The U.S. and the CSA both recognized the potential importance of foreign powers in the Civil War, as a European intervention could greatly aid the Confederate cause, much as French intervention in the American Revolutionary War had helped the United States gain its independence. At the start of the war, Russia was the lone great power to offer full support to the Union, while the other European powers had varying degrees of sympathy for the Confederacy. Nonetheless, foreign nations were officially neutral throughout the Civil War, and none recognized the Confederacy, marking a major diplomatic achievement for Secretary Seward and the Lincoln Administration.