Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

ROBERT E. LEE: OUR GREATEST GENERAL?

Posted on 06/22/2018 11:46:12 AM PDT by DIRTYSECRET

That was according to my 8th grade history teacher-retired military. The only one who came close was MacArthur. That brings up the politics of the left. If it is true that Lee was a great General isn't it at least worth acknowledging? This tearing down of statues should stop. Educated persons should acknowledge the truth. It's the left that's the intelligent ones as they would have us believe. I see no conservatives standing up for this truth. The Senate GOP candidate in Virginia should start an 'intellectual' conversation on Lee and let the left react. Don't wait for a baiting reporter to to knee-jerk him into a quick response that they can interpret their own way.


TOPICS: Politics
KEYWORDS: dixie; militaryhistory; robertelee
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 381-400401-420421-440 ... 621-637 next last
To: odawg

Beauregard was acting at the behest of that terrorist jeff davis.


401 posted on 06/23/2018 8:40:08 PM PDT by rockrr ( Everything is different now...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 400 | View Replies]

To: odawg

Oh please. C’mon. Do better then that. Lincoln sent Federal troops to guard and secure Federal property the South was intending to confiscate and occupy.


402 posted on 06/23/2018 10:08:21 PM PDT by jmacusa ("Made it Ma, top of the world!'')
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 397 | View Replies]

To: Svartalfiar
No they didn't - if Lincoln hadn't invaded the South, there would have been no war.

Having started the war only the Confederacy controlled where it would be fought. They have nobody to blame but themselves.

The misnamed 'Civil War' was not much different!

Well, yeah it was. But I agree on the "misnamed" part. For the first 60 or so years after the conflict it was officially referred to as "The War of Rebellion" or "The War of Southern Rebellion". I think we should go back to that.

403 posted on 06/24/2018 4:11:05 AM PDT by DoodleDawg
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 394 | View Replies]

To: panzerkamphwageneinz; rockrr
panzerkamphwabgeneinz: "Exterminated?
You belong to the other side- no gentleman ever spoke such language.
We are done here."

I can't vouch for how much of a gentleman he was, but here's one who did:


404 posted on 06/24/2018 4:44:43 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 297 | View Replies]

To: DIRTYSECRET

He was Lincoln’s first choice to lead the Union army.


405 posted on 06/24/2018 5:37:35 AM PDT by jmcenanly ("The more corrupt the state, the more laws." Tacitus, Publius Cornelius)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: CondoleezzaProtege; DiogenesLamp; miss marmelstein; Pelham
CondoleezzaProtege: "What happened to the South instead was similar to what happened to a defeated Germany at the signing of Versailles treaty 'ending' WWI.
In choosing to punish, humiliate, and leave Germany with a massive debt - its neighbors helped set the groundwork for Hitler, the Nazis, and ultimately World War II.
Germany’s revenge."

Sorry, but that's a misreading of history.
Germany's problem after the First World War was, they didn't feeeeeeel defeated, had never been invaded and were offered by Southerner US President Wilson "peace without victory'.
And "peace without victory" was perfect for Germans, just what they needed -- a twenty year break from war, then next time they'd show those verdammt Allies how to do it!

And plenty of Allied officials understood just what Germans intended in 1918, including our Army commander, Gen. Pershing, who wanted to march across Germany into Berlin to show the Germans who really won their war.
Another who understood was a young Under-Secretary of the Navy, in charge of naval codes & communications, a handsome fellow named... ah, yes, Franklin Roosevelt.

But Wilson's "peace without victory" prevailed until the Allies at Versailles began demanding reparations from Germany, and Wilson was too weak to stand his ground.
So yes, Germans felt "betrayed" & "stabbed in the back", but only because Wilson had promised them better and then, like any Democrat failed to deliver.
In fact, Germany in 1919 was treated certainly no worse than Germans treated countries they defeated, notably Belgium and Russia.

So the Allies in the Second World War intended not to repeat the mistakes of the First and instead could look back to the US Civil War where Union imposed costs on civilians (i.e., Sherman's march upgraded to 2.0 version became allied bombing) demanded Unconditional Surrender, militarily occupied the country for years afterwards, rooted out the root causes of the war -- slavery in one case, Nazism in the other -- and then welcomed the defeated people back into the family of states/nations.

