Repeatedly,
the British seem to fail because they don’t think through how their actions
will look to others or how the enemy may act in innovative ways. Bottom line: It
is a strength to have a self-righteous enemy.
Issue |
Strength |
Weakness |
Experienced,
trained army |
Able to
field an army with little preparation |
Also have
lack of discipline at the level of General Howe (1777+) |
Experienced,
trained naval force |
Able to shut
off Patriot shipping and their supplies. The
greatest navy in the world. |
Face
battles inland |
Need for
soldiers in the region |
Able to
pay mercenaries (the Hessians) |
Enrage the
citizens (This became one of the charges in the Declaration of Independence.) |
|
Recruit
African slaves with promise of freedom |
Enrage or
frighten the Southerners, who the British thought were their best allies |
Issue |
Strength |
Weakness |
Citizen-soldier |
Personal commitment
to battle to defend own homeland |
Citizen-soldiers
have short-term enlistments, are untrained and undisciplined, and may never
have faced combat (and both risk to life and pain of taking life) before |
Funding |
Loans and
gifts from foreign nations, primarily from those nations that hated |
Continental
Congress with authority only to issue paper money and borrow. It will not be able
to pay its own soldiers or even feed them well. The troops are dependent on
France for gunpowder, but French support does not come until 1777 with the
battle of Saratoga. |
Government
in foreign relations |
Benjamin
Franklin as a person able to persuade the French |
The 13
states are obviously vulnerable. |
Government
in general |
|
The
Articles of Confederation create a weak organization of virtually sovereign
states. The centralized effort is primarily with the army itself. It cannot: §
Draft troops §
Tax §
Control trade |
Navy |
French
navy |
There is
no navy. |
The first two rows cover issues detailed in the prior tables; the
last two rows cover larger issues that reveal the interconnections between
weakness and strengths of opponents, especially in a civil war and a guerrilla
war.
Issue |
British |
Patriots |
Battleground |
Face 1500
miles of coast, distant supply lines, and difficulties with supply inland. |
Fight on familiar
and home land. Can fight and then quickly look like innocent civilians. |
Power,
relative |
Have the
power of a great nation. |
Have the
allies (initially secretly) of those who hate a great nation that has
previously defeated them. Patriots received aid from such nations as |
Public
position |
Are
stopping a rebellion of those who want their own nation. |
Are
fighting for the goals in the Declaration of Independence, the type of goals
that lead men like the Marquis de Lafayette to volunteer. |
Requirement
for victory |
Must force
the Patriot army or the people to quit fighting. (To force a civilian
population to surrender may lead to hatreds of multiple generations.) |
Must avoid
having the army be wiped out. (They can retreat for a long time if needed.) |
Pat.
negotiators are Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay. Treaty
(Preliminary peace in November)—separate negotiation with
The peace
terms included:
Copyright
C. J. Bibus, Ed.D. 2003-2020 |
WCJC
Department: |
History –
Dr. Bibus |
Contact
Information: |
281.239.1577
or bibusc@wcjc.edu |
Last
Updated: |
2020 |
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