Good stuff! I defer to others on the topic of military strategy and tactics, but I recently saw a civil war documentary that made much the same case you do. That is, while Robert E. Lee, the traitor rebel general is diefied and held out to be the greatest general of the civil war - and one of the greatest in history - it was actually U.S. Grant that has been vastly under-rated. I mean, just the fact the Grant and Lincoln both were in a position to lead the United States and our army at that pivotal time in history almost makes me believe in fate. Our country really needed truly exceptional men in those roles for that brief four year period of history. If lesser men had been president and General of the Army, who knows what course the civil war would have taken?
Grant had far more difficult job than Lee. He had invade a hostile region and attack. James McPherson said best when said the Confederacy could win by not losing. The Union had to win by winning.
Meaning the Confederacy only had to fight to a stalemate to win. They did not have to conquer the Union. Which is a far easier task. It is also important to keep in mind that at that time the advantage lay with the defense. Breech loading rifles, mini balls and rifled artilary gave an entrenched defensive a huge advantage.
This where Grant shines over Lee. Lee consistently used the offensive and Napoleonic era frontal attack which incurred massive casualties that the Confederacy could not afford. That turned great tactical victories, like Chancellorsville into strategic losses. Lee ended up suffering greater casualties than he inflicted on opponents due to his offensive operation which were at odds with the strategic goals of the Confederacy.
Grant, on the other hand, suffered fewer losses than Lee in both absolute terms and as a percentage of his forces. Lee's casualty rate as a percentage of his total forces was about 20% where Grants were around 15%. Grant also inflicted greater casualties on his opponents then he suffered from them. This an amazing figure when you consider Grant had to be on the offensive to when at a time when defensive operations had the advantage.
I'll again use Vicksburg as example. To attack Vicksburg Grant had to invade western Missippi, had to cut his lines of communication and supply and had to face numerically superior forces who had the defensive advantage yet he won the Vicksburg campaign, inflicted 35,000 total casualties on the Confederates while his only suffering 9,000 casualties himself.
Grants Vicksburg victory cut the Confederacy in half, gave the Union complete control of the Mississippi River, eliminated Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and western Tennessee from the war.
Meanwhile Lee decided to go on the offensive by invading Pennsylvania which resulted in the battle of Gettysburg. To do so he denied providing support to Bragg who had Buell's Army of the Ohio trapped outside of Chattanooga and denied support to Pemberton at Vicksburg and actually drew upon men and supplies from those theaters of the war for his his offensive campaign which he lost at Gettysburg. It was a strategic failure of staggering proportions on Lee's behalf. He literally staked the entire war on a gambit and lost his gambit and ultimately the war. This is not the stuff great generals are made from.
If Grant had been in overall command that day instead of Meade the war would have ended that day.
Instead Grant took his Army to Chattanooga where he rescued the trapped Union Army and drove the Army of Tennessee into Georgia which effectively removed Alabama and eastern Tennessee from the war. The Confederate hopes of winning the war were hanging by a thread largely due to Lee's strategic failures and shortly thereafter that thread would be cut.
