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The Greatest General in History

The Greatest General in History

  • Napoleon Bonaparta

    Votes: 5 14.3%

  • Genghis Khan

    Votes: 10 28.6%

  • Julius Caesar

    Votes: 4 11.4%

  • Salah ad-Din, Yusuf ibn Ayyub

    Votes: 1 2.9%

  • Georgy Zhukov

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Alexander the Great

    Votes: 10 28.6%

  • Sir Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington

    Votes: 2 5.7%

  • Charles Martel

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Sun Tzu

    Votes: 3 8.6%

  • Akbar the Great

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    35
DDD said:
Hence I voted for Alex :)
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And I agree, partially.

He was perhaps the most important general in history in terms of influence and significance. Exposing the East to Greek civilization and influence, and the introduction of Macedonian rule to huge new swathes of Asia, define his legacy.
 
I voted for Alexander the Great but my first choice would probably be Flavius Belisarius, who with little real support from his emperor Justinian, won a number of major compaigns and reconquered much of the lost Western Roman Empire.
 
DDD said:
Including sending troops at the peak of Syberian winter.
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They invaded in the summer, but winter conditions were a problem in 41-42 because the Germans didn't have winter gear.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Are you defending Patton? There's no argument that he was above average, but if he'd had his way, we would not have stopped the war - we would have continued it against the Russians. And what do you think would have happened when he ran up against Zhukov and a battle-hardened force (with superior armor) many times his number?
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Patton would have out-maneuvered Zukhov. Our superior air power would wrecked their lines of communications.
 
apdst said:
Patton would have out-maneuvered Zukhov. Our superior air power would wrecked their lines of communications.
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Superior Air Power didn't help the Germans. And I'd take a T-34 over a Sherman any day of the week. Only way we win, would be to resort to the A-Bomb.
 
apdst said:
Patton would have out-maneuvered Zukhov. Our superior air power would wrecked their lines of communications.
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Most of their lines of communication were out of range of our air power. And one of the worst mistakes one can make in warfare is to underestimate the enemy - Zhukov was a very, very good general...and after the logistic advantage is taken into consideration, it would have been a very difficult matter for Patton to overcome Zhukov...especially considering that the Soviets had the superior armor.

Don't get me wrong - Patton was a childhood hero of mine. I thought he could take on just about anyone and win...but now that time has passed and I've learned more about the Eastern Front in WWII (I've been a student of military history and especially WWII since I was a child), well, Zhukov would have soundly beaten Patton.
 
MichaelJR said:
I dare say morale is at least 50%. Royal Gurkha rifles, point in proof. Throughout history, large military forces have been overwhelmed by smaller, vicious, more motivated forces. Give them a reason to fight, and forces with high morale will fight as though the devil had possessed them. You can kill a soldier, but you can't kill an idea. Now THAT paired with tactics wins wars.
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Well said! But...ya still gotta have logistics on your side....
 
Wiggen said:
He would have lobbied hard for atomic weapons.
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No doubt. But the fact remains that it would have been several months after Nagasaki that we would have had enough enriched uranium available for even one more atomic bomb...and winter is when the Russians are at their very best....

If you read "Game of Thrones", remember that "Winter is coming"...and the only ones who ever beat General Winter were the Mongols under Genghis Khan....
 
Proud South Korean said:
Battle of Myeongnyang - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Yi-Soon-Sin is easily one of the best generals in the world in my opinion. He won all of his 13 battles which at first glance may seem insignificant, but when one appreciates the odds, his feats truly become astounding. That battle saw 13 Joseon ships against 333 Japanese ships, yet Joseon still won. Although the article is full of problems being a Wiki article about Korea, the basics are still true.
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I really appreciate that! It's not often that I learn about a great battle that I'd never heard of before!
 
Glen Contrarian said:
"Zhukov's army performed much more poorly"???? Dude, you should read up on the Battle of Kursk sometime. The battles of Kursk, Stalingrad, and just outside of Moscow were all much larger than anything we did on the Western Front. The Soviets faced many more German divisions on the Eastern Front than we did on the Western Front.

I posted this as a reply to another guy who thinks as you do, but you should read up on it, too:

=================paste begins==========================

That's what I thought, too...until I began to find out just what we would have faced.

1. During WWII on the European side, air power was not nearly as decisive as you seem to think - it was most effective against stationary infrastructure targets within range of the bombers. The thing is, except for rail hubs, the Soviets didn't depend on much in the way of infrastructure within range of the bombers. If they had been able to reach some of the major cities in the western USSR, then maybe they could have helped...but against mobile armies on the ground, WWII bombers were not that effective - the targeting technology and skill simply weren't there yet. If you'll remember, even our bombing of ground troops in Vietnam when we had total air supremacy and much bigger and better bombers and bombs, we still couldn't shut down the Ho Chi Minh trail.

