Major General T.J. Jackson's Shenandoah Campaign: An Operational Art Analysis

摘要

Major General T.J. Jackson's Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1862 is criticallyexamined from an operational art perspective, with particular emphasis on operational factors. The Federal invasion of Virginia was the catalyst that caused Jackson and General Robert E. Lee to collaborate at the operational strategic level of war, in an effort to relieve the pressure on Richmond, and the main Confederate Army. Jackson's subsequent operations are replete with practical examples of applied operational art that served his country's higher strategic purpose, and were to have profound implications on the war in the east. After a review of the strategic setting on the eve of the Valley Campaign, the paper turns to the specific conduct of Jackson's strategic diversion. Analysis of the Campaign demonstrates Jackson's masterful ability to properly balance the operational factors of space, time, and forces. The resulting freedom of action allowed Jackson to stymie significantly larger Union forces, who were specifically diverted from the Federal main effort at Richmond and detailed to destroy him. In almost every case, Jackson was victorious by using operational factors in the form of maneuver warfare, to concentrate superior combat power on the field at the decisive time and place, against smaller enemy formations.