Your entire argument seems premised on the idea that internal social change can't happen. Based on your reasoning if we were discussing whether South Africa would give up Apartheid in 1985 your argument would be "their entire existence is based on Apartheid so they wouldn't give it up". Yet we know that the South African regime did give up Apartheid due to internal and external forces. Keep in mind noone here has said that a CSA would've given up slavery quickly if they had survived the civil war but that it would've taken decades for such change to occur. That would track well with how large social change as worked whether it was with Apartheid ending in South Africa or more recently here how Gay Marriage is set to become the law of the land. 30 years ago the idea of Gay Marriage was almost unthinkable. 20 years ago it was considered enough of a threat that a federal law, with the support of both parties, was passed to oppose it. Now a majority approve the idea. Your own view though to paraphrase Wallace is that for a CSA it would be slavery before, slavery now and slavery forever. While that may have been very well a possibility that is frankly a very limited way of looking at things and ignore all of the forces that were driving an end to slavery as a viable state institution. If history was static you would have to wonder why any country would give up slavery to begin with since it had been an entrenched institution in many countries prior to the 19th C. I'm not sure where you are getting this idea that I or JV are buying into some sort of political or romantic view of the Confederacy. If you read through my arguments I've painted a very dire view of a CSA that it wouldn't have been able to survive as an independent country. JV makes a compelling argument that it would've but he isn't painting a particular rosy picture either. If anything you are the one who is bringing a political bias to the discussion as since you seem to be unable to consider other evidence showing how slavery was a dead end institution and reasons why that might've led an independent CSA to eventually drop it. Instead your view seems to be that the people of the South would be unable to change and that it is only revisionist history that says they could. That ignores things like that even during the Civil War change was already happening internally when the Confederacy allowed blacks to fight with the promise of freedom, and also the vast amount of evidence showing how moribund the institution already was. That speaks to a far great bias than anyone else has brought up in this thread.
Kinda hard to believe that the South would have given up slavery considering how it seemed to be everything to them. Even if they were forced to do it one could argue there would not have been meaningful change for half a century, maybe more than that. It would be easier to believe if the same old racist attitude wasn't as pervasive there today.
There is a series of "alternate history" books out there : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Victory_Series Basically, Lee's "lost orders" never turn up and McClellan chickens out at Antietam.
There probably would have been another war between the North and South. The South probably would have looked towards Cuba and South America rather than westward. No matter how the South would have "won" the war, there is no way they would have gotten major land concessions like New Mexico, Arizona, etc. - or any "border state" areas. I think they would have looked for expansion in other areas to compete with the stronger North. There already were privately funded excursions into Cuba before the war - but that might have been to carve out states and numerically increase their numbers in Congress (which would have been rendered moot if they were independent). All conjecture I guess. I do think slavery would definitely not have persisted until modern times. Slaves probably would have gradually been granted more and more legal protections until they were eventually granted "second-class" citizen type of rights. Whether or not race relations would be better or worse would be hard to say. I think some of the anti-Reconstruction reactionary movements like the KKK might not ever have happened. But things like suffrage and segregation (not to say prejudice) are another matter altogether. Would there be educational and economic disparities still? Of course there would - and most likely to a far greater degree than reality.
