John Ferling’s Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence

I have just finished John Ferling’s excellent Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence. Ferling is a retired professor of history, and this book is the product of a lifetime’s work on his part. And it shows.

This is, without doubt, one of the finest books on the American Revolution ever written. It’s a military history of the Revolution meant to be the companion volume to his A Leap in the Dark: The Struggle to Create the American Republic , which is a political history of the Revolutionary War. It covers the war completely, with enough detail to give the reader a good overview of what happened and ideas of where to look for more if that’s of interest. He focused on the strengths and weaknesses of the commanders on both sides and demonstrates rather amply that the American victory in the war was, indeed, nearly a miracle.

One of the things that I really appreciated about the book was how Ferling managed to place the war in North America squarely in the context of the global geopolitical situation. Only by seeing the entire picture can one truly understand how the chain of events that brought about the unlikely American victory over the finest standing army in the world came to pass. Few books do that, and I found Ferling’s efforts to do so to be among the most useful aspects of the analysis.

The central thesis of Ferling’s book is that George Washington designed and brilliantly implemented a Fabian strategy to win the war. For those unfamiliar with the concept of a Fabian strategy, here’s a quick primer on it. Fabian strategy is an approach to military operations where one side avoids large, pitched battles in favor of smaller, harassing actions in order to break the enemy’s will to keep fighting and wear that enemy down through attrition. Generally, this type of strategy is adopted by smaller, weaker powers when combating a larger foe. In order for it to be successful, time must be on the side of user, which must be able to avoid large-scale actions. Also, Fabian strategy requires a strong degree of will from both politicians and soldiers, as frequent retreats and a lack of major victories can prove demoralizing.

Fabian strategy is named for the Roman emperor Quintus Fabius Maximus. Given the task of defeating the great Carthaginian general Hannibal in 217 BC, following crushing defeats at the Battles of Trebbia and Lake Trasimene, Fabius’ troops shadowed and harassed the Carthaginian army while avoiding a major confrontation. Knowing that Hannibal was cut off from his supply lines, Fabius instituted a scorched earth policy intended to starve Hannibal’s army into retreating. Taking advantage of shorter interior lines of communication, Fabius prevent Hannibal from resupplying his army while also inflicting several minor defeats on his army.

Ferling very convincingly argues that Washington came up with the idea of implementing and executing a Fabian strategy, and that, with only a couple of exceptions (most notably, the September 11, 1777 Battle of Brandywine, where he was soundly thrashed), Washington adhered to the strategy throughout the eight long years of the Revolutionary War. He also argues, again quite effectively, that Washington’s most able and most dependable subordinate, Maj. Gen. Nathanael Greene, did an even better job of implementing the Fabian strategy to counter the British Southern Strategy. Although Cowpens was the only battle that Greene won, his tactics inflicted such heavy losses on Cornwallis’ army that he was forced to abandon the Carolinas, make for Virginia, and adopt Yorktown as his base of operations. That, in turn, made the surrender of Cornwallis’ army and the negotiated peace a foregone conclusion.

The book is brilliant, and I recommend it to anyone with even a passing interest in the Revolutionary War.

It also got me wondering what would have happened had the Confederacy implemented a Fabian strategy from the beginning of the Civil War. There certainly would not have been three invasions of Maryland. Robert E. Lee was probably far too aggressive to execute such a passive means of waging war, so it is unlikely that it could have happened. However, it certainly makes for interesting speculation. What do you think?