The Grand Design: Strategy and the U.S. Civil War

by Donald Stoker

Despite the abundance of books on the Civil War, not one has focused exclusively on what was in fact the determining factor in the outcome of the differences in Union and Southern strategy. In The Grand Design , Donald Stoker provides for the first time a comprehensive and often surprising account of strategy as it evolved between Fort Sumter and Appomattox. Reminding us that strategy is different from tactics (battlefield deployments) and operations (campaigns conducted in pursuit of a strategy), Stoker examines how Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis identified their political goals and worked with their generals to craft the military means to achieve them--or how they often failed to do so. Stoker shows that Davis, despite a West Point education and experience as Secretary of War, ultimately failed as a strategist by losing control of the political side of the war. Lincoln, in contrast, evolved a clear strategic vision, but he failed for years to make his generals
implement it. And while Robert E. Lee was unerring in his ability to determine the Union's strategic heart--its center of gravity--he proved mistaken in his assessment of how to destroy it. Historians have often argued that the North's advantages in population and industry ensured certain victory. In The Grand Design , Stoker reasserts the centrality of the overarching plan on each side, arguing convincingly that it was strategy that determined the result of America's great national conflict.

Genres: Civil War, History, American Civil War, Military Fiction, American History, Military History, War

498 pages, Paperback

First published June 27, 2010

About the author

Donald J. Stoker is an American military historian. He earned a bachelor's degree (1989) and a Master's of Arts (1990) from Valdosta State University.
He is Professor of Strategy and Policy for the U.S. Naval War College's program at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California."

Reviews

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not sure I learned a whole lot new in this book compared to other histories of the Civil War. It felt like most of this book took place in Tennessee, and it was somewhat hard to follow where/when things were happening because the author is loathe to discuss specific battles. I get that part of the point of the book is to get away from excessive focus on battles and too look at campaigns and overall strategies, but I spent a lot of the book just trying to orient myself. While I can see this book working well in courses about strategy, there's not a lot of color in this book, which makes it a bit dry. It does do a very good job relaying the overall strategies of the Union and Confederacy, but I was a little bored with the operational history, which is about 80% of the book. Better as a reference than a full-on read.

[James Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of the Civil War told in narrative is a familiar one. And at first Stoker's history seemed just another one. His intent is to explain the course of the war in terms of the military strategy developed and employed by the two sides. His claim that it's not been told before is questionable. The strategies are present in all general histories of the war, but they're folded in with the enormous amount of information about the individual battles and about the personalities that make the history. Stoker's account succeeds in filtering out most of those details about the long litany of battles and the cast of characters and the social upheaval brought about by it all. What he's distilled from the mountains of material available is a rather compact 418-page study of the strategies the two sides devised to try to win the war, how these strategies evolved in response to unfolding circumstances and how they failed or succeeded. It's an interesting book. I was a little while warming to it, not seeing at first he's provided a fresh and useful addition to the histories. What I slowly realized is that by concentrating his study on the war's strategy alone he's given us something so totally comprehensive and efficient that we're able to see some of the old history in new and convincing ways. Some of his analysis is surprising. We're not used to being told--especially in the South--that the Gettysburg campaign was a tactical and strategic failure. Nor are we used to thinking Vicksburg was a less important military objective than Chattanooga. Traditional Civil War histories add a little romance and drama--Grant cutting away from his supply base to approach and besiege Vicksburg, Lee leading his ragtag veterans into Pennsylvania to manhandle the Union armies once again, this time on their own soil. Stoker avoids all that and focuses on the hard realities of the strategic picture. Lee overreached and failed at Gettysburg and nearly lost his army. Grant conducted a nimble campaign against Vicksburg but the more important prize was Chattanooga. While other historians might consider the use of black soldiers as a slave rebellion, Stoker simply states the Union's enlistment of those 200,000 blacks was certainly one of the determining factors in their final defeat of the Confederacy, especially since the South, though chronically short of manpower, decided against their use in the ranks. Surprisingly, Stoker is mildly critical of the generalship of Robert E Lee. He agrees that Lee was by far the outstanding leader in the Confederate armies, but he's less lavish with his praise of the operational accomplishments of Lee against consistently larger and better-equipped Union armies. And Stoker savages Jefferson Davis's overall mismanagement of the Southern armies and strategy. His heroes are--rightly so--Grant and Sherman. And Lincoln, whose political skill and management of difficult personalities held it all together. I have come to think Stoker's ability to refine all this information has left us with a resonant and rich overview of those strategic ideas and resources--overpowering on the Union side, meager and desperate for the Confederacy--and a new insight into the war.

[Mark · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really can't rate this book higher than two stars. I wanted to like it; but I kept barking my shins on poorly-substantiated sweeping statements (such as the statement that there has never been a book written concerned with Civil War strategy) and questionable conclusions. It's well-researched and capably-written... but.



