Reassignment Backfire: Difference between revisions

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* Julius Caesar was sent over to Transalpine Gaul, a far-flung province mostly composed of constantly rebellious barbarians, so that Pompey in Rome wouldn't have to deal with him. Unfortunately, Caesar ended up conquering the ''rest'' of Gaul (modern day France), which made him so popular back home that he was able to gain enough support to overthrow Pompey.

** Caesar was quite happy to be assigned to Transalpine Gaul as:

## He couldn't be taken to court over his massive debts while employed by the republic.

**# He couldn't be taken to court over his massive debts while employed by the republic.

## He was allowed to ''pacify'' much of North-West Europe.

**# He was allowed to ''pacify'' much of North-West Europe.

## He was originally allotted Italy by the Senate as his proconsular province, which would have given him nothing to do, no way of making money to pay off aforementioned debts, and no way of making a name for himself.

**# He was originally allotted Italy by the Senate as his proconsular province, which would have given him nothing to do, no way of making money to pay off aforementioned debts, and no way of making a name for himself.

## He also got Illyria and Cisalpine Gaul.

**# He also got Illyria and Cisalpine Gaul.

** Caesar had originally been assigned to look after the local province but this was in reality an insult, known as looking after the "woods and country paths". It actually took a lot of political skill to secure the impressive Transalpine, Cisalpine Gaul and Illyricum for five years. Pompey was influenctial in Julius Caesar securing it, but it was because he was allied with Caesar at the time.

* Napoleon's entire republican career was this; Italy was a sideshow just to keep the southern border vaguely covered, but it ended up winning the war while the rest of Europe went "huh?". Egypt was a sideshow and an attempt to get rid of him; he came back at the perfect time and position to hasten the fall of the Directoire and take over.

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** The undesirability of the Alaska assignment was actually a key factor in his plan -- after having gone to considerable trouble to get him the Pentagon job in the first place, his superiors would have been notably unwilling to prematurely end it. But when there's a big hole in the TO&E that they're having that much trouble filling, volunteering to be the guy to fill it gets you unquestioning approval.

* Matthew Maury was a naval officer in the Nineteenth Century who broke his legs in a carriage accident. He asked for command of the US Naval observatory. What others looked on as a supremely boring assignment (most of the people there spent their time shuffling paper) Maury used to examine ship's logs and create a chart of currents which ship captains used to speed voyages. In this case it was a downplayed version. Maury's superiors had no personal or political grudge against him; they simply could not figure out how to employ a lame officer.

* How the whole thing with America aiming for and [[American Revolution|successfully claiming independence]] (which eventually led to picking apart the rest of British Empire, for that matter) started? Well…

{{quote|The British government, only too glad to be rid of rebellious Puritans, Quakers, and Roman Catholics, willingly gave them liberal charters. This explains that freedom in many of the old charters which has surprised so many students of our colonial history. Some of these liberal instruments were granted by the Stuart kings, with the approval of their officials and courtiers, all of whom showed by almost every other act of their lives that they were the determined enemies of free parliaments and free representation of the people.

Connecticut, for example, obtained in 1662 from Charles II a charter which made the colony almost independent; and to-day there is no colony of the British empire that has so much freedom as Connecticut and Rhode Island always had, or as Massachusetts had down to 1685.

|'''Sydney George Fisher''', ''[https://archive.org/details/truehistoryofame00fishuoft The True History of the American Revolution]'', 1902}}

[[Category:Index Backfire]]