Trump: 'Robert E. Lee was a great general'

DiogenesLamp: "Anderson invaded Sumter in December of 1860.
The property ceased to be that of the US government when South Carolina voted to secede."

Asserted here & elsewhere as if it were recognized fact.
I'm not aware of any law of the United States or anybody else at the time which confirms DiogenesLamp's bald-faced claim.

DiogenesLamp: "I've already said that slaves seized during the war have at least a reasonable argument to be made justifying it, but how many slaves were seized during the war, and how many after?
How do you legally justify any such actions after the war?"

Confederates seized freed African-Americans in Union states for return & sale in Confederate slave markets.
The Union "seized" no slaves, merely pronounced "free" any which escaped to Union lines.

All told, there were originally 3.5 million slaves in the Confederacy, another 1/2 million in Union states.
By the time of Appomattox in 1865 nearly all had already been freed as a result of Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation or their own states' abolition laws.
One result was that by the time of the 13th's ratification, December 1865, only a few percent of the original four million slaves had not already been freed.

DiogenesLamp seems to suggest here that somehow those freed slaves should have been returned to bondage after Appomattox in 1865.
Seems to suggest... but refuses to come right out and say that....

DiogenesLamp: "Somehow you and others have gotten the impression I am referring to wartime conditions.
I am not.
Of course you don't give back any seized assets during the war!
I thought it was axiomatic that we were talking about post war conditions.
To suggest we do so during a war is so silly it never occurred to me anyone would think we were talking about the period when the war was being fought. "

DiogenesLamp seems to be struggling with the idea that maybe slaves freed during the war should have been re-enslaved after Appomattox.
Or maybe there were large numbers of slaves freed after Appomattox under less than pristine legal conditions.

But DiogenesLamp has to date cited no specific examples of what he really means, and so we're left to guess what his real point here might be.

DL: “Anderson invaded Sumter in December of 1860. The property ceased to be that of the US government when South Carolina voted to secede. Lincoln also sent a force of riflemen to strengthen his garrison in April of 1861.”

Anderson vacated Moultrie when the nightly Confederate patrols, of the channel between Moultrie and Sumter, dramatically increased. Both those forts were Federal property. If Charlestonians really thought it belonged to them, then why did they leave it abandoned for Anderson to move into? And yet, you maintain that Anderson “invaded” a vacant Federal garrison? I maintain he simply moved into the much safer Sumter in light of increased Confederate activity. Can you tell me that the increasing patrols in the channel between the two forts, by the Confederates, wasn’t the start of the ensuing unpleasantness?

I ask you, if the Charlestonians and Beauregard and Davis really believed that Sumter was theirs, then why didn’t they allow Anderson his couple of days to run out of provisions and peacefully evacuate? Why, on earth, did they opt to bomb the smithereens out of their own property? I’ll tell you why: If Davis gave Anderson the opportunity to peacefully abandon the Fort (which was imminent) Davis would lose his biggest opportunity to strike at the biggest target in front of him. And risk losing Virginia and all that went with it.

I've heard the theory, and I don't dismiss that it might have had an influence on Davis, but i'm not convinced this is the sole reason he did what he did.

The theory has some plausibility, but I haven't seen enough supporting evidence to accept it outright.

The evidence is in Davis's own words in his April 3rd letter to Braxton Bragg:

“It is scarcely to be doubted that for political reasons the U.S. govt. will avoid making an attack so long as the hope of retaining the border states remains. There would be to us an advantage in so placing them that an attack by them would be a necessity, but when we are ready to relieve our territory and jurisdiction of the presence of a foreign garrison that advantage is overbalanced by other considerations. The case of Pensacola then is reduced [to] the more palpable elements of a military problem and your measures may without disturbing views be directed to the capture of Fort Pickens and the defence of the harbor. You will soon have I hope a force sufficient to occupy all the points necessary for that end. As many additional troops as may be required can be promptly furnished.” [Jefferson Davis to Braxton Bragg, 3 Apr 1861] Source

Davis saw the advantage in trying to create a situation where the Union would have to fire the first shot, but he thought that "other consdirations" outweighed the advantage of not having fired the first shot.

Davis doesn't go into what those "other considerations" that outweighed the advantage of not starting a war by firing the first shot were. Did the benefit of shooting first lie in solidifying support for the new government in the seceded states, or in rushing other slave states into secession? In any case, Davis wanted war for reasons of his own, and he was willing to start a one himself without any Yankee trickery.

We do know that Davis was getting letters and telegrams telling him that Virginia was ready to fall into the Confederate camp if only he would take bold action. What action could be more bold than starting a war?

Put Davis's letter to Bragg together with the letters and telegrams that Davis was receiving, and he really doesn't look like a victim of Lincoln's machinations. He was playing 3-D chess, maybe more so than Lincoln, but either he wasn't that good at it or his new country was at such a disadvantage that it didn't matter in the end.

More here.

You know, if we can believe Diogeneslamp’s story, this topic is tbe heart & soul of what brought him to the Lost Cause.
He says his African American roomate laughed in mockery of Jefferson Davis for getting “fooled” by tricky Abe Lincoln into starting war at Fort Sumter.
So Diogeneslamp tells us repeatedly that, no it was really Lincoln’s “war fleet” which fired the “first shots” and “tricked” poor Jefferson Davis into war.

But what if the real truth is Davis wasn’t “tricked” into anything, , but instead brilliantly started war knowing it would at least double the Confederacy and solidify its citizens support?

What if the one event which turned Diogeneslamp from a disinterested Unionist to a vigorous Lost Causer turns out he misunderstood it?

Kinda reminds one of blasey-ford, donut?

Respect for your adversary’s ability, doesn’t mean you agree with their fighting position.

But I don't have much respect for Vo Nguyen Giap. I still maintain that he is overrated and was not that great a military leader despite the adulation he has gotten in the mainstream media. Given the ineptitude of their opponents, the North Vietnamese could have prevailed if they had been led by General Custer.

You come in at the end of a discussion and start talking shit. Did you miss the part where acknowledging the prowess of your enemy does not mean you are a commie?

I double dog dare you to go up to any man who fought in Vietnam and tell him we lost the war.

Oh for Christ sake, put down the bottle and go to bed.