Most Efficient Army

[privatehudson]

I don't think they did

 

[Xen]

did what? make a badass movie- I have to disgree with you there, i definatley though that movie was badass too

 

[privatehudson]

I was reffering to the roman army....

Gladiator is a nice movie, good visuals and music, well acted, awful history. Someone should have made the writers sit down and actually READ a history book for a change

 

[Sarevok]

it was still good though.

 

[Lynx]

a good movie indeed, i own it

 

[Sarevok]

of course.

 

[Cactus_Jack]

Originally posted by Sarevok
Xen, this is not who are the most efficient civs, its who are the most efficient armies. The mongols were a DAMN good army and very strong. If you want to compare time, Napoleon barely lasted 20 years, yet his army was very efficient and conquered a great deal of land and they only failed when they were totally overextended.

Basicly if Napoleon didnt messs up in russia and like lose 75 percent of his army to the cold. France would rule europe now. People may laugh at the french for losing in world war two, but would britian escaped the same fate if there was no such thing as the channel? Rember in Veitnam the usa was bombing the **** out the place and still withdrawed after onlu 50.000 troops compared to 2 million veitcong.

 

[Sarevok]

true, most people just overlook the statistics.

 

[HighlandWarrior]

mongol horde.

 

[Sarevok]

of course

 

[Titan2018]

I'd say the Roman legions.

Edit: although its hard to compare armies across such a huge timespan because of the differances in technology. i.e. a aquad of marines today is eual to a Roman legion interms of firepower.

 

[addiv]

The Swedish army at the end of the 17th century.

 

[Sarevok]

i should have put them on there shouldnt i?

 

[Moff Jerjerrod]

My vote for the worlds most efficient army is Zahal. (Israel Defense Forces)

 

[Jorge]

Depends on the definition of efficiency. I think spanish conquistador's did pretty well, conquering almost all South America with very few men.

 

[Sarevok]

my definition is an army who even being outnumbered ridiculously can defeat just about any enemy with seeming ease.

 

[privatehudson]

Originally posted by Jorge
Depends on the definition of efficiency. I think spanish conquistador's did pretty well, conquering almost all South America with very few men.

But with vast numbers of allies to fight alongside them in Cortez's case, and a civil war to distract the enemy in Pizarro's. Both had vastly superior technology also.

IMO Zahal between the 50's and 70's were an excellent armed force, but again more than the quality of their troops played the part in their victory, in places like the Golan heights in 73 the terrain, superior vehicles and so on were also heavily responsible for the results.

 

[Martacus]

Originally posted by privatehudson


But with vast numbers of allies to fight alongside them in Cortez's case, and a civil war to distract the enemy in Pizarro's. Both had vastly superior technology also.

Don't forget, disease was on their side as well.

As for Napoleon, I can understand him being on the list, but not for the Grand Army. IIRC, prior to building that his military forces were based around small, swift units, not the huge lumbering masses of soldiers that were prevalent in other European armies at the time. Going big slowed him down; a major mistake. After that he just kept losing.

The most efficient army I've ever seen is the army of one howitzer that conquers the world. That's efficiency! As for real-life armies, I can't say for certain, but I'll join the crowd and say the Romans.

 

[privatehudson]

I was just referring to the battle conditions really, disease weakened the numbers of Indians in each case, but had less effect in actual battle, more a campaign issue.

 

[privatehudson]

As for Napoleon, I can understand him being on the list, but not for the Grand Army. IIRC, prior to building that his military forces were based around small, swift units, not the huge lumbering masses of soldiers that were prevalent in other European armies at the time. Going big slowed him down; a major mistake. After that he just kept losing.

Not exactly, Napoleon's Grand Army or armies saw action from 1805 onwards, and in 1805 they outmarched, outfought and trounced Austria/Russia. The grand army basically consisted of individual Corps which consisted of all 3 arms, plus reserve formations such as the I. Guard, Oudinot's combined Grenadier units and Heavy cavalry formations. An excellent expample of the Corps ability was Davout in the 1806 campaign where he alone faced off against the 50,000 men of the Prussian army with just 27,000 of his own whilst Napoleon with some 90,000 of the French army fought the remainder, only some 47,000. Davout not only held the Prussians all day, but when the day came to an end threw back their army into dissaray and drove them from the field with help from a tardy Benadotte. This also matches your comment on the bigger european armies being clumsy.

Whilst this matches your theory about the smaller formations, it was the way in which these operated under the Grand Army system that made them excel. Alone and unco-ordianted they would more often than not be seperated and defeated in detail. Napoleon's system of march allowed them to advance on the enemy quickly and each be in support of the other. This enabled the army to quickly concentrate at specific points as the enemy were located. Without this ability, disaster would be likely, for example had a lesser man than Davout fought the above battle, unsupported he would have been crushed. Napoleon also made excellet use of Berthier, his incomparable chief of staff which helped hold the army together.

Also the system usually performed well even with larger armies, what often failed the system was the inconcistency of it's commanders. Take Auerstadt, the battle mentioned above, an even larger victory could have been achieved, but for the stubborn attitude of Bernadotte, who was supposed to be in support of Davout but arrived very late in the battle. At least one of the penninsula battles was lost due to the reluctance of French commanders to co-operate and unite against Wellington. Some of the 1813 battles could have been greater victories but for the problems Napoleon's subordinates caused.

So to me, it was the combination of the excellent corps system coupled with the excellence of the Grand Army in bringing the Corps together to fight the enemy that made the armies sucessfull across europe.