But for those who just can't let go of hysterical historical hyperbole, let's also point out that Second World War Germany was, in fact, treated orders of magnitude more severely than were Confederates.

CondoleezzaProtege: "The Nazis lost WWII. And to this day there are Neo-Nazis who wave or tatoo Confederate flags on themselves in the South and around the world."

No pro-Confederate on these threads accepts any comparison of Confederates to Nazis -- das ist verboten!!
So I am here only comparing Union Civil War actions to those of World War Allies.
The First World War taught us how not to do it, the Civil War taught Allies basics in how to do it.

406 posted on 06/24/2018 5:39:31 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 255 | View Replies]

To: BroJoeK

I would never compare Confederates to Nazis. That’s silly and insulting to America.


407 posted on 06/24/2018 5:44:11 AM PDT by miss marmelstein
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 406 | View Replies]

To: DoodleDawg
Having started the war only the Confederacy controlled where it would be fought. They have nobody to blame but themselves.

Actually, it's the complete opposite - the South didn't need to invade the North, didn't want to fight a war at all, they just wanted to be left alone. It wasn't a civil war, it was a succession. In order to 'win', the South needed to do merely nothing. But then Lincoln invaded and that's were war was needed - without it, the North couldn't force the southern states back into the Union. War and invasion was his only option.
408 posted on 06/24/2018 5:48:48 AM PDT by Svartalfiar
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 403 | View Replies]

To: DiogenesLamp; Bull Snipe
DiogenesLamp: "Blockade runners got the guns through.
The Union ships weren't really there for the guns.
They were there for the cotton.
It was a war over that European money stream."

And so with DiogenesLamp, the nonsense never ends...

Civil War blockade runners used small fast ships to transport their most valuable cargoes, i.e., guns and luxury items for Southern elites.
So most of them made it through, most of the time.
But cotton normally shipped on large slow & easily captured ships, many Northern owned and so withheld from 1861 on.

It didn't matter though, because Confederates adopted a "cotton diplomacy" policy hoping to win support from European countries.
Then Confederates also shifted from growing cash crops to supplying food for their armies.

The net results were: 1) unshipped cotton bales piled up, and eventually 2) were replaced by Confederate food production.

As for General Scott's Anaconda Plan, it was likely first developed when Jefferson Davis was US Secretary of War and so cannot have come as a surprise to him.
Indeed, the Brits had blockaded enemy ports for centuries, including ours in the Revolutionary War and War of 1812.
So it had to be expected.

409 posted on 06/24/2018 5:57:12 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 256 | View Replies]

To: DiogenesLamp; DoodleDawg
DiogenesLamp: "The Declaration of Independence disposed of it.
Same way it disposed of all the states from the United Kingdom."

More nonsense, since no Brits evacuated their US forts just because of the Declaration.
Indeed, many Brit forts in US territory were not abandoned until decades after the 1776 Declaration.

So nothing about the 1776 Declaration or 1861 secessions automatically turned over Federal forts, ships, arsenals or mints to Confederates.

410 posted on 06/24/2018 6:04:41 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 259 | View Replies]

To: DiogenesLamp; DoodleDawg
DiogenesLamp: "I’m not arguing with you.
You are like the anvil upon which I hammer my arguments for the benefit of others. :)"

But you have no valid arguments, it's all total nonsense.
Which you never seem to tire of giving us opportunities to point out.

So thanks!

411 posted on 06/24/2018 6:07:24 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 261 | View Replies]

To: outofsalt
outofsalt: "While the Brits were dominant in the 'triangular trade' the whole of western Europe and the Africans themselves were buyers and sellers."

Sure, but the important point about the 19th century is not that it started off with legal slavery, just as had centuries for time immemorial, but rather that one whole category of slavery was abolished by century's end.

outofsalt: " (If history teaches us anything, it's that history rarely teaches us anything.) "

History has much to teach, but we are very slow learners, easily distracted by bright-shiny objects in the news.

412 posted on 06/24/2018 6:13:11 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 262 | View Replies]

To: dangus
The Union prohibited transatlantic slave trade in 1807. And had prohibited slavery within Northern states even earlier.

