ITT: Underrated Commanders

I'll say. Nobody quite diddled the kiddies like old Slim.

Yeah it would be pretty cool seeing a general in his 90s fighting a war

test

What if Hannibal no kill and fought in ww2

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Unironically better than anyone who attended a military academy

He would gain successes in North Africa until politics at home cut him off from supplies.

agreed

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He was actually a fantastic logistician though. He wasn't a GOOD commander by any stretch of the imagination but he wasn't as outright shit as people make him out to be.

Mcllelan was secretly one of the best Union generals of the war tactically, but he was his own worst enemy because he constantly overrated his opponents.

Asked after the war who was the best Union general he fought, Lee himself admitted that Mcllelan was nearly flawless on the battlefield, he was just too timid to take advantage of that fact.

I would also submit as candidates for underatted Union Generals of the Civil War:
- Francis Barlow
- George Thomas
- Nathaniel Banks

and for the South:
- Patrick Cleburne
- D.H. Hill
- Longstreet
- Kirby Smith

Owen Roe O'Neill was pretty dope

i remember hearing/reading that this was a surprisingly common mistake among Yankee generals, they always expected Dixie generals to have much greater numbers and such than they actually did, so they were likely to over compensate for things like the most moderate assaults against them and not fully commit to attacks that could have succeeded.

There was a great difference in mentality between the two sides.

Union generals were very concerned about reputation and their standing with the government, so they had a terminal fear of loosing troops or getting caught in a trap, making them averse to taking risks.

Southern Generals in contrast were in high demand (the South actually had trouble finding enough trained Senior officers to staff it's armies), so they were able to take great risks in pursuit of victory. This is compounded by the offensive mindset Southern's had about battles in general. To a Southern general, loss of manpower or supplies were minor inconveniences as long as something was gained, to Northern generals, such losses were unthinkable unless the corresponding gain was greater.

Perhaps the greates irony of this is that these mentalities would have been better suited to a reversal of roles. The North would have been a far more effective defensive military, and the South would have been better in the role of attacker.

But it didn't work out that way and it took the Union three years to find Generals willing to throw caution to the wind and attack without fear of loosing their jobs.