[wardaddy]

They were twin sides of the same coin in many ways. Aside from Forrest, Cleburne, Wheeler (the only Confederate ever recommissioned at rank in the US Army)and a few others, the Southern theater was nearly always a win for the Union forces.

[Cleburne]

The Confederate high command was almost always lousy, though the rank and file commanders and soldiers were of fine material. But with incompetent men like Bragg and Hood leading them, they were little more than heroic cannon fodder. Bragg missed a fine chance to hold Kentucky for the Confederacy, but he squandered it. Was he replaced? No, he went on to lose Tennessee in a long, humilating retreat that could have quite easily been halted (Middle Tennessee is littered with ranges of limestone hills and crossed by deep-bedded rivers, fine defensive ground), then, coming into Georgia, squandered a victory at Chickamauga, argued with Longstreet and squandered his forces, and, to top it off, pulled off a miserable "seige" of Chattanooga. His army would likely have been destroyed had it not been for Pat Cleburne's stand in the gap south outside of Ringgold.