I am a fan of the Desert Fox but I would take Heinz Guderian before Rommel. That said both were brilliant.

One thing to not lose track of the US today can be anywhere in the world with an impressive show of force in a few hours and has the capability to destroy the world in even less time.

The Mongols never even took Korea or Japan. Just think about that for a minute if you want to who pick had/has the best shot of actually taking over the world.

Destroying the world and taking it over are 2 different things. Russia could probably destroy the world as well but that doesn't really mean much. No nation on earth has ever been capable of taking over the world.

This we both agree.

Some of the tactics that the Mongols used were well over the line of anything we see in the modern world. They used all the item's in their bag of tricks, and still fell short of capability in ruling the world.

It's interesting to me because if you go to a sports board like here on 2 + 2 people tend to highly overvalue the talents of current sports stars and undervalue those of the past.

If you go to a History board many posters seriously underrate the more recent figures. England and the United States are two of the greatest powers the world has ever seen and both have had most impressive leaders and campaigns.

My post was very specific to wil318466: "During their respective times, Khan/Hitler had the best chances to actually "take over the world", even though I personally view that as impossible."

Neither had any shot at this. As much as the Mongols assimilated from others they never mastered any amphibious or sea warfare. Their Japan campaigns were an absolute disaster. They went about as far as they ever could as impressive as that was.

As for Germany they were a long way away from any chance at this either. The Mongols, Alexander and the Greeks, The Persians and the Romans were much further along to reach this goal then then German's were ever capable.

My point was the US and England at the peak of it's empire were the closest in capability to "take over the world" even though no-one thinks of that as a potential reality in 2012.

I absolutely agree about England in terms of ''world conquest'' in a gaming sense. I would say that if you put the duke of malborough at the top of the england in the 19th century and you could see the world dominated. However we are adding the navy in here(which i always do not take in account in military leaders, as they are in their own).

America, like Greece and China, dominates through its Cultural influence. While it has the military to steam roll most of the world(but in the process probably turn earth into a nuclear wasteland, in a similar way that the mongols destroyed cities).

As previously said, on a set battlefield, with specific forces,

For a single battle, i think Napoleon, Hannibal, Malborough, Suvorov, Ibn-Walid

For a Campaign which includes logisitics and training of forces, i would go Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, Alexander, Han Xin(for those who saw my top 100, those are in the top as well, and this is my criteria)

For a Grand Campaign, which includes pacification of conquered territory, diplomacy, logistics on a massive scale, recruitment, technology, economics and so on, i would go with Caesar, Sulla, Taizong. Note that in this category you begin to fall in ''Great leaders'' and not great military leaders.

I'm gonna have to disagree about the England part. It should really be Britain. For example, between 1885 and 1939 one third of colonial governors general were Scots.

Badger, why do you have such a high opinion of Clausewitz? If he wrote plainly (ie sans the Hegelian dialectics), On War would have been a 20 page pamphlet.

As an Englishman, I agree with this correction. Scots were a major contributor to the British Empire during its rise and peak. Sure, the English were in charge per se, but it was definitely a British Empire, not English Empire.

'When people say England, they sometimes mean Great Britain, sometimes the United Kingdom, sometimes the British Isles -but never England.'

How to be an Alien' by George Mikes

Many people including me use the England term interchangeably with Britain. I know it's technically wrong but everyone still seems to understand what it means. Not trying to offend. I have great respect for you, and your countries history.

I also think the term 'English' makes people think of the pan-world language and its speakers in many countries, rather than the people of England - British doesn't have that implicit confusion.

Courage, above all things, is the first quality of a warrior.
Karl Von Clausewitz


John Boyd one of my mentors (Interestingly Boyd's best work turns out to be less then a 20 page pamphlet and some slides) spent much time bashing Clausewitz. I spent more hours then a care to even try to compute studying and discussing Clausewitz.

Unlike Boyd who had a love hate relationship with everything in life, I came more and more to respect Clausewitz's work. It is brilliant. Not an easy read and not easy to assimilate, but Boyd's work was not either. I came to understand that Boyd was so committed to "maneuver warfare" that he felt he needed to completely intellectually destroy Clausewitz's work. Boyd was absolutely right about some serious philosophical flaws in Clausewitz's work but that doesn't mean that there is not great value to a military commander or historian to study his work.