The author unquestionably knows his stuff, but I'm not convinced by some of his arguments. It's notable that he goes against the grain and highlights some of the positive points in the ideas of controversial individuals like McClellan, Halleck, Bragg, and Beauregard (although accurately pointing out their errors and failures as well), and he makes a good case for Lincoln learning to become a great strategist. But while the author is clearly a Clausewitzian and derides many of the Jominian principles underlying the military education of the officers on both Northern and Southern sides, he doesn't go far enough into the explanation or analysis of those principles to demonstrate just why they were either misguided or misapplied.



More worth a read-through than many books rated two stars... but the reader may end with more questions than answers.

[Joseph · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was ok, but more geared towards the Civil War buff than the general reader. The author keeps the narrative lively, but at times it is almost pedantic in style. I expected the book to focus more on combat than it actually did. I was not overly impressed with the author's style overall. So this book would be one that I would recommend to those intensely interested in Civil War detailed studies..

[Heinz Reinhardt · Rating 4 out of 5]

The War Between the States has experienced a never ending stream of literature printed on the conflict ever since the centennial over fifty years ago. Despite this vast library of works, however, few look at the conflict through the lens of strategy, how it correlates to military action, how it is implemented by a state for political ends, and how this is then filtered down through the military hierarchy to the sharp end where the poor sods with the guns (in this case, rifled muskets) had to bear the brunt of the consequences of said strategy.
Donald Stoker, himself a professor of, ironically enough, strategy for the Naval War College has written an excellent work on the competing strategies of the warring factions in the American Civil War.
Despite possessing superior manpower, industrial power, and flexible wealth, the United States was forced to bear the burden of conquest in the conflict. This meant that victory, in large part, depended upon the careful harnessing of the superior resources mentioned above, and utilizing in such a way as to either break the will of the Confederate States or, as what actually occurred, bleed it to death in a crushing, horrendously bloody, war of attrition.
Stoker makes no apologies for writing a top down, classic military history. Because he is focusing on strategy, he must. As such there are very little in the way of human interest stories, this isn't meant to be 'popular history' or social history, rather this is something far more important (especially considering we are a nation, perennially it seems, at war while simultaneously, rather blithely as it turns out, refusing to focus upon an overall strategy for victory). Because of this the two seats of power, Washington and Richmond, take center stage. There is very little, also, in the way of tactical detail, and operational detail is bare bones, the books entire focus is strategy. This makes for an interesting, and honestly refreshing, reading experience.
Certain characters on both sides of the war who get short shrift in the usual narrative come to the fore here such as the Confederacies Judah Benjamin (Secretary of War and adviser to Davis throughout the conflict) and Stephen Mallory-Confederate Secretary of the Navy. The Union side featured Henry Halleck heavily, as well as Edwin Stanton though his own mark on the war seems far less than previously assumed. The field commanders from both sides do get space in the pages as well, particularly the ones that impacted the war with Robert E. Lee and Grant and Sherman receiving the lions share of the attention. However Beauregard, Joseph Johnston, McClellan, Buell and Bragg also feature heavily as the wars course was, largely, determined by their actions.
Stoker makes some good points, and key observations, that may challenge previously held notions.
The most vital area of the Confederacy was not the Mississippi River valley as so often assumed. Rather the vital rail corridor that ran from Nashville-Chattanooga-Atlanta was the literal spine of the Confederacy. The Union's fixation on the Mississippi, while important, was a dilution of badly needed resources into a theater of secondary importance to the overall pursuit of victory.
The Union also had a bad habit of wasting resources, and lives, on secondary and even tertiary theaters and objectives of limited, or totally absent of, strategic value. Then again, much of this was due to the meddling of Lincoln himself who, contrary to commonly held notion, was far more detrimental to the Union cause in his interference in military matters than he was ever a comfort. Also, it took the Union nearly three years of incredible suffering, catastrophe and bloodshed to figure out that the main objectives were not Southern cities or geographical reference points, but rather the Confederate Army itself.
Destroy and kill it, and you win the war.
Granted this greatly increased the scale, and volume, of the bloodshed when the operations focused on destroying the Confederate military in 1864, but flawed Union strategies prior to the Spring offensives of 1864, as well as Confederate determination, ensured that no other course but one of bloody attrition and savage ruin to the South was left to Washington.
Davis, for his part was far more injurious to the Confederate cause by his meddling than was Lincoln. Stoker makes an astute observation regarding Davis' personality. Davis was a West Point Graduate, a war hero, and a former Secretary of War. Therefore he assumed he knew all there was to know about war. Lincoln had no practical military experience, and was not afraid to admit he knew little. However, Davis was incapable of learning, and was never willing to admit he had ever been wrong. Lincoln was able to learn, and furthermore, Lincoln possessed the moral courage to assert when he was wrong and to own up to it.
Davis also was incapable of handling his own generals. While Davis had an excellent relationship with Lee (to the benefit of the South) and Bragg (who while unfairly vilified in part, to the detriment of the South) he had poor relationships with nearly every other single Confederate officer of rank above that of Brigadier General. As such this rocky relationship between Richmond and the men commanding the field armies, helped to ensure Confederate defeat.
Matters were not helped that Davis never formerly implemented a set strategy for victory. While Braxton Bragg would outline a genuinely good strategy for victory, Davis only utilized portions of it, and tossed it out the window when it failed to suit his political needs. While Lincoln did not always get along with field commanders either, he did far better in this regard than did Davis, and unlike Davis, Lincoln implemented an overall strategy to victory. The Union's problem was finding men who could take the tools of the strategy, the field armies, and use them effectively to obtain victory.
Davis also suffered from the inability to relieve poor commanders.
Joseph Johnston, while beloved of the Confederate soldier, was a poor general. Beauregard, while a competent tactician and field commander (as long as he was tethered to a tight leash) was prone to strategic whimsy and down right insanity at times, and while he was a far better commander than Johnston (at least Beauregard fought and when he did he tended to hit hard and hit skillfully), his acidic relationship with Davis ensured that he contributed little of benefit to the Confederate cause.
Robert E. Lee was the South's best commander (perhaps the best in the war, overall) and he was Davis' greatest appointment.
Although Davis initially passed Lee up for field command for fear that he was ill suited to it. Proof enough of Davis' inability to select men of merit.
The South understood that to win the war, and their independence, they needed to exhaust the North, to wear down the civilian morale, and to make it thoroughly sick of seeing her sons come home in closed pinewood boxes. However Richmond never formulated an official strategy to implement this, and only Lee understood this fact fully out of all the Confederate generals.
The North knew that to win the war it had to exhaust the South, wear out its ability to wage war, and to demolish its main tool of war: her field armies. Lincoln implemented the strategy needed to achieve this goal.
And this simple fact made all the difference between victory and defeat.
Overall a well written, fascinating, intellectually deep at times look at the strategic dimension of the American Civil War. A definite keeper even if one isn't a Civil War buff, the lessons of the US Civil War apply to all warfare.
Highly recommended.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stoker argues that Lincoln without military education better understood the necessity of matching military battles to further his political objectives. Davis in contrast, because of his military training was distracted and never managed to subordinate the military to his political aims.

