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Harper’s Weekly 84 ARMY ■ March 2009 By Col. Cole C. Kingseed U.S. Army retired istory is replete with examples of chief executives making important adjustments before determining the best military team to lead the nation’s armed forces in time of war. In recent months, historians have remarked on the political sagacity of President Barack Obama borrowing a page from one of his most illustrious predecessors in forming a “team of rivals” as he begins his presidency. As did Abraham Lincoln before him, President Obama has included a number of prominent political adversaries in his administration as he assumes the nation’s highest-elected office in the midst of a major war. On the occasion of the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth, the current Commander in Chief might profit by reflecting on the challenges encountered by our 16th President during the Civil War, before he settled on Ulysses S. Grant to serve as the “general in chief” of the Union armies. March 2009 ■ ARMY 85 National Archives President Lincoln meets with his generals on Antietam battlefield, October 1862. of the Mexican-American War, devised the Anaconda Plan to slowly strangle the Confederacy. Maritime strategies by their nature are longterm strategies, and, with enemy armies on the outskirts of the federal capital, Lincoln required a far quicker solution. Following the failure of Union forces at First Manassas/Bull Run in July 1861, Lincoln summoned McClellan, fresh from his victories in western Virginia, and entrusted him with command of the newly formed Army of the Potomac. A few months later, McClellan was appointed general in chief of all Union armies. Despite constant urging from Lincoln, McClellan simply would not fight. ot surprisingly, Lincoln articLincoln finally relieved McClellan of ulated his intent to crush the command in November 1862 because armies of the newly formed Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan of the general’s inactivity following Confederate States of America. In rethe Battle of Antietam. peated messages to his army commanAmong the series of commanders of the Army of the Poders, Lincoln stressed that the destruction of armies, not the capture of cities, was the surest path to winning the war. tomac who followed McClellan, including Major Generals Finding the right commanders who shared this vision was Ambrose Burnside, Joseph Hooker and George Meade, Lincoln repeatedly reiterated his desire to seek a decisive a more formidable challenge. The generals best positioned to implement Lincoln’s engagement over Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern goals during the first year of the conflict were Command- Virginia. In each case, the military commanders failed to ing General of the U.S. Army Bvt. Lt. Gen. Winfield Scott interpret Lincoln’s command intent. Burnside initially and his immediate successor, Maj. Gen. George B. McClel- moved quickly but squandered an opportunity to attack lan. Scott, the aged veteran of the War of 1812 and the hero Lee before Lee was able to concentrate his entire force at Fredericksburg, Va. Then Burnside horribly mishandled COL. COLE C. KINGSEED, USA Ret., Ph.D., a former profes- the Army in a series of ill-fated attacks against Lee’s army, sor of history at the U.S. Military Academy, is a writer and which was entrenched in an impregnable position. Lincoln thought he had found a solution in Hooker, consultant. N 86 ARMY ■ March 2009 Mathew Brady In his assessment of the Lincoln presidency, Tried by War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief, James M. McPherson states that “Abraham Lincoln was the only President in American history whose entire administration was bounded by war.” From the day he took the inaugural oath until his assassination four years later, Lincoln’s predominant task was to win the Civil War. Accordingly, he established policy objectives, articulated war aims and searched for a team of commanders, whose principal chore was to develop a military strategy to implement Lincoln’s political objectives. Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker Maj. Gen. George Meade As Lincoln searched for the right commander in the Eastern Theater, the most successful Union strategy was being implemented in the Mississippi River Valley and along accompanying tributaries. There, a series of commanders, most notably Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman, emerged. Grant was clearly the rising star, having destroyed two Confederate armies with his capture of Fort Donelson, Tenn., in February 1862 and Vicksburg, Miss., in July 1863. Though he had not met Grant, Lincoln became his staunchest ally because Grant demonstrated the tenacity that Lincoln sought. Even when Grant’s tactical conduct of the 1862 battle at Shiloh, Tenn., was called into question because the North endured excessive casualties, Lincoln stated, “I can’t spare this man. He fights!” Later Lincoln would identify what Grant possessed and so many of his commanders lacked: “They [politicians and many military commanders] have no idea that the war is to be carried on and put through by hard, tough fighting—that it will hurt somebody.” Vicksburg convinced Lincoln that Grant was the type of general he needed to win the war. A week following Vicksburg’s capitulation, Lincoln wrote Grant to express his “grateful acknowledgement for the almost inestimable service you have done the country.” He candidly informed Grant that as President, he thought that Grant had made a serious error in his approach to Vicksburg. Lincoln continued, “I now wish to make the perMaj. Gen. William T. Sherman M 88 ARMY ■ March 2009 Mathew Brady whom he appointed commanding general of the Army of the Potomac despite his personal reservations over Hooker’s claim that the country needed a dictator. Lincoln wrote to Hooker: “It was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you the command. … What I now ask of you is military success. … I shall assist you, as far as I can. … Go forward, and give us victories.” Hooker failed badly at Chancellorsville, Va., in May 1863, and with Lee’s army invading Pennsylvania in June, Lincoln reminded Hooker again that Lee’s army, not Richmond, was the true objective. Hooker thought otherwise, and his impulsive resignation was accepted by Lincoln. eade followed in the commander’s role and won a tactical victory at Gettysburg, but he failed to follow up his success. When Lee escaped to Virginia, Lincoln prepared a message to Meade: “My dear General, I do not believe you appreciate the magnitude of the misfortune involved in Lee’s escape. He was within your easy grasp, and to have closed upon him would … have ended the war. … Your golden opportunity is gone, and I am distressed immeasurably because of it.” After careful reflection, Lincoln filed the message, relieved that at least a tactical victory was better than nothing. Yet in Lincoln’s mind, Meade had failed the test of command and was not the general who would prosecute the war in the manner that Lincoln intended. Mathew Brady Mathew Brady Mathew Brady Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside Mathew Brady After Major Generals Burnside, Hooker and Meade failed their Commander in Chief’s mission, in 1864 Lincoln selected Ulysses S. Grant to pursue and defeat Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. sonal acknowledgment that you were right and I was wrong.” Lincoln had found his man. Before he could summon Grant to Washington, D.C., the Confederates won a victory at Chickamauga in northwest Georgia in September 1863, and the Union Army of the Cumberland fled to the city of Chattanooga, where they were immediately besieged. Lincoln had had enough. Reorganizing several military departments into the Military Division of the Mississippi, he placed Grant in command and authorized him to take whatever measures were necessary to remedy the situation. Grant relieved several commanders, rushed in reinforcements and within a month routed the Confederate Army of Tennessee. The bill restoring the grade of lieutenant general of the Army, a rank previously held only by George Washington (and Winfield Scott as a brevet appointment), had been passed by Congress and became law in February 1864. Grant’s nomination was sent to the Senate on March 1 and confirmed the next day. President Lincoln summoned Grant to Washington, D.C., to receive his commission. On March 8, Grant arrived in the nation’s capital to take command of all the Union armies. His entrance into Washington “was consistent with his image as an unpretentious man of action,” according to author Doris Kearns Goodwin in Team of Rivals. Upon arrival at Washington’s historic Willard Hotel at 90 ARMY ■ March 2009 dusk, accompanied only by his son Fred, Grant was not recognized by the desk clerk. He was initially told that nothing was available except a small room on the top floor, but once the clerk looked at the signature in the register—U.S. Grant and son, Galena, Illinois—the general’s accommodations were switched. After a private dinner, Grant prepared his son for bed and strolled over to the White House to meet the Commander in Chief for the first time. Grant arrived at the White House, where a large crowd had gathered for the President’s weekly reception. Grant walked along modestly with the rest of the crowd toward the President. Meeting Grant for the first time, Lincoln remarked, “Why, here is Gen. Grant! Well, this is a great pleasure.” After a brief exchange, Lincoln