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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An interesting thesis, fairly well backed., March 8, 1999
By A Customer
This book will be of interest primarily to those readers who have some basic grounding in Civil War history. As much as Mr. Bonekemper's conclusions have upset a number of other reviewers, in many instances the statistics speak for themselves. I do not feel that Bonekemper denigrated the sincerity, courage or devotion to the cause of either General Lee, or any of the other Confederate officers and men. My major objection to Mr. Bonekemper's writing was his continual misuse of the word "reticent" when he meant "reluctant."
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11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Should be paired with J.L. Harsh's "Confederate Tide Rising", December 23, 2001
If you're interested in this book, you should also read "Confederate Tide Rising" for well researched counterpoint. I enjoyed both perspectives. A warning about this book: you'll want to have a Civil War era map to refer to while reading since the descriptions of army movements/battle logistics gets very dense. It would have been better if the book included such maps since the author goes into blow-by-blow accounts of several battles. I don't see how he could expect normal readers to keep up with the information without some visuals aids. I give 4 stars for the author's competent writing--not necessarily for his conclusions. Some reviewers gave this book a bad review because they disagree with his conclusions which is o.k. but that doesn't mean the book is written badly.
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A review, June 18, 2007
Bonekemper has written a book that many Civil War history buffs will find outrageously controversial. His thesis, that Gen. Lee lost a winnable war through incompetent leadership, is broken down into the following claims:
1) By taking the war into the North, Lee followed an ill-conceived strategy that had no chance of ultimate success. He could not maintain himself in supply at that distance from his base. He would eventually have to retreat, making it seem like he had been defeated, whether he had been or not. Further, he was making poor use of the two strategic advantages that the South had: a) they did not have to conquer the North in order to win the war, they only had to outlast them; and b) with their internal lines of communication, they could shift men and resources to the places where they most needed them.
2) Lee's strategical viewpoint was influenced by his focus on the war in the East, and particularly the war in Virginia. He demanded and received the best of everything the South had to offer, and used it to fight for Virginia rather than for the South as a whole. He ignored important developments in the West, and denied that theatre resources that might have prevented its collapse. This myopia eventually allowed his own forces to be cut off and surrounded.
3) Lee's strategy was made even worse by his preference for being on the offensive tactically. He failed to grasp that technological changes in weaponry had made massed charges on well-prepared defensive fortifications tantamount to suicide. He sent his soldiers into numerous assaults on Northern positions, that, even when they succeeded in driving back the enemy, were using up his manpower resources at an unsustainable rate.
4) Compounding the above errors, Lee was not good at managing his army. He failed to provide himself with an adequate staff that could oversee the carrying out of his orders. His orders themselves were often vague, discretionary, and delivered verbally so that they were subject to misinterpretation and distortion.
Anyone who is not wed to the image of Lee as a brilliant military commander will probably find himself being swayed by Bonekemper's arguments. Although born and raised in the South, my opinions on the Civil War make me an honorary Yankee. Therefore, I was entirely open to reading criticism of Lee, in spite of his iconic status. I found that at some point, though, I began to lose confidence in Bonekemper's objectivity. No possible objections to his viewpoint are presented or answered. He sets up the facts he want the reader to focus on, and ignores everything else. Nowhere does he mention that the idea of an invasion of the North was promoted by Johnston before Lee ever took command, or that it was also floated by Jackson at the end of his Valley campaign. Nowhere does he mention that the weight of public opinion in the South was completely opposed to a defensive war, and would probably have forced the resignation of any general who attempted to fight in that manner. (Lee could hardly have argued in favor of a defensive war using the prestige that he only enjoyed due to his willingness to go on the offensive.) Nor does Bonekemper mention the material advantages in resources and advanced weaponry enjoyed by the North that would have made a defensive war unlikely to succeed. Although weaponry made great technological advances during the war, the South did not possess the advanced weaponry as soon or in the same quantity as the North. For example, the South's retreat in the face of McClellan's advance during the Peninsula campaign was necessitated by their lack of long range guns that could respond to an artillery bombardment by Northern batteries.
That said, I think there is some truth in Bonekemper's book, even if he does overstate his case. The South did not lose solely because of the decisions of one man, but Lee does bear some of the responsibility for the loss (not that I would have wanted the outcome to be different). Had Bonekemper tempered his arguments and taken into account some of the possible objections, this would be a much stronger book. Even so, I think it is worth reading for those who already have some knowledge of the issues. It is not a good book to start with in learning about the Civil War, though, and it is definitely not the last word on its subject.
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