"This welcome study examines the degree to which Civil War-era officers applied the military principles of Antoine Henri Jomini and Carl von Clausewitz. Using selected Union and Confederate generals, Smith provides the best treatment to date of Jominian and Clausewitzian influences across the arc of the conflict from Forts Henry and Donelson in 1862 through William Tecumseh Sherman's March to the Sea in late 1864."-- Gary W. Gallagher , John L. Nau III Professor in the History of the American Civil War Emeritus, University of Virginia, and author of The Enduring Civil War: Reflections on the Great American Crisis "Napoleon casts a gossamer shadow over Timothy Smith's penetrating new operational study of the conduct of Civil War campaigns, yet it is not the 'Little Corporal' himself that dominates these pages, but the tug-of-war between conflicting lessons derived from 'Boney's' operations by his preeminent interpreters, the Swiss General Antoine Henri Jomini and the Prussian General Carl von Clausewitz. Almost relentlessly, Smith uses the decisions and actions of Union and Confederate commanders to separate the Jominians from the Clausewitzians. In so doing, he fashions a convincing case for the preeminence of the maxims of the Prussian over the Swiss in deciding the outcome of the war, though ironically hardly any commanders North or South had read Clausewitz since his work was not available in English. This is arguably the most interesting and original work on Civil War operational strategy in half a century.

"-- William C. Davis , formerly director of the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies, and author of Crucible of Command: Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee--The War They Fought, the Peace They Forged "Tim Smith has become one of the leading historians of the American Civil War. Not only has he written some of best blow by blow accounts of the fighting of the war itself, but now he has traveled to Europe to study how the leading military thinkers of the period, Jomini and Clausewitz, thought war should be fought. The result is a fresh and outstanding study which no other historian has even attempted. Professor Smith has written another volume that puts him ahead of all modern-day historians."-- John F.

Marszalek , Giles Distinguished Professor Emeritus of History, Mississippi State University "This book offers an intriguing theoretical framework for examining operational victory and defeat in the Civil War, written in an engaging and lively style."-- Christian B. Keller , professor of history, US Army War College, and author of the award-winning The Great Partnership: Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and the Fate of the Confederacy.