Stonewall Jackson on Strategy

Given the ongoing discussions and debates on various subjects such as
the rise and fall of COIN and CT and everything else under the sun
since 9-11, perhaps this is an apt quote that we should consider as we
participate in these debates.

Men who, aware of their ignorance, would probably have shrunk from
assuming charge of a squad of infantry in action, had no hesitation
whatever in attempting to direct a mighty army, a task which Napoleon
has assured us requires profound study, incessant application, and
wide experience.

They were in fact ignorant – and how many statesmen,
and even soldiers, are in like case? – that strategy, the art of
maneuvering armies, is an art in itself, an art which none may master
by the light of nature, but to which, if he is to attain success, a
man must serve a long apprenticeship.

The rules of strategy are few and simple.  They may be learned in a
week. They may be taught by familiar illustrations or a dozen
diagrams. But such knowledge will no more teach a man to lead an army
like Napoleon than a knowledge of grammar will teach him to write like
Gibbon.

Stonewall Jackson and the American Civil War, G.F. R. Henderson,
Chapter XII, pages 345-346  Originally Published in 1898