Why I started this book: Audio books are the best, and I was pleased to find more of my professional reading lists available.

Why I finished it: Returning home after vacation always means picking up the pieces, cleaning and organizing and catching up. Plenty of time for a wonderful audio. This book better illustrated Carl von Clausewitz's arguments of convergence/intersection of war and politics.

[Chris Esposo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great introductory overview of the Civil War that seeks to provide an assessment of the respective national strategies of the Union and the Confederacy (CSA). The primary thesis of the text is that the Union, mostly because of Lincoln’s leadership (or what some may consider meddling/centralized-control), had a well-defined ‘national strategy’ on how it would achieve its aims, but the Confederacy did not. Instead, the author contends that Jefferson Davis being a very details-oriented individual could understand tactics and limited goals (i.e. defeating the Union Army in battle in X-Y. location, providing supply to the Confederate Army in X.x-Y.y location etc.), but apparently did not conceive of a wider plan to defeat the union besides ejecting their forces from Southern states and defeating their armies when it was practical to do battle.

The author believes this is the primary differentiator which enabled the Union political and military leadership to eventually prevail over the CSA, as Union generals were able to see how a defeat of a CSA force (or seizing of a particular territory within CSA lands) would enable expanded (or more efficient) operations in other theaters of the war e.g. securing forts along the Mississippi allows you to leverage it as a supply and transit route, enabling Union forces to reach locations faster than their Confederate counterparts and keep them supplied, but also, by dividing CSA armies in two, disrupting their internal lines of supply and communication and confounding their ability to maneuver their forces to exploit Union weak-points etc. From a modern reader, this seems hard to believe, as the notion of strategy has become embedded in the average individual’s mind, but apparently this sort of thinking was somewhat novel for the era, just as using maps to think of maneuver was foreign to the war planners of the Western mediterranean in the third and second century BC, but are also considered a fundamental tool to a modern person’s understanding of the world (i.e. Google Maps, Satellites, digital maps etc.)

The author breaks down the events of the Civil War sequentially, and from an actor-centric standpoint, focusing on the thoughts and communications of the main military and political planners. Here mostly between Lincoln and his generals on the Union side, and Davis and his generals on the Confederacy, as well as between the generals and themselves within their respective camps. The author makes some interesting points about McClellan, who was a kind of wunderkind Union general that commanded Union efforts in the beginning of the war, but was not able to achieve “decisive” victories against the Confederacy. A lot of details are provided on various moments when McClellen could have acted, but did not, and the author explains how these could be explained in various moments as a combination of the fog of war providing poor/lagged information, McClellen’s il-ability at actual command and his overconfidence in his mastery of the “theory” of war, as well as his own personal judgments on how the war ought to be prosecuted.

