The Impact was major as it resulted in the unification of Germany.
Plausibility Check of Timeline-191 (aka Southern Victory)
- Thread starter Ficboy
- Start date
Ficboy
Banned
Pretty much and it was the same power that made and broke alliances with various nations as well as compete in an arms race with Britain that led to World War I. Even if Franz Ferdinand's assassination in Sarajevo were to fail, Austria-Hungary would find out about the Black Hand and execute Gavrilo Princip as well as his conspirators not to mention they would be furious at Serbia given the ethnic origins of the group and thus still declare war on them and then the Entente would in turn retaliate thus there is still a World War I.
It wasn't small, but it was short, and it's historical importance was of the first order.
The Franco Prussian War involved more troops then fought in the Russian Campaign in 1812.
Ficboy
Banned
Even though it's unlikely the Confederate States would ever get Cuba from Spain or execute the Golden Circle idea they could however try to spread it's influence via proxy wars and supporting coup d'etats.
Ficboy
Banned
America yes. Britain probably not given that they are trading partners with the Confederacy and America. But it won't always be constant fighting every decade or two like Turtledove portrays it.
History Learner
Banned
All it takes, as I've cited, is for Lee to able to strike on the 19th; two historians agree Lee's prospects were good in such an eventuality.
And as I have exhaustively cited in reply, if Lee strikes as he planned on the evening of the 18th / day on the 19th, he is launching a frontal attack against at minimum Reno's Union infantry divisions and, considering the most likely butterflies of the PoD needed to get Lee's attack happening, likely more Union forces in close support. Frankly Pope's position is even better than @Belisarius II suggests - if he stays in place until the blow strikes, he is in a reasonably good position to fend it off successfully.
Of the two historians we have been citing thus far, one looked merely at an overview of the campaign without going down to the level of detail needed to seriously analyze Lee's prospects in this counterfactual. The other wrote many pages of details (cited in my previous post) that support the position of Lee having no particularly good prospects in this attack, and few-to-none supporting Lee having good prospects, admittedly making his final analysis rather confusing.
But if you think Lee's possible attack could have had a decisively positive result, perhaps you could outline a TL, in comparison to the one in my previous post, that shows how Lee's success comes about.
History Learner
Banned
Thank you, and I apologize for the delay in responding.
Largely agreed.
Definitely and, again, my apologies if this was not sufficiently clear. Sometimes what seems to obvious to one isn't to others, and I should've been more wary of that.
Fair enough.
Sure. My main point here is that, beyond the fact they are small as you note, on the 19th they're also effecting their own retreat; they cannot accomplish both a withdrawal and stalwart defense against overwhelming Confederate forces.
Siegel, McDowell and Banks are all operating with open left flanks. Reno, it appears, is the only one who isn't.
Not in strength and not on the 19th overall.
I'll see if I can get a scan/screenshot of the map in question.
Buford's cavalry was going a different route compared to Fitzhugh, but even ignoring that, Pope was already in a headlong retreat.
Between his own reports from spies and Buford's cavalry capturing Fitzhugh along with two satchels detailing Lee's plans, Pope decided to retreat. I cannot think of any likely reason why Pope would suddenly cancel this decision mid-day on the 19th, when McDowell is already ensnared in a traffic jam given the retreat is underway, to reinforce Reno who is also already under retreat.
This map and yes, I added those. I have yet to look at the map you cite, but my understanding was that the crossing was to be done in a "swinging door" manner; i.e. clockwise movement into the V?
I really don't agree with this scenario, to be honest. To quote from the book:
McDowell and Pope himself didn't get the traffic jam sorted out until the afternoon of the 19th; I fail to see how the addition of Banks or, as you seem to be suggest, on his own, can speed it up when the other two officers failed. Further, as noted on the proceeding page and the top of this one:
Reno's men had been marching all day of the 18th and since 11 PM that night had been in a counter-march into the 19th. Their supply trains had, under Pope's orders, been likewise sent back first. I fail to see how they can make a determined stand when, as already noted, they are about 5,000 men spread out covering a lot of ground, exhausted from nearly 24 hours of march, most of their mass is not even in prepared fortifications and, finally, their supply wagons for their artillery aren't even available.
