Why Did the Americans Triumph in the War for Independence
2015-08-28 来源: 51due教员组 类别: 更多范文
51due论文代写网精选代写范文：“Why Did the Americans Triumph in the War for Independence”。这篇论文分析了美国独立战争取胜的原因。英国在许多方面的失败，主要是没有利用好占美国人口三分之一的那些忠诚的人们；华盛顿的卓越军事领导；法国等国的支持等等，让美国在独立战争中取得了胜利。
The Americans triumphed in the war for Independence due to a number of reasons, which when combined, could only lead to one solution, that of victory for the Americans. As Hugh Brogan says, There was no middle ground for the Americans: for them it was either victory or total submission. The reasons are far and wide reaching and include a number of failures by the British. The British failed to use the loyalist Americans who numbered up to a third of the population, they withheld some of their best troops from the conflict and suffered major communication problems. The role of George Washington as commander-in-chief was an important factor in the success of the Continental Army and the final reason for American success lies in the support it received from other nations and in particular from France.
The American Revolution divided the American people in three ways. There were those who wanted a new political order and wanted to be free from the British, there were those who were loyal to Britain and those who had not decided who to side with or did not care which way the conflict went. The revolutionaries called those loyal to Britain Tories, royalists or the Kings men. The British did not make enough use of what could have been up to a third of the American population who supported them. A large number of these loyalists could be found close to the East Coast and they were from different backgrounds including shopkeepers, farmers and professional people. The British failed to make enough use of these loyalists from the very start of the conflict and they waited until the war was well under way before organising them for military service. One of the main reasons for this was that Britain expected the war to be a short one and did not see the point in organising and t! raining people who would not be needed. Many other possible loyalists were lost to the British cause due to the actions and behaviour of some of the British troops who treated some of the American civilian population with contempt. The rape and ransacking carried out by some of the British troops Converted potential friends into enemies. The loyalists, if organised properly, could have secured the land that the British army had won. Instead as the British army moved on from one area to the next the newly gained land was soon back in the hands of the Americans.
Major-General Charles Lee of the Continental Army had been a General in the British Army, he wrote in an essay in 1774 that the British Army was Ineffective, recruited from the poorest classes and as short of generals as the American army. This was the view of a Major General in the Continental Army and that view must have been enhanced when the British withheld some of their best troops and kept them in England. The reason for this was because the British feared that the French might take advantage of the war and attack them at home. Therefore the British sent out some of their weaker forces and hired mercenaries to fight for them. One of the problems with using mercenaries was that they were not as committed to the cause as soldiers from Britain would have been. The mercenaries included up to 30,000 German Hessians, They were especially detested by the Americans, for they plundered and destroyed with professional conscientiousness. On top of these problems with the army personnel there was a major communications problem. It took six weeks for messages to be sent backwards and forwards the three thousand miles from the government in Britain to the British generals fighting on American soil. The major supplies for the British came from England into the ports on the East Coast that were in British control. This meant that the British Army was not able to travel for any great distance from the coast. Although the major towns and cities had good roads once outside the boundaries good roads were few and far between. Large parts of the terrain were covered in impenetrable forests. As Gordon Wood says: Europeans had long since devastated their forests. So when they came to America, they were overwhelmed by all of these trees. There was no New York thruway to come down. They had to hack their way through forest and trails. It was an excruciating experience. The lack of knowledge of, and disregard for, the terrain in America seriously hampered the British Army. Washington took over the Continental Army in July 1775 at its siege of Boston, Massachusetts. He took over 17,000 poorly trained, poorly equipped and poorly disciplined soldiers. He soon realised that he needed a more disciplined army and that he would have to get rid of the incompetent officers. He started work straight away and soon had a semblance of a proper army. Washington suffered a number of early losses; Long Island, August 29th 1776 and New York City, 15th September 1776 but was able to hit back with defeats of the British at Trenton, 25th December 1776 and Princeton, 3rd January 1777. Although these wins were only small ones Washington and the Continental Army were able to settle into their winter quarters on a positive note.
Throughout 1776 and 1777 the British failed to totally defeat the Continental Army and this gave Americans strength and gave them a symbol to look up to, that symbol was George Washington. One of his great skills during the war was to ensur! e that Congress, who were fearful of a military take-over, were kept informed as to what was happening. At times he had to lay it on the line to them, especially in relation to finances, as many of his troops deserted due to not being paid. He even used his own money at times to buy supplies and to pay his men. His skills in his dealings with the politicians and his leadership and the loyalty he received from most of his men were vital in the winning of the conflict. The importance of Washington cannot be over exaggerated, Washington was the Army, and at times only the existence of an Army kept the Revolution alive. That is not to say that he did not have his critics. In the autumn of 1777 Washington discovered that a letter had been sent by an officer in the Continental Army called Thomas Conway to General Gates in which Conway accused Washington of being a weak general at the same time there was talk in Congress questioning Washingtons ability. Washington indicated tha! t he would resign from the army if his performance continued to be brought into question. Eventually Gates and Conway appeared before Congress over the matter. Many people wrote letters and gave testimony is support of Washington and Congress came out in support of him. General Gates returned to his troops a chastened general and Conway was transferred to a subordinate command in the Hudson Highlands. Washingtons role as commander-in-chief was not openly questioned further throughout the war. The main foreign support for the Americans came from the French who were still smarting over their defeat by Britain in the Seven Years War and wanted to see the British defeated. The French supported the Americans from the start of the war when they sent over fourteen ships filled with military supplies. On 17th October 1777 General John Burgoyne found himself and the British troops surrounded at Saratoga, New York. There was nowhere for them to go and they surrendered to the Continental Army. This was one of the major turning points of the war as this was when the French realised that America could and probably would win the war. Within a few months of this event two treaties had been signed with France, a Treaty of Amity and Commerce in which France recognised the United States, and a Treaty of Alliance. Included in the Treaty of Alliance was an agreement that if France were to get involved in the war then both countries would fight until American independence was won and neither would conclude a truce or peace without the formal consent of the other first obtained. In June 1778 British ships fired upon French and the two countries were now at war. The French gave the Americans a subsidy of two million dollars and loans of almost seven million. Spain became involved in the war as an ally of France as she wanted to regain Gibraltar from Britain and she also wanted to gain control of Florida once more. The Spanish aid to America included Four hundred thousand dollars in subsidies and two hundred and fifty thousand in loans. The Dutch gave financial aid to the Americans and supplied them with a large amount of gunpowder; they also carried large amounts of the French supplies on their vessels over to America. This in turn led to Britain declaring war against the Dutch in 1780 over the question of neutral rights at sea. The conflict had now escalated and the British were at war in Europe and three thousand miles away in America. Their army and navy were now stretched to the limits and losing America now seemed a small cost to pay to the British in order to get themselves out of the mess that they were now in.
The reasons that America triumphed in the war for Independence were far and wide reaching and included many failures by the British. The British failed to make effective use of the loyalist Americans who numbered up to a third of the population, they kept some of their better and more experienced troops away from the conflict and found the distance between government and battlefield a major obstacle. The role of George Washington as commander-in-chief was a crucial factor in the success of the Continental Army and in the support he was able to receive from Congress. American success was cemented by the support it received from other countries including Holland, Spain and in particular from France. -w
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