That other war would have been WWI. WWI was basically a do-over of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. It would have also been a do-over of the Confedero-American war of 1862. The entirety of the Schlieffen Plan that Germany followed at the start of WWI was "how we should have done it in 1870". You would see a whole lot of re-fighting of the grand tactics of the Civil War - lots of battles on the same battlegrounds. North and it's Germanic populations would have sided with Germany. The fact that England and France aided the South would have created a grudge against England and France the same way Germany felt a grudge against the two. The South and their cotton trade with England would have sided with the Triple Entente. I assume the Confederacy via Texas would have taken back all of the land surrendered to USA as part of joining in 1848. Possibly even the other lands that the USA got from Mexico at the same time. And I assume England would then have proceeded to kick the USA while they were down and abrogated the Oregon Treaty, and the USA's western most border would be the non-Confederate lands on the edge of the Louisiana Purchase. I agree that CSA would try to annex Cuba and parts of Mexico - maybe Sonora and Baja California/ Baja Sur. Maybe using Pancho Villa to get control of Chihuahua. It would be interesting to see what would have happened to the Indian Territory (aka Oklahoma). Much of the land that the USA annexed resulted as a result of their position of strength on the continent. USA would be much weaker entering WWI. They would then be fighting a war on two or 3 fronts - CSA from the South and the West, England from South and West. CSA would have heavily industrialized post WWI, both because they would have learned of their deficiency from WWI, and they would have no longer been able to count on the industry of the enemy to the North. USA would have been stomped on by combined Canada/CSA in the War. Deeply embedded trenches not far from DC would have resulted in the super powerful CSA equivalents of the Paris Gun would have turned DC into a pile of rubble. Here is Ypres, Belgum before WWI: <img src="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/02/21/article-2282108-000673E900000C1D-430_964x701.jpg" height="600" width="700"> Ypres after: <img src="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/02/21/article-2282108-182A04EB000005DC-770_964x667.jpg" height="600" width="700"> Straight line from Bowling Green VA, a battery Paris Guns could hit every spot in Washington DC. From Fredricksburg, VA, a battery of Paris Guns could lay waste to Baltimore, too. Extensive trenches along the Rappahannock and/or the Potomac would have stopped advancing armies trying to shut down those guns just the same way they did all over France in WWI. Both of those cities would look like the "after" picture of Ypres, above. USA would be crushed in WWI, and the capital of the USA would probably be Philadelphia. WWI and/or WWII fought on what is to us USA and Canada would have inflicted major psychological trauma on North America, and the entire 'Murica, (**** Yeah!) mentality through the second half of the 20th century wouldn't exist. We wouldn't be the pushy swinging dicks that we sometimes are. Also, entering WWII (assuming it happened) the CSA would have all the major oil reserves that exist in the USA, which would severely screw the USA as it did Germany in WWII. And actually in WWI, too, USA's coal/fuel oil reserves might be limited, resulting rationing and really unpleasant winters. Potentially, it would have sucked so badly in what was left of the USA after WWI, that things might have played out like Germany and the rise of fascism in Weimar. Last thing - if South Africa was forced to give up Aparthid in the 1980's/90's, I have to think that slavery would have been gone in the CSA by then. It might have been the 1960's before it happened, but I can't see the rest of the world letting slavery continue, to this day, barring North Korea type pariah status.
History ultimately won with CSA taking huge ass L. I appreciate the reminder every time I see the ol rebel.
Texas oil boom would have been interesting in the CSA. Reminds me of the doc Virtual JFK about if he would have continued escalating the Vietnam war.
Ottomaton, thank you for exerting the historical and strategic insight to explore this premise without indulging in ideological self-righteousness.
Indulging in ideological self-righteousness defined the CSA and CSA wet-dreamers around still today. The CSA has already been condemned so I didn't need to gloat about it here. So I apologize.
All the slaves would have run away to the North and then the South would have attacked the North and restarted the Civil War to get their slaves back :grin:
Some interesting ideas but I'm not so sure history would play out quite that way. While the UK was very interested in Southern cotton I don't think that would've meant that they would've necessarily allied with the South in a do over of the Civil War during WWI. As noted the UK had already done away with slavery and public opinion in UK was against slavery. If the CSA had still had slaves by 1914 I'm not sure how much the UK, France or even Germany might've wanted to support the CSA. My own guess is if the USA and CSA were fighting then most likely European powers might've taken a neutral stance while they thought each other. It does bring up an interesting question though whether either the USA or CSA would end up in Europe. As would the Lusitania have happened if there was already a major conflict in North America? I think you give more capability to the CSA than could be possible. Again the while the UK might want to kick the US while it's down I still don't think there is any guarantee that the UK would support the CSA instead. Also you still have to consider that even if the CSA survived the Civil War the nature of the CSA is one of a confederacy and as such once it survived there are questions