History Learner
Banned
I was already working on the reply to that post after I responded to his; his was shorter, so I wanted to go ahead and get that out of the way. It just takes me awhile to get through everything I have to respond to on the forums.
History Learner
Banned
I got some free time, so I thought I'd post some excerpts from the sources I previously cited to you guys.
Modernizing a Slave Economy: The Economic Vision of the Confederate Nation by John Majewski, Chapter ECONOMIC NATIONALISM AND THE GROWTH OF THE CONFEDERATE STATE
Confederate railroad policy, in fact, provides a microcosm for understanding how secessionists crossed the thin line separating antebellum state activism and a powerful, dynamic Confederate state. On the face of it, most Confederate leaders seemingly opposed national railroads. During the Confederate constitutional convention, South Carolina’s Robert Barnwell Rhett and other secessionists sought to prohibit the central government from funding internal improvements. The Confederacy, they argued, should never allow internal improvements (at least on the national level) to generate the evils of logrolling, budget deficits, and higher taxes. Rhett won an important victory when the Confederate constitution specifically prohibited Congress from appropriating ‘‘money for any internal improvement intended to facilitate commerce.’’ The constitution allowed the Confederate Congress to appropriate money to aid coastal navigation, improve harbors, or clear rivers, but only if it taxed the commerce that benefited from such improvements. ‘‘Internal improvements, by appropriations from the treasury of the Confederate States,’’ Rhett’s Charleston Mercury cheered, ‘‘is therefore rooted out of the system of Government the Constitution establishes.’’
States’ rights ideology, though, eventually lost to a more expansive vision of the Confederate central state. As Table 6 shows, the Confederate government chartered and subsidized four important lines to improve the movement of troops and supplies. Loans and appropriations for these lines amounted to almost $3.5 million, a significant sum given that a severe shortage of iron and other supplies necessarily limited southern railroad building. Jefferson Davis, who strongly backed these national projects, argued that military necessity rather than commercial ambition motivated national investment in these lines. The constitutional prohibition of funding internal improvements ‘‘for commercial purposes’’ was thus irrelevant. That Davis took this position during the Civil War followed naturally from his position on national railroads in the antebellum era. Like Wigfall, he believed that military necessity justified national railroad investment. As a U.S. senator, Davis told his colleagues in 1859 that a Pacific railroad ‘‘is to be absolutely necessary in time of war, and hence within the Constitutional power of the General Government.’’ Davis was more right than he realized. When the Republican-controlled Congress heavily subsidized the nation’s first transcontinental railroad in 1862, military considerations constituted a key justification. Even after the Civil War, the military considered the transcontinental railroad as an essential tool for subjugating the Sioux and other Native Americans resisting western settlement.
When the Confederate Congress endorsed Davis’s position on railroads, outraged supporters of states’ rights strongly objected. Their petition against national railroads—inserted into the official record of the Confederate Congress—argued that the railroads in question might well have military value, ‘‘but the same may be said of any other road within our limits, great or small.’’ The constitutional prohibition against national internal improvements, the petition recognized, was essentially worthless if the ‘‘military value’’ argument carried the day. Essentially giving the Confederate government a means of avoiding almost any constitutional restrictions, the ‘‘military value’’ doctrine threatened to become the Confederacy’s version of the ‘‘general welfare’’ clause that had done so much to justify the growth of government in the old Union. The elastic nature of ‘‘military value,’’ however, hardly bothered the vast majority of representatives in the Confederate Congress. The bills for the railroad lines passed overwhelmingly in 1862 and 1863. As political scientist Richard Franklin Bensel has argued, the constitutional limitations on the Confederate central government ‘‘turned out to be little more than cosmetic adornments.’’
