Union conscription shows that the war was not modern. The draft was only useful in encouraging men to volunteer. Of the total forces raised only 1 in ten were actually drafted. The political commutations and substitutes belie Union conscription as a limited measure and not characteristic of a total war. McPherson demonstrates that Union conscription was a political device and not a full call-out to mobilize the full manpower of the North as would have been the case in a total war.1 In contrast, the French levee en masse of the Napoleonic wars was far more extensive. The French commonly employed the practice of calling “future” classes. Napoleon called up the class of 1814 a year early to help oppose the Russian offensive of 1813.2
United States Civil War mobilization falls between twentieth-century total wars and the Franco-Prussian war. When the numbers are separated for union and confederate we find that the union raised a force of 1.6 from its total population of 22.3 million while the south recruited about 1.0 from its 5.5 million white population for 7.2 percent and 18 percent, respectively. We can say that forces raised in the south were comparable to twentieth-century wars while the union war effort clearly did not approach these levels. Further comparison with the Franco-Prussian war should point out that the entire war lasted but 9 months. For this length of time union and confederate numbers would be 576,000 and 351,000 and 2.6 and 6.4 percent, respectively. Again, we find these levels are far below twentieth-century wars. The major European powers each mobilized 15% or more of their population 1914-1918. In World War II mobilization ranged from 10 to 15 percent.3
The large economic changes and population growth in Europe in the fifty years before the First World War decisively altered the means of warfare. The requisite social conditions for modern war existed only after 1900. “Massive expansion of European population and economy from 1871 to 1914 set the stage for the first truly ‘modern war’ in 1914 in contrast to the pre-modern 1870 carnage.”4 By the 1680’s and 1690’s developments in France showed clearly that economics and politics now were major influences in making war and strategy.5 By the time of the Napoleonic wars, economic social and political events have as much impact on strategy and tactics as did new drills and weapons.6
The wars of Fredrick II and Napoleon demonstrated the early changes occurring in the transition from pre-modern to modern warfare. Fernand Braudel, the French economic and social historian, in his Civilization and Capitalism 15th-18th Century, recognizes a number of distinctions in the progress of western warfare. He finds, in part, that the “Strategy of men like Frederick II and Napoleon… no longer concerned with taking towns but with destroying enemy forces.”7 This he finds to have been a break in centuries of warfare in the 18th century8 Here he appears to suggest a watershed. He also recognizes nascent industries producing “Artillery and firearms quite transformed inter-state warfare, economic life and the capitalist organization of arms production” from 1500-1750.9 He further states “this shows the huge scale of war expenditure, even when there was no war.” As early as 1588 in Venice modern war industries had effect on market and state economy.10 Even the earliest pre-modern market economies strongly influenced the strategies European commanders. Before 1700, we find France and England using trade policies to attack their opponent’s economy. In the War of the Augsburg League, 1689-1697, the English embargoed all French wine or merchandise from entering their country, directly or indirectly, and expressly to impact the French economy and the war’s outcome.11
Already during the Napoleonic wars, we see that transportation and supply operations controlled the strategic options of commanders. Many Campaigns from Spain to the Rhine, Italy, the Elbe and into Russia ultimately turned on the logistics as much or perhaps even more than the elan of Napoleon’s Guard or the genius of his strategy.12
NOTES PART 7
PART 2 - TACTICS
PART 3 - ENTRENCHMENTS
PART 4 - BOER TACTICS
PART 5 - RAILROADS
PART 6 - CIVILIAN VIOLENCE
PART 7 - DRAFT
List of figures and tables
WORKS CITED
top