TommH wrote:I don't think Scott was right, at least not at the time he was proposing his plan. For the federal goverment to just atttempt to passivly starve the population of the South into submission would have been politically untenable. It also had little chance of working. For instance look at the history of strategic bombing, which is significantly more devastating then a blockade. In no case has it won a war or forced a peace in spite of massive commitments of resources (agains German, Japan, and North Vietnam specificly).
The North had to invade and ity had to invade in the East and the West. Strictly it didn't have to carry out the various amphibious operations but it made sense for them to do so since they had the navy and could afford the resource diversion while the South could not.
With all due respect, you are totally wrong on your conclusion regarding the blocakdes discussed above. A blockade is a much different creature than the strattegic blockade you are comparing it to. I will conceede for purposes of this discussion, that the strategic bombing carried out in WWII and Vietnam did not sufficiently contribute to the ultimate victory so as to justify the resources devoted to it, but it was the blockades of the Central Powers in WWI and Japan in WWII that ultimately won both Wars.
The Central Powers collapsed becuase of the failure of the home front to be able to maintain the war materially (a combination of the losses sustained, disruptiosn to prodictive capacioty caused by material shrotages, and starvation).
With Japan, it was the unrestricted submariein campaign by the United States taht destroyed the merchant marine that compromised the IJN's ability to defend the Empire. The Battle fo Lyete Gulf was brough on becaus the Combined fleet had to be disbursed and home proted close to its fuel production centers in the Dutch East Indies. This led to the piecemeal and overly complicated plan that allowed the USN to cut it up in detail. Moreover, it was the loss of production capacity and the ability to replinish its garrisons (due toe the greatly diminished Merchant Marien) that allowed the Allies to island hop towards the Home Islands.
My point is that through the history of "total war," effective strategic blockades, of teh type first pionered by the Union navy, have been the truly effecitive means of globally reducing the effectiveness of a nations field troops.
The South Collapsed due to the deteriorating logistical situation, leading to starvation on the hoem front that compriomised the Army's Morale and recruiting. Under Gorgias, the Confederate were generally able to keep their field troops supplied with munitions, but that took the enteire productive and trasport capacity of the Confederacy.
The Confederacy was able to grow enough food to feed itself (as demosntrated by the Union Cavalry raids), but it was unable to transport that produce to the field units and the pospulation centers due to the disruption to its population centers caused by the refugee crisis. This loss of transport capacity was brought on by the inability of the Confederay to use costal trade and to trade in Eurpoe. Nearly all of the South's production capacity was devoted to mility supplies, and there was not enough residual capacity to make up for the loss of transport capacity in the form of rails, rolling stock and costal/riverine transport.
In the end, the South collapsed for similar reasons as the Central Powers, a gradual, but inexerable starving off of their productive/logistical capacity.
In short, it was the strategic blockade, more then the combat attritional losses inflicted by Grant et al. that led to the surender of Lee's Army. Rember at Appomatix, the ANV was still organised and well supplied with Munitions, but the troops were starvign and without food/forage due to the breakdown in logistics/production. Had there been food at Appomatix waitign fro Lee rather than munitions, the War would probably have continued, at elast for a while longer.
)...I think you could arguably call every operation by the Union from north to south...save the Mississippi River campaigns....diversions.
apy: 
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