The US civil war involved very large numbers of men on both sides and had many huge battles with very large amounts of casualties, why does it seem that success on the battlefield had less of a strategic result than those of other contemporary wars? Perhaps it could be as a result of the general American inexperience in large land wars at the time or perhaps the large distances involved in the US theatre compared to European wars?
You might find /u/vonadler answears to the questions “What did Europeans think of the military innovations of the U.S. civil war?”, “How did the Union/Confederate Army compare to the European armed forces of the same time period?” and “How would US troops in the Civil War era have compared to European troops in the same era (Austro-Prussian and Franco-Prussian wars)?” interesting. He mentions a number of differences betwen the armies and why you would see less decisive result in the American Civil War compared to the European wars.