the beaten and demoralized Army of Tennessee in a few months into a force capable of fighting one of the great campaigns of history. The "100 days battle" as some of his veterans called it. In army reviews and inspections, Johnston rode down the line of every unit, glancing at each man, and unlike other commanders, would look the man right in the eyes. It was as if he made an unspoken contract with each soldier of his army that their lives would not be sold cheap. Where Johnston commanded, the corruption that robbed the troops of rations and clothing (and made men wealthy) was not welcome. Recall he had been the Quartermaster General of the US Army. So while the troops loved him, he was persona non grata to the party of "harpies."
Sam Watkins of the 1st Tennessee on Johnston assuming command in early 1864:
Douglas J. Cater of the 3rd Texas recalled, "We loved him , we were proud to be commanded by so great and gifted a soldier."
Bringing the