Like Louis Wigfall’s rambling interview with William Howard Russell, the ‘‘cosmetic adornments’’ in the Confederate constitution allowed secessionists to articulate republican principles without actually having to follow them. If Confederate delegates in Montgomery really wanted to stop all national improvements, they could have simply prohibited the Confederate Congress from appropriating ‘‘money for any internal improvements’’ rather than insert the qualifying phrase ‘‘intended to facilitate commerce.’’ It is hard to believe that the inclusion of the ‘‘commerce’’ qualification was accidental. Having spent much of their careers debating the old federal Constitution, the delegates at Montgomery carefully considered the implications of every phrase they wrote.∞∂ The delegates surely knew that men such as Wigfall and Davis had used the national defense argument to justify federal spending on internal improvements. As it was, the delegates ritualistically invoked states’ rights without having to worry about the consequences. Historian Don E. Fehrenbacher has argued that the Confederate constitution was written ‘‘by men committed to the principle of states’ rights but addicted, in many instances, to the exercise of national power.’'Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Confederates were committed to the language of states’ rights in a way that rarely prevented the growth of national power.
The decision to subsidize railroads, while ideologically important, was only a small part of the overall growth of the Confederate state. Other elements of Confederate state building, in fact, proved less controversial. When a shortage of pig iron threatened ordnance production, Davis told Congress in early 1862 that the ‘‘exigency is believed to be such as to require the aid of the Government.’ In April 1862 the Confederate Congress passed legislation that offered no-interest loans to iron masters who expanded their forges. The loans would only pay half the cost of the additional investment, but the Confederate government also covered to make advances up to one-third the value of contracts. To help forges secure additional raw materials, the Confederate Congress set up the Niter Bureau in 1862, which quickly became involved in exploration for new sources of iron. The Confederacy sometimes used private firms to produce ordnance—the famous Tredegar Iron Works is a good example— but the Confederacy’s Ordnance Bureau also built and operated its own arsenals, mills, and factories throughout the South. The arsenal at Selma, Alabama, for example, employed 3,000 civilians, while the Ordnance Bureau’s powder factory in Augusta, Georgia, was the second largest in the world. Whereas the North tended to rely on government contracts with private firms to meet the needs of wartime production, the Confederacy, with surprisingly little opposition, produced much of the military supplies consumed by its armies.
The story of the Quartermaster Department is similar to the Ordnance Bureau. Historian Harold S. Wilson describes Confederate e√orts to outfit soldiers with uniforms, shoes, blankets, and tents as the ‘‘brink of military socialism.’’ The Quartermaster Department of the Confederacy operated its own factories and workshops, employing some 50,000 workers (many of them seamstresses). To obtain cloth for these factories and workshops, the Quartermaster Department exerted immense control over privately owned textile mills. Mills that refused to submit to Confederate controls on prices and profits faced the prospect of having their workers conscripted into the Confederate army. When wool supplies ran short—largely because Union forces captured most of the major woolproducing areas early in the war—the Confederate Congress authorized quartermasters to impress whatever supplies they could find. The Confederate Congress also allowed the Quartermaster Department (under the auspices of the Bureau of Foreign Supplies) to regulate and control most blockade runners. In early 1864 the Confederate government prohibited private shipments of cotton, tobacco, and other staple crops; required that private blockade runners devote half of all cargo space to the war department; and prohibited luxuries from entering the South. The Confederacy had essentially nationalized much of its foreign commerce.
Also from Majewski, but this time the Chapter REDEFINING FREE TRADE TO MODERNIZE THE SOUTH:The Confederacy, of course, never really had a chance to collect its tariff. If the seceding states had been allowed to leave without war, however, the Confederate tariff would have had a significant fiscal impact. According to economist Thomas F. Huertas, the South imported $200 million worth of northern goods in 1860 (see Table 5). With an independent Confederacy, northern goods would have been transformed into dutiable foreign trade. Under Confederate tariff schedules passed in May 1861, imported manufactured goods from the North and Europe would have yielded the Confederate treasury almost $34 million. The percentage of collected duties to the value of total imports would have been 14.3 percent, which was only slightly lower than the ratio of 16 percent for the entire United States in 1860. In per capita terms, every free person in the Confederacy would have paid $6.07 in duties. By way of comparison, the entire United States (both North and South) collected duties worth $53 million, or $1.94 per free resident in 1860. If the North had allowed the South to peaceably leave the Union, the Confederacy would still have increased the tax burden on its own citizens—an ironic result for a nation supposedly committed to free trade and limited government.
