What factors allowed the north to win the Civil War? Was northern victory inevitable?

Answer 1

The North had all of the weapons industry and 3 times the manpower. The odds were heavily favouring the North

Victory was definetly not inevitable. Jackson (Stonewall) proposed several times to raid the North - bypass Washington and concentrate on the undefended industrial supply areas. His proposals were rejected every time and the generals (both North and South) mostly concentrated on meat-grinder tactics- set piece battles. Victory in such battles goes to the side with more resources- so the North had to win.

Stonewall Jackson's tactic was used- ironically it was used by a very able Northern general who ripped the heart out of the Confederacy with his "March through Georgia". In this manner he practically ended the war with almost no casualties to his troops.
Lee's surrender was simply the result of suddenly finding himself with no supplies and no prospect of future supplies from the destroyed rear.

Answer 2

The north had a much greater industrial capacity and more than double the population of the south, and of this population all were free people able to contribute to the war.

Nevertheless, the south won all of the early battles in the war. It's troops were better prepared and the southern culture encouraged being good fighters and marksmen more than the north's culture did. This was in part because the population of the south was more rural, and also because in order to keep the slaves in line white southerners had to be able to enforce their domination from time to time.

The south and the north also had different goals. The south was not interesting in conquering the north - merely in keeping the northerners out. The armies of the north had a bigger job because they had to retake all that territory that had seceded.

So from the southerner's standpoint it seemed like they had a good chance to win. And they could have, if the north had been ruled by someone who was squeamish and didn't want to pursue a war when it became too costly.

The southerner's hope would have been that after a few quick victories the north would have been forced into acknowledging that the price was too high to bring the south back into the Union. And it was very, very high. The levels of drafting the north was forced to undertake often caused riots and unrest.

A lesser president might have looked at these things and decided that he could live with the southern states being part of a separate country. Such a president would have made peace with the south and gone his own way. The leaders of the south must have hoped this would happen.

But Lincoln was unwilling to settle for anything less than the complete surrender and reconquest of the south. Even though the north's losses were much higher than the south's, Lincoln refused to allow any slackening of the war effort.

Northern victory was indeed inevitable, but only because the north was willing to do whatever was necessary, however long it took, to ensure a total victory. Had Lincoln been a different sort of person it is quite conceivable that he may have given up and allowed the south to go their own way.

Answer 3

Northern victory was never totally inevitable, but still, you'd have bet your money on the Union. First off, the South could not match the North's industrial output - they couldn't manufacture enough weapons or enough supplies to properly support the Confederate army. They also had a very inadequate overland transport system - their railroads were a joke.

The Union strategy was simple and as old as history itself: surround the enemy and wear him down and starve him out. Although smugglers did manage to breach the Union naval blockade throughout the war, as the war progressed, that became much harder. When it did, the South was severely under-supplied with imported weapons, gunpowder, medicines, food and everything else needed by a civil society. When the Union seized control of the entire Mississippi River, it cut the Confederacy in half, making their war efforts that much more difficult.

The South had some of the best generalship ever seen by humankind - but not even Massa Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson could wave their hands and magically create more soldiers to replace the three hundred thousand they lost in battle. The North, on the other hand, not only started off the war with a much larger population of men fit for military duty, but were able to induce tens of thousands of immigrants to enlist right off the boats from Europe. There were entire regiments in which not one private soldier spoke English. Germans and Irishmen made up many such units. And, the North eventually agreed to accept blacks as soldiers - and you better believe those black men fought like demons!
The Confederacy simply could not compete - and it is nothing short of amazing that they held on as long as they did. Too bad courage and ideology don't win wars...

