the military strategy of the north was fourfold:to blockade southern ports to cut off supplies from Europe, to break the confederacy in two at the Mississippi River, to destroy the transportation and communication systems of the confederacy thus crippling morale and to attack the confederate capital at Richmond.
The souths strategy was to take advantage of their compact geography, with internal lines of communication, their military heritage (Southerners had been disproportionately the officers of the United States Army), and their greater enthusiasm for their cause to wear down the Union will to wage war.
During the Congress of Vienna, the great powers of Europe (Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia) guaranteed each other's independence by ensuring that no one country could dominate the continent.