Yap

Never march by flank in front of an army in position. This principle is absolute.
Napoleon Bonaparte 

The only exception to this rule is well known for being an exception to this rule.  Lee had Stonewall Jackson do this at Chancellorsville.  Knowing his enemy, Joesph Hooker, Lee knew he would get away with it.  And he did.

My Pix

The Devil's Den, Gettysburg

My Pix

Headstones, Evergreen Cemetery, Getttysburg

My Pix

Names of Pennsylvania Civil War soldiers, Pennsylvania Monument, Cemetery Ridge, Gettysburg

My Pix

Pennsylvania Monument and mist on Cemetery Ridge, viewed from the Emmitsburg Pike just south of Gettysburg.  The Southerners briefly captured this part of the ridge late on the 2nd day.  Click on the image for big. 

Gettysburg Gate

This is the gate of the Evergreen Cemetery, which gives Cemetery hill its name.  It looks much the same as it did in July 1863, apart from the paved road and the nice landscaping.  On the second day, the Southerners took the crest of this hill, along with the gate.  But they were unsupported, and were driven off by Union re-reinforcements.  Lee's best chance to win the battle slipped away due to poor generalship by Ewell, who turned out to be a disappointing replacement for the dead Stonewall Jackson.

Gettysburg: Stars & Bars

I've just come back from a few days at Gettysburg.  More photos will be forthcoming.

To start, I was surprised at the number of Confederate flags on the battlefield and at the trinkets and trash stores around town.  The almost equal time given to this symbol creates the impression that this was all a civilized discussion that got tragically out of hand.  I wonder how Americans would feel about the Germans putting swastikas all over Omaha beach?  To me its almost the same thing.  This is a symbol of slavery, discrimination and the ruthless exploitation of people for profit. 

Gettysburg and Stalingrad

     The Sharpshooter's Den, Alexander Gardiner, 1863

    Stalingrad Attack, Georgie Zelma, 1942

    The most iconic images of the two battles.  Both staged.


Though vastly different in time, place and circumstance, the battles of Gettysburg and Stalingrad share some interesting similarities.

Both were the culmination of invasions gone wrong.  Both marked the strategic high water mark for their respective nations.  Both were attacks by smaller, more powerful forces against larger armies, more poorly organized and led.

Although neither battle was decisive, in the sense of deciding the war, both represented a change in momentum that lasted the duration of the contest.

The preceding campaigns had ended in disaster for the battle's defenders, Case Blue in summer 1942 had cleared Southern Russia and cleared the way to the Caucasus, Chancellorsville in May 1863 was the Army of the Potomac's worst defeat.

These previous defeats set the psychological tone for the battles, leading to fatal overconfidence in the invaders.  Lee had come to feel (IMHO), that his boys could defeat the North on any field at any time.  The German high command, from Hitler on down, were certain the Red Army was on their last legs.  Both were looking for a chance to pin the enemy in order to crush them.  As a result, neither battle was planned in advance by either side.

The other notable psychological issue was that the attacker's overconfidence led them to discount the ability of the defending soldiers to withstand their assaults. They became contests between the high commands of one side, and the regular soldiers of the other.  In both cases, the soldiers stood their ground and won.

On a tactical level, both attacking armies gave up inherent tactical advantages to press the assaults.  This changed the nature of the combat, allowing the defenders to at least partially offset the attacker's superior mobility and firepower.  The assaults themselves were numerous, and the failure of each to finish off the defenders was taken by commanders to indicate the defenders were weakened enough for the next assault to work.  In neither case did the attacking commanders take a step back and contemplate alternative approaches despite the stated objections of their colleagues (most notably Longstreet,  and von Richthofen).

But these parallels only go so far. Gettysburg was all Lee, Stalingrad was all Hitler.  At Stalingrad, the German side had better equipment and an air force.  At Gettysburg, the Army of the Potomac was better equipped, and had a cavalry.  Lee's object was to capture Washington destroy the Army of the Potomac and force a political collapse, ending the war.  Hitler's object was to acquire the Soviet Union's main oil reserves to prolong the war.

Meade was unsuited and unable to deliver a strategic counter-stroke.  Had I Lee's army on the run, I would have been careful too.  The Soviets, on the other hand, delivered a devastating counter-stroke, led by Vasilievsky.  The Army of Northern Virginia got away.  The German Sixth Army was destroyed. 

Gettysburbg

Some photos of the battlefield at Gettysburg, 1996.

Chancellorsville

Confederate dead at the stonewall outside Fredricksburg, May 1863. This was the same stonewall so bitterly contested in December 1982 during the battle of Fredricksburg.

In the first week of May, 1863, Robert E. Lee disregarded some basic rules of warfare to inflict a stunning defeat on the Army of the Potomac at Chancellorsville.  While the win was triumphant, it led to several bad things for Lee.  First was the loss of Stonewall Jackson, who died 150 years ago today on May 10, 1863.  Second was the confirmation to Lee that the Army of the Potomac was so inept that he could defeat them on any field at any time.  This attitude led to Pickett's charge at Gettysburg in July.