One definition of madness

Gen. George Armstrong Custer, born this day in 1839, once wrote: "You ask me if I will not be glad when the last battle is fought, so far as the country is concerned I, of course, must wish for peace, and will be glad when the war is ended, but if I answer for myself alone, I must say that I shall regret to see the war end. ... I would be willing, yes glad, to see a battle every day during my life." The "Boy General" was speaking of the Civil War in a letter to a cousin in October 1862. I suspect most of the 625,000 soldiers who died in that conflagration -- along with the 268 US soldiers (and an unknown number of Native Americans) who perished with Custer at the Little Big Horn -- would beg to differ with his lust for endless war.