|
Post by quincannon on May 21, 2013 11:19:14 GMT -6
Fuchs: Custer did not rise to the rank of Major General fighting Indians. He rose to that rank fighting Confederates. Just because someone is an experienced driver of an automobile, does not mean they are a competent race car driver. So competence (real or assumed) in one, is not evidence of competence in another.
The reality is that these things happened, with some degree of variation. The fact that all of these actions were a compendium of stupidity and error of judgment, does not mean they did not happen. It means they were stupid and errors of judgment, not condoned, not understood, just happened.
As far as MTCF is concerned: I have stood where Custer is supposed to have stood, and having map in hand indicating where all the tribal circles were I could not have seen all of them, and there was no haze, smoke and dust when I viewed the area. What I could see was enough to convince me that Custer had bitten off more than he could chew. I would have gone no further, and that's even if my subordinate commanders were named Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, and Billy Batson.
If necessity is the mother of invention, then it also goes that to much assumption of fact not in evidence is the mother of all screw up.
If it is any comfort to you it is also beyond me why he did what he did, but just because I am unable to understand that which is not understandable, does not mean that those events did not take place.
A person could spend the entirety of their natural lives trying to understand why Custer did what he did. At the end they would not understand it any better than in the beginning except to conclude that for no apparent reason, reasonably intelligent people do monumentally stupid things.
|
|
|
Post by bc on May 21, 2013 12:15:48 GMT -6
Ian: The original question concerned an incident in Saving Private Ryan. The technical advisor of that movie was Dale Dye, and generally speaking anything he is associated with is pretty accurate when it comes to military detail. I will concur about Dale Dye. However he doesn't have control of the script and what equipment is available to use but he does the best he can. He did manage to get a script change in Platoon where the director had planned to burn the whole village with people in it. He said he told the director that american troops wouldn't have done that so it was changed. bc
|
|
|
Post by benteen on May 21, 2013 12:28:59 GMT -6
[quote author=yantaylor board=basics thread=870 post=89212 time=1369145237 Hi Dan, I forgot to post this thread when you asked Richard about using Mortar rounds ‘’aka Saving Pvt Ryan’’. Scroll down to ‘’Medal of Honor Citation’’ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauford_T._Anderson#Medal_of_Honor_citationIan. Ian, Thank you my friend for taking the time to look that up for me, I appreciate it Also you can rest assured that a LLama will win the Grand National before old Dan pulls the safety pin off a mortar round and bangs it against a rock Be Well Dan [/quote]
|
|
|
Post by fuchs on May 21, 2013 13:55:17 GMT -6
Fuchs: Custer did not rise to the rank of Major General fighting Indians. He rose to that rank fighting Confederates. Just because someone is an experienced driver of an automobile, does not mean they are a competent race car driver. So competence (real or assumed) in one, is not evidence of competence in another. But still, if you have good intelligence that shows that [insert enemy here] had behaved basically the same for the last few weeks, it would be foolish to count on it that he will behave differently just tomorrow, for your convenience, no? ;D Oh, I don't question the reconstruction of Custer's movements, just some of the "standard" motivations he supposedly had for them. I'm not sure your summation of the camps in the Rosebud valley is correct. Neither am I But that's the conclusion I draw from crossreading Centennial Campaign and WoodenLeg And while Gray occasionally goes on some wild speculations and bends the interpretations to fit his hypothesis, I don't have reason to believe that he systematically misrepresents his sources. Unfortunately both dry up just around the time it gets interesting, early June. Any suggestion for a more modern, analytical treatment of what was known about the Indian camp movements, what was supposed but wrong, known but rejected or plainly made up in the aftermath? An example for possible misinformation: Those "wikiups/doghouses" allegedly seen by Godfrey, or the "joining of the agency Indians at the sundance camp" were not recorded in his diary, but appeared in the 1892 narration supposedly based on it, according to Gray.
|
|
|
Post by quincannon on May 21, 2013 14:24:16 GMT -6
Fuchs: The day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, Douglas MacArthur, who was a reasonably intelligent fellow, inexplicably had the majority of his offensive and defensive air power destroyed on the ground, after he assured the President of the United States that he was fully aware of the situation at hand, and was on full alert.
This same reasonably intelligent fellow sent a half strength ill equipped infantry battalion (reinforced with a battery of field artillery) to blunt the main attack of the NKPA, telling his subordinate commanders that all the NKPA needed to do was see an American uniform (meaning I suppose American resolve) and that would be enough to turn them around.
And yes it was this same MacArthur who told the President of the United States once again (different president) that the CCF would not dare enter North Korea, this after the CCF nearly destroyed the 8th Cavalry Regiment in North Korea a week or so earlier.
Now Douglas was a pretty fair brigade commander in World War I, had been Chief of Staff of the U S Army, and was as personally courageous as a soldier could be, despite being referred to as Dugout Doug, by some of the more miscreant soldiers that he left to starve and rot on Bataan, visiting them only once, but much preferring the tunnel on Corregidor.
So you figure out why a reasonably intelligent general officer, who had proven his ability in one war, could screw something, many things up so monumentally in two others. When you arrive at conclusions that have escaped me for fifty years please post them here so I may pass on to another life secure in that knowledge.