To be brief, McClellen, like his adversary Jefferson Davis, sought to defeat Confederate armies in the field, but he also wished to keep Southern society and infrastructure largely intact. In the most generous understanding of his motives, this could be viewed as practical, as the the war was not anticipated to be a long-drawn out affair, and thus once the Union “put down the Rebellion” these lands would come back into the fold of the nation, and thus it would be counterproductive to bring harm to the people or the lands in that case in the longer perspective. However, in a more detailed understanding of his motives, the author finds that there’s evidence that McClellen had sympathies for his colleagues in the South, which is understandable in that as an officer, he would have known many of CSA officers, who would have attended similar kinds of elite institutions/schools as he. Many of the CSA officers were graduates of West Point (or VMI), and colleges like Princeton attracted many Southern elites to it’s halls, where they would have fraternized with their Northern cousin-elites (famously Princeton University history claims that precisely half of the casualties of their alumni who fought in the war came from the Union).

Thus, as well known McClellen’s tenure as the primary Union prosecutor of war efforts amounted to a lackluster affair of no-moves or minor-actions, especially during the “Phony war” period in the beginning of the conflict. The author mentions that McClellen was too imbibed with mimicking doctrine for form’s sake, and lacked a General’s intuition or innate understanding of the battle. In one case, McClellen had an overwhelming force vis-a-vis the force fielded by his CSA opposite, but instead of striking all at once, to “fall unto” the much smaller force on all lengths of the front and collapsing them with mass, apparently McClellen sought feigning maneuvers in an attempt to induce his adversary to focus his mass along their linear lines in one location so that he could fall upon them with maximum mass in another. In effect, he was taking one of Von Clausewitz (or Jomini) dictum literally and applying it to practice, but he failed to see how given the disproportionately of his men at arms relative to the CSAs that he could just as easily crush them and induce a break in the line and a full route.

This of course changed once Grant was put in charge. And the author does a great job outlining not only the eastern front of the war, but the western one, where Grant was able to crush CSA forces more directly. Here, the author makes clear that Grant, and his staff understood (along with Lincoln) how to “end the war”. Not only did one have to defeat the CSA’s field armies, but that they had to crush the will of the populace to fight. This is where I get personally confused, as this notion seems to be consistent for the US Civil War specifically, yet when applied to other wars, such as WW2, the recent Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, or Vietnam, operations on civilian populations do not often (or ever?) have the desired effects of “crushing the will” to support the war. If anything, air war theorists have concluded that offensive counter-air is much more effective than “strategic bombing”. No amount of wanton destruction of the landscapes and people of Vietnam (who lost something north of 3 million individuals) “crushed their will” to continue prosecution of the war. Still, it may have been the other thing that Lincoln/Grant understood more clearly than McClellen that was more important, which was that the respective disparity in populations by which the Union and CSA drew their forces, which favored the Union informed a perverse arithmetic of the war as well. This was that although the CSA could technically “win” a battle or “get the better” of their Union counterpart by better placement/positioning “in detail”, ultimately, this didn’t matter for the overall war aims. This is because unlike McClellen, who sought to fight a war of maneuver, Grant and Lincoln sought to prosecute a war of attrition, where victory would be counted not on some formal understanding of defeat or victory, but on how many Confederate men were killed that day, and what that meant for their ability to maintain complete corps and units of men to continue prosecution of their war effort. Going back to why “crushing the will” of the CSA was apparently a viable strategy in the American Civil War, but not in almost every other major war the US has engaged in since, it may just be that the war was in a different time, with different mores. Lee advises Davis after the routes of Sherman’s Georgia campaign that though the CSA could resist, in guerilla warfare with the dissolution/diminution of their formal armies in the field, such a path would unlikely bring about their war-aims (independence), and would induce much suffering on the populace of the South. In effect, Lee believed a war attrition via guerrilla means was not worth it.

Though, unlike the cliche understanding of the war, the author shows that Grant also understood how to defeat in detail, and was also an excellent tactician (some “fans of the Red” pain the erroneous picture that Grant was like Stalin in Stalingrad, hurling men indiscriminately at Confederate lines to exhaust them). In fact, Grant perfected a kind of war of maneuver in the Western front, by training his armies to forage and depend less on formal supply/logistic lines. Grant would hone in many of these stratagems and mental tools out in the west, which would allow him to directly confront the main confederate armies in the east more pronouncedly.

One of the most interesting narrative pieces I found in this book was the description of the planning and motivation for Sherman’s march on Atlanta and southern Georgia. Although effective, there are some historical echoes with how Sherman perceived/talked about the citizens of Atlanta and how Curtis LeMay spoke of the citizens of Japan or Germany that he firebombed during WW2. In both cases, it is contrary to ‘jus belli justi’ or the doctrine of “Just War” (though many would say this is mostly an ornamental/inconsequential notion) it should be noted that the analog exists.

Overall, the book was great, I will definitely benefit from a second reading, as I read it the first time mostly via audio, there are some maps and maybe one or two tables, so it may make sense to go over those parts more carefully. I think for those who are new to the Civil War (like myself), this is a great first text. There are so many books dedicated to just single battles or more detail treatments of Union/Confederate cultures, weapons/artillery etc., or even encyclopedic accounts like Shelby Foot’s trilogy, that having a relatively shorter text (approx. 500 pages) that provides a decent analytic overview of the conflict from the strategic level is of much utility to anchor future readings. Highly recommended.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a challenging book because of its breadth; Stoker really covers everything and sort of expects the reader to have a familiarity with most of what he writes about. I wouldn't recommend picking up this book on a whim. To get the most out of it, it requires deep study, and perhaps a notepad on the side to keep track of the various ups and downs of the war.