2. The atomic bombs wouldn't have made any difference at all - for instance, in August of 1945 (four months after Berlin fell), we only had enough enriched uranium for two bombs, and it would have taken several months to make enough for a third bomb. The threat that we could continue bombing Japan with more atomic bombs was essentially a grand bluff. Not only that, but the Soviets had spies at Alamogordo - Stalin apparently indicated that to FDR at the Yalta conference. They knew what we were doing and likely knew what we did and did not have. What's more, our bombers did not have the range to reach, say, Smolensk or Minsk or Kiev, much less Moscow.

3. Look at what the Soviets had just for the Battle of Berlin: "The Battle of the Seelow Heights, fought over four days from 16 April until 19 April, was one of the last pitched battles of World War II: almost one million Red Army soldiers and more than 20,000 tanks and artillery pieces were deployed to break through the "Gates to Berlin" which were defended by about 100,000 German soldiers and 1,200 tanks and guns."

4. Soviet armor was significantly superior to our own - the T-34 medium tank was arguably the best tank of the war. We had the Shermans which - though they were greatly improved by then - were still crappy.

5. We had about 1.3 million men in the U.S. Army in Europe when Germany surrendered, and there were a few hundred thousanfd more Brits and French and a few Poles to boot. The Soviets had:

The three Soviet fronts had altogether some 2.5 million men (including 78,556 soldiers of the 1st Polish Army); 6,250 tanks; 7,500 aircraft; 41,600 artillery pieces and mortars; 3,255 truck-mounted Katyusha rocket launchers, (nicknamed "Stalin Organs"); and 95,383 motor vehicles, many of which were manufactured in the USA.

Most of their air power was fighters - and though the armored IL-2 would have been outmatched by the P-51, they still would have prevented Western air power from being a decisive factor.

6. Most importantly, the Soviet lines of communication - their supply lines - were MUCH shorter and more easily traveled. We would still have had to onload and ship our men and materiel across the Atlantic, then offload them in French ports...whereas the Soviets had made great strides not only in repairing the rails all the way from the Urals to Poland, but had probably begun changing the rails in Poland and Germany to the narrower Soviet guage...which meant that all they had to worry about was one long train ride, most of which was out of range of Allied air power.

And no matter how good you think he was, Patton commanded only one army...and even if he'd been in control of the whole American army, it had already been demonstrated that it was difficult for him to work with the Brits (Montgomery). That was one of Eisenhower's great strengths - he was able to master and coordinate the different nations' armies. I doubt Patton could have done this. Patton was a great tactician and a great motivator...but it takes more than those to be a truly great general.
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And yet, with numerical inferiority and inferiority of equipment, Pattons 3rd army killed, wounded or captured more than 6 times it's numbers. The Soviets, with numerical superiority and possible parity in equipment, tanks, still lost a greater number than they killed, wounded or captured. At such a loss rate, the soviets would of needed 2.4 million, just to handle 3rd army alone, and that is if they suffered only the casualty rate the Germans did, which the Soviets actually lost more. So Qualitative performance puts Patton alone far ahead of what the Soviets had.

Lets see, you also claim the P-51, which was superior and out-performed all German Aircraft except the ME-262 would be out matched by the IL-2 which could not take on the 109s, which the P-51s ate up? Gotcha.
 
Any poll of great generals that includes Alexander and Hannibal and ignores Publius Cornelius Scipio and Gaius Julius Caesar isn't a poll at all.

For my money Scipio Africanus was THE greatest general of antiquity.

I think you can take him out of his "home" the the 2nd century BCE and transport him forward or backward in time, call it, 1400 years and he's just as "unconventional" and just as effective.

He beat Hannibal so there's no comparison worthy of note there.

I find it hard to compare him to Alexander but look at where both started and how far each went.

Alexander's dad handed him what was probably the greatest army in the world up to that point in time and he took it out and defeated a Persia that was, by any reasonable reckoning, no great shakes militarily.

On the other hand, Africanus' first assignment had him take over an army that had been badly mauled in Spain by Hannibal. He was in his mid-twenties at the time, much to young to be considered proper general officer material by Roman standards, had no general officer experience, and only really got the job because, I've heard it argued, nobody else wanted it. And he went on to win every battle against a power which everyone had every reason to believe, and had in fact shown itself to be, militarily superior. He did this on two separate Continents despite the fact that envious factions in the Senate conspired to deprive him of the means of crossing the Med, one of his major victories involved a mass stealth night attack (uncommon to the point of being almost unheard of in the ancient world), and another involved him breaking from traditional manipular Legionary formation in order to mitigate the strength of Hannibal's elephants.

head to head I think Africanus packs the goods to beat Alexander any day of the week and twice on Sunday.