I figured you would know Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne, but I was surprised that you knew of Billy Batson, just as surprised as Custer was when he found out that Indians would fight. Go figure.
If you can't understand Custer's motivations, you are not alone, and Douglas will be a real puzzler, because he graduated at the top, not the bottom, of his class at West Point. He also kept a secret mistress, and was afraid of his mommy until the day she died, and he was near sixty at the time.
There is one answer I would like to try on you though. There is in the human condition something that happens to some people when they achieve positions of power, especially achieving those positions at a relatively young age as did both Custer and MacArthur. They come to feel that the rules that apply to other (read lesser) men, no longer apply to them. This causes them to disregard those rules and think they can do anything they please and all will be well. I don't understand this other than power is just as corruptive to the thinking process, as it is to other aspects of life.
|
|
|
Post by alfakilo on May 21, 2013 14:57:57 GMT -6
MacArthur...now there was a piece of work.
|
|
|
Post by quincannon on May 21, 2013 15:02:10 GMT -6
AK: You bet your sweet ass he was a piece of work, a monumental screw up, who achieved five star rank, had a statue erected in his honor at his Alma Mater, and who today's general officers and politicians still slobber over. Why they slobber does not speak well for their level of intelligence either.
When the histories are written five hundred years from now I do hope that the good he did do, the post war administration of Japan, is not buried under the muck and mire of his unraveled military triumphs, that showed he had a better press flack than a G-2 and G-3
|
|
|
Post by mac on May 21, 2013 15:24:34 GMT -6
We seem to have shifted a bit to why was he there at all. The key, to me, is to clear your mind of what we know and think in terms of what Custer knows. He knows Indians run when they can. He does not know about the Rosebud attack! There is no suggestion that he could! He knows there are lots of NA but his number is an underestimate. He knows what he did at the end of Washita worked. He knows his Crow scouts are telling him to attack. They would, wouldn't they! Sure it all falls apart; partly in my view because Custer is Custer. He is impatient, aggressive, brave, and as quincannon has very perceptively said his main experience is in handling much larger numbers of troops. Lots of other reasons I won't go into here. If we are empathic with Custer, in my view, it all does make sense. We must forget what we know! Cheers
|
|
|
Post by quincannon on May 21, 2013 15:56:04 GMT -6
Mac: And he "knows" that the rules of mortal men don't apply to him.
|
|
|
Post by mac on May 21, 2013 16:03:49 GMT -6
Re MacArthur: Don't start me on the Kokoda campaign in WW2!! Idiot! Cheers
|
|
|
Post by mac on May 21, 2013 16:06:22 GMT -6
Quincannon you are perceptive as always. I left out arrogant for Custer but it certainly applies.
|
|
|
Post by quincannon on May 21, 2013 16:29:06 GMT -6
Mac: I don't have any problems with arrogant, as long as they are arrogant and good. When they are just arrogant, good men die, for that arrogance.
|
|
|
Post by benteen on May 21, 2013 16:47:23 GMT -6
MacArthur...now there was a piece of work. Alpakilo/ Mac, Lets not forget Peleliu. MacArthur wanted his right flank protected Nimitz said he would support him, But Halsey knew that it wasnt needed. it could do nothing to upset MacArthurs invasion into Leyte. But even though they may have agreed with Halsey, what the heck they were already underway. Be too much trouble to turn them back. What the hell did a few thousand grunts lives mean when compared to the greatness of this General that can never be wrong. Be Well Dan
|
|
|
Post by montrose on May 21, 2013 17:43:22 GMT -6
Obviously, we are stuck with determining LTC Custer's attack plan after the Ford D recon. I have been working extensively with the Hussar Academy research center to determine the attack plan. The research summary is contained below. www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKaYOW9zMoY
|
|
|
Post by quincannon on May 21, 2013 17:55:06 GMT -6
Dan: I am not sure he was wrong here. We know it was wrong in hindsight. The question is did he know it was wrong in foresight. I don't believe he did.
Your own commander of the 1st MarDiv thought it would be a three or four at most day battle. He spread the seeds of easy victory disease, so don't blame MacArthur for that.
Don't blame Nimitz either. That decision came from the President of the United States.
I would also find one hell of a lot better paragon of good judgment than William F. Halsey. His poor judgment led the Third Fleet into two Typhoons which could have been avoided, then there is that little matter of Samar and those men lost, then left in the water and lost. So I would not point to him as an example when you are trying to throw brickbats at those you don't particularly care for. There were more American deaths in those three episodes than Peleliu. Every damned one of them were men that should not have died save for arrogance.
Men die in war Dan. Sometimes they die for good reasons, sometimes for bad ones. Sometimes they die for some personal arrogance. Sometimes they die by simple human error. Peleliu was human error on MacArthur's part, and I have no love for him. But it was the arrogance of Rupertus, and the bull headed, high diddle diddle straight down the middle of Puller that caused the deaths that were needless. So blame the right guys.
There is also the experience gained on Peleliu that saved a hell of a lot of Marine lives on Iwo Jima and Okinawa. No Marine had ever faced Japanese defense in depth before Peleliu. You always have to pay a stiff price to learn the best lessons.
|
|