This is a picture of the surrender that took place nine months after the poiny an overwhelmingly superior tactician would have demolished Lee

Nine months after the what?

The point at which, if the Overland Campaign had been fought between an excellent union general and a poor Confederate general, we’d expect everything to be finished.

Don’t forget, thinking ahead a bit to WW2…the Allies thought they’d be in Berlin by x-mas of 1944.

They certainly would have been if the German leadership had been as terrible as people say Lee was!

Lee made the mistake of not listening to his subordinates.

You keep throwing non sequiturs with no particular relevance at me. Why?

The Siege of Petersburg was 9 months. It was a different time. It was also the first time trench warfare was a major part of battle. Trying to equate warfare in the 1860s to today doesn’t work. Lee was a good Colonel. He did well in Texas and Mexico.

"It was also the first time trench warfare was a major part of battle" Common myth, people have never heard of the Siege of Sevastopol

The Crimean War did escape my memory. Too many distractions.

But what are you saying? I make the point that instead of a lightning victory, Grant was forced to resort to a torturous 9 month siege. You reply by repeating in turn that "The Siege of Petersburg was 9 months," as if that's not what I'm saying.

There wasn’t going to be a lightning victory. Grant recognized that.

Is there a biography or letter that records Grant making the observation that the war would go on for 12 more months in April 1864?

No.

That was the way battles were fought. Shut down the city. The Confederacy could’ve won. There are plenty of alternative histories that show the path. Lee is overrated. Grant was better at leadership. Sherman/Thomas/Meade were better tacticians.

While there were many protracted struggles over cities in the years 1860-71, it was hardly some kind of universal rule that this was the "way battles were fought," above all other sorts of battles