As for mentions earlier in the thread of Patton and Lee...no. Just, no.
 
Ad_Captandum said:
I see you know about as much about the world, history and progress as you do about the government of your backwards and repressive state.
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First of all, you started off commenting and arguing about something that no one had even said.

Second, you obviously have a dislike for Patton for some reason. Being that he was one of the wealthiest Generals in US History and you claim to be a socialist, that could be the reason. You give Montgomery credit for Victory in North Africa but he was actually the third British General and didn't take over until around the same time as Patton when Galt was killed and both were following the strategic plan of Eisenhower.

You also seem to totally disregard that Patton accomplished at least two feats of military prowess that no other military leader has ever done. First he took over a defeated and demoralized army and in 10 days, marched them back into battle and defeated the same enemy. Second, he disengaged part of his army, turned it 90 degrees, marched it further and faster than any army had ever done in history, in the middle of winter no less, and without rest, engaged a superior force and defeated it. No one, not Sun Tzu, not Alexander the Great, and certainly not some dumbass cretin who is retarded enough to be a socialist.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
I'm not so sure of that. The Japanese had great tactical minds, too...but our logistical strength was overwhelming.
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The Japanese made the same mistake that Hitler did: rigid defense.
 
DVSentinel said:
And yet, with numerical inferiority and inferiority of equipment, Pattons 3rd army killed, wounded or captured more than 6 times it's numbers. The Soviets, with numerical superiority and possible parity in equipment, tanks, still lost a greater number than they killed, wounded or captured. At such a loss rate, the soviets would of needed 2.4 million, just to handle 3rd army alone, and that is if they suffered only the casualty rate the Germans did, which the Soviets actually lost more. So Qualitative performance puts Patton alone far ahead of what the Soviets had.

Lets see, you also claim the P-51, which was superior and out-performed all German Aircraft except the ME-262 would be out matched by the IL-2 which could not take on the 109s, which the P-51s ate up? Gotcha.
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1. The Soviets faced FAR greater numbers of German forces - and the more experienced German soldiers - than the American army did. What we faced wasn't even a quarter of what the Soviets faced. You should think about that.

2. I did NOT say that the IL-2 would outmatch the P-51 - in fact, I said quite the opposite. Go back and read what I wrote.

3. Do something really different and LEARN how titanic the struggle was on the Eastern Front. What we did on the Western Front wasn't much more than a sideshow compared to what happened there.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Most of their lines of communication were out of range of our air power. And one of the worst mistakes one can make in warfare is to underestimate the enemy - Zhukov was a very, very good general...and after the logistic advantage is taken into consideration, it would have been a very difficult matter for Patton to overcome Zhukov...especially considering that the Soviets had the superior armor.

Don't get me wrong - Patton was a childhood hero of mine. I thought he could take on just about anyone and win...but now that time has passed and I've learned more about the Eastern Front in WWII (I've been a student of military history and especially WWII since I was a child), well, Zhukov would have soundly beaten Patton.
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Zuhkov was successful because of Lend-Lease, British intel feeding and force of numbers. Patton would have had to make major mistakes for Zhukov to gain the upper-hand.
 
apdst said:
The Japanese made the same mistake that Hitler did: rigid defense.
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Actually, the German generals did not want a rigid defense, but Hitler overrode them.

But the rigid defense doctrine may well have saved the USSR. The Red Army was faltering, falling back in disarray, and quite a few military historians think that Stalin's rigid defense order - "Not one step back" - slowed the advance of the Wehrmacht just enough to keep it from becoming a rout on a grand scale...and just enough to allow the Soviets to move their factories back to the Urals.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
1. The Soviets faced FAR greater numbers of German forces - and the more experienced German soldiers - than the American army did. What we faced wasn't even a quarter of what the Soviets faced. You should think about that.

2. I did NOT say that the IL-2 would outmatch the P-51 - in fact, I said quite the opposite. Go back and read what I wrote.

3. Do something really different and LEARN how titanic the struggle was on the Eastern Front. What we did on the Western Front wasn't much more than a sideshow compared to what happened there.
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American units from the PTO would have been deployed against the Soviets. These are troops that were far more hardened to the horrors of war than the ETO soldiers. They were accustomed to fighting an enemy that literally fought to the death; the Soviets, in general never fought to the death.
 
apdst said:
American units from the PTO would have been deployed against the Soviets. These are troops that were far more hardened to the horrors of war than the ETO soldiers. They were accustomed to fighting an enemy that literally fought to the death; the Soviets, in general never fought to the death.
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Yeah but how long would it of taken them to redeploy all those forces to defend Europe. By the time they did, UK would be the last free country in Europe. They'd be better off invading Vladivostok, opening a second front and attacking the industry that had been moved away from the eastern front.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Actually, the German generals did not want a rigid defense, but Hitler overrode them.
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Yeah...I've already mentioned that.

