Jmm, thanks for getting the discussion back on course but you need to understand that professional military officers don’t like discussing war crimes…it makes them think and uncover cracks (actually gapping holes) in their strategic war fighting doctrine. Yes “warfighters”, that is a gauntlet you are staring at in front of your corfammed toes. In order to get this discussion going I will gladly defend Sherman and state he is not a war criminal (and maybe some of you will take five minutes to read the Lieber Code).
Sherman is not a war criminal because he followed and obeyed his Laws of War (the Lieber Code – GO 100). The Lieber Code, at just over 9000 words, is a thing of beauty that served the US military well through the Civil War, the Indian Wars, the Spanish American War and the Philippine American War. The Lieber Code not only established the protection for wounded, POWs, and civilians but also demonstrated little tolerance for treachery. Because it did not enable treachery, it provided for the successful occupation of the Confederate States at the end of the civil war. An interesting study is the occupation at the end of the Civil War compared to the botched occupation of Iraq. One of the guiding principles of the Lieber Code in Article 29 states “The more vigorously wars are pursued the better it is for humanity. Sharp wars are brief.” That principle is long forgotten by our senior military leadership.