What? The Paris Peace Accords called for the withdrawal of all US troops from Vietnam. I can hardly imagine something more favorable to North Vietnam and the Viet Cong. Many people realized at the time that this would cause the collapse of South Vietnam, which of course it did within two years.
There are of course many many examples of wars of liberation and occupations in which the more powerful side was forced to grant independence or withdraw because the cost was too great, from the Latin American Wars of Liberation to the French in Algeria to the Russians in Afghanistan to Israel and the Gaza Strip. At some point occupying those who no longer want to be occupied becomes more trouble than it’s worth.
Quite true. The fact that the South had more competent commanders at the start of the conflict than the Union did was a big factor in the war running as long as it did.
As I’ve noted. that part isn’t speculation. The Democrats in 1864 publicly said that they were going to negotiate an end to the war if they were elected. And the Republicans were privately saying they thought they were going to lose the election because of this.
It wasn’t about unforeseen setbacks. The setbacks had already happened and it appeared that they would keep going on with no end in sight. If you want a historical comparison, the Americans felt they were looking at the same situation the Europeans would be facing in 1917; a war that just kept on going and killing massive amounts of people but never seemed to get any closer to victory. There was a growing feeling that the war needed to be stopped.
But Lee wasn’t one of them. He was assigned to supporting commands and suffered several significant defeats in the early months of the war. In retrospect, he was in unwinnable situations but at the time his reputation was dismal. It wasn’t until he was given an army command in June 1862 and won the Seven Days Battles that he was seen as a hero in the south. And that was an accident; Johnston was seriously wounded and needed to be replaced and Lee was the only general of suitable rank who was available.
Lee’s reputation at the start of the war rested on his service in the Mexican War, during which he received several promotions. He was offered promotion to major general and command of the main Union army at the start of the war, but decided to resign instead when Virginia seceded.
At the start of the war Lee was made one of the first five full generals of the Confederacy. It’s true that he had little success at the beginning but that doesn’t reflect on his competence.
While I can’t claim to know a lot about Lee’s early career in the Confederate Army, the fact that, despite his early defeats, Lee was assigned as military advisor to Jefferson Davis and then given command of the defense of Richmond after Johnson was wounded would argue that he wasn’t actually believed to be incompetent by Davis or other commanders, even if he had a bad reputation in the press.
I believe Lee was assigned as Davis’ military advisor for reasons similar to those why Pope was assigned to fight the Dakotas in Minnesota; to get them away from where the important parts of the war were.
The situation changed drastically when Johnston was unexpectedly wounded in the Battle of Seven Pines. The American troops were less than ten miles from Richmond. Davis did not have time to look around for a replacement. Johnston’s second-in-command Smith was too ill to take command. Other choices like Beauregard, Bragg, or Pemberton were hundreds of miles away. Cooper was an administrator who had never commanded in a battle. Lee was available, he had the rank, and he was there in Richmond. He was sent to take charge.
Be that as it may, Lee was in fact competent, even if he had a rocky start. Lee’s name was raised above with respect to the fact that he was offered command of the main Union army at the start of the war. I think the premise that if Lee had been in charge of Union forces from the beginning (and not available to the South) the Union would have won much more quickly is very plausible.
(Could you clarify what your point in this side discussion is? I can’t see how it has any relevance to the OP.)
I agree Lee was a great general (although I do feel he had his flaws). But I’ll admit I’m surprised by the offer to name him commander of the American Army in 1861. Lee was a colonel. There were other men in the army who already held the rank of general.
It’s also not clear who exactly offered Lee the position. I’ve seen it attributed to Lincoln, to Winfield Scott, and to Francis Blair.
I think it’s interesting that Lee would have done better if he was in command of the American Army and McClellan would have done better if he was in command of the Confederate Army.
I’m just going with the flow of the discussion. It seems my actual topic is being set aside.
This account seems to sum up the various versions of the event. Most accounts I’ve seen say Blair made the actual offer. Secretary of War Cameron had authorized the offer, but Blair told Lee that Lincoln had done so to help influence the decision. After receiving Blair’s offer, Lee went to Scott for advice.
Lee himself said that Blair made the offer to him:
As to why Lee as a mere colonel was offered command, my best guess would be that it was on the recommendation of Winfield Scott, commanding general of the Union Army and Lee’s friend and commanding officer during the Mexican War. Several accounts refer to Scott as Lee’s mentor, and the fact that he went to him immediately after the offer suggests that is true.
It’s not clear exactly what command Lee was offered either. Certainly he wasn’t being asked to replace Scott. He may have been offered second in command or command of the forces defending Washington. Be that as it may, he was respected enough to be offered a high level command.
It’s possible that this was owing to the stagnant promotion system that often afflicted the US military in times of peace, up until the modern up or out system enacted post-WWII. This led to many of the senior most positions in the Army being held by men who, like Scott, had gained fame in the last war but were well past being physically fit for field command crowding out younger (but hardly young) men who would fight the next. Eisenhower, for instance, was only just promoted to Colonel (and not even in the Regular Army) on the eve of US entry into WWII, 25+ years into his career. He was then rapidly promoted to 4-star rank over the course of a mere two years.
@Colibri, there is some relevant information on the subject of the pre-war Army hierarchy, starting at page 48, under the heading West Pointers Bide Their Time:
Notably, there were only four general officers in the Regular Army at that time, with Scott being the only one holding the rank of Major General, and the other three being Brigadier Generals. So Lee, as a senior (but not geriatric) Colonel must have been pretty close to the top of the list of eligible candidates for a major field command in the event of war.
It says none of the four were graduates of West Point, and three of the four were veterans of the War of 1812, putting them in their sixties at least, and thus too old for a field command. So as you say Lee at 52 was likely one of the more eligible candidates for command, and his personal connection with Scott would have given him a leg up.
If we’re assuming that stray bullets left pacifist leaders in charge on both sides, and the rebels had the benefit of foresight, perhaps they could have sold a peace deal that scrapped Reconstruction in favor of a statutory Jim Crow apartheid.
That was never going to happen, though. Confederates were as ignorant and delusional as Qanon. That’s why we see those flags together. They thought they stood a chance of victory up until the end. Once Lincoln effected the Emancipation Proclamation, threatening the cornerstone of the Confederacy, there was no hope at a negotiated peace unless the Union blundered into some very unlikely losses and prolonged the war for a few more years.
Flashman served in the Union Army in 1862, and in the Confederate Army in 1863. As the usual case in Flashman’s career, this would have given him the opportunity to participate on the wrong side in some of the greatest disasters of the War, like Union defeats at Second Bull Run and Fredricksburg in 1862, and Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg in 1863. Flashman’s main talent was getting himself into the thick of some hideous cock-up, and then being saved by some combination of luck and cowardice.