The Greatest Ever Infographic - Napoleon in Russia

Started by Unbeliever, April 05, 2019, 04:50:05 PM

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Minimalist

QuoteBut his point was that new soldiers thrown into battle were not prepared for the reality of death.


That may have been what he meant but it only enhances the point that he was a rank amateur with a one-dimensional view of the issue .  McDowell got an inkling of what his troops were like on the march to Centreville.  The performance of his 90 day wonders - another reason why Lincoln urged him to hurry - should have warned him of the inherent problems of making that long flank march on the Confederate left.  But the alternative would have been a frontal attack into prepared positions.  The sad fact is that McDowell did not think much of his army with its elected officers, political generals and volunteers with one eye on the calendar counting down to their discharge day.  I rather imagine that McDowell would have agreed with Wellington's comment about his army from the Waterloo campaign:  "I don't know what they'll do to the enemy but by god, they frighten me."

I certainly agree about the civilians getting in the way especially as the roads sucked although at least the mud should have dried by July.  But both sides were infected with an almost embarrassing sense of bravado so the party atmosphere is not that much of a surprise.  To be sure many of the officers had experience from the Mexican War but certainly not the rank and file. 

As for Lee?  Lee's genius was enhanced because of the odds he faced.  He spent the first year of the war doing nothing of much significance.  When he got his chance at command he excelled but McClellan, Pope, Burnside, and Hooker did not demonstrate much ability in opposition.  I don't know if Lee's genius would have been appreciated in the north or allowed to blossom.  He was, after all, a southerner and a slave owner.
The Christian church, in its attitude toward science, shows the mind of a more or less enlightened man of the Thirteenth Century. It no longer believes that the earth is flat, but it is still convinced that prayer can cure after medicine fails.

-- H. L. Mencken

Poison Tree

Quote from: Cavebear on April 14, 2019, 07:01:03 AM
Yeah, the Union side sufferred from having less best top generals.  And some of their best died early.
To be fair, I've heard arguments that Albert Johnston could have proved an equal partner to Lee in the western theater had he lived--an unfalsifiable position to be sure.

Quote from: Baruch on April 14, 2019, 09:55:45 AM
Hence the Trent affair
Prince Albert rose from his death bed to help smooth that over
"Observe that noses were made to wear spectacles; and so we have spectacles. Legs were visibly instituted to be breeched, and we have breeches" Voltaire�s Candide

Baruch

http://dighist.fas.harvard.edu/projects/russiaglobal/items/show/267

There were Russian warships on a friendly visit to the US East and West coasts.  This amity led to the purchase of Alaska after the war.
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Minimalist

QuoteTo be fair, I've heard arguments that Albert Johnston could have proved an equal partner to Lee in the western theater had he lived--an unfalsifiable position to be sure.


Jefferson Davis lamented the death of A. S. Johnston at Shiloh himself.  He regarded him as the south's strongest pillar.  To be fair, in the East he had the quarrelsome and prickly Beauregard and Joseph Johnston who had not done much to stop McClellan's advance up the Peninsula.  I suppose McClellan was his own personal Stop Sign and Johnston did not have to do much.

But when Lee took command he displayed an aggressiveness which was lacking in Johnston.  Although he lost most of the battles of The Seven Days he kept attacking and scared the shit out of McClellan so badly that he packed it in and sailed back to Washington.  I don't know if he would have gotten that chance in command of the Union Army.  After bursting onto the scene and saving Richmond Lee had carte blanche from Davis. 

I'm not sure that even Lee could have done much with the hodge-podge that constituted the Union Army in 1861.  But it is a great discussion topic, C/B.
The Christian church, in its attitude toward science, shows the mind of a more or less enlightened man of the Thirteenth Century. It no longer believes that the earth is flat, but it is still convinced that prayer can cure after medicine fails.

-- H. L. Mencken

Poison Tree

Quote from: Minimalist on April 15, 2019, 02:36:50 AM
To be fair, in the East he had the quarrelsome and prickly Beauregard and Joseph Johnston who had not done much to stop McClellan's advance up the Peninsula.
Fortunately, Davis felt the same way at Atlanta and threw away the last chance of the Union loosing the war by replacing Johnston with John Hood.
"Observe that noses were made to wear spectacles; and so we have spectacles. Legs were visibly instituted to be breeched, and we have breeches" Voltaire�s Candide

Baruch

Quote from: Poison Tree on April 16, 2019, 02:26:10 AM
Fortunately, Davis felt the same way at Atlanta and threw away the last chance of the Union loosing the war by replacing Johnston with John Hood.

Albert Sydney Johnston vs Joseph Johnston.  Both Confederate generals, not the same guy.  It was Albert being talked about originally.
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Minimalist

Albert was dead two years before Atlanta so there isn't much danger of confusing the two.  The south had some shitty generals, too.  Hood and Braxton Bragg leap instantly to mind.
The Christian church, in its attitude toward science, shows the mind of a more or less enlightened man of the Thirteenth Century. It no longer believes that the earth is flat, but it is still convinced that prayer can cure after medicine fails.

-- H. L. Mencken

Baruch

Quote from: Minimalist on April 16, 2019, 02:11:14 PM
Albert was dead two years before Atlanta so there isn't much danger of confusing the two.  The south had some shitty generals, too.  Hood and Braxton Bragg leap instantly to mind.

Helps to add the first name with the last name.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
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Don't do that.