Answer 4

The North had the industrial capacity and they were smart to blockade the south with their superior navy not allowing the South to easily import the arms and supplies needed from overseas. Northern victory was inevitable. The north also had a much larger population and could bring more men to the battlefield over time.
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Here's some stuff they don't teach in history class. The Civil War was less about slavery and more about states rights and money. Southern slave owners had a great deal of their money and fortune tied up in the value of their slaves. The North wanted to free the slaves and the southern planters said in effect "fine but where's my money?".
Freeing the slaves meant certain bankruptcy for many land owners in the south. With the Emancipation Proclamation, overnight a vast majority of their net worth disappeared into thin air.
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By the time of the war the industrial revolution was beginning and farming with the use of human labor was beginning to be nonproductive with machinery coming into use.
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There's no doubt that slavery was a horrible and terrible institution which had been around since Biblical times. The African slave trade to the new world was instigated by the English in their efforts to make their colonies in the West Indies profitable through sugar cane cultivation.
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It has been reported that even now in the twenty first century slavery still exists in some places on Earth.
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Answer 5

U.S. Grant wrote famous memoirs, and according to those, after Vicksburg fell, he was summoned to the White House. He never wore his rank, and so was mistaken for a Private in Washington! When he finally got into the White House, he and Lincoln conferred over the path to victory.

Grant told Lincoln that the only way to guarantee victory was to be willing to trade casualties with the South at a rate of 4 Federals to each Confederate. The Federals had huge cities like New York, Chicago, Boston, and Philadelphia teeming with young men. As long as Lincoln was willing to "pay the butcher's bill" (take the onus for the horrible death tolls) then victory was inevitable.

Lincoln promoted Grant to "General of the Army" a four-star rank created just for Grant, and gave him the go-ahead to begin his war of attrition. The North could tap into the huge number of young men in the cities, while the South had virtually every man already in uniform. The North could replace their losses, the South could not. This made victory certain.

Answer 6

Several key factors played a part in the Union's victory.

For one The Northern States had more factories and railroads thus they were able to better manufacture weapons and supplies needed to fight the wars as well as transport them.

As I pointed to abover the North had more railroads but they also used the natural flow of the rivers to move boatloads of troops and supplies. A large part of winning a war is logistics which means being able to move personnel and supplies to battle in large quatities.

Also The Confedearate government mostly relied on individual states making the decisions on what to do and in some cases the army actually needed a state's governor to give them permission to fight or to use their troops. This resulted in no new railroad lines being built to replace what was destroyed by the raids of Union general William Tecumseh Sherman.

Sherman's raids crippled much of the confederacy's manufacturing capabilities as well as it's transportation system and rendered the South unable to fight.

Finally an invention that would change the tides of armed warfare forever was making it's debut. The repeating rifle. While they weren't officially adopted to service many Union soldiers purchased Spencer repeating rifles with their own funds to replace the traditional muzzle loaded muskets which were complicated to load. A soldier armed with a repeating rifle did not need to go through the cumbersome process of loading the powder, shot, and percussion caps only to have the gun not fire if they messed up one of the intricate steps.

Answer 7

Overwelming industrial and human resources were the main factors that allowed them to win the war. Victory, however, was probable..not inevitable.

The south came close to winning if it weren't for a few key events at the Battle of Gettysburg. If the rebs would've won, the anti-war sentiment then growing in the north may have caused Lincoln to sue for peace or a victory may have brought recognition from the european nations.

Just to name a few of the events that turned the tide in north's favor....the death of Stonewall Jackson, the failure of Ewell to take the high ground on day 1 of Gettysburg, failure of Lee to circle the Union left on Day 1, instead of at Little Round Top, Governoer Warren's last minute reinforcement of Little Round Top, lack of Stuart's cavalry on the rebs side prior to Gettysburg, and finally Lee's blunder on the final day.

These are just some of events that may have changed history if they were different. At the time, they could've gone either way.

Answer 8

One of the main reasons why the North won the American Civil war was it's industrial capacity. In the North, they were able to make muskets by a new factory process which meant that every musket was exactly the same.

The other major reason why the North won in the end was because it believed it was fighting to liberate the slaves. People today can say what they like about that, but I am aware that many young men left the shores of Britain to sign up in the Union Army because they wanted to help put an end to slavery.

Meanwhile, back here in little old England, the cotton mill workers refused to use cotton imported from the South. They held a mass strike which lasted for months. It caused them much personal pain and hurt and many were near to starvation, but they would not give in. In the end their Socialist argument won the day.

Answer 9

Yes, victory was inevitable. The North had all the factories and industries. The South was losing money due to loss of fields and they were losing money fast.

Answer 10

The north had all the industrial capacity for the manufacture of weapons. That, and the moral righteousness of being against slavery. Yes, victory was inevitable.