American Front by Harry Turtledove

before we undertake it. If we can throw a strong force of infantry into Kentucky, they’ll beat down the Confederates’ defenses there, allowing our cavalry to get into the enemy’s rear and complete his destruction as he flees. If the sailors can hold off the Rebel river monitors—”
    “Yes, sir—if,” Dowling said. If, on the other hand, one of those heavily armed, heavily armored craft got loose among the barges and such shipping Americans across the river, the slaughter would be horrendous. And, since the monitors were so heavily armored, holding them away from the landing force would be anything but easy—no wonder the Navy was shillyshallying about that.
    “I shall go to the front,” Custer said suddenly, catching Dowling off guard. “Yes, that’s what I’ll do. My presence there will surely inspire the men to give the utmost effort. And,” he added with an angry snort, “I am sick to death of being bombarded with telegrams demanding that I move faster. Roosevelt delights in having the War Department nag me. He has delighted in making my life difficult for more than thirty years.” The general commanding First Army and the president had fought the British together during the Second Mexican War. By all the signs, neither had enjoyed the experience. Custer went on. “We are punching into Canada, I hear—but that is all Roosevelt will let me do: hear about it, I mean.”
    “Yes, sir,” Dowling said in his most placating tones.
    That did no good. Custer was off to the races: “Damn it to hell and gone,
I
should be the one punching into Canada. Roosevelt knows what I owe the goddamn Canucks. They murdered my brother—shot him down like a dog in front of my eyes. I
deserve
that command, and the chance to take revenge at last. But do I get it? Have I any chance of getting it? No, by jingo! Roosevelt has had it in for me since 1881, and he will not give it to me—not till my dying day, I wager. The one thing I want more than any other in all the world, and I cannot have it. Do you know—have you got any idea—how maddening that is?”
    “I’m sure it must be, sir,” Dowling said with some sympathy—some, but not much, for he’d been listening to Custer on the same subject for longer than he wanted to. Custer would not let it go. He clung like a bulldog, or, considering the bare natural state of his gums, perhaps more like a leech.
    He took a couple of deep breaths, then went on, “We are fighting hard all across the plains. We have invaded western Virginia—so why, the brass hats in Philadelphia demand, don’t I move? Idiots! Cretins! Imbeciles! Because Teddy Roosevelt has it in for me, they do, too. To them, Dowling, the Ohio and the Mississippi are little squiggly blue lines on a map, nothing more. I am the one who has to find the way across. Make arrangements at once to transfer headquarters to Vienna, Illinois, as soon as is practicable. Why are you still standing there gaping?”
    “I’ll attend to it immediately, sir,” Dowling promised. Custer had a point—throwing an army into Confederate territory wasn’t going to be easy here. But if he thought his presence at the front would help things along, he was probably fooling himself. Whether he understood it or not, war had changed over the past fifty years. Most of the soldiers wouldn’t know he arrived, and most of the ones who did know wouldn’t care.
    “And one more thing,” Custer ordered. “Keep it secret. Half these Missourians and more than half the downstate Illinoisans wish they were Rebs. Our scouts may have trouble in Kentucky, but theirs, I have no doubt, enjoy a fine old time here.”
    “I’ll take care of that, too, sir,” Dowling said. “If the Germans can keep their plans secret from the damned Frenchmen they rule in Alsace-Lorraine, I expect we can keep the would-be Southerners from getting word of ours.”
    “We’d better.” Custer bared his teeth in what was meant for a fearsome grimace. Since those teeth