.

It’s common knowledge that Rome won the 2nd Punic War. Doesn’t take away from Hannibal’s legend.

I have read that Cannae is the most studied battle in history.

Count Alfred von Schlieffen studied Cannae endlessly and no doubt was in his thoughts when he developed plans for quick destruction of France.

It is a remarkable feat considering Hannibal’s army was made up of very different units from all over the Carthaginian world and  speaking dirfferent languages.
I think most great commanders recognise the simplicity of the double envelopment plan, but its execution has escaped so many of them.
Lee tried so many times and came close at least twice; he used rivers as the basis of his Cannae. The wounding of Jackson and his own incapacitation on the North Anna prevented his realising his own. I think he believed just one Cannae would result in the North suing for peace.
Virginia seems a good place to spring one too.

What about Westmoreland? :P

@Gargantua:

What about Westmoreland? :P

No nothing about him,sorry. Have never studied or read about post war history.

@ABWorsham:

Robert E Lee is greatest general.

Washington was fighting an enemy that had a supply line the length of the Atlantic Ocean and needed French aid to win.

Lee fought a hopeless battle and was able to keep the end in question for many seasons. The fact that Lee and Davis kept the C.S.A alive for 5 years is amazing.

Once again this depends on what “American” means. Bobby Lee never fought for the United States as a general. George Washington was a major factor in the United States creation. If American means born on the Americas once again Bobby Lee is coming up short. Simon Bolivar has to be the choice. Bolivar liberated practically an entire continent. Bobby Lee may have won a few battles against inept commanders but he led two invasions that failed miserably.

Grant as a general basically paid for his victories and defeats with excessive loses. He just put soldiers into a meat grinder using the advantage of greater resources and manpower. Not unlike Stalin.

“Quantity has a quality of its own”

First of all I have not “poked fun” at anybody so don’t get your panties in a bunch.

Lee was an American the same way any human being born in the Western Hemisphere is an American. Lee was NOT a general in the United States Army. That is a fact.

90% of the southern soldiers not owning slaves only makes the rebellion that much more pathetic. A group of rich slave holders sending their poorer neighbors out to die. For what? So the slave owners could continue their wicked way of life? You can write all you want about “preserving the original union” but everyone knows if there were no slaves their would have been no war.

Then you ask me to defend war on civilians. How do you expect anyone to justify war on civilians? That is silly.

As for all the battles you claim Grant lost I do not understand. The ANV held the field thus a tactical victory? None of those battles drove the Union Army from Virginia. It simply regrouped and pressed forward. Lee should be commended for a skillful retreat during a period of warfare where the defender had a decided advantage.

Bobby Lee defeated the Union army during the Peninsula Campaign, true. So he must be praised because McClellan was an outstanding commander?

Does anyone on the forum think that Burnside was anything but inept for attacking at Fredericksburg?

Finally Chancellorsville, was the commander of the Union’s right flank, General Howard, anything but inept for disobeying orders and not preparing his position?

Facts are Bobby Lee led two offensive campaigns. Both times the Union needed a single major engagement to turn them back. At least the second campaign managed to get through Maryland. The first campaign made it what all of 5 miles into Union controlled territory. That’s outstanding.

The 62 Maryland campaign was on the back of a fantastic summer of Southern victories. It was also in conjunction with a Western advance in to Kentucky. It was a political decision and proved to be ill conceived. Few troops joined either army, but the Kentucky one rattled the Administration. The Maryland one just did not have the numbers. Lincoln, understandably, ensured he had a vast number of troops in the East as he realised the importance, home and abroad, of not losing his capital.
The 63 Pennsylvania campaign is another matter. Lee’s army, again on the back of a fabulous victory, could have won the war. Instead a meeting engagement made it harder, then impossible. (Bad decision day 3?).
Lee is the best American general. Again I wish to bring up his North Anna trap. Grant’s army of the Potomac would have limped back after that battle. There would have been the end of Grant’s 64 campaign.