I view this as the best book about the Civil War that I have ever read. Stoker rescues the war from a discussion of a chain of battles and places it into the context of an overarching struggle for different aims. Everything is analyzed through the perspective of whether or not it assisted the aims of the sides, and if the commanders were acting in ways to further political goals.

Stoker wrote this book from the perspective of military strategy. Although he had the benefit of hindsight, I viewed this book as Stoker viewing the lay of the land as it was at given points in the war, and then judged the actions of the various military commanders in comparison to what an application of modern military theory would indicate. He is quick to indicate that commanders, even good ones, were often distracted into going after secondary goals rather than after centers of gravity. (Grant and Vicksburg is a good example of this.) He writes that the Union had a better grasp of strategy than the Confederacy did, even though it took Lincoln several years to find the commanders to implement his strategy. He also writes about the notion of "centers of gravity." For the Confederacy, the main centers of gravity were "Lee's army" (as Lincoln astutely observed) and the South's railroads and industrial capacity (which Lincoln may well have neglected for much of the war). The North's center of gravity was really Northern public opinion, which only Lee seems to have grasped. Stoker argues that the Confederacy never really employed a strategy to accomplish its political goal of independence, with Jefferson Davis getting a fair bit of the blame for that.

In short, this is essential reading for any strategy buff or Civil War buff. Highly, highly recommended.

----------------

Lastly, I'll just list a few things that stuck out to me as memorable:

- Stoker provided a measure of skepticism in response to hagiographical evaluations of Abraham Lincoln as military leader and strategist. Lincoln is praised up and down as a brilliant military leader, but Stoker is able to put Lincoln's skills into the context of the war, and Stoker points out a few areas where Lincoln could have done better. For example, Stoker noted that Lincoln probably should have meddled a bit less and fired a bit more often.
- McClellan is (partially) rehabilitated in this book. He comes across as a keen strategist who simply did not understand the war he was fighting.
- Sherman, Grant, and Lee all earn praise for their creativity and understanding of reality. Sherman is the hero of the story, if there is any.
- Stoker emphasizes the importance of 1863 and 1864, which makes much more sense in a historical context, when you think about it, than does the study of the war in detail up until Gettysburg and Vicksburg, and then glossing over everything until the capture of Atlanta and the March to the Sea, which is how I remember most textbooks covering it. Stoker views Grant's capture of Vicksburg as a brilliant feat for a secondary objective. He views Gettysburg as a distraction, and comes down with Lincoln in agreeing that Gettysburg was an opportunity lost for the Union (in not trapping and destroying Lee's army at the Potomac) moreso than a turning point in the Union's favor.
- Stoker absolutely hammers Henry Halleck, basically at every turn.

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is the drama. There is the story. Then there is the analysis.


The U.S. Civil War usually gets the drama/story write-up. After all, it is an epic that has never ceased to fascinate. But Donald Stoker has skipped those well-trod lanes of narrative to pave the road less-taken: analysis. "The Grand Design" is about how the war was fought.


The Civil War came with no instruction manual. How does one muster the strength of a nation and commit to a multi-year war? How does an officer with command experience no higher than a regiment marshal armies and get them to go somewhere? And how does a president, as commander-in-chief, manage this?


Stoker is very thorough walking the reader through these problems. Presidents should set strategy, sometimes managing it, but should not execute it. Lincoln was guilty of this at times, though the Confederacy's Davis made this a habit. National leaders and generals had to learn on the job on how to find the best places to draw their arrows on the map, then make plans come to life with marching armies, followed by lines of supply.


Political objectives mixed with operational demands. When to make a move mattered every bit as how, as Lincoln and Davis puzzled over the best way to bring a neutral Kentucky to join their cause.


Bragg and McClellan, never history's darlings, could draw those arrows on the map, figuring out where a well-placed army could unbalance the enemy's plans. But they were poor in execution. Stoker is charitable in this respect, showing their shortcomings alongside their strengths rather than writing off the lesser generals with 20/20 hindsight.


IN the end, Lincoln, his cabinet and his generals did the better job of figuring out how to conquer an area half-the-size of Europe. There would be nothing singular about the effort. The Napoleonic era of decisive battle that could end a war in one day was clearly past. Having more men and materiel was not enough for the North. Stoker shows how victory went to the side that figured out how to apply its strength to best effect.


Readers already familiar with the Civil War should read "Grand Design" as a supplement. Stoker doesn't devote a lot of space to the battles. He keeps his focus on how strategy is made and executed. For the reader seeking a better "top-down" understanding of the war, this book becomes required reading. For the average armchair general who wants to read about battles and action, this may not be the book to pick up.

[Joe · Rating 1 out of 5]

FALLS SHORT

The author's stated goal with this book is to provide a new perspective on the Civil War; the strategic plans, both in theory and in practice, employed by both the Union and the Confederacy, from Lincoln and Jefferson Davis, through each side's commanding generals, down to the foot soldier and the results on the battlefield - Both an interesting case study and one possibly long overdue. Unfortunately this book doesn't accomplish this lofty goal and quickly becomes mired down in details, tactics, personalities and the author's opinions.

