[central_va]

Our first Civil War was primarily about slavery, but that was in the context of social and economic models in the South that were ripe for extinction. The South’s reaction was to launch a last-ditch effort to maintain and prop up its way of life at all costs, so it was visceral and violent.

This is cookie cutter pablum. The good Colonel is ignorant of history so I stopped reading right there.

[2ndDivisionVet]

I hate to criticize someone above me, but getting to O-5 in 20 years is not exactly a shooting star. My brother-in-law was the ROTC honor graduate at a cow college and he get to O-6 in 20 years.

[TADSLOS]

This is cookie cutter pablum. The good Colonel is ignorant of history so I stopped reading right there.

He was professionally trained by the very best that neocon interventionists can offer.

[wbarmy]

Actually, he is correct, if you change one word. It was not the South’s reaction, but the leading families of the South, who had the political and financial power endangered, who reacted. They were trying to keep their elitist position in control, while fanning the flames of Southern Pride with the people who, for the most part, didn’t own slaves and didn’t live like the leaders lived.

If slavery had ceased, their lives would not have changed, but the lives of the political and controlling elite would have changed drastically.