But in my opinion, that is nothing but cope. A good general should realize that they have no chance to achieve victory and instead seek an alternative route, either through diplomacy or an insurgency, not draw out the inevitable and waste lives for nothing.
Related: The Civil War is extremely formative to the US approach to war in a way that went away from the European established approach (decisive battles convincing one side to give up). The US model was broadly "deny all alternatives to surrender", a model developed by the Sherman/Grant "total war".