Strategic Planning & Implementation Flashcards

What was one strategic purpose of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803?

Answer: To gain control of the Mississippi River and New Orleans for American trade

Jefferson sought secure access to the port of New Orleans, and the purchase doubled the nation's size.

What was the main idea of the Union's Anaconda Plan?

Answer: Blockade Southern ports and control the Mississippi River to squeeze the Confederacy

Winfield Scott's plan was to strangle the Confederate economy by blockade and river control.

Which was a strategic effect of the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863?

Answer: It freed enslaved people in Confederate-held areas and allowed Black men to join the Union army

It made ending slavery a war aim, discouraged foreign support for the Confederacy, and opened Union military service to Black soldiers.

What was the goal of Sherman's March to the Sea in 1864?

Answer: To destroy Confederate supplies and infrastructure and break the will to fight

Sherman used total war tactics across Georgia to cripple the South's ability to continue.

What was Grant's strategy in the 1864 Overland Campaign in Virginia?

Answer: Keep constant pressure on Lee's army and eventually besiege Petersburg

Grant kept fighting despite heavy losses, forcing Lee into the long siege of Petersburg, which supplied Richmond.

What was the purpose of the Pacific Railway Act of 1862?

Answer: To fund a transcontinental railroad linking the East and the West Coast

Federal land grants and loans supported the Union Pacific and Central Pacific, which met at Promontory, Utah, in 1869.

Which Reconstruction agency was created to help formerly enslaved people with food, schools, and legal assistance?

Answer: The Freedmen's Bureau

Congress established the Freedmen's Bureau in 1865 to aid freedpeople in the postwar South.