Didn't Custer do 'the surge' back in 1876?

[Stanchetalarooni]

And the English colonists before that?
And Columbus before that?

[bigtree]

1. thing is . . .

unlike Bush, he was actually leading that 'surge' in person

[Turtlebah]

2. Custer was also crazy

just like chimpy. But he at least had some courage.

[Stanchetalarooni]

3. Who ordered that 'surge' back then?

Wasn't there some kind of 'coast to coast' proclamation about the future ownership of all that green between the Atlantic and the Pacific?

[tanyev]

4. And look how well that worked out.

[SteppingRazor]

5. Actually, in the Sioux War ...

the massive troop surge came as a direct result of Custer's death, not before it.

I see your point here, but I'd be wary about comparing the Iraq debacle to the Native-American genocide. I don't think the two have a great deal in common. On the one hand, you've got a foreign military power trying to impress its will on a separate nation-state. On the other, you have a country suppressing its aboriginal people.

If you want to compare Iraq to other points in U.S. history, I'd say Vietnam is a closer example. Less so (but still more apropos than the Indian Wars) perhaps the Revolutionary War, with the U.S. recast as the British. This second example though, doesn't have as much in common with Iraq as Vietnam, though, since the Rev. War featured two similar cultures, one derived from the other.

America's brutal suppression of the native populace certainly has comparisons in the Middle East -- and, indeed, throughout nearly all times and places -- but I don't think this is one of them.

[bigtree]

7. General George Custer wrote, in 1874:

"If I were an Indian, I often think that I would greatly prefer to cast my lot among those of my people who adhered to the free open plains, rather than submit to the confined limits of a reservation, there to be the recipient of the blessed benefits of civilization, with its vices thrown in without stint or measure."

He mused about Indian's 'freedom' in one instance, and committed himself to their slaughter and imprisonment in the next, much like Bush and the Iraqis. When the Indians were no longer intimidated by Custer's muckraking army, they lay in wait and fought him and his soldiers to their bloody end. Their last stand.

It's unfortunate for our nation, our soldiers, and for the Iraqis, that Bush and the rest of his republican enablers aren't on the field like Custer was in his time. Both share his arrogant belief in their own righteousness as they attack and kill the 'insurgent' Iraqis like Custer slaughtered his 'savages'. The Bush regime's escalation of their occupation may well be their own 'last stand'. Let's hope it's not ours as well.

[H2O Man]

22. "Crazy Horse and Custer:

The Parallel Lives of Two American Warriors," by Stephen E. Ambrose (Meridian; 1975) is perhaps the most important look at who Custer really was. Unlike Bush, he was a person his enemies could respect.

[bigtree]

23. I'm sure he had allies.

There's much to dislike about Custer as well.

We tend to look at the past as a world with limited dimensions, but I can imagine extremely complex communities, at that point already driven together by many forces and events - not apart from the ravages and displacement of the U.S. expansion, but aggravated by it and adding to the survival concerns by pushing the many tribes together to compete for the same limited resources. It was interesting to read of accounts of Indians who would make their camps right nearby the forts that were full of men who had little regard for their lives, their customs . . . I imagine out of need. I found in most accounts of the interactions between the soldiers and the Indians that there was an amazing disconnect between them, a profound misunderstanding - the soldiers ignorant (and often uncaring) of the importance of the symbols and traditions of the indigenous inhabitants they encountered, and the native people tragically underestimating the sinister motive of their sometimes benefactors.

I found Custer to be a duplicitous man who was no more, and no less worthy of respect than any of the other soldiers, outside of the obvious esteem he would receive as a warrior among other warriors. But, it's hard to tell from this distance, even with the benefit of such detailed accounts as Ambrose's.

Thanks for the reference.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

8. Exactly...

Little Big Horn was the beginning of the end...

[CatWoman]

21. It was the Indians' last stand

rather than Custer's.

[CrazyOrangeCat]

10. There really are so many parallels to Vietnam.

It is terrible to watch. I was not of soldiering age, fortunately, but a very involved teenager--with a nervous eye on the draft.

The similarities are certainly there. Unfortunately, the American people, by and large, are completely detatched from the issues. The teenagers of the late Sixties and early Seventies, knew more about what was happening in Southeast Asia, and why, than virtually everyone does now about the Middle East situation. Frightening and frustrating to think about--it was only thirty-five years ago!

I need a new drug.

[Stanchetalarooni]

11. Didn't we invade that separate nation state and in effect have its' "leader "assassinated

in full public view?
Maybe those Iraqis are the aboriginals...our aboriginals.
As far as Vietnam I understand some of the comparison but then Vietnam didn't have a great big dollop of oil sitting under her ass.

[wtmusic]

18. Agree -- and native Americans had a big dollop of great farmland

under theirs.

Occupation is the common thread, and a strong one.

[Virginia Dare]

13. Custer made the fatal mistake...

of underestimating the strength, the ability and the will of his adversaries. He also let his own ego cloud his judgement, and he only listened to what he wanted to hear.

[TX-RAT]

14. A little more than that.

He was way under gunned. While his soldiers carried single shot rifles, they carried Henry Repeaters.

[SteppingRazor]

15. Personal comparisons between Custer and Bush may be notable...

but that's different than comparing Iraq and the Indian Wars.

[Virginia Dare]

16. It was hard to tell if the OP was about the Indian Wars..

or the Battle of Little Big Horn? :shrug:

[Stanchetalarooni]

17. I think that Custer was just following orders.

He was really a pawn no matter what his military rank.

[sweetheart]

6. smallpox blankets

cannons and ethnocentric pride
elevated on every iraqi shelter,
cannot white man's burden snide,
annihilated in a bagdhad swelter;
blessed iraqis blown far and wide,
allah comes for those who felt her.

[underpants]

9. Yeah but Custer was not only warned about what was to happen...

but anyone could have guessed that it would.....oh never mind

[Virginia Dare]

12. And the Romans before that...n/t

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

19. No. Custer's Ego Forced Him To Storm Ahead Of The Main Group Arriving Later, Thereby Getting His

entire group killed.

[itsmesgd]

20. hoka hey!

His ego got the best of him. Like the shirt says," Custer got Siouxed"

Hoka hey!

[Kickin_Donkey]

24. Hitler did the "surge" back in the winter of '44-45, the Ardennes Offensive ...

also known as the Battle of the Bulge.