We lived in Montana for several years and I spent many hours at the battlefield imagining and trying to understand Custer’s circumstances and decisions. Fundamentally, he made a series of poor decisions (no recon, split command and having expectations of subordinate leaders that they would not/could not meet). Also, the topography of the battlefield was not friendly—while it looks like wide open spaces, it is not and provides a lot of hills and gully (or as Montanans call them -coolies) concealment
Agree with all you stated.
I’ve only been there twice. You cannot see very far from most vantage points. You lose your horses there and you’re done.
I remember seeing a few photos from the first “reenactment” of the battle back in the 1880s where some black & white stills showed the numbers of Indians coming over those hills and up the ravines.
Picture that landscape and hundreds and hundreds of warriors coming at you in masse - he had no chance.
We took a trip several years ago out west. The stop I was looking most forward to was the battlefield. It really changed my understanding of the battle. You could understand what went wrong and why. One camera drone would have made a huge difference.
The troops were largely green. We drove across South Dakota and it was very sparse. (I remember reading a local paper and the staff was very concerned about wise land use. LOL.) There was no shortage of land. Traveling by horse over those distances had to be exhausting. The Indians had very recently changed their tactics which Custer was not aware of because there was no intelligence.
The battle would not have been needed had there not been widespread corruption in DC. People DC hired repeatedly lied to and cheated the Indians. DC didn’t manage their programs, just their take (Nothing is new under the sun).
I really felt bad for the common soldiers buried there. It is really quite a desolate place and has to be very cold in the winter.
Somewhat recent books by Donovan, Robbins, and Fox are really good. I was lucky to have read them before I went. It made it much clearer and they were not cluttered up with the DC park service politically correct tripe which I am sure has gotten worse.