What Do You Think Was Most Stupid And Pointless Battle (not war) Ever?

[Adler17]

The most stupid battles, erm let me see: At first I should take out the Italians. I mean otherwise I would only Italian bashing here:
1. War of 1866 with Austria: Although marching into Venecia with a force multiple times as big as the Austrians, you were defeated and the army was in no way able to do any offensive actions after that. So the navy stepped in: To the same mistakes in the battle of Lissa, where an Austrian fleet was able to win against a supremacy, sinking 3 armoured frigates (=battleships) loosing no ship (although several were badly damaged).
2. Shortly after that war the Italians try to take Rome, but since only Garibaldi dared to attack he was beaten by the Swiss Guard.
3. Then the French came to help the Pope and sent troops, which were withdrawn after Sedan in 1870/ 71. So they finally had the chance to unify themselves only because of German aid.
4. Italian campaign 1915- 1918: The Italians switched the sides and attacke the Austrians. Although having regular soldiers en masse and "only" fighting against militias mostly at first they are not able to gain much. Indeed all Isonzo battles were lost. When in 1917/ 18 the Austrians attacked, the Italians had to retreat. And nearly the only battle they won was a few days before the end of the war...
5. Italian campaigns against Ethiopia: Once they were unable to conquer that independent country. The second time they were successful, but had also severe problems.
6. WW2: The italians were unable to win against an ally, yes Greece was a German and Italian ally!, and had to rely on German help. Also in North Africa.
7. How we could win the Kosovo war and the war in Afghanistan with them is a good question... (This remark should take no offence to you)

Okay that should be enough Italian bashing.
Back to the topic indeed Verdun is one of the top list as well as Somme. But I also think more idiotic was Tanga. The British general Aitken was not only unable to win with a 8- 10 times supremacy, he lost nearly 1/4 of his troops. Only 68 Germans died in tha battle BTW...

Adler

 

[Wotan]

Army surplus add after WW2 sort of sums it up re. Italian activities during the war:

Italian army rifles, mint condition, never fired and only dropped once!

 

[privatehudson]

Battles fought after the war had ended were remarkably common in that era, Tolouse for example was fought 4 days after Napoleon abdicated for the first time.

Pleanty of the Boer war battles were remarkable examples of British incompetence, Spion Kop being a good example. Just about the only good thing to come from that was the name for Liverpool's main stand at Anfield...

That reminds me of a quote by Kitchener

The Boers are not like the Sudanese who stood up to a fair fight. They are always running away on their little ponies

Of course to the colonial general like Kitchener playing the game consisted of the spear/sword/ancient firearm armed enemy advancing in massed lines into the concentrated rifle and machine gun fire of the British. Taking cover, hit and run tactics and returning fire with modern rifles simply wasn't cricket

 

[sydhe]

The eleventh battle of the Isonzo. After ten battles of the Isonzo hadn't accomplished anything, why have an eleventh? (The twelfth was Caporetto, which did accomplish quite a bit.)

Passchendaele and Verdun also are great candidates.

 

[Verbose]

Passchendaele and Verdun also are great candidates.

Verdun — "The anvil upon which we will hammer the French people to death!" — according to von Falkenhein...

...which meant using the German people as the hammer unfortunately. And all of this according to von F. was actually an attempt to "strike Britains best weapon from its hand", i.e. France.

The thinking behind the fighting was a total mess.

 

[Adler17]

Another one would be the battle of the Hürtgen forest, 1944/ 45. After the invasion and the break through of the German lines the Germans retreated rapidly. This made the western allies hoping to end the war before Christmas. So they also advanced rapidly. But near to the German border the situation became different. Although Aachen was taken, the allies met much tougher resistance. Also they had severe supply problems. Also they feared a German counterstrike at the flank near Aachen. So they decided to attack in the Hürtgen forest, a dense and stoney forest with many hills and only small ways. When the desert was the perfect area for offensive action this was the best for defense actions. So the Germans defended this area very well. The US were attacking over 7 months to take the objects they wanted to take in a few days and only finally were able to do so when the front was broken in another point. Until this masses of tanks and also about 35.000 soldiers died in a battle which was nonsense to start since heavy equipment was here not suitable and an offensive from this area could not take place.

Adler

 

[Esckey]

I would have to say that "war" between the two south american countries that started cause of a soccer game(the tensions between the countries was reaching critical mass when one side lost a soccer game) I'm only bringing this up cause most of the battles brought up sofar lasted longer then this war.


But stupids use of man power and so forth....probably Verdun. Alot of mess ups during WW1 come to think of it, but new technology requires new tactics to defeat

 

[LLXerxes]

Two battles stupidly executed:

Little Bighorn (NO DUH)
Teutonbug Forrest

There was one I learned about in RTW, but I forget it.

 

[deo]

There was one I learned about in RTW, but I forget it.

Teutoburg Forest?

Anyway IMO Italy wins in most cases.

 

[Odin2006]

Teutoburg Forest?

Germans anihilated an entire Roman legion, ending Octavian's plan to push the frontier to the Elbe River.

 

[deo]

Germans anihilated an entire Roman legion, ending Octavian's plan to push the frontier to the Elbe River.

I know but i he said that there was one battle he learned about in Rome: Total war and Teutoburg Forest is one of them.

 

[allhailIndia]

What abt the 3-nations (or was it four) war between Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina v. Paraguay which ended in the slaughter of 75% of all Uruguayan males???

What did that achieve?

 

[silver 2039]

What abt the 3-nations (or was it four) war between Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina v. Paraguay which ended in the slaughter of 75% of all Uruguayan males???

What did that achieve?

The War of the Triple Alliance?

Paraguay was the one that lost most of its male pouplation not Uruguay. Paraguay at the time was one of the most developed countries in South America and it had a larger aremy than Brazil, and Argentina and such. Tjhey did remarkabley well even against such overwhelming odds. Their King was kkind of insane.

Also the Gran Chacho War between Paraguay and Bolivia is a good candiidate. They though there was oil there and fought over this useless piece of desert land till the brink of collaspe only to discover there was no oil.

 

[privatehudson]

Adler:

Hurtgen didn't really last 7 months. It began it September and was completely over by February (6 months) but there was a gap of 6 weeks during the Ardennes campaign were little occurred in the Hurtgen region. Most of the fighting was already finished before the Ardennes began also.

 

[classical_hero]

I would say one of the most pointless battles was Gallipoli. That was a senseless waste of lives.

 

[DAv2003]

And it would of worked too, if reinforcements had arrived I'm led to believe.

 

[silver 2039]

And it would of worked too, if reinforcements had arrived I'm led to believe.

Actually I believe it was a large delay between the time of the artillery bombardment and the attack which allowed the Ottomans and Germans to prepare was what proved fatal.

 

[Gelion]

forgive my blindness.....

 

[Vietcong]

the british only lost 700 men, but over 1000 whear wounded.
i dont have to kill lots and lots of meh to when, the brits whear routed and soundly defeated.

british forces, 10,000
us 5-7,000

casualties,
british 700 dead, 1 400 wounded
us 8 dead, 13 wounded

 

[Ukas]

I imagine Battle of Suomussalmi for the Russians.

They draft troops from mainly warm southern parts of their country, send them to north where it's very cold, tell them it's going to be a winter picnic through Finland.

Result, two divisions and a tank brigade (50,000 men) wiped out, with approx. 22 500 killed and wounded. All this was done by 10,000 Finns with inferior equipment and no artillery support. The Finns lost less than 400 killed and 600 wounded.

As this happened in early phase of the Winter War (1939-40), it showed the Finns the enemy can be beaten and also helped greatly with material shortage.