Horn2RunAgain
2,500+ Posts
Define "at the front" first. Did he lead charges? No, that is what Lieutenants and Capitans are for. Field grade officers plan and direct. General Officers have total responsibility for those under them.
Patton was a brilliant military strategist. He knew his enemy and he knew how to motivate his men. Look up Operation Quicksilver (the Normandy one; not the A-bomb one); or the breakout in Normandy when Bradley would not push Montgomery to do the job he was assigned; or who turned his Army 90 degrees in freezing weather and saved the Allies in the Battle of the Buldge.
Also, do not believe what you read about what his men thought of him. Yes, there was that 10% who hated him, but the vast majority loved him. In the early seventies, one of the CEO's of a subsidiary of the company I worked for was a Capitan/Major in Patton's army. The love and respect for Patton was quite obvious.
This went far afield, didn't it. My point is (as many WW2 vets) that Patton was nowhere near the front line during ww2. He wasn't battle fatigued like our troops were.
It's fkn easy to desire to start another war, one with Russia that was going to be far bloodier and costly than our assault on Germany - if you don't have empathy for your own troops, or have a good read on their availability for such a long drawn out war. The nation as a whole was ready for peace time. The whims of one nutcase, undisciplined General notwithstanding