I think Napoleon's is overrated, that has not stopped me from spending a great deal of time studying his tactics in particular his use of mobility, something that the Mongols excelled in as well.

If I could take one document back in time with me to try to rule the world with my GOAT Military Commander............

The Thirty-Six Stratagems would be my first choice. It is a Chinese essay used to illustrate a series of stratagems used in politics, war, as well as in civil interaction, often through unorthodox or deceptive means.

Briefings by - Colonel John R. Boyd, USAF would be my 2nd choice.

Sun Tzu would be my 3rd choice.

Written in 1989 as a philosophical and strategic guide-book for the US. Marine Corps, Warfighting, would be my next choice.

To round out my top, 5 list would be Clausewitz.

If this thread is of great interest to you, all the documents above are no-brainer to check out. Boyd stuff can be secured online for free as well as the Marine Corps, Warfighting manual.These are powerful documents that many of the people closest to John Boyd felt was too dangerous to provide to easy access. I know if I could go back in time I would certainly want to keep these documents to myself as they are roadmap to being a military GOAT.


Never forget that no military leader has ever become great without audacity.
Karl Von Clausewitz

That may be part of the problem, if the book wasn't written in that high Hegelian style, it may have taken you fewer hours to study and discuss.

who came the closest to ruling the entire world?? that guy

Queen Victoria?

Apple?

It's a pet peeve as I've never really understood if others are referring to Britain or specifically England when they use the term. You've kinda clarified it though.

To add to that, despite what I've said above I don't get offended by it.

/End derail

and Microsoft. But any discussion must be in a different Forum or thread.

This thread is strictly about the military.

The Lounge Forum is going to discuss the movie Zulu, which is a fairly reasonable (for a movie) rendition of the famous Battle of Rorke’s Drift that occurred in South Africa in 1879. The link to the Lounge Forum Thread:


http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/63.../#post35192213


The military buffs and others of the History Fourm are invited to participate in the discussion to add their perspective and knowledge. Below is a link to a website that has accurate information on the Battle:

http://www.britishbattles.com/zulu-war/rorkes-drift.htm

Adaptation, ETA on revised list?

End of the week. Im going to do a + and - like they do in power rankings, this requires considerable work.

Any study of the maps at the time shows why Stalingrad had, had, had to be taken and held if the Germans wanted to operate south of there in the Caucasus region. It's where the Volga and the Don nearly meet. Capture Stalingrad and your left flank is secure (notice how the volga forms a beautiful NE facing defensive line after Stalingrad/Volgograd). Leave Stalingrad in Russian hands and a completely devastating attack down the Don towards the Sea of Azov is a terrifying possibility.

Stalingrad is one of those places on the map where the geography meant a huge battle would be fought there.

I have studied Jackson pretty thoroughly. His valley campaign is really brilliant. I feel like it can't be appreciated without serious study. There are very subtle demands he has to deal with: defeating the union forces and not allowing them to withdraw east, threatening the Potomac to provoke a response without getting cutoff, defeating separate armies in detail while denying them a chance to join, and then withdrawing in time to help in the Peninsula campaign while leaving his opponents stranded far away from the action.

And then he seriously sucked in the seven days battles. While Lee was brilliant in those battles. He was dealing with a very powerful (overwhelming really) threat to Richmond. Lee lashed out strong at the enemy, improvised quickly when conditions unexpectedly changed, and should have bagged at least a major chunk of the union army if his lieutenants hadn't failed him.

Lee didn't rest after that either. He quickly pushed on to Second Manassas, where Jackson was brilliant again, and Maryland, where Jackson was great also.

Seems unfair to Hannibal. He was just a guy in charge of his one army. It's not his fault that while he was being awesome the rest of the Carthaginian world was acting like they weren't really at war.

McClellan gets a bad rap because Lee made him look foolish by comparison. He was actually a good general and his cautious style was probably a good one though it certainly hurt at times. More aggressive leaders like Pope fared much worse when they tried to mix it up with Jackson, Longstreet and Lee. And Burnside's attempt to steamroll the confederates at Fredricksburg didn't work well either.