The book opens with an explanation on the theory of war, i.e. Clausewitz - delineating strategy from tactics in the context of political and military decisions. Although a tad dry at times, this "primer" on war in general sets a solid foundation for the book's premise and its application to the Civil War.

The Confederacy without much forethought seceded from the Union resulting in the inevitable war - at least with Lincoln in the White House. This hasty and emotional decision made, although the South was at a grave disadvantage when it came to manpower and manufacturing and thus war supplies output. The Confederacy also decided to defend every acre of land it considered within its borders. The paradox is that it took the Union four long and bloody years to bring their huge advantage to bear before winning the war.

After providing this "big picture" of the war though, the author then jumps right in up to his ears into the conflict's details and the book becomes yet another one of many average Civil War narratives. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, but the material has been covered before and frankly, in a much more engaging manner - for instance by Catton, Foote and Sears. So unfortunately for all of its lofty goals I found nothing new here in this book.

[Sean Chick · Rating 1 out of 5]

A one rating might not be fair, for Stoker has his moments. His analysis of McClellan is dead on. Unfortunately, his examination of Confederate strategy is shallow, revolving around the tired idea that Davis could do no right. Meanwhile, Lincoln's obsession with "destroying armies" (which NEVER OCCURRED IN A FIELD BATTLE) is blithely trotted out like gospel true. If Grant fails it is always the fault of others. Most of all, any book on strategy in the American Civil War that claims to be "the first of its kind" and then discusses points brought up elsewhere by more able hands (Woodworth, Catton, Rafuse, Archer Jones, etc.) deserves only scorn. Oh, and his thoughts on Meade's generalship are so dishonest that I can trust little else in this piece of dreck.

[Andrew Tollemache · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll preface this with admitting that I am rather ignorant about the US Civil War. Sure I remember stuff from school and have read a couple books on Civil War foreign policy, but I always feared that to read up on the Civil War is to have it take over your reading unviverse. Civil War people jsut seem to only read about the Civil War. This book by Donald Stoker was rather eye opening.
Stoker sets out to detail the grand strategy (and lack thereof at times) of both the Union and Confederate forces during the Civil War. In the end Stoker notes that Lincoln far more than Davis was able to use the harmonizing of political goals and military means to drive the Union to voctory. Stoker builds his analysis off of the insights of Clausewitz and Jominy who were the 2 preeminent military theorists of the pre Civil War 19th Century and hugely influential on military and politcal leaders of the times. The ideas of war as politics by other means and that toi win at war one must strike at the enemies' centers of gravity and power were integral to how Lincoln and his better generals like Grand and Sherman pursued. the war.
While Lincoln would take a year or 2 to get his sea legs as commander in chief, the South seemed to suffer from not thinking out its overall strategy from the get go. Instead of waiting to marshall resources and foreign allies before seceding or initiating hostilities they just started bombing Fort Sumter which basically Lincoln goaded them into. Then the South thought embargoing the world its cotton would bring foreign intervention to their cause when instead it denied the South its one economic export good to raise funds for the war while forcing its foreign trade partners to find new cotton sources. Then the South threw scarce resources into trying to invade Kentucky.
The North on the other end wanted to restore the Union and built its strategy accordingly. In the East Lincoln needed his generals to destroy or at least wear down Lee's army as it was they key center of Confederate gravity and power. Seizing the CSA capital in Richmond might just force the CSA army into the Carolinas. In the West, the Union sought to carve up the CSA's territory to deny them resources and the ability to move troops by doggedly seeking to control the Mississippi and captureing key Southern rail junctions across Tennessee and the Deep South. There was also an aggressive effort to capture all the main Southhern ports. Even though the South racked up some great battlefield victories the clock began ticking. July 1863 saw Gettysburg and the Fall of Vicksburg which mortally wounded Lee and denied the South use of the Mississippi. This laid the ground for the next two years fighting as Grant and Sherman carved up the South.
Even the Emancipation Proclamation grew out of the tactical need to address what to do with freed slaves in Union territory to a politcal wedge to end any hope by the SOuth of French or English intervention and tilting the manpower advantage of the North even more in its favor.

[Matt Caris · Rating 3 out of 5]

A really interesting idea that is less than exceptionally executed. The introduction promises a fascinating analysis, but the remainder really just comprises an original spin on the standard high-level narratives of the war (without all the tactical emphasis).

Could have benefitted from less narrative of the back and forth between generals and presidents and more cogent analysis of why the individuals thought the way they did, how it conformed (or didn’t) to the (admittedly limited) standards of operational and strategic thought of the era, and the like.

[Chad Handley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall - a good dissection of the Civil War. What I enjoyed the most about this was the thought process of Jefferson Davis and his leadership approach; something not common in most Civil War histories.

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

3/5 stars - lots of battles and military tactics. Blah but the author had white a few clever quips

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good book about the Civil War.