The high rate of per capita taxation suggests the complex relationship between trade and Confederate nationalism. In some respects, the traditional southern commitment to free trade remained strong. In 1861, for example, South Carolinian G. N. Reynolds wrote in a letter to William Porcher Miles (a South Carolina delegate to the Confederate constitutional convention) that Switzerland was a model of free trade: ‘‘The result is that capital and industry flow solely in the most productive channels. So let it be with us.’’ Other secessionists thought in nationalistic terms and conceptualized trade not as a free-flowing river but as a weapon for punishing enemies. Referring to the North, Texas senator and former South Carolinian Louis Wigfall boasted, ‘‘Not one pound of cotton shall ever go from the South to their accursed cities; not one ounce of their steel or their manufactures shall ever cross our border.’’ A moderate revenue tariff that lowered duties on European goods while raising duties on northern goods synthesized these two potentially contradictory messages of free trade and Confederate nationalism. In the minds of many secessionists, free trade offered the Confederacy a means of escaping northern economic domination and solidifying international alliances. At the same time, secessionists could tout the ability of their government to penalize northern goods and protect southern manufacturers.
In fusing free trade and protectionist impulses, secessionists spoke and wrote in a Hamiltonian idiom of economic modernization and economic nationalism. Just as Hamilton had imagined the United States becoming a world economic power, secessionists envisioned the Confederacy as a vehicle for promoting economic modernization. Confederate duties closely resembled (and sometimes exceeded) the 10 to 15 percent tariff rate proposed by Hamilton in his famous Report on Manufacturers (1791). The similarity in rates reflected shared goals of simultaneously promoting nation building and economic development. Hamilton wanted to make his new nation economically independent while simultaneously encouraging enough international trade to pay for his ambitious fiscal plans. His moderate tariff encouraged domestic manufacturing while generating enough revenue to finance the Revolutionary War debt. Confederates wanted tariffs high enough to penalize northern goods—thus encouraging economic independence—but still low enough to allow for a vibrant trade with Europe.
Colossal Ambitions: Confederate Planning for a Post–Civil War World by Adrian Brettle:
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So, in the couple of days I was away, it seems @History Learner has been banned. Apparently I was far too generous in my granting his (?) sincerity in reasoned detail-oriented debate in our post exchanges. I had a few qualms based on a few other posts of his I read but was giving the benefit of the doubt....but oh well.
So let my final (unanswerable) reply serve as a post-script regarding these types of posters - whatever their overall objective is and whatever lack of good faith they may use in these exchanges: if someone is willing to descend into the weeds with them (and fortunate enough to have both the time and on-hand citations to do so), they will still lose the debate.
History Learner already granted agreement with the first half of my last post, so picking up from there:
What History Learner is ignoring is that our entire exchange is concerning a point of *Alternate* History. Specifically we have already agreed (finally) on the PoD, and furthermore agreed that an immediate butterfly of the PoD is Brodhead not running into Stuart or his adjutant general Major Fitzhugh, whose capture was critical iOTL because he carried a satchel detailing Lee's plan. Hennessy, Page 48:
"The satchels produced an order from R. E. Lee to Stuart, describing precisely the Confederate program for disposing of Pope's Army of Virginia. Pope had for several days suspected that Jackson was being reinforced from Richmond. Now, here was proof that the entire Confederate army confronted him, bent on turning his left -- precisely the scenario Pope had feared."
