General George Washington: A Military Life

"Washington's gift of courage coincided with remarkable luck... No better example exists of the old maxim that to be good, a commander only has to be better than his opponent."

Even that may be overstating Washington's military abilities: he fought Howe, Clinton and Cornwallis to something less than a stalemate in New Jersey, Howe having complacently both failed to round up the Americans on Manhattan and left Burgoyne to his fate in upstate New York instead of combining their forces to cut the US in two. He kept the Continental Army in being while seeking to proactively attack, and through harsh winter camps, long enough for French supplies, troops and ships to come through. With a little luck for de Grasse's fleet off the Chesapeake, show more that was enough to win the victory at Yorktown which ruined Parliament's confidence in the war. Washington's early experiences of war only really schooled him in what not to do, he learnt on the job and from books instead of in a smoothly functional army, and Trenton was his own success in spite of the failure of several elements of his plans. His reputation survived attack while others' heads rolled, not entirely fairly, but in the end his best was just about good enough. show less

A great narrative about the military role George Washington played throughout his life. I suppose one might be able to interpret a number of different styles of leadership from the evidence of his multiple commands. However, at the end of the day, his perseverance through admittedly diffucult days during the Revolutionary War, saw the colonist through to victory (albeit with a little help from the French!)
A great story, which also tackles Washington's early years working with the British against the French. A good primer overall on Washington's military exploits.

This was an interesting narrative about George Washington and the quality of his generalship from his days fighting in the French and Indian War until he said farewell to his command at the conclusion of the War of Independence.

Lengel covers all the main important aspects of the war, and reasonably critiques Washington's performance in the important battles and campaigns. I don't think there are many big surprises in the book. The discussion of Washington as tactically aggressive, sometimes to the point of rashness, while being strategically cautious, was useful and interesting.

My one criticism is that a deeper analysis at the end of the book would be stronger than the analysis that seems to be parceled out at the end of chapters.