U.S History. The American Civil War. Literature & Language Essay

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May 31, 2020
The American Civil War
The Civil war is perhaps one of the most well-known wars in the history of humankind. The battle that differentiated contrasting ideologies, between idealized geopolitical lines has undoubtedly been one of the turning points on the United States as a beacon for hope for the whole world. However, the civil war is also one of the most debated events in United States history. For the most part, scholars have debated whether the war has been preventable or whether it led to the great nation that America is today. Nonetheless, one of the main questions that scholars and laypeople have sought to understand is whether the Civil War can be characterized as a total war or a modern war. In this article, I would discuss why the American Civil War is considered to be one that is both considered as a modern and total war.
The American Civil War
Total wars and civil wars are two typologies of wars. On the one hand, total war is characterized by an older type of warfare whereby the main goal is to annihilate enemy forces with less regard towards the lives of ordinary citizens. There is less restriction as to what the armies can do, as long as they think that an action is necessary for the advancement of their cause. For the most part, total wars can be seen in most wars of the past, whereby armies would pillage and raid different villages and kill their inhabitants for the hopes of demoralizing or killing the enemy. On the other hand, modern war is more humanitarian and more advanced than total war. Even though it is characterized by the use of more advanced pieces of machinery, it also follows different ideologies as to what can and cannot be done by the soldiers regardless of the situation at hand. Ideologies that led to the creation of the concept of ‘war crimes,’ which are those atrocious acts that are severely detrimental to the citizens of the enemy nation.
The Civil War is considered for the most part as a total war. Due to the inherent differences between the economy and ideology of the South and North, ideologies that tend to focus on ‘winning’ rather than humanitarian consideration have been the main focus of both the soldiers and their commanding officers. For example, in 1864, General Tecumseh Sherma...