If Major Fitzhugh is not captured then this captured order never reaches Pope, and he has no *definitive* information of Lee's plan. What he *will* know is that there is a buildup of Confederate forces south of Raccoon Ford. In this event, it is unlikely that Pope orders his army to retreat at all on the 18th; and it is far more likely that Pope orders Raccoon Ford and the others in the area more strongly defended than by mere pickets. Reno has enough strength to put up some opposition at the fords, if not enough to hold indefinitely against a determined assault, and this would lead to the scenario I had described.
Or, in other words, butterflies work for both sides once the PoD happens.
I'm not sure what History Learner was referring to here. Reno *was* the Union left flank - the other corps arguably may have open left flanks *only if* they were sufficiently far *behind* Reno, which may indeed be the case. It would also be irrelevant given that Reno is at the river line and would have to be gotten through first.
Yes but not, as I said, in the new TL that we are debating, for the reasons quoted above.
As noted already iTTL Fitzhugh would not be captured, which is the entire point. Spies alone would confirm the presence of Longstreet's wing, which should already have been suspected, and possibly the arrival of Anderson's division. But none of this would necessarily pose an *immediate* threat to Pope's army without knowing Lee's actual plan. The one spot where Pope could *definitely* make a stand against any plan Lee has is at the major Rapidan crossings, so abandoning these and retreating makes sense only once no alternative for holding them remains. One could even argue his decision to retreat iOTL is over-cautious.
However, let us assume that Pope orders the retreat anyway. Hennessy page 49 describes Pope's orders for the OTL withdrawal:
"The corps trains should precede each column, Pope directed, and each corps should throw "very heavy rearguards of reliable troops" three miles to the rear. The cavalry would also screen the rear of the columns: Beardsley with Sigel, Bayard with McDowell, and Buford with Reno. Pope would march that night. He hoped his army would be across the Rappahannock by noon on August 19."
Now that seems like a commander who plans to oppose any force trying to catch up with him. "Three miles" to the rear of the retreating columns would actually have the rearguard (for Reno and McDowell at least) be *at* the Rapidan River opposing the crossings. Cavalry brigades may not be able to hold the river line but they can definitely slow the crossings down, and then prevent the Confederate army from moving beyond them in route column for long, constantly having to deploy to clear the cavalry defenders. Note also Pope's hope for the timing, and compare to Hennessy page 51:
"At 11 P.M. the army "stole quietly" out of its camps, formed into columns along the assigned routes and started toward the Rappahannock."
So Pope, who naturally would not plan to have traffic jams in his withdrawal, still thinks it will take 13 hours of unopposed marching to get his army from the Rapidan back to the Rappahannock. There is no inherent reason for Lee's army to be able to march faster than Pope's. So once they *succeed* in forcing the Rapidan crossings, if they were unopposed they would also not be able to get to the Rappahannock until about 13 hours later. With cavalry covering the crossings we cannot expect the Confederates even iTTL to force the Rapidan until dawn on the 19th, and so they could not reach the Rappahannock until about sunset. However, they will be strongly opposed - by cavalry slowing their march to a crawl and then, if they catch up to the Union columns (perhaps at Culpeper where the columns converge) by the strong Union rearguard infantry. Considering that everything other than the Union rearguard *did* succeed in both reaching and crossing the Rappahannock by the end of the 19th, any forced slowdown of the Confederate pursuit *at all* is enough to let Pope's army to escape cleanly.
Non-sequitur. To swing "into" the V Lee needs to get on Pope's *right* flank, to the west, and force him eastward (clockwise) into the V. This is the exact opposite of Lee's plan.
Already largely addressed - the slowdown at Culpeper can take as long as it did iOTL and not harm Pope's retreat if he makes one (in which case he will be on-hand in person to straighten it out as much as he did iOTL, so it doesn't take longer). If Pope holds the river crossings instead then the slowdown can take even longer without harming the eventual retreat.