@wittman:

The 62 Maryland campaign was on the back of a fantastic summer of Southern victories. It was also in conjunction with a Western advance in to Kentucky. It was a political decision and proved to be ill conceived. Few troops joined either army, but the Kentucky one rattled the Administration. The Maryland one just did not have the numbers. Lincoln, understandably, ensured he had a vast number of troops in the East as he realised the importance, home and abroad, of not losing his capital.
The 63 Pennsylvania campaign is another matter. Lee’s army, again on the back of a fabulous victory, could have won the war. Instead a meeting engagement made it harder, then impossible. (Bad decision day 3?).
Lee is the best American general. Again I wish to bring up his North Anna trap. Grant’s army of the Potomac would have limped back after that battle. There would have been the end of Grant’s 64 campaign.

Bottom line Bobby Lee was 0 for 2 in offensive campaigns. Both campaigns were stopped after only one major engagement.

I disagree with your assessment that the war could of been one. The South never had might or right on its side.

As far as the Greatest American General once again Bobby Lee was never a general in the United States Army. The greatest general born in the western hemisphere is Simon Bolivar.

Face it. You like Grant and Sherman because they waged war against civilians. You like that Grant needlessly killed men (which he later admitted about Cold Harbor). It makes you mad that Lee gets all the attention, while Grant and Sherman when they get attention, are famous for butchery and war against civilians.

First of all I have never given Grant credit for anything. On a previous post about which Civil War general I would want to be I responded Grant because I like being a winner. I did however say that Abraham Lincoln was the greatest, and I stand by that statement 100%

Secondly this is the first time I have ever typed Sherman on this forum. SHERMAN there I typed his name twice now.

Third I always find it funny when supporters of the Southern cause point to “butchery” or “crimes against civilians” by the Union Army. The South went to war in order to preserve its right to own slaves. Every death in the war was caused by Southern men who wanted to continue the very criminal practice of slavery.

Your whole post is a laugher.

Every death in the war was caused by Southern men who wanted to continue the very criminal practice of slavery.

Including the free blacks who volunteered?  Wow I had no idea…

Schwarzkopf was the boss!

In Vietnam in March 1970, Schwarzkopf was involved in rescuing men of his battalion from a minefield.[4] He had received word that men under his command had encountered a minefield on the notorious Batangan Peninsula, he rushed to the scene in his helicopter, as was his custom while a battalion commander, in order to make his helicopter available. He found several soldiers still trapped in the minefield. Schwarzkopf urged them to retrace their steps slowly. Still, one man tripped a mine and was severely wounded but remained conscious. As the wounded man flailed in agony, the soldiers around him feared that he would set off another mine. Schwarzkopf, also wounded by the explosion, crawled across the minefield to the wounded man and held him down (using a “pinning” technique from his wrestling days at West Point) so another could splint his shattered leg. One soldier stepped away to break a branch from a nearby tree to make the splint. In doing so, he too hit a mine, which killed him and the two men closest to him, and blew an arm and a leg off Schwarzkopf’s artillery liaison officer. Eventually, Schwarzkopf led his surviving men to safety, by ordering the division engineers to mark the locations of the mines with shaving cream. (Some of the mines were of French manufacture and dated back to the Indochina conflict of the 1950s; others were brought by Japanese forces in World War II). Schwarzkopf says in his autobiograpy It Doesn’t Take a Hero that this incident firmly cemented his reputation as an officer who would risk his life for the soldiers under his command.

Schwarzkopf told his men that they might not like some of his strict rules, but it was for their own good. He told them “When you get on that plane to go home, if the last thing you think about me is ‘I hate that son of a bitch’, then that is fine because you’re going home alive.”[4] Lt. General Hal Moore later wrote that it was during his time in Vietnam that Schwarzkopf acquired what later became his infamous temper, while arguing via radio for passing American Hueys to land and pick up his wounded men.[7]

@Gargantua:

Every death in the war was caused by Southern men who wanted to continue the very criminal practice of slavery.

Including the free blacks who volunteered?  Wow I had no idea…

Yes Garg- it may be hard to believe but if the South never rebelled then even free blacks wouldn’t of had a war to fight.

And Schwarzkopf was the boss. He had war in his name!

interesting discussion
there are a lot of good ones out there 
surprised winfield scott hasn’t been mentioned
he basically created the US army
beat the british a few times in the 1812 war and defeated the mexicans

What about John Brown as a great American General? (Great failure perhaps) He sounds like your type Extra B.

An Abolitionist, a well known Murderer of Slave-owners, and leader of the infamous John-Brown Raid on Harpers Ferry. He mustered 18 men, and attacked an armory. He was the general of his American forces.

