Learning From Washington’s Wartime Leadership Prowess
Lt. Gen. James M. Dubik, U.S. Army retired
Wednesday, November 17, 2021
The 250th anniversary of America’s War of Independence is fast approaching. So, it seems appropriate to take yet another look at George Washington’s wartime leadership. Doing so will highlight three lessons contemporary military professionals need to understand: war as a unitary phenomenon; the two forms of wartime leadership—warfighting and war-waging; and the proper civil-military relationship.
Let’s start with what seems like a simple, straightforward question: When did the Revolutionary War begin and end? The answer that it started in 1775 in Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, and ended in 1781 in Yorktown, Virginia, might be satisfactory in a high school history class, but it’s not for a military professional. For this answer applies only to the major combat operations, the fighting phase of the war.
Merrill Jensen, author of The Founding of a Nation: A History of the American Revolution, 1763–1776, puts the beginning of the Revolution at 1763, for example. So does Don Higginbotham in his classic work, The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies and Practice, 1763–1789. In other words, the war began before the fighting started. In fact, the Revolution was almost over when Washington left the Second Continental Congress in June 1775 to assume command of the Continental Army in Boston. Adopting the Declaration of Independence in July 1776 ended the political revolution, but the major fighting that took place from 1775 through 1781 was necessary to secure independence from a British monarchy that did not just give it to us.
https://www.ausa.org/articles/learning-washingtons-wartime-leadership-prowess
