Banks was no Napolean, but he wasn't the blithering idiot that some made him out to be. His basic plan to detach Texas or neutralize it economically from the rest of the Trans- Mississippi is arguably the correct one. The Texas campaign was Banks' best moment. He had a valid strategy and the dispersed forces used at points along the Texas coast forced him to delegate the tactical situation to professionals who usually did their job. There were clinkers, like Sabine Pass. Texas always got low priority in logistics on the Union side. The drought during the early 1860's kept Union forces, especially cavalry, from living off the land and they never had enough of the shallow-draft steamers to move provisions adequately. If you read Confederate reports, even the under-supplied troops present in Texas gave the defenders all they could handle. Magruder always maintained that Texas was the guts of the Trans-Mississippi Department and it is difficult to imagine a functional Confederate west without the Matamoras Trade and the small runners at Brazos. Sabine, with its shorter lines to Shreveport and Calcasieu was important through 1863. In 1864, it was pretty well bottled up and tonnage of shipments in and out dropped. General Sherman went on record before the Red River fiasco recommending that the emphasis be placed on taking Galveston island and just sitting on it to control the bay and its entrances. The numbers say that Union control of Brazos Santiago and Port Isabel were more important, forcing overland movement of cotton out and goods in through Bagdad and Matamoras. This throttling of the Rio Grande trade was a key component of Bank's original strategy. The economics of the trade were deplorable except to the profiteers on the river. Red River bought Texas another 14-18 months before a serious Union return.