[DiogenesLamp]

That Abe Lincoln was calling the shots? How could you believe anything else? If not him, then who?

[Tau Food]

Both sides had people who were calling the shots for their own side. The Union could have avoided war by allowing the secessions to take place and the folks on the other side could have avoided war by not seceding in the first place or by calling off the secessions in early 1861.

In other words, bloodshed was the result of the failure by each side to give the other side what it wanted.