The Guns of the South

This is a book I enjoy in parts, especially near the beginning. It has a gripping and semi-plausible story, and conveys something of the feel of the period. I appreciate this: for an Englishman, I'm relatively well informed about the American Civil War, having read a number of non-fiction books on the subject over the years.

In this story, a bunch of white South African time-travellers from the year 2013 arrive in the Confederate States of America in late 1863 and assist the CSA to win the American Civil War by supplying AK-47 rifles and ammunition in large quantities; although the winning of the war takes up less than half of the book. The subsequent events are also of interest.

It's a book that tries to be nice to everyone, except to the South African time-travellers, who become the baddies. The Unionists, the Confederates, and their slaves are all given sympathetic and understanding treatment. On the whole I approve of this—they all had their own points of view which deserve some understanding—except that most of the characters on all sides seem too good to be true.

The Bad Guys from the future are portrayed as highly competent in general (which is probably unrealistic: too good to be true, in that respect). However, partway through the book they commit a monumental blunder that seems unnecessary and uncharacteristic. It contributes dramatically to the plot; but it's so incredible that I regard it as a serious blemish.

Because of his moderately anti-slavery views, they try to assassinate Lee after his election as president of the CSA, and they do so in such an incompetent manner that they fail, and are then wiped out or imprisoned by an indignant Confederacy. They could easily have shot Lee on the street from the window of a building, and could even have managed to avoid any blame for the assassination. Instead, they screw up completely, which is incredibly stupid considering the competence they display in all other respects.It's even more stupid when you consider that they had no need to assassinate Lee at all. He was only the President; he had to get his legislation through Congress, and there was considerable opposition to it anyway. The time-travellers had already demonstrated an ability to influence Confederate politics: they could surely have given the opposition enough covert support to prevent Lee from making any changes to the law regarding slavery.Having made their main blunder, they then make another one by trying to remain where they are and fight the whole Confederate army: an attempt doomed to fail, even though they have some better weapons than the AK-47. They could easily have just accepted defeat and used their time machine to go back where they came from (as some of them belatedly manage to do at the last moment).