Confederate States Army (Dixie Forever)

The Confederate States Army (CSA) is the land warfare service branch of the Confederate States Armed Forces. It is one of the seven uniformed services of the Confederate States, and is designated as the Army of the Confederate States in the Confederate States Constitution, Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1, and the Confederate States Code, Title 12. As the oldest and seniormost branch of the C.S. military in order of precedence, the modern C.S. Army has its roots in both the Continental Army and the Union Army before secession. The US Army was created by the Congress of the Confederation on June 3, 1784 to replace the disbanded Continental Army. The Confederate States Army was officially begun on February 28, 1861 to help the Confederate States acheive independence from the United States.

As a uniformed military service, the C.S. Army is part of the Department of the Army, hwich is one of the three military departments of the Department of War. The C.S. Army is headed by a civilian senior appointed civil servant, the Secretary of the Army, and by a chief military officer, the Chief of Staff of the Army, who is also a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It is the largest military branch, and in the fiscal year 2018, the projected end strength for the Regular Army (CSA) was 395,000 soldiers; the Confederate Home Guard (CHG) had 285,000 soldiers, and the Confederate States Army Reserve (CSAR) had 210,000 soldiers; the combined strength of all C.S. Army components was 890,000 soldiers. As a branch of the armed forces, the mission of the C.S. Army is "to fight and win our nation's wars and protect the sovereignty and independence thereof, by providing prompt, sustained, land dominance, across the full range of military operations in support of combatant commanders." The branch participates in conflicts worldwide and is the major ground-based offensive and defensive force of the Confederate States.

Mission
The Confederate States Army serves as the land-based branch of the C.S. Armed Forces. Section 2075 of Title 12, C.S. Code defines the purpose of the army as:


 * Preserving the peace and security and providing for the defense of the Confederate States, the Commonwealths and possessions and any areas occupied by the Confederate States
 * Supporting the national policies
 * Implementing the national objectives
 * Overcoming any nations responsible for aggressive acts that imperil the peace and security of the Confederate States

History
Main Article: History of the Confederate States Army

Origins
Main Article: War for Southern Independence

The Confederate States Army has its origins in the War for Southern Independence as the Provisional Confederate Army, becoming the Confederate Army soon afterward. After most slave states, located in the southern U.S., formed the Confederate States, the Confederate States Army, led by former U.S. Army officers, mobilized a large fraction of Southern white manpower. Forces of the United States (the "Union" or "the North") formed the Union Army, consisting of a small body of regular army units and a large body of volunteer units raised from every state, north and south, except South Carolina.

For the first two years Confederate forces did well in set battles but lost control of the border states. The Confederates had the advantage of defending a large territory in an area where disease caused twice as many deaths as combat. The Union pursued a strategy of seizing the coastline, blockading the ports, and taking control of the river systems. By 1863, the Confederacy was being strangled. Its eastern armies fought well, but the western armies were defeated one after another until the Union forces captured New Orleans in 1862 along with the Tennessee River. In the Vicksburg Campaign of 1862–1863, General Ulysses Grant seized the Mississippi River and cut off the Southwest, though over 29,000 troops left Vicksburg to continue the fight in the western theater. Grant took command of Union forces in 1864 and after a series of battles with very heavy casualties, he had General Robert E. Lee under siege in Richmond. Lee's foray north at Gettysburg was a mixed bag; he failed to capture the high ground, so he left before taking massive casualties. In the north, this was seen as a defeat; in the south, this was seen as a partial victory.

With the Union bearing down on Atlanta, General Cleburne proposed emancipating and enlisted black servants and free blacks officially. While this was not supported completely within the Army of Tennessee under General Joseph Johnston, his plan was leaked in the press, and after consultation with General Lee, the plan was approved, helping provide much-needed manpower for the beleaguered Confederates. As General Sherman pushed south to attempt the capture of Atlanta, his proximity and near-capture helped ensure Lincoln's reelection in the Union elections. Through some unique maneuvering, the Battle of Chickamauga Creek under Johnston was an impressive route of Sherman, the defeat massive enough to cause him a relapse. General Grant left his army to attempt to smash through to destroy the Confederates, but his feint towards Montgomery was discovered and his army destroyed after the election.