No, they didn't. Some states prohibited slavery, but there were still several slaves kept in the north until after the war. Even Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation didn't affect slaves in the north - it ONLY 'applied' to Confederate states (over which he had no power) because he was trying to incite mini-riots in Confederate states. He didn't free any slaves in the north, where he actually had the power to do so. Funny, right?
413 posted on 06/24/2018 6:18:22 AM PDT by Svartalfiar
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 387 | View Replies]

To: DiogenesLamp; Snickering Hound
DiogenesLamp: "I've said for a long time that without the Union interdicting Southern Cotton going to European markets, the only way a foreign company could compete would be to use slaves themselves."

Blockades have been a usual feature of warfare for many centuries.
It had to be expected, but blockade was not what stopped cotton shipments to Europe -- that was Confederates' "cotton diplomacy" they hoped would win friends & influence people in Europe.

It failed.

414 posted on 06/24/2018 6:18:49 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 264 | View Replies]

To: BroJoeK

It’s one thing to say we will love fight or be exterminated and entirely another to say the men of the South deserved to be exterminated because the fought against lincoln’s invasion. Anyone who takes that position is not a conservative nor sane. Because if you do then our founding fathers are tarred with the same brush- no liberty loving individual could say such a thing- there are a lot of trolls and instigators on FR and it’s obvious at times.


415 posted on 06/24/2018 6:22:27 AM PDT by panzerkamphwageneinz
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 404 | View Replies]

To: DoodleDawg

The official US War records call it the war of the rebellion which to me is the most accurate term. They were rebelling against the duly elected government of the United States of America.


416 posted on 06/24/2018 6:25:13 AM PDT by OIFVeteran
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 403 | View Replies]

To: DIRTYSECRET
Great tactician; strategist not so much, considering that like Washington, he didn't have to win, he just had to not lose. (bad sentence structure there, huh?)
417 posted on 06/24/2018 6:28:07 AM PDT by metesky (My investment program is holding steady @ $0.05 cents a can.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Lagmeister; Bull Snipe
Lagmeister: "These are not things that simply come with winning a war.
He was a butcher."

The actual record shows that "brilliant" Lee lost more men in battle than "butcher" Grant, especially when Lee was on offense.
Yes, the nature of 19th century warfare dictated entrenched defense had a huge advantage over mobile units on offense, and Lee took advantage of that by war's end.
But in the beginning, when Lee was on offense at, say, Antietam or Gettysburg, his losses in losing those battles were greater than Grant's in winning his.

During the war, Lee had three commands -- first in West Virginia, then North Carolina and finally Virginia.
In all three Lee failed.

Grant also had three commands -- first at Forts Henry & Donelson, then Vicksburg and finally Virginia.
In all three Grant won "unconditional surrender" from his opponents.

Grant's performance made him hugely popular with Union voters who elected him President, twice, at their first opportunity.
So "Grant the butcher" is propaganda which people of his time knew to be untrue and people today can soon learn with a little effort.

418 posted on 06/24/2018 6:37:23 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 265 | View Replies]

To: Svartalfiar
He didn't free any slaves in the north, where he actually had the power to do so.

Wrong. Lincoln recognized that it was up to Congress to resolve the slavery issue.

Funny, right?

No.

419 posted on 06/24/2018 7:11:08 AM PDT by rockrr ( Everything is different now...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 413 | View Replies]

To: DiogenesLamp; DoodleDawg
DiogenesLamp: "He didn't have Grant's Army and logistics then did he?
He wouldn't have needed to invade anybody if he had Grant's army and logistics.
Nobody would have dared attack him except through dire necessity."

In fact, both Lee and Jefferson Davis were committed to offensive military actions because they believed, correctly, that often the best defense is an aggressive offense.
That's why Lee marched on Maryland in 1862 and Pennsylvania in 1863 -- offense would make the Union sit up & take notice like no defensive strategy could.

So,from the beginning Confederates sent armies into Union states & territories -- Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma & New Mexico.
There was nothing "defensive" about those.
Confederates also claimed Union states & territories as their own.

So the whole idea that Confederates just wanted to be "let alone" is pure propaganda.
Sure, they wanted to be "let alone" -- to consume & destroy as much of the USA as possible.


420 posted on 06/24/2018 7:12:43 AM PDT by BroJoeK ((a little historical perspective...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 266 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 381-400401-420421-440 ... 621-637 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson