most powerfull general ever

[Gruntboy]

Don't want to just pick at peoples choices but there are *so* many variables.

Just to be a little iconoclastic, take Zhukov and Napolean. Anyone can win a battle with massed artillery and tank armies against a materially exhausted foe. A better example might have been his brilliance aganist the Japanese at Kalkin Gol (sp?) (1938). As for Napolean, what did he really achieve in the long run, for all those glorious decisive battles? He was defeated and exiled twice and brought nothing but ruin to France. If he was an able a diplomat as he was at winning battles...

 

[ceebs]

In the build up to the normandy invasions a group of American generals went to visit the philosophy department at the university of Cambridge during the meal the generals were asked how you judged wether someone was a great general or not.

after much discussion the generals decided that to be considered a great general you had to win five battles. after further discussion they came to the conclusion that 3 out of every hundred generals could be called great

after a few minutes calculations the philosophers came back with the fact that generalship was all luck. If you assume that each side has a 50/50 chance of winning each battle then you can see that aproximately 3% of generals will win 5 battles

It's about 10 years since I heard this story and if I remember correctly it was Bradley and Wittgenstein who were the main opponents in this debate, but have been unable to track down the origins of it

 

[Gruntboy]

Nice story and the maths is right.

But 5 battles is such an arbitrary number.

Although Napolean did ask of potential candidates for Generals, "Is he lucky?"

 

[DingBat]

Well, in order to get your Field Marshall's baton in the German Army, you used to have to:

- Win a campaign or war
- Conduct a successful siege

So, at least there was some criteria involved.

Btw, Manstein won his baton for the seige of Sebastopol, so in some cases it was still being applied even in WW2.

/bruce

 

[Cosine]

Patton: he was the only American general that the Nazi regime feared...I saw Rommel mentioned....I do believe Patton defeated him.

And i'm sorry to say that I think whoever came up with the Pearl Harbor attack was brilliant, sad to say he was playing for the wrong side

 

[Gruntboy]

Yamamoto.

Yeah, I thought the strategy was briliantly executed (sad to say).

He even acknowledged, though, that it was political suicide (and no, this is not from the recent movie) as he carried out.

 

[DingBat]

Feared is definitely too strong a word for the Germans feelings about Patton. Respected, maybe. Feared, no.

That respect came from an appreciation that Patton alone amongst (Western) allied generals understood mobile warfare and was agressive enough to implement that knowledge.

However, in the end, Patton was merely an army commander. Also, an army commander that enjoyed almost limitless resources, total air supremacy, and spent much of his campaigning in pursuit.

I can name at least a half dozen other generals who performed equally well, or better, in much less favorable conditions.

Case in point: von Manstein.

Manstein took over Army Group Don after the encirclement of 6th Armee at Stalingrad. Here he faced:

- A rampaging Red Army attempting to pin the entire army group against the coast.
- His best army encircled.
- Few reserves.
- A large number of divisions commited in the Caucausus which required extraction.
- Questionable air superiority.
- Hitler's interference.

With all this he managed to mount a relief attempt (unsuccessful, but he knew it would be), conduct an orderly retreat, and finally eventually turning the tables on the Soviets and inflicting a sharp defect at Karkhov.

The conduct of a retreat is often considered the most difficult problem a military commander can face.

Patton was a skillfull general, but I can't really get behind nominating him as the most "powerfull" in WW2, let alone ever.

/bruce

 

[smokeyjoe]

I don't think anyone has mentioned Wellington. While most famous for Waterloo, when all he really did was hold on against greater numbers until reinforcements (the Prussians) came to his relief, his campaign in Spain/Portugal showed his tactics to superior to the French when Britain was desperate for a victory.

Also Sir John Moore, one of the pioneers of light infantry.

 

[elfstorm]

Napoleon dominated European History like no other military leader. Or political for that matter.

Someone mentioned that Wellington held out against superior numbers - true BUT when has there ever been a fair fight between two armies of identical size?? No one fights with equal numbers. At Waterloo Wellington had 100,000 Napoleon had about 115,000. When you are dealing with armies of that size - that is equal numbers really.

Also Wellington didn't have to win the battle - just hold on. He and Napoleon both knew it. That fundamentally affected both mens strategy. Napoleon had to attack more than he might have liked, Wellington didn't have to risk a thing, just hold on.

 

[Gruntboy]

Napoleon dominated European History like no other military leader. Or political for that matter.

No he didn't. He dominated European Military History. He dominated European geopolitics for 20 odd years.

He didn't dominate European History. He lost everything France gained. France reverted to a Monarchy for a period (and it was a Republic before Naps came along). How did he dominate European history?

 

[Comrade Juhon]

What about Ataturk?

He stopped the Allied army with its huge supporting fleet at Gallipoli with inferior troops, stopped the Arabs (with British support) advancing beyond the Tauras mountains, and drove the greeks out of Thrace.

And after all that, he changed Turkey from a feudal country into a modern state, changed the script from Arabic into Latin in SIX MONTHS, and was acknowledged as the Father of Modern Turkey.

Not bad, huh!

