It’s not! It happened in another thread, too. And you’d think I would notice doing it by the third time — right? Anyway, I’ve reported myself to a mod, we’ll see what they do.
PS. Sorry, I’ll stop hijacking the thread now.
ETA: Actually, since it happened again when I edited the post above, that makes it four times. Close enough.
Just a note — I did not edit straight man’s post above; I was only checking to see if I could figure out what might be going on.
Ellen Cherry
Moderator
George McClellan – 2 points
I’m sold, I’m sold, on Charles the Bold – 2 points
Titokowaru – 1 point
Carl von Clausewitz - 2 points
While an influential theorist von Clausewitz didn’t lead any notable campaigns.
George McClellan - 2 points
An able administrator but out-witted in command.
Charles the Bold - 1 point
For reasons already mentioned.
I agree with Sailboat about Sherman.
A Southern-born historian and professor at the University of Georgia spoke to our Civil War roundtable a few years ago, while he was researching Sherman’s March to the Sea, and spoke highly of Cump. He became convinced, in his research, that tales of Sherman’s depredations grew with each later generation of pissed-off Georgians. He said several sweet little old ladies told him that Sherman’s Visigoths burned the town to the ground… and then took him to see all the beautiful antebellum houses. He noted that Sherman court-martialed and executed dozens of his soldiers for criminal conduct on the March that would’ve been unremarkable in many armies, both before and since.
This brief letter, by Sherman to the Atlanta City Council in late 1864 after he had determined to destroy the town and begin the March, is the most concise statement of Sherman’s principles I’ve ever read. I urge you to read it in its entirety: William Tecumseh Sherman to Atlanta : "War is Hell"
I guess I will halfway defend poor Mehmed. I wouldn’t put him on this list either - in general many of even the more prominent Ottoman sultans can be a little hard to asses as it isn’t always entirely clear just how much their own personal leadership contributed to victory. At any rate I’d probably argue that his grandson Selim I achieved even more more on the battlefield ( conquest of Syria and Egypt, victory over the early Safavids ). But I also wouldn’t make Mehmed a first cut against this compeitition. Early maybe, but not first round.
It’s true Constantinople was likely doomed by the 1450’s and taking it, though a major effort, was still probably not all that impressive given the disparity in resources. But Mehmed earned his sobriquet el Fatih ( ‘the Conqueror’ ) for more than just his future capital. Over a very active 30 year reign he rounded out all of his borders, in Anatolia, mainland Europe and the Aegean. And one of his opponents, Uzun Hasan of the Aq Qoyonlu ( the Turcoman ‘Horde of the White Sheep’ ) was certainly a comparable power in scope. Mehmed’s victory over his Hasan at the battle of Bashkent in 1473 arguably marked the real dawn of the Muslim gunpowder empires ( more usually noted at Chaldiran in 1514 ) and their superiority over more traditional light cavalry tactics. And at the battle of Razboieni in 1476 he was specifically given credit for rallying the faltering Ottoman army and spurring them to victory over Stephen Bathory.
So he has more going for him than just the one city ( which he took early in his reign, at age 21 ). One of the greatest sultans, but probably not THE greatest and a very effective military leader if judged by results. It’s just detaching his own ability as a general ( probably pretty decent ) from his powerful military machine is a little hard.
George McClleallan-2
Charles the Bold-2
Isaac Brock-1
Nobody nominated Saladin.
Nope. I can think of several others who deserved to be nominated, but them’s the breaks.
In my defense of Sherman, I stuck with moral issues. However, it’s worth noting that influential early armored warfare theorist Basil Liddell Hart wrote glowingly of what he called Sherman’s “indirect approach.” During his march to the sea and the subsequent march through the Carolinas, Sherman repeatedly positioned his column to threaten more than one point. The Confederates often split their already inadequate forces to defend every target, and sometimes he ignored all the obvious targets and moved past them to seize a different objective, generally leading the enemy to evacuate the bypassed areas without a fight. Liddell Hart regarded it as masterful maneuver warfare in the tradition of Sun Tzu, baffling and unbalancing your enemies.
His principal opponent, Joseph E. Johnston, at first was comforted by the opinion of Confederate military engineers that the flooded rivers lying across his path in the Carolinas would completely halt military operations. But upon learning that Sherman was crossing the swamps and rivers at a dozen miles a day, corduroying roads and building bridges as he came, Johnston admitted “…there has been no such army in existence since the days of Julius Caesar.”
Lastly, remember at the time Sherman departed for his march to the sea, it was widely believed he could not survive logistically so far from safe railheads, and Confederate cavalry would isolate and starve his army to death. Grant almost didn’t allow him to try. It was a daring feat.
It’s also true that Sherman’s march worked, strategically – if you read Confederate diaries and newspaper accounts, Sherman’s penetrations (and the inability of the rebel armies to oppose him) thoroughly disheartened Confederates and led many of them to see the end was indeed near.
