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Post by yanmacca on Dec 11, 2015 20:27:47 GMT
I am usually all right with military terms but I will leave that one for Chuck to answer Beth, as I don't know if the W is for withdraw and the H is for high ground, the two Fs could be something to do with fight or force and the I for infantry, there I had a go and probably failed miserably.
Yan.
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Post by quincannon on Dec 11, 2015 21:00:50 GMT
A WHIFF is What If.
AS IN----- WHIFF the Easter Bunny came on a dog sled at Christmas? WHIFF Santa came hopping down the bunny trail in April?
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Post by yanmacca on Dec 11, 2015 21:03:33 GMT
Well I walked into that one.
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Post by quincannon on Dec 11, 2015 21:06:48 GMT
Yes you did and with both eyes open.
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Post by Beth on Dec 11, 2015 21:14:13 GMT
Don't feel bad Yan. I thought it was a military as well.
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Post by quincannon on Dec 12, 2015 15:33:51 GMT
Well it is sort of. WHIFFING is what a commander does when he reviews possible courses of action in the planning process, prior to making a decision. WHIFF I do this. WHIFF I do that. You WHIFF all of them, and then select the WHIFF that best accomplishes what you set out to do.
What we most often do here is reverse engineer WHIFFING, in that we present and examine alternatives to the action that was taken historically.
Case in point. Ian presented am excellent WHIFF in his latest post on the Calhoun Hill thread. WHIFF Custer did exactly what was presented in the JSIT narrative? We are not talking then about a game changing outcome difference, but it sure would throw everything we think we know about the battle in a cocked hat. A lot of those speculations and assumptions heretofore made would be totally invalid, moving us not back to square one, but certainly as far back as square eight or ten.
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Post by yanmacca on Dec 12, 2015 15:47:15 GMT
I remember an old military magazine that had a message board titled "A Whiff of Grapeshot"
I do think that some of these Indian accounts do need reading and if a couple of them do correspond and also match some of the finds and markers then we really need to re-evaluate.
Yan.
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Post by Beth on Dec 12, 2015 22:05:32 GMT
I remember an old military magazine that had a message board titled "A Whiff of Grapeshot" I do think that some of these Indian accounts do need reading and if a couple of them do correspond and also match some of the finds and markers then we really need to re-evaluate. Yan. I totally agree. The NA accounts are the only eyewitness accounts we have, why wouldn't they be considered as important as any other 'survivor' story. The problem though with NA accounts is that they have been filtered through translators and depending on the interviewer been asked very leading questions in order to get testimony to support the interviewer's theory. Personally I think that not only do NA accounts need to be re-evaluated but also the accounts passed down to the next generation. It might be my own personal prejudices but I suspect in a society who has a tradition of passing on it's history orally, that those accounts might be closer to the truth than perhaps the Camp interviews.
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mac
Brigadier General
Posts: 1,790
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Post by mac on Dec 13, 2015 12:02:57 GMT
As I mentioned on the Calhoun Hill thread..The accounts are excellent data but often, in Chuck's term, they are foxhole views and we need to know where that foxhole was. JSIT presents the Cheyenne view of the northern part but the rest is then just hearsay or best guess. Cheers
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Post by yanmacca on Dec 13, 2015 12:52:23 GMT
Mac I know it’s difficult to nail down stuff from these accounts especially with a battle fought over such a large area, and this is why I picked out JSIT, because if we take it one step as a time and concentrate on the first phase and how Custer arrived then we can take it from there, as I would expect that ford B would be used more by the Indians on foot returning from the Reno fight and these would have arrived too late to see Custer’s arrival.
Ian.
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Post by quincannon on Dec 13, 2015 17:01:13 GMT
I agree that this matter should have, and deserves a thread of its own.
The first thing I look at when evaluating any of these stories is if they present a logical flow of battle. Regardless of an individuals tactical skill, even bad commanders do things in some logical manner. They may not be the right thing tactically, but most times it can be determined why they did something. The JSIT narrative fits this criteria. Also, I don't think anyone is going to blow smoke up Don Rickey's hind parts and not be called on it. It seems here that Rickey was satisfied enough to affix his name to it.
Therefore if we are going to collectively take this journey we must start I believe just before 3411, and concentrate first on the route taken. We all need to get out our maps and determine a logical route from the south end of the Reno field (before 3411) and go from there.
Don't know if anyone else had the same take away, but to me the JSIT narrative brings Custer at 3411 in some doubt.
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Post by yanmacca on Dec 13, 2015 19:04:22 GMT
Chuck what’s Don Ricky’s book like (40 miles a day on beans and hay), it is on sale for £3.58 including postage which is not too bad, but can be a lot if the book is trash.
Yan.
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Post by deadwoodgultch on Oct 6, 2018 14:19:49 GMT
Hi everyone, I just want to ask you all your opinion about if Reno have had four companies instead of three and its effect on the valley fight, now Reno had one hard flank which extended into the timber, now as far as I know this flank was not turned by the enemy even though it was only lightly defended, I know that one company left the line to counter the threat of Indians stealing the soldiers horses but I don’t think they ever got near the horse holders. Reno’s centre position too, managed to hold and again I don’t think the Indians got close enough to cause any damage, so now we come to his left flank. Now just by looking at any map of the valley fight you would notice this flank as being a weak point, now what would have happened if Reno had a forth company still mounted and operating on the flank, would this had made a difference? Would this had given Reno’s men a longer period of time in skirmish order? If Reno would have had say an extra 15-30 minutes defending the valley floor, and Benteen turned up with another two or three companies and reinforced this left flank, would this be enough to keep the Indians at bay? Now I know that there would have been another 500 or Indians still in the circles but would they have had the confidence to leave the village and go after Custer with so much uncertainty and the valley fight still hanging in the balance? Yan. Ian, this thread has been ignored for too long. This is where the battle was lost, it may never have been won due to the odds. You mention horse holders and the left end of the line. The company there may have been the best trained and managed. The horses never should have been moved to the timber. When the #'s got too great the three companies should have done a fighting controlled withdrawal towards ford A. There in lies my only real fault with Reno in this engagement. Chuck mentioned WIFFS above, there are many to be displayed in the valley. The above is just one.
GAC's mistakes prior to the 25th and early on the 25th are compounded here.
Regards, Tom
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Post by yanmacca on Oct 6, 2018 19:49:20 GMT
Tom, thanks for re-opening this thread, I even forgot what it was about.
I think that Reno had no choice but to halt, but he not only halted he dismounted and took his men forward on foot a short distance and began to defend the ground that he held. Now Reno must have felt that Custer had deserted him but this never stopped him from doing what all soldiers should do and make the most of a bad job. He never for one minute thought, hey the 'ass'-'ole' Custer has left me to hang, so I am turning my command around and heading back, no he and his battalion fought for the ground they stood on. I guess that what Reno went through in that 30 minutes or so from dismount to reaching Reno, must have been the most ghastly 30 minutes of his life and I guess that it would have broken quite a few other officers.
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Post by deadwoodgultch on Oct 6, 2018 22:15:51 GMT
Like the new AV.
Regards, Tom
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