 

[tetley]

Since the question is most POWERFUL general ever, I'd have to agree that it's Eisenhower. Who was the ranking general when the U.S. had a monopoly on nuclear weapons? Having a monopoly on nukes is as powerful as you get. One might argue that America's checks-and-balances system cut into Eisenhower's power, and that's true, but--earlier dictator-generals like Alexander and Caesar didn't have radio & telegraph communications. Kind of hard to control someone a thousand miles away whom you can only reach by horseback.

 

[Knowltok 2]

Are you claiming that Eisenhower was most powerful because he had nukes? Because he didn't. Unless you are talking postwar, in which case why not say Marshall since he wes in charge of both theaters?

 

[DingBat]

Originally posted by tetley
Since the question is most POWERFUL general ever, I'd have to agree that it's Eisenhower. Who was the ranking general when the U.S. had a monopoly on nuclear weapons? Having a monopoly on nukes is as powerful as you get. One might argue that America's checks-and-balances system cut into Eisenhower's power, and that's true, but--earlier dictator-generals like Alexander and Caesar didn't have radio & telegraph communications. Kind of hard to control someone a thousand miles away whom you can only reach by horseback.

Doesn't that make their accomplishments all the more impressive?

Oh, and Eisenhower never had command of nukes when he was a general.

The use of the word "Powerful" in this thread was really unfortunate. Powerful requires definition. Modern generals have really very little power in any sense other than command of military units. Those that have political as well as military power tend to come to bad ends.

I suggest we change the discussion to "skilled" generals.

I submit Erich von Manstein as the most skilled general in history. Why?

1) Development of the Ardennes plan for the invasion of France.
2) Successful seige of Sebastopol.
3) Successful withdrawal of Army Group Don after Operation Uranus.
4) The Miracle on the Donetz.

I'd actually consider #3 to be the greatest accomplishment of them all.

I'm open to arguments.

/bruce

 

[tetley]

Okay Knowtok, Marshall. Although if we took "most powerful general" to mean "most powerful person ever who was a general at one time," I'd say Eisenhower again. Because Eisenhower was a general, and he was the most powerful man in the world--just not both at the same time.

 

[DingBat]

Originally posted by tetley
Okay Knowtok, Marshall. Although if we took "most powerful general" to mean "most powerful person ever who was a general at one time," I'd say Eisenhower again. Because Eisenhower was a general, and he was the most powerful man in the world--just not both at the same time.

Kind of a thin argument.

Eisenhower the general never had, and never would have, the authority to use nukes on his own. Eisenhower the President had the authority primarily because he was no longer a general, but an elected head of state.

Nukes are a tricky yardstick to measure power by. I might just as well argue that the Soviet commander of their missile force became the most powerful general in history as soon as their warhead count exceeded the United States.

/bruce

 

[tetley]

Read the thread more closely, Dingbat. I said a nuclear MONOPOLY. The U.S. could easily have conquered the world during the time it had a nuclear monopoly, were they that kind of a people.

 

[DingBat]

My reading skills are perfectly adequate, thanks anyway.

The nuclear "monopoly" you're referring to amounted to a handfull of free fall bombs that had to flown thousands of miles to their target. Perfectly fine when the enemy is already beaten but refuses to roll over. Another thing altogether if the enemy is full of fight.

Obviously we're talking about the Soviet Union here. Do you really believe that, after taking the best the Nazi's could offer, after sacrificing millions of his own people, that Stalin would roll over and play dead if Eisenhower had threatened him with a few nukes?

Nukes are great for getting someone's attention, but they're a lot harder to use than most people think and they don't hold territory, which is kind of important if you want to conquer the world.

The American nuclear monopoly looks good on paper but it doesn't equate to world domination.

/bruce

 

[tetley]

: Obviously we're talking about the Soviet Union here. Do you really believe that, after taking the best the Nazi's could offer, after sacrificing millions of his own people, that Stalin would roll over and play dead if Eisenhower had threatened him with a few nukes?


Actually, yes. And that is virtually exactly what happened. The Soviets invaded Iran not long after the War, and Truman pulled him aside and said, "if you don't take your troops out of Iran we'll drop the Bomb on you." They pulled out. Also, brinkmanship was a core facet of Eisenhower's foreign policy during his presidency, and it was effective--though not always good with world opinion.

I do think, though, that "most skilled" might have been the original intent of this thread. In which case my first guess would probably be William the Conqueror. Good battle tactics at Hastings, but more importantly, the logistical and diplomatic skill in consolidating France and conducting a reverse D-Day in the 11th century. But who knows...Norman Schwartzkopf may well have been far more skilled than anybody, but he never truly got the chance to prove it (which is a good thing).

 

[DougInFL]

Originally posted by Thuloid
I'm just going to list off a few of my favorites...

Ah! An American Civil War nomination...couldn't agree more with your mention of General Jackson. At the risk of igniting a "flame the newbie f***wit" salvo, Generals Lee and Stuart shouldn't be ignored either.

And just to be fair to my northern countrymen, Generals Sherman and McClellan also get my nod.

Doug