turned Grant over to Secretary of State William H. Seward to negotiate the crowd. As Goodwin describes it, the President was “delighted by the crowd’s embrace of Grant, [and] he willingly ceded to the unassuming general his own customary place of honor, fully aware that the path to victory was wide enough, [as a young colonel said], for the two of them to ‘walk it abreast.’” After an hour, Grant returned to Lincoln, who was waiting with Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. They discussed the next day’s ceremony at which Grant would formally receive his commission. Then Lincoln conferred privately with Grant to establish the general parameters of what would be the most successful civil-military partnership in American history. A ccording to Grant’s memoirs, Lincoln stated that he had “never professed to be a military man or to know how campaigns should be conducted, and never wanted to interfere in them: but that procrastination on the part of commanders, and the pressure from the people [of] the North and Congress, which was always with him, forced him into issuing his series of ‘Military Orders.’ … [Lincoln] did not know but they were all wrong, and did know that some of them were. All [Lincoln] wanted or had ever wanted was someone who would take the responsibility and act, and call on him for all the assistance needed, pledging himself to use all the power of the government in rendering such assistance.” Grant then assured Lincoln “that [he] would do the best [he] could with the means at hand, and avoid as far as possible annoying him or the War Department.” Grant’s initial interview was over. Grant’s account of his meeting with Lincoln doesn’t entirely ring true, according to McPherson. Lincoln “did want to know what Grant was going to do, at least in a broad strategic sense.” In April 1864, Lincoln advised Grant that as for the tactical “particulars of your plan, I neither know nor seek to know.” Grant wanted to maintain his headquarters in the West, but according to McPherson, “Lincoln made it clear that he wanted him to come east ‘to see whether he cannot do something with the unfortunate Army of the Potomac.’” Two of Grant’s initial decisions were to promote Sherman to command in the West and to retain Meade as commander of the Army of the Potomac. The latter was an uncomfortable arrangement, as Grant would eventually establish his field headquarters in close proximity with Meade’s headquarters. L incoln also confessed his frustration that in the past, Union armies seemed intent on securing territorial objectives rather than focusing their efforts on the destruction of enemy armies. In addition, it seemed that the various Union armies seldom operated in concert. Lincoln had previously—and repeatedly—suggested that Buell (commander of the Union Army of the Cumberland) and Halleck (Commanding General of the Army), among others, devise a coordinated strategy to “move at once upon the enemy’s whole line so as to bring into action our great superiority in numbers.” Time and again the generals ignored him. Grant’s coordinated strategy—to have the smaller armies serve a pin-down function, while the principal Union armies in the West and in the East moved simultaneously against the main Confederate armies in the field—impressed Lincoln. Following his meeting with the President, Grant immediately conducted an inspection of his principal armies and conferred directly with his commanders, presenting his general outline for a concentrated movement of all federal armies with the expressed purpose of destroying the Confederate armies to their respective fronts. From late March 1864 to the onset of the Overland Campaign in May, Grant visited Washington, D.C., once a week to confer with the Secretary of War and President Lincoln. Within a month of receiving his commission as commanding general of all Union armies, Grant issued orders to all of his commanders, outlining his general intent for the upcoming campaign. Excerpts from his orders to Sherman 92 ARMY ■ March 2009 Library of Congress Lt. Gen. Grant and his staff and to Meade, his two senior commanders, indicate that Grant fully comprehended Lincoln’s military objectives. To Sherman, Grant wrote, “It is my design, if the enemy keep quiet and allow me to take the initiative in the spring campaign, to work all parts of the Army together and somewhat towards a common center. … You, I propose to move against Johnston’s army [Confederate Army of Tennessee], to break it up and to get into the interior of the enemy’s country as far as you can, inflicting all the damage you can against their war resources. I do not propose to lay down for you a plan of campaign, but simply lay down the work it is desirable to have done and leave you free to execute