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posted by cmn32480 on Monday June 12 2017, @12:08AM   Printer-friendly
from the south-shall-rise-again dept.

In the June 1969 issue of Civil War History — Volume 5, Number 2, pages 116-132 — a renowned Southern historian attacked the legacy of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

"No single war figure stands in greater need of reevaluation than Lee," wrote Thomas L. Connelly, the late University of South Carolina professor. "One ponders whether the South may not have fared better had it possessed no Robert E. Lee."

Connelly's essay was among the first academic musket shots fired on Lee's standing as an outmatched but not outwitted military genius presiding over a Lost Cause — a reputation celebrated in fawning biographies and monuments like the one removed Friday in New Orleans.

Was General Lee overrated? Get your armchair historian on...


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by jmorris on Monday June 12 2017, @01:04AM (6 children)

    by jmorris (4844) on Monday June 12 2017, @01:04AM (#524063)

    Yea, I think I'll take the opinion of pretty much every US General who fought Lee over some pink Cultural Marxist trying to rewrite history. The winners generally write the history books and usually make the losers out as well, losers, and themselves as the geniuses. So when the winners all universally respect the losing general it says something very good about the dude.

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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @05:04AM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @05:04AM (#524126)

    Lee and most Confederate Generals apparently thought that they were still going up against swordsmen or smooth-bore muskets in the 1860s.

    The rifled firearms and minnie balls of the era could cut a force to pieces at a range of hundreds of yards--not to mention grapeshot and cannister rounds from artillery.
    ...and the commanders didn't seem to get that.

    N.B. The only saving grace of the period was that the powder they were using produced so much smoke that after a few volleys it was difficult to spot targets.

    In Ken Burns' "Civil War" miniseries, Shelby Foote identified the Confederate General who understood that tactics had to change to match the decades of improvements that had been made in the killing ability of weapons.
    Foote noted that Stonewall Jackson's advice to his commanders was "Hit 'em on the end."

    Pickett's Charge was just stupid.
    Frontal assaults on dug-in troops in 1863 was suicide.[1]
    Lee telling Pickett to have his division cross hundreds of yards of of open ground wasn't tactically or strategically[2] smart.

    Again, Shelby Foote, had the line to describe the situation.
    After Pickett's Charge, Lee told Pickett, "Arm your division, we need another assault."
    Pickett said, "General, I have no division."

    [1] There are reports that some of Pickett's men who managed to make it to the Union lines were helped across the barricades by Union soldiers who admired their courage and luck.

    [2] The South trying to fight a war of attrition was just stupid.
    It was said that The North could have won the war with one hand tied behind its back.
    It had most of the industry and way more manpower from which to draw more conscripts.
    The Rebels needed to be SMARTER than The Yankees--and mostly they weren't.

    When Stonewall died, Lee said, "I have lost my right arm" and that was no understatement.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

    • (Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Monday June 12 2017, @07:25AM (4 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 12 2017, @07:25AM (#524179) Journal

      Pickett's Charge was just stupid. Frontal assaults on dug-in troops in 1863 was suicide.[1] Lee telling Pickett to have his division cross hundreds of yards of of open ground wasn't tactically or strategically[2] smart.

      Not if the Confederate cavalry had been able to hit that Union line from the back side. They were stopped three miles away instead by superior numbers of cavalry.

      Confederate strategy depended on the Confederates being able to invade and destroy infrastructure in Pennsylvania and elsewhere like the Union was doing along the Mississippi valley. To do that, they needed to beat the Union army at Gettysburg. Pickett's charge like so many military operations was a gamble with enormous gains possible, including a favorable end to the war, if they won. It didn't work out this time, but that doesn't make it stupid.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @10:52AM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @10:52AM (#524263)

        Not only is charging a dug-in opponent stupid, by 1914 the generals STILL hadn't figured out that it was stupid and now there were MACHINE GUNS.

        As long as commanders were actually -leading- their forces, the stupidity had a natural limiting factor.
        (The stupid commanders were killed in battle.)

        The leading-from-the-rear thing got militarism a century of unparalleled stupidity, stretching from rifled barrels up until battle tanks.

        .
        Jeb Stuart's cavalry[1] and Quantrill's Raiders[1], with hit-and-git tactics were effective on a limited scale.
        The let's-slog-this-out-with-massed-forces Confederates weren't at all.

        [1] ...and the ethics of those bunches were on par with weasels.

        -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 12 2017, @11:56AM (2 children)

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 12 2017, @11:56AM (#524296) Journal

          Not only is charging a dug-in opponent stupid

          Hence, why the cavalry attack from behind was so important. No point to second-guessing military decisions unless you take into account what they were actually doing and trying. There's a huge difference between charging a dug-in opponent and charging a formerly dug-in opponent that is running for their lives because they just got attacked from behind.

          Jeb Stuart's cavalry[1] and Quantrill's Raiders[1], with hit-and-git tactics were effective on a limited scale.

          The battle of Gettysburg would have been at that scale. And it wasn't a hit-and-git. From the Wikipedia article, Stuart's group toughed it out until they were surrounded on three sides. The "git" part would normally have happened long before that point.

          [1] ...and the ethics of those bunches were on par with weasels.

          Because we care about the ethics of our cavalry officers. Can't have unethical pillaging and burning.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @06:59PM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @06:59PM (#524594)

            That last sentence just explains so much about you.

            • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday June 13 2017, @12:16AM

              by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday June 13 2017, @12:16AM (#524729) Journal

              That last sentence just explains so much about you.

              You have a name?