How the Civil War changed the face of war The Civil War represented a momentous change in the character of war. It combined the projection of military might across a continent on a scale never before seen with an unprecedented mass mobilization of peoples. Yet despite the revolutionizing aspects of the Civil War, its leaders faced the same uncertainties and vagaries of chance that have vexed combatants since the days of Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War. A Savage War sheds critical new light on this defining chapter in ...
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How the Civil War changed the face of war The Civil War represented a momentous change in the character of war. It combined the projection of military might across a continent on a scale never before seen with an unprecedented mass mobilization of peoples. Yet despite the revolutionizing aspects of the Civil War, its leaders faced the same uncertainties and vagaries of chance that have vexed combatants since the days of Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War. A Savage War sheds critical new light on this defining chapter in military history. In a masterful narrative that propels readers from the first shots fired at Fort Sumter to the surrender of Robert E. Lee's army at Appomattox, Williamson Murray and Wayne Wei-siang Hsieh bring every aspect of the battlefield vividly to life. They show how this new way of waging war was made possible by the powerful historical forces unleashed by the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution, yet how the war was far from being simply a story of the triumph of superior machines. Despite the Union's material superiority, a Union victory remained in doubt for most of the war. Murray and Hsieh paint indelible portraits of Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman, and other major figures whose leadership, judgment, and personal character played such decisive roles in the fate of a nation. They also examine how the Army of the Potomac, the Army of Northern Virginia, and the other major armies developed entirely different cultures that influenced the war's outcome. A military history of breathtaking sweep and scope, A Savage War reveals how the Civil War ushered in the age of modern warfare.
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Williamson Murray and Wayne Wei-Siang Hsieh make the first of their many references to Thucydides in the Preface to their book, "A Savage War: A Military History of the Civil War." Thucydides had described the Peloponnesian War as "the greatest disturbance in the history of the Athenians". The learning of this book, which draws insights from Thucydides through the Franco-Prussian War through the two World Wars to modern Iraq, help makes the work a most perceptive, penetrating history of the United States' "greatest disturbance". The two authors are scholars of a broad range of military history in addition to the Civil War. Murray, Professor Emeritus of History at Ohio State University, has written on the Iran-Iraq war, and on much else. Hsieh, Associate Professor of History at the United States Naval Academy is a specialist in 19th Century American military history. Together, they offer a broad perspective on the Civil War with a high regard for "the greatest of strategic historians, Thucydides".
"A Savage War" discusses the American Civil War in both breadth and depth. It studies meticulously the key battles and campaigns, armies and navies, and military and political leaders of the conflict while putting the Civil War in historical perspective. Early in their study, the authors describe several conditions with created a "military-social revolution" that transferred the nature of warfare. They find that two conditions critically affected the character of both the Civil War and of WW I. The first was the Industrial Revolution which allowed the mobilization of soldiers and material over large areas. The second was the French Revolution which created passion and a spirit of nationalism in the war efforts of both North and South. Throughout the book, the authors stress the influence of these two factors on the conduct and outcome of the War.
The authors also examine other broad factors in the Civil War and its outcome. The most important of these is individual leadership. The book is critical of the attempts of some modern historians to minimize the importance of individual leaders. It argues that strong individual leadership was important politically and militarily to the War's outcome. Abraham Lincoln receives the highest praise in this book for his strong, committed, and astute leadership of the Union war effort. General Ulysses Grant is similarly praised for his leadership and for his rare understanding of the strategic nature of the war and his ability to put his understanding into effect on the ground. Other leaders receiving more qualified praise include Sherman, Sheridan, Lee, and Jackson. Both sides also had their share of unsuccessful leaders, including Bragg for the Confederacy and McClellan for the Union. The authors are thorough and fair in their discussions of the combatants.
The book examines the different Civil War Armies and their competing organizations and cultures. Here as well, the authors explain the differences between the poor showing of the Army of the Potomac as compared with the Union's western armies. Conversely, they show how leadership and organizational structure made the Army of Northern Virginia a formidable force as compared to the Confederacy's Army of Tennessee.
The book emphasizes throughout that the Civil War was a close thing and that the result was not predetermined. Chance as well as leadership played a role in the outcome. The authors write: "[w]e do not take a deterministic view of the war; the North confronted and almost insoluble task of crushing Confederate resistance because of both the distances involved and the tenacious nature of white Southern resistance. In the end, the Union succeeded, but only by the barest of margins."
Some of the strongest passages in the book involve logistics. The work emphasizes the difficulty of projecting Union military might over the long continental distances involved in the War. As the narrative proceeds, it shows how the Union was able to muster its forces and industry only after the first two years of the war. The effort was prodigious. Among many other passages describing logistics, the book gives an extended discussion of the Union's support efforts for Sherman as he began his campaign to take Atlanta in Spring 1864. The discussion provided essential background to understand the campaign, both Sherman's advances and Johnston's defenses.
The book shows how, with the strength of Southern resistance, the Civil War gradually assumed a hard, total, or "savage" character. Again, the conflict became increasingly bitter after the first two years when the Union came to the conclusion that in order to prevail it would have to take away the will to fight of the Southern people. This war was taken to the population in Sherman's March to the Sea and march through South Carolina and through Sheridan's activities in the Shenandoah Valley late in the War. The authors find that this form of warfare, which they analogize to the Allies' bombing of German cities during WW II, was militarily necessary to win the war and to discourage the enemy from reopening the conflict. There is a sharp vision here of the harshness of war. The authors also have a strong underlying moral and ethical perspective about having the strength to persevere and to fight for what is right. Some of this will be controversial; I find it refreshing.
The book is clearly written and organized and allows the reader to follow the chronological development of the war and its intensification. Each chapter is followed by a helpful summarizing conclusion. In the Introductory and concluding chapters, the authors describe their approach to the war in broad terms while the body of the book gives the details of the conflict and supports the authors' understanding of the events. There are over 50 maps which help the reader follow the accounts of the battles. The book is written with great knowledge, wisdom, and a fundamental love for our country. Readers with a strong interest in the Civil War will learn from this outstanding book.
