Colossal Ambitions: Confederate Planning for a Post–Civil War World

Abstract

Adrian Brettle's book offers a topic new to the literature on the Confederacy: a comprehensive look at planning for the post-Confederate world. The book is well written, though aimed more at scholars than a lay audience. It is based on remarkably intensive research in a variety of sources, including military records, papers of politicians and civilians, and congressional hearings from both sides in the conflict. The simple and counterintuitive thesis of Colossal Ambitions is that an abundant number of Confederate politicians and other leaders, such as planters, engaged in extensive planning for the era after Confederate independence. Brettle quotes optimistic leaders hoping for hegemony over Latin America, industrialization, new cooperation with Indian nations, a reboot of relations with England based on trade, and interaction with the United States. Brettle examines Confederates who had ideas about the future. However, he often describes musing about the postwar world as planning. Dreams of change would matter more if the Confederacy had a process for planning a colossal future and making it happen. For the story to matter, he would need a way to turn ambitions into reality. Brettle depicts the Confederacy's most eloquent voice for progress, the political economist and publisher James D. B. De Bow, as a planner, and here he has a case. However, De Bow, a strong voice for economic reform before the war, is an interesting individual rather than a movement.