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!historychads look at what Kings & Generals uploaded today 
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Is it really dramatic? Then just put it in the main feed.
Is it chuddy? (Be honest.) Then /h/chudrama.
Is it from back in old boomer times or before?
This is the place for it.
Feel free to talk about history here at
whatever level of seriousness you feel like.
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Why did Lincoln appoint so many r-slurs to lead the Army of the Potomac?
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It took a disaster like this to make the union realize how r-slurred those guys were
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This was just the first one, McDowell. Then they had McClellan who launched the peninsula campaign and fricked it up royally. Then they tried John Pope who got his butt kicked at the second battle of bull run.
So they tried McClellan. Again. He fricked up Antietam even though he was literally given Lee's plans and blew a chance to destroy Lee's army. Fricked around forever after that and got fired again.
Then Burnside and the massacre at Fredericksburg. Fired.
Hooker's turn: butt whooped at Chancellorsville: fired.
Finally they settled on Meade after literally no one else would take it and Lee pushed his luck too far at Gettysburg.
"I can't keep getting away with it"
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His plan for First Bull Run was working out perfectly. If Confederate reinforcements hadn't unexpectedly arrived, he would have won. If he fricked something it was Second Bull Run, but that's all caught up with the trial of Fitz-John Porter and everyone flinging shit each other so I would take any criticism with a grain of salt.
Fricked up big time at Second Bull Run but he had won an important victory in the west, capturing the Confederate's defensive position blocking the Mississippi without a shot. Historians don't give you credit if there isn't an exciting battle. Served competently for decades after the war. Again, involved in the Fitz-John Porter thing so he's gonna get a lot shit thrown at him.
Very good at organizing the army and coming up with plans (like the Peninsula) but bad at following through on them. Historians of course will have a grudge against him because he was Lincoln's #1 foe.
A difficult amphibious campaign in North Carolina succeeded in large part due to his leadership. He's the scapegoat for Fredricksburg but, again there's lots of politics going on and historians have reasons to be biased against him. He was pushed into attacking by Lincoln. His understanding was that Lincoln needed to have a lot of guys killed before he would trust the Army of the Potomac again. Later he planned out the attack at the Crater, which could have won the war if his superiors hadn't meddled and fricked everything up at the last minute.
Had performed well in the Army of the Potomac before he was put in command. Lost at Chancellorsville but if he had a bit more luck he would have won and we'd be praising him now as smarter than Lee. Later served competently under Sherman in the decisive battles that were far more important to winning the war than anything on the East Coast.
Won at Gettysburg so we're taught that he must be some kind of genius. With some bad luck he would have lost and we'd be calling him a tard now. Didn't do very well running the next campaign after the battle. Served well under Grant.
If he hadn't won, we would definitely be calling him a tard who threw away the lives of his men. He did some pretty tarded things (Cold Harbor) that we forget about because he had won so many victories.
Losing a battle (especially against Lee) doesn't mean you're an idiot. Getting fired for largely political reasons doesn't mean you're an idiot. These guys get shit on all the time because, among other things, nobody will admit that Lincoln could ever mistakes. He made a heck of a lot of them early in the war when he should have been listening to real professionals. The commanders of the Army of the Potomoc always end up being the scapegoats.
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peacetime has a habit of pushing connected incompetent commanders up in the ranks
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A lot of them made their names shitstomping the Mexicans.
Like taking a bunch of teen boys who shitstomped the Women's National Team to the Olympics and being shocked that these teen boys were in fact not hyper-athletes but just regular dumdums.
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If Mexico is so easy how did they beat the French 20 years later?
It was actually pretty good practice for them. They had to deal with the same challenges, just on a much smaller scale. Keeping your army supplied while advancing vast distances through enemy territory and cooperating with the navy.
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Oh and I forgot: There was a lot of politics going on that histories nowadays completely ignore but was really important back then. Republicans vs. Democrats on a national level of course, but also politics within the army. If you read a little about the trial of Fitz-John Porter you'll see how much these guys were blaming each other for every defeat.
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You proceed from a false assumption.
Just because a guy loses one battle (or fails to win a big enough victory) it doesn't necessarily mean he's a moron. It's possible he just had a really difficult job. It's like saying that Rommel was an idiot because he was losing most of the time. A lot of these guys had proved their competence in other theaters (and would go on to again later) so we know they weren't stupid. Some of them got fired more for political reasons than anything else.
They had a much more difficult job because they were on the offensive. I don't mean on the tactical level, I mean on the operational level. An army that's strung out marching down a road is extremely vulnerable so the invader has to disperse troops all over the place to protect them from surprise attack. There's all kinds of issues with supply. The farther you go, the more feed your oxen will need to bring. There's weather.
Note that Lee went on the offensive twice. At Antietam he was lucky to escape complete destruction. At Gettysburg, well we know what happened there.
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