"The War"

Sooner or later I was going to talk about my obsession with "The War".  Being a SoCal guy and largely removed from a lot of the early history of our country, I really never gave the Civil War much thought.  It was a long way away, both geographically and historically.  I mean, who really cares about something that happened 150 years ago?

During our first assignment in Washington, DC, we got a great indoctrination to all of the important monuments and museums that dominate the landscape.  We immersed ourselves in really seeing the country from a historical perspective and we all learned a lot from the experience.  But it was during our second sojourn to the nation's capital that I really became immersed in the Civil War.  While attending National War College I took the required Civil War course and several electives.

The more I learned about this incredibly sad, complicated, and dangerous time, the more I got drawn in.  We visited battlefields.  We went to museums and explored little knows details of all the battles.  I read book after book.  Believe me, if you want to know something of the Civil War, someone has written a book about it.  The strange thing is the more I knew, the more I wanted to know.

I just kept coming back to the central question.  How could the nation let itself get mired in such a traumatic event?  There are always two primary reasons given by scholars who know more than me.  Slavery and economics.  The enslavement of our fellow man and the industrial North versus the agricultural South.  Okay. I'll buy that.  But there was much more going on.  To pit brother against brother, father against son, family against family, the dynamics were extremely complicated and varied.  It is just plain fascinating.  I suspect that If we still lived back in that part of the country I'd be driving my wife crazy (or at least more than I already do) with an even greater obsession.

I would recommend study of the Civil War to any American.  It is so instructive of things that can happen, even if those things can't be conceived.  How could we have conducted the bloodiest war in our history right on our shores?  Its also a great way to study leadership.  Both sides had some of the beat and some of the worst leaders in the history of the nation.  It is axiomatic that Lincoln was the greatest President in our history.  But he had an incredibly tumultuous Presidency and certainly didn't always make the best decisions.  But that he held the Union together...well, that's what makes him great.

If anyone is intersted, the best and most readable book on the Civil War is "The Battle Cry of
Freedom" by James McPherson.  You can find it here:  http://www.amazon.com/Battle-Cry-Freedom-The-Civil/dp/0345359429

Be careful, it's addicting!