Soon afterward, the Confederates recaptured Chattanooga, then through the maneuvers of General Forrest and a recently recovered General Albert Sidney Johnston, the Confederates maneuvered to capture Knoxville (Tennessee), Lexington, Frankfort, and even Louisville in Kentucky by April. In the east, with the Union attempted to capture Lee, but with the counsel of both General "Stonewall" Jackson and the cavalry of General J.E.B. Stuart and Jubal Early, Lee drew the Union west, deeper into Virginia (and away from Richmond) and straining their supply lines. At Appomattox, Lee made his stand. When the majority of the Union army crossed the river, Lee attacked, while Early, Stuart, and Jackson held in reserve, till Lee gave the order, and they came in a pincer movement, finally routing the army and causing General Meade to surrender on April 9, 1865. All other Union armies surrendered within a few months.

The war remains the deadliest conflict in C.S. history, resulting in the deaths of 620,000 men on both sides. Based on 1860 census figures, 8% of all white males aged 13 to 43 died in the war, including 6.4% in the North and 18% in the South.

Reorganization
After the war, the Army was reorganized utilizing the experience of the war to prevent the hardships experienced by troops from happening again in the event of another U.S.-C.S. War. Notably, the Confederacy created a series of forts along the northern border of Kentucky with the US at Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and West Virginia; Virginia and West Virginia; Arkansas and Missouri; Oklahoma and Kansas, New Mexico and Arizona with Utah, Colorado, and Nevada; California and North California. New training techniques professionalized the army, and improved not only morale, but readiness and martial ability.

Uniforms were simplified, as the complex knots on the sleeves were expensive and made officers a target on the field. The army, navy, and marine corps were all aided by railroad improvements aided by the UK and France to help improve rail travel, making it faster, safer, and more reliable as a means of transport. In Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and northern Georgia, new factories were built to supply munitions, guns, cannon and other weapons, uniforms, boots, blankets, canteens, and other troop supplies. Bridges were built along multiple points across the Mississippi River to prevent the nation from being divided in half like during the war.

General Robert E. Lee, along with other Generals, namely J.E.B. Stuart, Nathan Bedford Forrest, Patrick Cleburne, Joseph Johnston, Albert Sidney Johnston, Jubal Early, Edmund Kirby Smith, and several others, submitted reports to Congress noting the battles they fought in, along with the various positives and negatives experienced, all of which helped improve communication, discipline, supply, and especially by General Forrest, ensured an integrated and equally paid army with black troops on equal footing with whites, unlike the segregated Union Army. Unfortunately, promotions to officer were relatively rare in the C.S. Army until the next war due to lingering race issues with members of Congress.

The rail caused tensions with the western tribes, making the army necessary again during the later 19th century.

Later 19th Century
Following the War for Southern Independence, the C.S. Army was tasked with pacifying and later containing the western tribes of Confederate Indians on Indian reservations. The army set up many forts, and engaged in a number of Confederate-Indian Wars.

The key battles of the Spanish-Confederate War in 1898 were fought by the Navy, but the Army played an important role in taking Puerto Rico, using mostly volunteers, and had a central role in the Philippine-Confederate War.

20th Century
Starting in 1910, the army began acquiring fixed-wing aircraft. In 1910, Mexico was having a civil war, peasant rebels fighting government soldiers. The army was deployed to C.S. towns near the border to ensure safety to lives and property. In 1916, Pancho Villa, a major rebel leader, attacked Columbus, Rio Grande, prompting a C.S. intervention in Mexico until 7 February 1917. They fought the rebels and the Mexican federal troops until 1918.

