Posted on 11/14/2004 5:23:06 PM PST by Cyropaedia
In light of the upcoming film Alexander (the Great), who in your opinion were actually the greatest military commanders our world has known...?
Mine are Genghis Khan, Alexander, and U.S. Grant.
Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, George Patton.
IIRC, Patton was not in command at Kasserine. The command structure prior to Pattons arrival AFTER Kasserine was part of the problem. Eisenhower was aloof & passive at the time. II Corps was commanded by Lloyd Freydendahl at Kassarine and I think he was operating under the direction of a British General (Anderson?).
Anyway, I think Patton had his faults, but Kasserine was not his failure as he was still back at Casablanca playing host to FDR & Churchill.
Von Manstein failed to get into Kursk. He got beat.
I think that the 'undefeated criteria' is a little unfair. Sometimes a general is just handed a losing hand and the best he can do is mitigate a defeat (MacArthur in the Philippines; Lee in the Wilderness, etc.) I don't think Phil Sheridan was ever defeated. He was a good general at the tactical & strategic levels, but one one of the greats, IMHO.
I agree that Giap deserves to be mentioned. It was his method that ultimately won the strategic victory, even if he did get removed from active command after Tet '68. Some would say that he overreached there and departed from his 'game plan'.
Perhaps you are right, but Lee was an aggressive military commander. Lee obviosly was not going to sit still in northern Virginia and be crushed by a larger force. Sooner or later you have to assume even the most poorly-led force is going to get a clue (or get lucky). I guess what I'm saying is that Lee-being-Lee, he could do nothing else.
This is why Jefferson Davis comes in for so much criticism. It was his "military genius" that selected the major field commanders for the Confederacy. Lee was brilliant in raising the siege of Richmond in the 7 Days. His aggressiveness was just what the situation required. But perhaps the South couldn't afford him in the long run.
Joe Johnston, the man Lee replaced, would probably have followed the course of action that you suggested. He was not as brilliant as Lee, but he was a solid general. Alas, he never held the confidence of Jeff Davis.
Forgot about Kursk. Scratch Von Manstein. Guderian remains, but he was already forced into retirement.
Yes, the undefeated criterion is unfair in determining the greatest general, or the best sports team coach. But it is a nice clear, crisp criterion nevertheless. Some of the world-changing generals of history, Alexander in particular, comes to mind. Was Cyrus the Great ever defeated? His achievement probably exceeds Alexanders, for Alexander had but one great empire to conquer, thqat build by Cyrus, while Cyrus had many.
As to MacArthur in the Philippines: yes, he was dealt a bad hand. But the American forces were not really PREPARED for the onslaught that was coming either. MacArthur was far too passive. The same thing happened in Korea. MacArthur was SURPRISED by the Chinese counterassault. He had intelligence, but he disregarded it. Perhaps he was playing brinkmanship with the President, and thought that the prospect of a sudden reverse might prompt the use of the atomic bomb, which his plan advocated, but about which he was rebuked. It is difficult to say.
I don't have an axe to grind with MacArthur, but it remains true that the Americans weren't just outnumbered in the Philippines, they were surprised. And they weren't just outnumbered in Korea, they were surprised. I might give him a pass on the Philippines, but what happened in Korea was MacArthur's fault.
Washington didn't just wait for the enemy to come to him.
In Boston, he pressed an encirclement and caused the enemy to retreat.
New York did not go well, but it was Washington who pressed into the City for the fight.
The attack on Trenton was bold, and an important turning point.
To the extent that Saratoga can be credited to Washington's overall strategic plan: keep Howe facing him, to let Schuyler, then Gates, amass the militia and cut-off Burgoyne, although Washington didn't pass to the attack, he kept the enemy fascinated with him long enough to prevent the enemy from using the one wing of his army to rescue the other.
And there have been generals like Washington, who were frequently defeated but still achieved their goals. They weren't the greatest of generals, but do they count as "winners" or "losers"?
Also, a general or army that was top flight in its prime might decay over time to the point where a lesser commander can beat them. I'm not convinced that if we examine their whole careers, that Wellington would come off a better general than Napoleon.
Even if Wellington does come out better for his victory, it doesn't mean that Napoleon -- whatever his faults -- wasn't one of history's greatest commanders.
It is said that an NVA officer referenced Gen. Greene when a visiting American officer made the comment that the "NVA never defeated the US Army in battle." The reply was something like, "Do you not recall your own Gen. Greene?"
I don't really disagree with you.
The trouble is in finding some sort of criteria you can apply across places and times. Napoleon and Wellington met on one battlefield, but otherwise were not on the same plane of existence. Napoleon was an Emperor, not just the commander of an army, but the commander of armies and ruler of nations. And he got there through his sword. Wellington was a good general who, along with Blucher, won the Battle of Waterloo (without Blucher's reinforcements, the English would have been ground down to nothing at Waterloo. They won, of course, but the French only broke because the Prussians began to arrive and Napoleon got desperate and launched a desperate gambit which failed. This is not to denigrate the Allied victory at Waterloo, but it is to point out something. Wellington was not the victor at Waterloo. Wellington AND Blucher were the victors at Waterloo. This was one famous battle. Wellington did not drive the agenda of Europe for a decade. Napoleon did.
