To a grunt in the midst of the fight, the battlefield consists of a radius of about three meters and he tends to fight for his buddy to his right and his buddy to his left. At its core, combat is all about human sacrifice, the willingness to give, in Lincoln’s words, “…the last full measure of devotion…” It’s that devotion that gives war the ability to be both ennobling and tragic at the same time.

However, imho, without discussion of the tactics and strategy employed as well as analysis of the logistics involved, a full understanding of the action being studied is impossible. For me, these factors put things in perspective, they provide the structure necessary to gain a true appreciation of not only the circumstances but the purpose of a battle.

For example, reading about the individual fights involved in the action at Gettysburg is certainly moving. Trying to understand how Confederate soldiers could march across hundreds of yards of open fields into the teeth of musket and canister fire during Picket’s Charge is gripping. But knowing what was at stake for both the North and the South and how the future of our country hung in the balance gives me a taste of the desperation the commanders in the field must have felt. Knowing the overarching strategy and the small unit tactics and maneuver employed as Joshua Chamberlain saved the day at Little Round Top puts me on the battlefield and gives me a true appreciation for how very close our Union was to complete dissolution that day.

At Bull Run, the gravity of the position our Union was in and of war itself was brought home to both the Army of the Potomac and the spectators who mistakenly thought a clash of great armies could be used as an afternoon’s entertainment. But without knowledge of the means by which the Confederates out maneuvered the Union Army you can’t fully grasp how serious the South was about its cause and how woefully unprepared–and how overconfident–the Federals were.

Once Lincoln finally found a general who both knew how/was willing to use it…

Prior to the Civil War there was a wall between government and corporations. Just as the war began the federal government started to give land grants to the railroads. Also contracts with various corporations to make the tools of war were signed. After the war any wall of separation between the government and corporations disappeared.

Alan, I am a Civil War buff too and will check it out. Thanks!

Your (in my estimation, anyway) more meaningful assessment is, of course, in line with academic historians, who enjoy a general consensus on the matter. There are always outliers, of course, but they usually have axes to grind.

We have a chronic problem with “free-floating history” in the United States. It’s by no means new, but it has become increasingly virulent. Bachmann represents perhaps the most outrageous example, but she is certainly not alone. It’s a dangerous thing to take historical ideas, events, and personalities out of their proper context. To an uninformed electorate, however, anachronisms become gospel.