As for Reno, if they try to hold the Rapidan crossings they are holding 3 *small* stretches of river with well-known crossing points, a far cry from "spread out covering a lot of ground". Somerville Ford may already be covered by McDowell's corps instead iTTL, further easing the burden. Any opposition at all will buy the Union until dawn on the 19th at least, as a night crossing against unknown opposition is a non-starter from Lee's perspective. They then need a couple hours maximum before reinforcements can reach them. If Reno retires instead, then they may be tired but they also have the shortest march to Kelly's ford at the Rappahannock, with no other column to join them and cause a traffic jam. In OTL they reached Stevensburg by the morning of the 19th and crossed the Rappahannock *before* sundown. Their march is also largely to the *east* and so *away* from Lee's main plan of attack.
========
The bottom line, as it pertains to this thread, is that Lee getting a Camp-Hill-*like* level of victory in this 2nd Bull Run TL we were discussing is roughly as unlikely as Camp Hill itself.
Now, I am also strongly of the opinion that the Confederacy was lucky that the Kentucky campaign turned out as good for them as it did - so many things had to go right for them both strategically in the campaign and tactically in the battle - and there was roughly a 0% chance of them doing better in the battle (due to the massive numerical imbalance) or the campaign (due to their poor supply situation and the end of the summer-long drought).
So, put a possible Maryland Victory for Lee barren of larger strategic victory, together with an *unavoidable* Confederate retreat out of Kentucky, and either an OTL Iuka victory or better for the Union, and I cannot see European intervention happening if it didn't iOTL - the Rebels' situation simply cannot be improved by enough to make it worthwhile. Which, in turn, fairly invalidates the rest of TL-191.
So let my final (unanswerable) reply serve as a post-script regarding these types of posters - whatever their overall objective is and whatever lack of good faith they may use in these exchanges: if someone is willing to descend into the weeds with them (and fortunate enough to have both the time and on-hand citations to do so), they will still lose the debate.
History Learner already granted agreement with the first half of my last post, so picking up from there:
What History Learner is ignoring is that our entire exchange is concerning a point of *Alternate* History. Specifically we have already agreed (finally) on the PoD, and furthermore agreed that an immediate butterfly of the PoD is Brodhead not running into Stuart or his adjutant general Major Fitzhugh, whose capture was critical iOTL because he carried a satchel detailing Lee's plan. Hennessy, Page 48:
"The satchels produced an order from R. E. Lee to Stuart, describing precisely the Confederate program for disposing of Pope's Army of Virginia. Pope had for several days suspected that Jackson was being reinforced from Richmond. Now, here was proof that the entire Confederate army confronted him, bent on turning his left -- precisely the scenario Pope had feared."
If Major Fitzhugh is not captured then this captured order never reaches Pope, and he has no *definitive* information of Lee's plan. What he *will* know is that there is a buildup of Confederate forces south of Raccoon Ford. In this event, it is unlikely that Pope orders his army to retreat at all on the 18th; and it is far more likely that Pope orders Raccoon Ford and the others in the area more strongly defended than by mere pickets. Reno has enough strength to put up some opposition at the fords, if not enough to hold indefinitely against a determined assault, and this would lead to the scenario I had described.
Or, in other words, butterflies work for both sides once the PoD happens.
I'm not sure what History Learner was referring to here. Reno *was* the Union left flank - the other corps arguably may have open left flanks *only if* they were sufficiently far *behind* Reno, which may indeed be the case. It would also be irrelevant given that Reno is at the river line and would have to be gotten through first.
Yes but not, as I said, in the new TL that we are debating, for the reasons quoted above.
As noted already iTTL Fitzhugh would not be captured, which is the entire point. Spies alone would confirm the presence of Longstreet's wing, which should already have been suspected, and possibly the arrival of Anderson's division. But none of this would necessarily pose an *immediate* threat to Pope's army without knowing Lee's actual plan. The one spot where Pope could *definitely* make a stand against any plan Lee has is at the major Rapidan crossings, so abandoning these and retreating makes sense only once no alternative for holding them remains. One could even argue his decision to retreat iOTL is over-cautious.