Perhaps a different criteria yet again we could apply to determine the greatest generals would be charisma: which ones were the true leaders of men in the way that Alexander and Napoleon, and Nelson and Lee clearly were, but Eisenhower and Wellington, great though they were, were not. MacArthur had that quality, but he made a couple of staggering mistakes and got surprised, which reduces him.
If we use those criteria, then the greatest would have to be said to be Cyrus the Great, Alexander, Caesar, Trajan, Aetius, Charlemagne, Napoleon...it's difficult to be objective in modern times.
Of the American World War II generals, MacArthur had the charisma, but he made some real bad mistakes in getting surprised in the Philippines and Korea.
Eisenhower was a master planner and diplomat, and by other criteria I suggested above, truly great. But the standard of charismatic leadership, however, he doesn't quite match up.
Maybe Patton, although it is difficult to say.
Yes, Nathanael Greene was a splendid commander. He pricked the hide of Cornwallis, causing the good lord to lose his cool and take a very rash decision. Washington saw the opportunity provided and exploited it. The Yorktown campaign was Washington's finest hour.
Interestingly, I have a different take on the Saratoga campaign than is the norm. Gates historically got credit for the victory. Tacticians credit General Benedict Arnold. But I think the real victor of Saratoga was neither of those, but was General Philip Schulyer, who was relieved of command by Gates.
Talk about an impossible job! Schuyler was facing a descending British professional Army and he had nothing but ragtag militia and no supply line. Schuyler addressed that last, crucial element. Schuyler gave Gates not an unsupplied and disordered militia rabble, but an organized army (albeit composed of militia). He created a command and control structure and established a functioning supply train. And in those desolate woods of the Adirondacks, in the end I think it was THAT, more than anything that happened in the field, that gave the Americans the victory. The Americans were not strong, but they were able to keep a larger body of men in the field, under command, and most importantly SUPPLIED in an empty forest that otherwise would yield nothing at all. The British were in the same forest, but couldn't keep themselves supplied. And the result was the capture of Burgoyne's army, and the victory of the Americans. Now, Gates got the credit because he was in overall command when the battle happened. And Benedict Arnold deserves credit for starting the battle that Gates was as likely as not to shy away from (which may have allowed the British an opportunity to escape). But that the Americans were able to command and to supply a large army in the woods: that was what Philip Schuyler put his mind to in command. That was what he built. Of course logisitics are not sexy. But no other general of the American War actually put together such a large logistical and command and control structure from scratch so quickly, and so decisively.
Had Gates NOT taken command, would General Schuyler have beaten the British at Saratoga?
Yes.
Because he had put them in an impossible situation: he had a bigger army than they did, and he could FEED it. They couldn't.
I don't expect many people are going to give credit to Schuyler as the architect of the victory at Saratoga, because his own contemporaries - notably those not eager to share the glory or have another major general in command around them - didn't have good things to say for him (he took command of a chaos, and in true blunt Dutch fashion didn't conceal his concerns for the fatal weakness of his army.
As it happened, if I recall correctly, he was quite ill by the time the battle was joined anyway, so I wouldn't say that Saratoga was a victory STOLEN from Schuyler. Gates (and Arnold) are properly credited for the victory, but I don't think there would have been a victory had Schuyler not given them an army in the wilderness, scratched together out of nothing and (barely) adequately supplied.
He won't be listed as one of the greats, but Philip Schuyler deserves a lot more credit than it occurs to anyone to give him for the decisive victory at Saratoga.
God Almighty.
Wellington has to rank very high. If memory serves, he never lost a battle; and generally he had to fight with troops far less numerous than his opponents.
Just my inexpert opinion:
The commanders of the destroyers (and destroyer escorts) of Taffy 3,
the group that kept some monster ships of the Japanese Navy from
attacking a defenseless beachhead in The Philippines.
Every time the story of these "Tin Can Sailors" shows on The History
Channel or The Discovery Channel, it scares the cr-p out of me,
thinking about charging cruisers with a destroyer.
Great book about it:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0553381482/qid=1135728793/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/002-1664605-6567256?s=books&v=glance&n=283155
Of course, I admit that these commanders might rank on the list of
"most courageous", more than "best" commander in terms of technical brilliance.
MacArthur has to be at the top of US military commanders. He fought against an enemy far more numerous; he fought with very meager supplies and a long way from his main source of supply; and he was the first to successfully integrate air, land, and sea power on a consistent basis. He was not afraid to take great risks and his casualties were low.
Classic example of boxer vs puncher. Given equal resources, Lee might have beaten Grant 9 times out of 10, provided his inclination to treat war as a gentleman's contest didn't get in the way.
I agree. Jean Francois Kerry.
Kinda sorta disagree. Grant's campaigns in the west showed that he had a good grasp of both tactics and strategy. His campaigns in the east simply took advantage of the vastly greater resources he had to wear down the enemy in the quickest possible way. That, in itself, isn't bad strategy or tactics.
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