Posted on 08/20/2014 5:31:44 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross
His march through Georgia has been gravely misunderstood ― as has Israel’s strategy in Gaza.
William Tecumseh Sherman 150 years ago took Atlanta before heading out on his infamous March to the Sea to make Georgia “howl.” He remains one of the most controversial and misunderstood figures in American military history. Sherman was an attritionist, not an annihilationist — a strategist who believed in attacking the sources that fuel and field an army rather than butting heads against the army itself. To review his career is to shed light on why the Israeli Defense Forces were both effective in Gaza and hated even more for being so effective.
Much of the South has hated William Tecumseh Sherman for over a century and a half, but not because his huge army killed thousands of young Confederate soldiers (it did not). Grant did that well enough in the horrific summer of 1864 outside Richmond. Rather, Sherman humiliated the plantationist class by staging three long marches during the last twelve months of the Civil War — from Tennessee to Atlanta, from Atlanta to Savannah, and from Savannah up through the Carolinas. In each of these brilliantly conducted invasions, Sherman, with a few notable exceptions, sought to avoid direct fighting with Confederate forces, either outflanking opposing armies that popped up in his way, or entrenching and letting aggressors wear themselves out against his fortified lines. He did enormous material damage, as he boasted that his enemies could do nothing to impede his progress — humiliation being central to his mission.
Instead of fighting pitched battles, Sherman was interested in three larger strategic agendas. War in his mind was not a struggle between militaries so much as between the willpower of entire peoples ....
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
As usual, Victor Davis Hanson provides keen insights and a thorough understanding of the subject matter.
Sherman was obviously a military genius. It is true that he destroyed the Southern economy and institutions so violently that it took over a century to recover. However, he did not slaughter the people; for this he is to be commended.
The greatest mistake of the Confederacy is that it did not free the slaves and appeal to the British Empire for deliverance. Secession was legal.
Amen.
VDH stuns me with his insight - Sherman was hated because he humiliated the south by driving thru their territory with impunity - not only cutting off their 'bullets and beans ' but showing the folly of continuing .
It is sad that Patton (our second Greatest General behind Washington) would never make it past corporal in Obama’s PC military.
I agree. God Bless the South.
Sherman was a traitor. He was from Louisiana. In fact, he founded LSU. This is why he left the plantations in Louisiana alone.
History shows that Sherman's march through Georgia and the Carolinas brought that war to an end far sooner than it would have otherwise. And he did it with far fewer deaths than others would have.
Traitor?! There’s more crying in baseball than traitors in The Civil War. Sherman simply chose to succeed from the Confederacy, as was his God-given right.
Sherman was born and raised in Ohio. Shortly before the war he was appointed president of a school that would much later become LSU. When states began seceding, military men had to choose weather to stay loyal to their oaths to the Union and the Constitution or to side with the rebellion. Sherman chose the Constitution.
As for burning plantations in Louisiana, I don’t think he ever set foot there during the war. In fact, Louisiana was pretty much out of the war after the fall of Vicksburg and union control of the Mississippi in the summer of 1863. It would make no sense to burn anything there since none of their goods went to the Confederate side.
Study W.T. Sherman the man sometime. You might change your mind about his “ethics”.
Sherman was Jewish????
Who knew LOL!
This one is a keeper.
Hey Bender I know what you mean
My teenage cousin had teacher who believe Alaska was part of Russia STILL
When I hear that I march down the school rip F-bomb on her a***
That very true story
After that teacher kept her mouth shut about anything about Alaska so Sarah Palin my time in Alaska and Deadliest catch series mention of it
It ban at this school SERIOUSLY LOL!
Real funny. Compare Robert E. Lee’s admiration and support in the North after the war, versus W.T. Sherman’s denigration in the South. Sherman was a creep who in his own memoirs admitted to a certain satisfaction in “making war” his way.
Saint Robert is mostly a post war myth created by the losers, as is the evil Sherman myth created by the same losers. Both men were good soldiers who served their causes loyally.
It would be better if you read real history instead of buying into the myths.
History? LOL. By your own admition, “history” is a myth created by the “winner.” How’s Lincoln’s America working out for you Yankee?
He didn’t found LSU; he was its first superintendent. And he was never deployed in Louisiana.
He was actually born in Ohio.
Lincolns America would work just fine if we still had it. We’re living in LBJ’s and FDR’s America and the solid south voted for both of them.
Tyrants borrow from each other. Lincoln was not the first, he just made it much easier for men like Wilson, FDR, Johnson, and Obama. Of course history-challenged folks like you pick and choose between “good” tyrants like Lincoln, and “bad” tyrants like FDR and LBJ.
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