of how likely would the states cooperate on an expansionist agenda without a strong central government. The other issue is that even if the CSA survived the CSA still was at a large population and industrialization disadvantage to the US. I would doubt that the CSA could both conquer and settle much western territory. Further the very nature of it a slave state means that much manpower for both conquest and settlement has to come from slaves. Given that there was no longer a major international slave trade where would the CSA get more slaves? They could try enslaving Mexico but I'm guessing then the US would be more than happy to arm Mexico to resist a CSA southward expansion. In short I think there are too many advantages to the US to allow for major CSA expansion. The CSA likely would've tried to industrialize but the North was already ahead of them there and they would've tried to play catch up. Further a slave based economy doesn't work well with an industrialized consumer economy. While you could press slaves to work in factories without having a major consumer base the market isn't there. If the CSA could become a manufacturing exporting power that could work but as noted it was already behind the US and the UK which would already be controlling the markets for manufacturing goods. It might be possible for the CSA to compete on price as slave labor by definition would be cheap but at the same time slave labor isn't as motivated or productive as wage labor. Further even with slaves the disparity in population size would still handicap the CSA. While the US would continue to benefit from waves of immigration I doubt the attitudes in the South would be welcoming waves of central and eastern European immigration that helped to build the industrial revolution of the North. Again I think you're giving too much credit to what the CSA could do. Keep in mind there was trench warfare in the Civil War so this wouldn've have been new to either side. Again given the North's industrial advantages it's more likely that they would develop the type of weapons you mention first and would use those to batter Richmond and other Southern cities. While the CSA would themselves develop heavy artillery numerically it seems like the USA would be in a much better position to fight a mechanized war.
The CSA had industrialized quite a bit during the war years. At the end, they had the guns - but not the manpower. I wonder how heavy industrialization/modernization would have affected slavery? Ottomaton - great post. Have you read Turtledove's Southern Victory series?
England and Austria-Hungary essentially aligned with the CSA in real life. They just did everything possible to make it secret, because they didn't want to piss off the USA. But they were, in very secretive ways, doing everything they could sneakily do to help the CSA. They definitely would have helped the CSA to "stick it" to the USA if they thought they could do so without repercussions. I think people don't realize exactly how much the raw cotton from the South powered the Industrial Revolution in England, and the extent of the depression in England that resulted from blockade. The Civil War really, really, really screwed the economy of England for a short while. My assumption with industrialization is that that would have been the big lesson taken from the Civil War, and there would be a "national program". You're right, I could be mistaken. But I'm going to give the peoples of the CSA credit for being able to read the writing on the wall. There was actually pretty extensive industrialization in the south anyway. Steel production was a major product of Alabama by 1900. Here's a "for instance". If I had more time I could come up with more. No machine guns in the civil war, because no nitro/smokeless powder. People think of machine guns shooting bursts in WWII. The big water cooled Maxim type guns used to be set up and fire continuously for hours on end. They'd point them, pull down the trigger, and then tap the gun a couple of degrees, wait a minute or two, and tap again until the reached the end and then go back the other way. There was nothing, nothing, at all like that in the Civil War. At the start of WWI, German Cuirassiers were still trying to do Calvary charges with long wooden pikes. That would have worked in the Civil War. Not WWI. Also, there was no breach loading artillery that could shoot anything like 75 miles. The quality of the steel would have not been able to handle the strain. You are right, though, that the north would beat the crap out of Northern Virginia, too. That border between North and South was just too heavily populated. It would have been as bad as anywhere in France during WWI. WWI is by far my favorite historical subject. I have tons of artifacts, gear, original photos, guns, uniforms, etc. Finally, now that I'm thinking about it, it'd be interesting to see what would have happened to all the energy sunk into the "Indian Wars" for the USA in the late 19th century if they didn't have quite so many Indians to kill. Where would that energy have been redirected? One more thing - about 7 million black people moved from the South to urban factory jobs in the North in the 20th century in the so called "Great Migration", escaping subsistence farming. If there was a hard, firm border between CSA and USA, they might have moved to urban CSA factory work in Southern cities?
I bet slaves would make running a hot ass Bessemer steel mill quite a bit easier. Those places back then were hot as hell and dangerous. I read "Guns of the South" and another series that had aliens that got high on ginger. I've read a couple of other books but not sure about "Southern Victory" series. I like his books because a) they aren't too deep or complex and b) they are long as hell. You can fill up a good week or two running through one of his series and they read very fast. They are the perfect definition of "potboilers" without any negative connotations to that word.