[Jerel Wilmore · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting survey of how the Union developed its winning strategy (and how the South failed to develop a cogent strategy) in the American Civil War.

[Jay Guffey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I learned alot more bout the civil war than I had even known about

[William Peynsaert · Rating 3 out of 5]

Could still dive deeper into grand strategy. Not the final word on this topic.

[Paul Dempsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great Overview of Strategy During the War

Very well written and easy to understand. A great starting point to understand the war at higher levels of command and leadership

[Chuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Strategy and the US Civil War by Donald Stoker is a well written and interesting book dealing with interactions between the top military leaders on each side, and how they determined and carried out their military goals.

When the war began, the United States did not have a tradition of a permanent General Staff. Nor, did the US have a ready stable of experienced Army commanders. Due to the generally dispersed and small size of the regular military, and the reliance on short term militia call-ups for manpower there were actually very few experienced battalion and general grade officers. Further, many of those were far too old for active campaigning.

Stoker covers how the sides determined their strategy, converted the theory into operational activities, and how well they succeeded. He has very kind words regarding Abraham Lincoln. Unversed in military affairs, he rapidly learned. From the first tentative deference to George McClellan through the careful investigation and vetting or US Grant and management of his priorities and objectives.

It took the North most of 3 years to identify and place into command roles leaders who were willing to actually get off their rear ends and successfully attack the south. It then took another year to get these leaders to successfully coordinate their moves. The result, clumsy and bloody and mishandled as it was, resulted in winning the war.

Stoker also has some very sharp criticisms of Jefferson Davis. This is not unexpected as Davis was one of the most experienced pre-war defense leaders on both military and civilian sides. He was a graduate of West Point, was a Colonel of the volunteers, was veteran of the Mexican-American War, and had served as Secretary of War.

All in all, he notes that the south was never able to identify and carry out a war winning strategy. In order to have done so, it needed to resolve, one hand, the need to concentrate it's limited military forces in order decisively defeat the North, and on the other hand, to disperse them in order to defend it's territory. In the end, it did neither. Nor did Davis draw deeply from the South's large pool of exceptional leaders for army and theater command. Instead he kept returning to the same commanders (Johnston, Beauregard, Bragg) over and over again. And the South lost.

I would recommend this book to someone interested in the Civil War with a basic understanding of it. The book is well written and I found it an interesting and enjoyable read.

[Josh Liller · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Grand Design is a "top down" (the author's words) book about the Union and Confederate military during the American Civil War. It looks at high-level decision making in regards to military and political strategy, operations, and grand strategy. Stoker examines the war through not only concepts that were known to the presidents and generals, but also through more modern philosophies like Clausewitz and Sun Tzu. As a professor of strategy and policy for the Naval War College, Stoker seems like the perfect person to write this kind of book.

This book shines when the author is on topic: showing how modern military theory approves or disapproves of decisions, examining attempts to develop high-level strategy, and explaining why strategies failed in action or failed to be implemented. These plans, many of them never effectively implemented, are illustrated with simple but useful maps. A reoccurring theme is the failure by the high command on both sides to be forceful in their orders, resulting in a great deal of caution and stalling. Stokes credits the Union with developing smart strategies that were not properly put in place, but which foreshadow more effective strategy implemented by Grant late in the war.

There are two main shortcomings here. First is that the book seems to occasionally lose focus. This is a book about strategy not tactic - why battles were or were not fought, not how they were fought. For example, in mentioning Champion Hill (during the Vicksburg Campaign), there is a sentance about Hovey's division suffering a large portion of the Union casualties. This is literally the only mention of Hovey in the entire book and utterly irrelevant to the strategy. The other issue involves several mistakes in details (ex: Cedar Creek is north of Richmond, not west) and some questionable assertions (Stokes apparently subscribes to Tom Carhart's controversial theory of Gettysburg). I'm also a bit surprised that J. F. C. Fuller, a 20th century British general who wrote about the Civil War, is never mentioned.

Overall, Stokes reminds me a bit of John Keegan: an author who makes some excellent observations yet is a bit dubious on the details. There is some interesting stuff here, but also some things that really could be cut in some places. I also would have liked more modern analysis. Not a bad book, but kind of disappointing. Very mild recommendation to Civil War buffs and not recommended for casual readers.

[Nathan Albright · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a historical reader with a passionate interest in the American Civil War, it is a treasure to be able to find, read, and recommend a book that provides something meaningful that has not already been said in depth and at length about the Civil War. This book delivers, in a detailed examination of the often-muddled attempts on both sides to align civil and military goals and ensure civilian leadership without harming the need for working through the military hierarchy. While this may not sound fascinating, most of the book is an examination of what generals and politicians on both sides did to both exploit the circumstances of war as well as execute a grand strategic design (rather than merely battle tactics).