Anyway, my candidates for elimination:
McClellan: 2
Pretty much a sure thing; not only did he manage to turn stalemates into defeats, he is possibly the most cautious commander on this list, ruled by his fears on too many occasions. And failing to capitalize on Special Order 191 is almost uniquely incompetent if one strives to be considered a great military mind.
Kesselring: 2
Probably a decent general. But a baboon could have held the spine of Italy against longitudinal advance – it was the best place in Europe for the Allies to invade, from the German point of view.
Tito: 1
Masterfully husbanded his forces to be certain he dominated postwar Yugoslavia. Masterfully rooted out disloyalty and informers.
Mediocre strategist in terms of irregular warfare.
Fortunately, he was able to capitalize when the Red Army’s advance doomed his German occupiers.
Now you’ve got me thinking. I’d like to have seen Bertrand Du Guesclin, Fabius Maximus, and perhaps David Glasgow Farragut on the list. Also, although I find the man’s personality and politics abhorrent, I might have put Nathan Bedford Forrest on the list, as a self-taught master of mobile warfare.
Thanks, everybody. The votes in our first round:
George B. McClellan - 23
Charles the Bold - 20
Charles de Gaulle - 5
Hernan Cortez, William T. Sherman, Titokowaru - 4 each
Mehmet the Conqueror, Josip Broz Tito - 3 each
Carl von Clausewitz, Ulysses S. Grant, Albert Kesselring, Richard H. O’Kane, Charles Upham - 2 each
Isaac Brock, Hugh Dowding, Gabriel Dumont, Douglas MacArthur, Pompey, Pyrrhus, Zachary Taylor, Sebastien Le Prestre de Vauban - 1 each
The top two are gone (deservedly so, IMHO). The next round will conclude at noon EST on Fri. Aug. 20. Same rules as before.
well let me get in my votes in for cortez in early then. if people thought sherman’s march to the sea was bad, how are they going to turn a blind eye to cortez’s stampede to mexico city? less infrastructural damage but WAY more civilian casualties. plus with boomsticks, dragon-llamas, and metal skin? it’s like plugging in IDDQD on Doom.
dumont - the metis john brown. sorry but playing hide and seek in western canada against mounties is daring, brave, and all that but it lacks the magnitude that this competition is really looking for.
aetius - i might be mistaken but i thought theodoric was the lynchpin to repelling atilla
Cortez - 2
Gabriel Dumont - 2
Flavius Aetius - 1
I award the maximum possible points to infinity to that fucking arsonist, General William Tecumseh Sherman May-He-Rot-in-Hell.
2 for Grant the Butcher
1 for Sheridan.
Alright, I need some more peeps.
Curtis LeMay - 1pt. The Berlin Airlift was certainly a neat logistic trick, but there’s not much else to commend the dude, so far as I can tell.
Robert E. Lee - 1pt. The one point is for Gettysburg —he was overall pretty good, but Lee himself thought he screwed the pooch there.
Cortez - 1pt. As I said earlier, he’s more a master politician than master general.
Charles de Gualle - 1pt. Since he wasn’t a bad commander at the time, I’ll reduce it to one point, even though he’s mostly military.
Charles Upham - 1pt. again, it’s not really about leadership for him. I don’t buy that whole “Alexanderian” thing —we don’t think of Alexander being great just because he led his armies in person!
Gabriel Dumont is tempting me. Given the numbers of his forces, it seems to me that he could have gone full guerrilla —but perhaps there was a reason to engage in set piece battles? I just don’t know.
I suspect Sherman is going to be a victim of the Southern Myth here — at any rate, his military accomplishments should (but probably won’t) keep him in for a while longer. ETA: Oakminster, it really strikes me as odd (and faintly appalling) to get worked up about Sherman, but not include Lee on the list, considering that Lee literally went on a campaign to kidnap free blacks in Northern states and enslave them. That’s a whole order of magnitude worse than arson. Arson was arguably justifiable in war in the 1800’s; taking slaves of civilians wasn’t.
I’m just about as harsh a critic of Lee as you’re going to find, but reenslaving blacks was waaaaaaaay down the list of Confederate Army priorities during either the Antietam or Gettysburg campaigns.
Zachary Taylor - just doesn’t belong on this list, despite some good work during the Mexican War - 2
Hernan Cortz - pretty damned lucky, and had a huge technological advantage over the Aztecs, but not a great general by any means - 2
Douglas MacArthur - insubordinate egomaniac - 1
I, erm, didn’t phrase that in the intended manner. What I meant was, “He intentionally ran a policy of enslaving free blacks…”, not “he went on a military campaign in order to…” Just to clarify.
ETA: Wait, MacArthur’s on the list? I didn’t even notice him before. Yikes. That’ll be some votes shortly.
I’m going to repeat my votes:
Titokowaru: 2 points. He won two minor battles. And apparently reintroduced cannibalism.
Sherman: 2 points. He was precedented by Wellington in both logistics and manoeuver.
Mehmet: 1 point. Taking Constantinople was no great feat as it was a rump state by then.
Cortez: 2
Pyrrhus :2 poster boy for winning the battle but losing the war
de Gaulle:1