it in your own way.” A similar message went to Meade: “So far as practicable, all the armies are to move together and towards one common center. … Sherman will move at the same time you do, or two or three days in advance, Joseph Johnston’s army being his objective point, and the heart of Georgia his ultimate aim. … Lee’s army will be your objective point. Wherever Lee goes, there you will go also.” Since Lee was the principal threat, Grant accompanied Meade’s Army of the Potomac. In the campaign that followed, Grant and Meade endured 55,000 casualties within six weeks, but Grant informed Lincoln that “there is to be no turning back.” Later, Grant telegraphed his Commander in Chief: “I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer.” It took all summer, all autumn and all winter, but the outcome was never in doubt. With Lee pinned into the defense of Richmond, it was only a matter of time before the Union would prevail. Lincoln never lost faith in Grant and was willing to endure political fallout as casualties mounted. Upon receipt of Grant’s August 1864 telegram stating that Grant intended to hold Lee in the trenches of Petersburg until the latter surrendered, Lincoln wrote, “I have seen your dispatch expressing your unwillingness to break your hold In April 1865, Lee surrendered to Grant at the McLean House at Appomattox, Va. where you are. Neither am I willing. Hold on with a bulldog [grip], and chew and choke, as much as possible.” On April 2, 1865, Grant broke Lee’s line at Petersburg. Lee abandoned Richmond and fled west. Lincoln urged pursuit, directing Grant: “Gen. Sheridan says, ‘If the thing is pressed, I think that Lee will surrender.’ Let the thing be pressed.” A few days later, Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House. The war was over. In retrospect, the Lincoln-Grant partnership was the most successful command team in American history. At its foundation was a Commander in Chief who clearly articulated his political and military objectives and his command intent. After careful screening, often by trial and error, Lincoln discovered a general who did not always agree with the President’s policies, but one who shared Lincoln’s vision of how to end the war. By Grant’s own admission, he had read the remarkable series of debates between Lincoln and Douglas a few years earlier, but he had by no means ever been a “Lincoln man” in that contest. Yet Grant had always recognized the President’s great ability, and he never questioned Lincoln’s constitutional role as Commander in Chief. O pen communication between Lincoln and Grant further cemented their relationship. Upon conferring Grant’s commission, Lincoln informed Grant that he had full confidence in Grant’s abilities and that he need not know all the intricacies of Grant’s strategy. Grant acknowledged that Lincoln “was willing to trust his generals in making and executing their plans,” but this willingness was tempered only if those plans followed Lincoln’s intent 94 ARMY ■ March 2009 to move rapidly and to crush the opposing armies. A review of Grant’s detailed correspondence in the final year of the war reveals a commander who kept the President fully informed of all major decisions and troop movements. Herein lay the reasons why Lincoln and Grant were so successful. Their relationship was founded on a shared strategic vision and a mutual respect for each other’s abilities and constitutional roles, not political affiliation or personal ambition. Clear communication and adherence to the expressed goals of the President characterized Grant’s actions throughout the war. In turn, Lincoln never wavered in his support for Grant, despite political pressure to relieve Grant from command. Those whom Lincoln did relieve were commanders who sought personal aggrandizement and those who failed to develop a coherent strategy that fulfilled the President’s intent to act decisively to destroy the enemy armies. In selecting his own defense team and in articulating his command intent in the global war against terrorism, President Obama can clearly glean lessons from how Lincoln and Grant achieved success in the most catastrophic war in American history. It took Lincoln three years to find Grant and to entrust the fate of the Union armies into his hands. Given the current international crisis in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Obama does not have that luxury of time, but he possesses one advantage that Lincoln did not—he has a proven team in place. Doubtless the current President will make adjustments, but by clearly articulating his intent and his war aims, he will have taken the initial step toward military success. By emulating President Abraham Lincoln during this nation’s greatest crisis, he follows a superb role model. ✭