Not sure why anyone would lol at Hooker. His fantastic plan at Chancelorsville gives me a boner. Lee and Jackson responded with an insane counterattack that was so bold no sane general would try it. Can't really blame him for failing to anticipate that. Then it looked like utter disaster would befall the union army but Hooker very competently led from the front and almost squeezed Lee to death. It was only after Hooker was stunned by a cannonball that defeat was admitted.

Cortes's accomplishments are incredible. Too do so much with so little...

That said, the Spanish definitely did not conduct themselves honorably (repeatedly violating flags of truce, kidnapping, etc). I think this hurts their standing with historians.

I think you way overestimate the Spanish advantages. They had metal. They had a few horses. They had some primitive, terrible firearms. They had the ability to build sailing ships from scratch.

They also had no supply from home, were in parts unknown and were surrounded by openly hostile and potentially hostile people that outnumbered them several hundred to 1.

Cortes also had a crew of nobodies for soldiers.

On the day they burned the ships at Veracruz, the Spanish were way, way less than 50/50 to succeed.

Tecumseh is the best one imo. The day he died the possibility of natives holding on to any land in America died too imo.

Chief Joseph also comes to mind, but for conducting a hopeless campaign against overwhelming forces.

This is not at all like Cortes' situation.

Also, it seems like Ghengis Khan is a bit overrated itt. The Mongols kicked ass just as well when he wasn't around.

I'm trying to say this nicely, but I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about.

I guess I could simply pull up the Wikipedia articles, but I remember reading/watching shows about how devastating the advantage of the Spaniards was. It was in no means at all a fight. I don't know of any other way to explain this. If you viewed it as 50/50 then so be it, but when the k/d ratio is 400 - 1, something is seriously wrong. There really isn't any need to debate this further, you either believe it or you don't.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish...he_Inca_Empire

"The fact that such a small number of Spanish troops were able to defeat the thousands Inca warriors at Cajamarca is attributable to many factors, among them that the Spanish had caballeros, cannon and guns while the Inca had only rustic armament. The Inca Empire also had a highly centralized chain of command directly related to the emperor's well-being or military victories which created a fictional perception of how the various gods perceived the Inca to either soldiers or commoners alike. This meant that once the Spaniards held the emperor hostage, they effectively paralyzed the empires' forces for a time.

At the signal to attack, the Spaniards unleashed volleys of gunfire at the vulnerable mass of Incas and surged forward in a concerted action. The effect was devastating, the shocked Incas offered such feeble resistance that the battle has often been labeled a massacre with the Inca losing 2,000 dead compared to five of Pizarro's men. Contemporary accounts by members of Pizarro's force explain how the Spanish forces used a cavalry charge against the Inca forces, who had never seen horses, in combination with gunfire from cover (the Inca forces also had never encountered guns before). Other factors in the Spaniard's favor were their steel swords, helmets and armor, against the Inca forces which only had leather armor and crude armament. The Spanish also had three small cannon which were used to great effect on the crowded town square. The first target of the Spanish attack was the Inca Emperor and his top commanders; once these had been killed or captured the Inca forces were disorganized as the command structure of the army had been effectively decapitated."

Khan brought them together. They were never as organized and concentrated until Khan came along.

I just want to be clear the same type of stuff could be said for the Mongols campaigns.

The time of the Mongols greatest conquests was in the Dark Ages. Not Europe's most advanced or brightest period. For example, some of the roads that Roman Republic/Empire were still the best the Europe had to offer, built hundreds of years before.

Everyone is use to the narrative of Europe being ahead of the rest of the world in technology until the 20th Century. This Mongol horde whipped up on these juggernaut powers. This was not the case when the Mongols were conquering. Many of the Mongol campaigns were like the Spaniards fighting the Inca's or the US Gulf war. The Mongols were not fighting the best Europe or Asia had to offer in it's great history and they were using superior technology including primitive biological warfare. We need to face that reality when underrating the US Gulf war campaign or Spanish Conquistadors and elevating Khan ahead of some many other commanders that defeated much stronger competition.