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No war is waged on rational calculations and the belief that one side is in the right. We may hope for victory but we do not count on it. Good armies make their own luck and must not count on hope to deliver victory to them.
No war is waged on rational calculations and the belief that one side is in the right. We may hope for victory but we do not count on it. Good armies make their own luck and must not count on hope to deliver victory to them.
No army has ever won without the support of the people.
No army has ever won without the support of the people.
Rome, the Bolsheviks, Just about every Medieval Army, and most ancient ones. Try something better than that. Or better yet, admit that you might be wrong on this.
Rome, the Bolsheviks, Just about every Medieval Army, and most ancient ones. Try something better than that. Or better yet, admit that you might be wrong on this.
Absolutely wrong sir. All of those groups had support of the people or at least the majority otherwise they would not have succeeded.
So explain how medieval monarchs put down peasant revolts with the support of the people? The people who were rebelling supported the monarch? Explain impressment into the British army of the Napoleonic wars.
So explain how medieval monarchs put down peasant revolts with the support of the people? The people who were rebelling supported the monarch? Explain impressment into the British army of the Napoleonic wars.
I thought we were talking about armies and war efforts?
And putting down a rebellion of armed peasants is not war? What is it then, playing croquet?Come on, you just don't want to admit that armies do not depend on the people except in democracies and even then only to a certain degree depending on the strength of democratic institutions. Armies have almost always been separate institutions within the state or realm. It is an uncomfortable fact that people in the US tend to not want to believe. An army emphatically does not depend on the support of the people, they are generally instruments of repression. I would hazard to guess that in the modern era armies have been used more to crush internal dissent than they have been employed in foreign ventures, the Western democracies are the exception, not the rule. To borrow a phrase from the post-modernists, don't let your cultural bias blind you to reality.
I simply cannot agree with what you're saying. Armies cannot win wars without civilian support. It's just not possible.
I simply cannot agree with what you're saying. Armies cannot win wars without civilian support. It's just not possible.
History shows otherwise. You may not like it but it is true. Heck, even I don't like it. It is what it is though.
Someone pm me if you need me to step in and lock this thread. 😉
What good would that do? Scout and I both can unlock it. LOL
Lee had another option, one he did not want to use. It may of worked. (It did for Washington.)Washington was willing--when he still had a viable army--to let the British capture the nation's capitol, instead of being pinned down defending it. Lee was not. Yet, as Lee said,"Richmond was a mill stone around his neck. Ultimately Washington's strategy was--at any cost--to keep an army in the field until the British grew weary of the conflict. That might have worked for Lee, but he was unwilling to do it. A guerrilla war might have worked. Abandoning Richmond and hooking up with Johnston before trench warfare reduced Lee's army to 25,000 men might have kept an army in the field until the North became war weary. Had Lee's forces included Johnston's army he might have been able to defeat Grant in a field of his choosing (then Sherman). Etc.Instead, Lee defended his nation's capitol to the last. A strategic failure that Washington avoided. Which, for me, shows Washington was the better general.
Blame Jefferson Davis for that. Davis would never allow Lee to abandon Richmond. He would have sacked him just as soon as he tried. Besides, Lee was going to defend his home state at all costs as he was very section minded.
I agree that Lee was more hamstrung or constrained, if you will, in his strategic decisions than Washington was. But I also think that regardless of what the correct thing to do strategically was, Lee would have never voluntarily surrendered or abandoned Richmond. In some ways I think Lee wanted to force a negotiated settlement whereas Washington's focus was driving the British off the continent. Washington had a more straightforward goal than did Lee. These factors complicate comparisons of the two generals.I still think Washington was the better general though.
Excellent analysis Daniel. i have often wondered why the South chose Richmond as its capitol. It would seem it would have been far more beneficial to place it further south, in Georgia or Mississippi. i think the South believed they were on equal footing with the North, but any third rate military planner would have seen that any early equality would soon fade, and the North would have huge advantages in men, material and resources. Chancellorsville was the real last chance for the South. Had the attack started earlier and Hookers army been entirely crushed, the Confederacy might have obtained international recognition, and with that the North might have had to come to terms. But, History, a fickle mistress, did not see it that way. Lee would never have fought a guerrilla war. It was not in him. He said after the war that the South failed to use Forrest and Mosby more effectively, but that was hindsight.Mr. Baker, i have to humbly disagree with you, Sir. Jefferson Davis had two Generals upon which he relied, Lee and Bragg. He did not get along with any others ie Beauregard, Joe Johnston, Longstreet. Davis tied himself to Lee. After Gettysburg, Lee was the Southern cause.This does not take away from the greatness of Lee, he was an equal to Bonaparte, and will be lauded for eternity, but in the end he lost. Washington, however, won the war. And you fight to win the war. And that is why i chose him.
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