World Wars
The Confederate States joined World War I as an "Associated Power" in 1917 on the side of Britain, Germany, Greece, Italy and the other Allies. U.S. troops were sent to the Western Front and were involved in the last offensives that ended the war. With the armistice in November 1918, the army once again decreased its forces.

In 1939, estimates of the Army's strength range between 174,000 and 200,000 soldiers, smaller than that of Portugal's, which ranked it 17th or 19th in the world in size. General George Patton became Army Chief of Staff in September 1939 and set about expanding and modernizing the Army in preparation for war.

The Confederate States joined World War II in December 1941 after the Japanese attack on Guam. On the European front, C.S. Army troops formed a significant portion of the forces that captured North Africa and Sicily and later fought in Italy. On D-Day 6 June 1944 and in the subsequent liberation of Europe and defeat of fascist France, millions of C.S. Army troops played a central role. In the Pacific War, C.S. Army soldiers participated alongside the Confederate States Marine Corps in capturing the Pacific Islands from Japanese control. Following the Axis surrenders in May (France) and August (Japan) of 1945, army troops were deployed to Japan and France to occupy the two defeated nations. Two years after World War II, the Army Air Forces separated from the army to become the Confederate States Air Force in September 1947. In 1948, the army promoted the first black man to the rank of General.

1945-1960
The end of World War II set the stage for the East–West confrontation known as the Cold War. With the outbreak of the Korean War, concerns over the defense of Western Europe rose. Two corps, VI and VII, were reactivated under Seventh Confederate States Army in 1950 and C.S. strength in Europe rose from one division to four. Hundreds of thousands of C.S. troops remained stationed in West Poland, with others in Germany, France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, until the 1990s in anticipation of a possible Soviet attack.

During the Cold War, C.S. troops and their allies fought communist forces in Korea and Vietnam. The Korean War began in 1950, when the Soviets walked out of a U.N. Security Council meeting, removing their possible veto. Under a United Nations umbrella, hundreds of thousands of C.S. and U.S. troops fought to prevent the takeover of South Korea by North Korea and later to invade the northern nation, as well as assisting the Nationalist Chinese forces push back the Communist-supported Chinese forces. After repeated advances and retreats by both sides and the Chinese People's Volunteer Army's entry into the war, the Korean Peace Treaty returned the peninsula to a unified Korea in 1953, and shortly thereafter in 1954, the Chinese Armistice Agreement agreed to a split China.

1960-1970
While the United Kingdom fought the Vietnam War, along with the Netherlands and Germany, having taken over the colony from the French after the second World War, the Confederate Army stayed out of the fight, while the U.S. Army did play a role under President Kennedy.

During the 1960s, the Department of War continued to scrutinize the size of the active and reserve forces, and cut the number from 15 to 8 divisions (one mechanized infantry, two armored, five infantry), and increased the number of brigades from 7 to 18 (1 airborne, 1 armored, 2 mechanized infantry, and 14 infantry). The states were unhappy with the reduction in size of the Confederate Home Guard, many people having lived through the threat of two additional U.S. invasions during the 19th century, and reorganized their own forces from 1967-1968.

1970-1990
From the 1970s's stagnation, the 1980s were a time of reorganization and modernization of the army. The army continued being an all-volunteer force, with an emphasis on training and technology, and opening up more positions to women, though front-line combat roles would remain male-only. The 1986 Stuart-Goldwater Act created a unified command structure with the other military services, organizing the world into NORCCOM (Northern Confederate Command) in North America, SOCCOM (Southern Confederate Command) in South America, EUCCOM (European Confederate Command), AFRICCOM (African Confederate Command) in Africa, based in Rhodesia, PACCOM (Pacific Confederate Command) based in New Caledonia, and ASCCOM (Asia Confederate Command) based in Wuhan (formerly Hankou).

By 1989, Poland was nearing reunification and the Cold War was coming to a close. Army leadership reacted by starting to plan for a reduction in strength. By November 1989 Army briefers were laying out plans to reduce army end strength by 23%, from 650,000 to 480,000. A number of incentives such as early retirement were used.