[Old Teufel Hunden]

"Lee's strategy was to engage the enemy and destroy his army in detail."

As I mentioned, I thought Lee was a better General than that. He won former battles by forcing the enemy to fight on his terms, he won by guile and manueverability. He never won any previous battle by fighting on the enemies terms and frontally assaulting fortified positions. No, he got the Union to do that.

The object of war should never be to attempt to destroy an army in detail. Did that work for Hannibal? No greater victory has ever been recorded in the annals of warfare than what Hannibal attained at Cannae. The classic double envelopment. He decimated the Roman Army, yet he still lost the war.

A lesson from our own history. Did the British sacking Washington cause us to lose the War of 1812?

[wideawake]

He won former battles by forcing the enemy to fight on his terms, he won by guile and manueverability.

This is too vague a description.

He never won any previous battle by fighting on the enemies terms and frontally assaulting fortified positions. No, he got the Union to do that.

He won Chancellorsville by engaging the Union forces with an extremely bloody frontal assault on Hooker's fortified position, while Jackson flanked the Union position.

The object of war should never be to attempt to destroy an army in detail.

Let's hold that thought for a moment - leaving aside the fact that this is precisely the successful strategy that Grant pursued against Lee.

Did the British sacking Washington cause us to lose the War of 1812?

So you've argued that destroying armies is a bad strategy and also that seizing territory is a bad strategy.

This leaves, as far as I can tell, a third option - destroying supply lines, something that Lee never cared much about (he preferred to use enemy supply lines if he could).