But the rigid defense doctrine may well have saved the USSR. The Red Army was faltering, falling back in disarray, and quite a few military historians think that Stalin's rigid defense order - "Not one step back" - slowed the advance of the Wehrmacht just enough to keep it from becoming a rout on a grand scale...and just enough to allow the Soviets to move their factories back to the Urals.
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The Soviets had the manpower resources to do that. The Germans and the Japanese didn't.
 
apdst said:
Zuhkov was successful because of Lend-Lease, British intel feeding and force of numbers. Patton would have had to make major mistakes for Zhukov to gain the upper-hand.
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Hardly.

Lend-Lease did help - there's no debate about that. But the Soviet intel was far greater than what the Brits had - check into what led to the Soviet victory at the Battle of Kursk sometime.

And it's a great mistake to underestimate the Soviet generals. We in the West grew up watching and admiring Patton and the other American generals (just like I did), and even the German generals, but during the Cold War it would have been politically incorrect for our media and historians to give proper credit to the Soviet generals. As a result, most Americans have no clue about how much greater the struggle was on the Eastern Front as compared to the Western Front.

What most of us don't realize is that the Soviets would likely have won even if we had never invaded Normandy. If we hadn't opened up another front, the Soviets probably wouldn't have stopped until they reached the Pyrenees...which means that the entire European continent other than Britain would probably have been communist. THAT was the real benefit of Operation Overlord.
 
DVSentinel said:
First of all, you started off commenting and arguing about something that no one had even said.

Second, you obviously have a dislike for Patton for some reason. Being that he was one of the wealthiest Generals in US History and you claim to be a socialist, that could be the reason. You give Montgomery credit for Victory in North Africa but he was actually the third British General and didn't take over until around the same time as Patton when Galt was killed and both were following the strategic plan of Eisenhower.

You also seem to totally disregard that Patton accomplished at least two feats of military prowess that no other military leader has ever done. First he took over a defeated and demoralized army and in 10 days, marched them back into battle and defeated the same enemy. Second, he disengaged part of his army, turned it 90 degrees, marched it further and faster than any army had ever done in history, in the middle of winter no less, and without rest, engaged a superior force and defeated it. No one, not Sun Tzu, not Alexander the Great, and certainly not some dumbass cretin who is retarded enough to be a socialist.
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Okay, I've got to help you out on this. I can't speak for the other guy, but I was a great admirer of Patton for many years...until I learned more about what happened on the Eastern Front.

Patton was a great tactician - but there's a lot more to being a great general than tactics, which is why Eisenhower was a better general.

Yeah, he did really well in his relief of Bastogne...but there are many generals throughout history that did better with less. Genghis Khan's general Subodai faced greater odds and won greater battles over greater distances than Patton ever dreamed.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Hardly.

Lend-Lease did help - there's no debate about that. But the Soviet intel was far greater than what the Brits had - check into what led to the Soviet victory at the Battle of Kursk sometime.

And it's a great mistake to underestimate the Soviet generals. We in the West grew up watching and admiring Patton and the other American generals (just like I did), and even the German generals, but during the Cold War it would have been politically incorrect for our media and historians to give proper credit to the Soviet generals. As a result, most Americans have no clue about how much greater the struggle was on the Eastern Front as compared to the Western Front.

What most of us don't realize is that the Soviets would likely have won even if we had never invaded Normandy. If we hadn't opened up another front, the Soviets probably wouldn't have stopped until they reached the Pyrenees...which means that the entire European continent other than Britain would probably have been communist. THAT was the real benefit of Operation Overlord.
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The Brits had cracked the Enigma Code and that info was being spoon-fed to the Soviets. The only real Soviet intel source was an operator in Switzerland--The Red Trio, ran by Sandor Rudo--that did nothing more than confirm the info the Soviets recieved from Bletchly Park.
.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Okay, I've got to help you out on this. I can't speak for the other guy, but I was a great admirer of Patton for many years...until I learned more about what happened on the Eastern Front.

Patton was a great tactician - but there's a lot more to being a great general than tactics, which is why Eisenhower was a better general.

Yeah, he did really well in his relief of Bastogne...but there are many generals throughout history that did better with less. Genghis Khan's general Subodai faced greater odds and won greater battles over greater distances than Patton ever dreamed.
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Battlefield tactics are what win the day. You'll never prove otherwise.
 
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