Robert E. Lee as a Military Theorist.

To Jefferson Davis, Lee wrote on 25 March1864, "Although we cannot do more than weighprobabilities, they are useful in stimulating anddirecting a vigilant observation of the enemy, andsuggesting such a policy on our part as may determinehis" (Dowdey and Manarin, eds., Wartime Papers, 683). Too, Lee expresses the supreme political goal of the Confederatewar effort to be independence, thereby agreeing with the Prussian's primarydefinition of war as policy by other means and his admonition that the chiefpolicymaker(s) and the general-in-chief must always be in sync about thepurpose of a given war. In so doing, she madethe postwar Lee more accessible as a fallible, feeling human being who wasa product of his unique personal background, rather than painting him as ascapegoat who should be vilified for not being as progressive as Ulysses S.Grant.10 Pryor's brief citations, however, did not reference what is probably themost significant portion of Lee's undated memorandum: the best, most succinctdescription in Lee's handwriting of war's enduring nature, at least as hethen understood it. REL to Jefferson Davis, 19 Apr. 1864, in Dowdey andManarin, eds., Wartime Papers, 704; Clausewitz, On War,87-89, 91, 607-8; Sun Tzu, Art of 'War, 63-65. [Extracted from the article]