Two conclusions that this book comes to are worthwhile–for one, that the North could have won much faster by focusing on taking Chattanooga in early 1862 rather than waiting until late 1863, and two, that the main reason the North was able to defeat the South was because the North (eventually) found a military strategy that corresponded to its strategic strengths (greater numbers and military power, a more consistent view of freedom, a powerful navy) and that allowed it to achieve its aims (a destruction of the slave owning power and a restoration of the Union). Notably, the South was never able to reconcile its contrary strategic goals of preserving its inferior strength and its political need to defend every inch of territory to form a grand strategy of any kind linking military and political and diplomatic aims. Thus defeat on the strategic level led to subsequent defeat on the ground. This book is a fascinating explanation of the greater strategic elements of the Civil War, making it a must-read for Civil War buffs with an interest in strategy. I somehow suspect that is a very wide audience.

[JerryDeanHalleck · Rating 2 out of 5]

Best for: Civil war buffs who want to know more about Civil War Strategy.

Detailed book focusing on the high-level strategy used by both the North and the South during the Civil War. If you are well versed in the Civil War, you will find nothing new, although Stoker restates the standard narrative in a concise, readable manner. Perhaps most interesting is his occasional defenses of both McClellan and Hooker, as strategists . However, for the most part, Stoker confines himself to expressing the standard opinions, and does little detailed CRITICAL analysis. We get a lot of narrative stating Lincoln or Davis or Grant'd strategic views at any given time.

Too bad, because CW history needs a critical analysis of Lincoln and the Union strategy. Too many of Lincoln's assumptions and views are merely accepted by Historians. There's a reluctance to criticize him, highlight his bad decisions, and contradictory strategy. For example, in the West Lincoln demanded his Generals occupy Geographical points - like East Tennessee. But in the east, he demanded Lee's army be the objective. Why?

Or Lincoln allowed McClellan to go to the Peninsula in March 1862, then in August 1862 bought the army back north. In 1863, refused all plans to send the Army back to Peninsula. But in June 1864, he flip flopped again and allowed Grant to go South of the James. Strangely, historians approve of ALL these contradictory positions! And finally, if the destruction of Lee's Army was key point in ending the war (as Lincoln said many times) why weren't more troops sent to Virginia?

[Steelman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is written to focus specifically on the planning and execution of policies and strategies on both sides of The Civil War. Battles and their outcomes are mentioned, but only as a result of the strategies each side pursued.

The Union developed a strategy well-suited to winning the war early in the conflict, but Lincoln encountered much difficulty finding both leaders and a command apparatus to implement his policy effectively. The Confederate government likewise developed a strategy they felt would enable them to win their independence. Davis, however, simply refused to enable his subordinates to command effectively.

The book shows how Lincoln learned from his early mistakes and learned to trust (not completely, however) the military command upon Grant's ascension to the post. Davis, however, continued to dominate the South's strategy and began to personally embody the cause himself. His megalomania eventually assisted in the Confederate downfall.

Stoker outlines his plans for the book wonderfully and argues them well. I enjoyed his work very much and found it very insightful.

[Frank R · Rating 3 out of 5]

A new perspective on the Civil War, which is quite an accomplishment considering the millions of words on the subject. Stoker gives a great review of the War from the vantage point of Grand Strategy, and shows how the Confederacy never achieved a strategic vision, while Lincoln and the Union did. He also challenges some longstanding truisms of Civil War buffs, such as the decisive nature of Gettysburg or the importance of Vicksburg.

Would have rated it higher, but Stoker gets into the weeds in some places, exploring the correspondence among the Union commanders and their conflicting strategic ideas and plans in such detail that I grew occasionally tired. However, the book challenged my thinking enough that I immediately wanted to pull out my old "House Divided" Civil War strategy game and tinker with fighting the war in different ways.

[Hale · Rating 1 out of 5]

Examines what we usually call the "Civil War" at the strategic level, a treatment that is long overdue. Most accounts of the conflict stress particular campaigns and battles -- the trees -- rather than poltical and miltary objectives, logistics and plans, and how they drove the conflict (the whole forest). The fact that we call this war the "Civil War" and not the "War for Southern Independence" tells you the story -- the US was able to align its military and political means (often in unforseen ways) to accomplish its national strategy -- the CS was not.

[John Kelley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Few books have given a cogent view of the use, or non use of strategy in the duration of war for more than four years. The Author, Donald Stoker has the credentials to write such an inviting look at the Civil War from the top down. This was not a quick read, but I finished reading last night.
I suggest those who hear the sound of the guns should read this excellent study on strategy in the Civil War.

[Rich · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well-written, significant contribution to Civil War literature. Stoker provides comprehensive coverage of the Union & Confederate strategies from the war's start to finish. There's more detailed coverage of the Union, but that's only logical since the Union ended-up having more of a 'grand strategy' than the Confederacy. In discussing the Confederacy, Stoker says that the generally accepted thought that they pursued an 'offensive-defensive' strategy is incorrect and shows why.

[Al · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dr Stoker presents a very lucid explanation of the three levels of war: strategic, operational, and tactical. Throughout this book, he reminds the reader what level of war is being discussed. This is a great strategic overview of the Civil War, presenting startegic and operational reasons for campaigns such as Arkansas-Missouri, as well as the political rationale. A very good read.