Initially, the raid went well, and they met no resistance entering the town. They cut the telegraph wires and easily captured the armory, which was being defended by a single watchman. They next rounded up hostages from nearby farms, including Colonel Lewis Washington, great-grandnephew of George Washington. They also spread the news to the local slaves that their liberation was at hand . Things started to go wrong when an eastbound Baltimore & Ohio train approached the town. The train’s baggage master tried to warn the passengers. Brown’s men yelled for him to halt and then opened fire. The baggage master, Hayward Shepherd, became the first casualty of John Brown’s war against slavery. Ironically, Shepherd was a free black man. Two of the hostages’ slaves also died in the raid.[29] For some reason, after the shooting of Shepherd, Brown allowed the train to continue on its way.

WOW!

if the South never rebelled then even free blacks wouldn’t of had a war to fight

What about Hayward Sheperd’s war? He lost it when murdered by your aboltionist friends, long before the war even started! and for no other reason then trying to help other? That’s quite a legacy you’ve chosen to defend.

Perhaps if the south never rebelled, these kinds of incidents would have kept occurring! And more innocent Hayward Shpereds would have been murdered by northernist abolitionists! That doesn’t leave much choice for a free man.

I’m sure glad ROBERT E. LEE was around, to bring JOHN BROWN the murderer to Justice, and to make sure Hayward Sheperd didn’t die in vain.

We need a thread -WORST American Generals- There are many…

Slavery, or Murder, what’s worse… would be another great thread title.

And is this thread restricted to Generals?  Or will other ranks of great -leaders- do?

I used to live in Charles Town, WV so I am very familiar with John Brown’s story. His plan was bad and the execution was worse. That may have been the last time Bobby Lee was one of the good guys.  :lol:

@Gargantua:

What about John Brown as a great American General? (Great failure perhaps) He sounds like your type Extra B.

An Abolitionist, a well known Murderer of Slave-owners, and leader of the infamous John-Brown Raid on Harpers Ferry. He mustered 18 men, and attacked an armory. He was the general of his American forces.

Initially, the raid went well, and they met no resistance entering the town. They cut the telegraph wires and easily captured the armory, which was being defended by a single watchman. They next rounded up hostages from nearby farms, including Colonel Lewis Washington, great-grandnephew of George Washington. They also spread the news to the local slaves that their liberation was at hand . Things started to go wrong when an eastbound Baltimore & Ohio train approached the town. The train’s baggage master tried to warn the passengers. Brown’s men yelled for him to halt and then opened fire. The baggage master, Hayward Shepherd, became the first casualty of John Brown’s war against slavery. Ironically, Shepherd was a free black man. Two of the hostages’ slaves also died in the raid.[29] For some reason, after the shooting of Shepherd, Brown allowed the train to continue on its way.

WOW!

if the South never rebelled then even free blacks wouldn’t of had a war to fight

What about Hayward Sheperd’s war? He lost it when murdered by your aboltionist friends, long before the war even started! and for no other reason then trying to help other? That’s quite a legacy you’ve chosen to defend.

Perhaps if the south never rebelled, these kinds of incidents would have kept occurring! And more innocent Hayward Shpereds would have been murdered by northernist abolitionists! That doesn’t leave much choice for a free man.

I’m sure glad ROBERT E. LEE was around, to bring JOHN BROWN the murderer to Justice, and to make sure Hayward Sheperd didn’t die in vain.

We need a thread -WORST American Generals- There are many…

Slavery, or Murder, what’s worse… would be another great thread title.

And is this thread restricted to Generals? � Or will other ranks of great -leaders- do?

And what is this all about? My abolitionist friends? Garg  The Champion of Forum Justice defending the practice of slavery and the “glorious South.”

I am truly surprised

As far as I know, John Brown was a civilian.  If leading a group of armed men was all it took to be a real general, the world (past and present) would be hip-deep in generals.

@ExtraBilly:

I used to live in Charles Town, WV so I am very familiar with John Brown’s story. His plan was bad and the execution was worse.

Given that John Brown was hanged, “the execution was worse” is a particularly good way to put it.

@CWO:

@ExtraBilly:

I used to live in Charles Town, WV so I am very familiar with John Brown’s story. His plan was bad and the execution was worse.

Given that John Brown was hanged, “the execution was worse” is a particularly good way to put it.

:-D