Poison Tree

Quote from: Baruch on April 16, 2019, 02:20:22 PM
Helps to add the first name with the last name.
I'm sorry if my two comments were unclear. I'd assumed that the shift from Albert Johnston to Joseph Johnston would be inferred by my quoting and responding to a sentence containing the name "Joseph Johnston".

Quote from: Minimalist on April 16, 2019, 02:11:14 PM
The south had some shitty generals, too.
I think that one of the major successes--if that's the right word--of the Lost Cause narrative has been to focus all the attention on Lee/Army of Northern Virginia, obscuring a lot of poor strategy and execution by the Confederates elsewhere and given people the misapprehension that the Confederates were always "this close" to winning. It is my position that the Confederates could have never won the war; But the Union could have lost it. The obvious culprit is ( pro-war) George McClellan and the (anti-war) Democrats winning the 1864 election. This would have required flipping New York (1%) Pennsylvania and Connecticut (2.8%) [doable so far] New Hampshire (5.2%) Ohio (6.8%) and Indiana (7%) [much bigger tasks]. I think that this would have required more than the Atlanta campaign simply dragging on like Richmond/Petersburg. Maybe if Sterling Price was still a threat and Jubal Early retained the Shenandoah. Even then the Union would have had a strong position from which to dictate peace terms. Maybe you have to go all the way back to an alternate outcome at Chattanooga (or Gettysburg).

I suppose now is as good a time as any to apologize to Unbeliever for the way this thread got hijacked.
"Observe that noses were made to wear spectacles; and so we have spectacles. Legs were visibly instituted to be breeched, and we have breeches" Voltaire�s Candide

Baruch

#24
Yes, the South eventually would have lost, provided that the British Empire didn't intervene.  Instead the Brits worked with Rothschild and BoE until 1913, to move the US from Constitutional money to that of the gold standard of the British Empire, and the restoration of a Central Bank that the US had tried twice and rejected.  By 1945, with the relationship between Churchill and Truman (FDR being too independent to be completely useable by Churchill) ... the takeover of the US was complete.  The British takeover (including Five Eyes) being somewhat reversed, by the Suez Crisis, where Eisenhower betrayed the British, French and Israelis.
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Minimalist

Lee's mistake was in not listening to Longstreet at Gettysburg.  Had he swung around to the south and got between Meade and Washington he would have forced the Army of the Potomac to attack him.  It should have been obvious to everyone at that point that the defensive firepower of CW weaponry was such that frontal attacks were doomed.  The AoP was still in piss poor shape after the twin disasters of Fredricksburg and Chancellorsville and all Lee achieved with his attacks on the 2d and 3d days at Gettysburg was to put the ANV in roughly the same predicament but without the north's resources to recover.
The Christian church, in its attitude toward science, shows the mind of a more or less enlightened man of the Thirteenth Century. It no longer believes that the earth is flat, but it is still convinced that prayer can cure after medicine fails.

-- H. L. Mencken

Cavebear

Quote from: Baruch on April 14, 2019, 09:55:45 AM
The Confederates were counting on British or French intervention.  Hence the Trent affair and the raider CSS Alabama.  But it was the Russians who kept the British from intervening.  France already had its hands full in Mexico.  After the war, it was easy to simply order the French out of Mexico.  Dooming Emperor Maximilian (Austrian head of French occupied Mexico).

Of course the Confederates had the desire to get European recognition.  That was what worked in the Revolution.  But things had changed.  In 1860, Europe had a lot of trade with the US.  Some for cotton in the South, but more manufactured goods from the North. And Britain had outlawed slavery. 

For ethical and trade reasons, Europe was never going to recognize the Confederates.   And it probably didn't even MATTER that, by the end of the war, that Europe recognized that the Union had the strongest army in the world at the time...
Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!

Baruch

Quote from: Cavebear on April 18, 2019, 09:43:37 AM
Of course the Confederates had the desire to get European recognition.  That was what worked in the Revolution.  But things had changed.  In 1860, Europe had a lot of trade with the US.  Some for cotton in the South, but more manufactured goods from the North. And Britain had outlawed slavery. 

For ethical and trade reasons, Europe was never going to recognize the Confederates.   And it probably didn't even MATTER that, by the end of the war, that Europe recognized that the Union had the strongest army in the world at the time...

Correct ... but British Imperial policy was to take down the US, from 1776 until 1913.  Then they had our nuts in a spanner (britishism).
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Cavebear

Quote from: Baruch on April 18, 2019, 10:44:42 AM
Correct ... but British Imperial policy was to take down the US, from 1776 until 1913.  Then they had our nuts in a spanner (britishism).

1.  I know what a "spanner" is. 

2.  Didn't you say you were from Canada?

3.  And they would have, except that they were engaged in 1776 in the first actual WW with the French.  It WAS all over the world...  We colonists got lucky.  If not for the French, we here would be sort of a big Canada.
Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!

Baruch

Quote from: Cavebear on April 18, 2019, 11:01:19 AM
1.  I know what a "spanner" is. 

2.  Didn't you say you were from Canada?

3.  And they would have, except that they were engaged in 1776 in the first actual WW with the French.  It WAS all over the world...  We colonists got lucky.  If not for the French, we here would be sort of a big Canada.

Correct about French intervention (also Spain and Denmark).  You are a little off.  Not Canadian, Texan.  "Spanner" doesn't fit the metaphor but it sounds good.  Poetic license.  What we call the French & Indian War ... aka Seven Years War in Europe happened two decades earlier.  Unless you want to count the War of the Spanish Succession as the first major coalition war that involved Britain and France.
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Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
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Don't do that.