However, let us assume that Pope orders the retreat anyway. Hennessy page 49 describes Pope's orders for the OTL withdrawal:
"The corps trains should precede each column, Pope directed, and each corps should throw "very heavy rearguards of reliable troops" three miles to the rear. The cavalry would also screen the rear of the columns: Beardsley with Sigel, Bayard with McDowell, and Buford with Reno. Pope would march that night. He hoped his army would be across the Rappahannock by noon on August 19."
Now that seems like a commander who plans to oppose any force trying to catch up with him. "Three miles" to the rear of the retreating columns would actually have the rearguard (for Reno and McDowell at least) be *at* the Rapidan River opposing the crossings. Cavalry brigades may not be able to hold the river line but they can definitely slow the crossings down, and then prevent the Confederate army from moving beyond them in route column for long, constantly having to deploy to clear the cavalry defenders. Note also Pope's hope for the timing, and compare to Hennessy page 51:
"At 11 P.M. the army "stole quietly" out of its camps, formed into columns along the assigned routes and started toward the Rappahannock."
So Pope, who naturally would not plan to have traffic jams in his withdrawal, still thinks it will take 13 hours of unopposed marching to get his army from the Rapidan back to the Rappahannock. There is no inherent reason for Lee's army to be able to march faster than Pope's. So once they *succeed* in forcing the Rapidan crossings, if they were unopposed they would also not be able to get to the Rappahannock until about 13 hours later. With cavalry covering the crossings we cannot expect the Confederates even iTTL to force the Rapidan until dawn on the 19th, and so they could not reach the Rappahannock until about sunset. However, they will be strongly opposed - by cavalry slowing their march to a crawl and then, if they catch up to the Union columns (perhaps at Culpeper where the columns converge) by the strong Union rearguard infantry. Considering that everything other than the Union rearguard *did* succeed in both reaching and crossing the Rappahannock by the end of the 19th, any forced slowdown of the Confederate pursuit *at all* is enough to let Pope's army to escape cleanly.
Non-sequitur. To swing "into" the V Lee needs to get on Pope's *right* flank, to the west, and force him eastward (clockwise) into the V. This is the exact opposite of Lee's plan.
Already largely addressed - the slowdown at Culpeper can take as long as it did iOTL and not harm Pope's retreat if he makes one (in which case he will be on-hand in person to straighten it out as much as he did iOTL, so it doesn't take longer). If Pope holds the river crossings instead then the slowdown can take even longer without harming the eventual retreat.
As for Reno, if they try to hold the Rapidan crossings they are holding 3 *small* stretches of river with well-known crossing points, a far cry from "spread out covering a lot of ground". Somerville Ford may already be covered by McDowell's corps instead iTTL, further easing the burden. Any opposition at all will buy the Union until dawn on the 19th at least, as a night crossing against unknown opposition is a non-starter from Lee's perspective. They then need a couple hours maximum before reinforcements can reach them. If Reno retires instead, then they may be tired but they also have the shortest march to Kelly's ford at the Rappahannock, with no other column to join them and cause a traffic jam. In OTL they reached Stevensburg by the morning of the 19th and crossed the Rappahannock *before* sundown. Their march is also largely to the *east* and so *away* from Lee's main plan of attack.
========
The bottom line, as it pertains to this thread, is that Lee getting a Camp-Hill-*like* level of victory in this 2nd Bull Run TL we were discussing is roughly as unlikely as Camp Hill itself.
Now, I am also strongly of the opinion that the Confederacy was lucky that the Kentucky campaign turned out as good for them as it did - so many things had to go right for them both strategically in the campaign and tactically in the battle - and there was roughly a 0% chance of them doing better in the battle (due to the massive numerical imbalance) or the campaign (due to their poor supply situation and the end of the summer-long drought).
So, put a possible Maryland Victory for Lee barren of larger strategic victory, together with an *unavoidable* Confederate retreat out of Kentucky, and either an OTL Iuka victory or better for the Union, and I cannot see European intervention happening if it didn't iOTL - the Rebels' situation simply cannot be improved by enough to make it worthwhile. Which, in turn, fairly invalidates the rest of TL-191.