They were indeed incompetent, and it showed in spades. Like I said I take nothing away from General Grant, his leadership played an important part for sure. Once the right leadership was employed it made the resources available to him even more of an advantage for the North. Had he not had those resources available to him, we may well have seen a different outcome. One cannot separate his availability to resources, which I contend was the real deciding factor.
Grant’s use of those available resources was the real deciding factor.