You know the old saying, “Everything in war is simple, but the simple things are hard?” That applies here. Even something as “simple” as firing a rifle at another human being to kill them is made harder for a host of reasons: fear of death, fear of failure, emotional consequences of being responsible for the life and death of other human beings (of your friends, and of the enemy).
Overcoming bowel-emptying fear of death in order to accomplish your mission, whatever that mission may be-- killing the enemy, rescuing your buddies, driving a freakin’ resupply truck-- requires a warrior ethos that most people will never encounter (and they’re luckier for it).
For that reason, someone like Hayha or Audie Murphy qualify as warriors. In the modern age, those kind of warriors are rarer, mostly because more and more fighting men are further removed from actual battle, but they still exist.
That said, all apologies for the snark, I think we need to consider this individual for the title.
As ol George said “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.” I think the best “warrior” is one who would engage the enemy at the times and places that are worst for the enemy to defend himself. A sniper who is constantly under fire isn’t a very good sniper, and probably won’t be around long enough to make much of an impact on the war effort.
A single soldier who takes out 500 plus enemy troops plus forces the other side’s leadership to specifically commit resources to counteract him is a pretty damn effective warrior I would think.
Who was the American machine gunner in Vietnam who basicly stopped a whole VC battalian, by killing them all, last man holding out and all that?
There was one Engliseh Knight who used to win all the staged battles and ransom his prizes, to such a degree of success that he built his own castle.During the medieival period knights would hone their battle skills through ‘games’ which were intended to simulate combat. The uidea would be to take your opponents captive and ransom them, they were not like the games we have, the only rule was not to kill your opponent, and dead people do not ransom very well. Thi sparticualr knight was very much the best pf his day, and won enough prizes to set himself up for life, but in fact he did go into battle and had a very distinguished career.
Wars are expensive both in blood and cash. A millitary whos soldiers consistently defeat 2-3 enemies to his loss is damn effective, and to paraphrase the saying, the value of a soldier is not always in what he kills, but in how many people he keeps watching for him.
80,000 Inca warriors were routed by 168 conquistadors at the Battle of Cajamarca, Peru. That’s a ratio of 476:1
In one day the Spanish killed 7,000 Indians with no injuries, as well as capturing the Inca leader.
Sure the Spanish had steel swords, some horses, and a few very early guns that were more effective at scaring the Inca than killing them. But 168 guys who had just walked hundreds of miles through unknown jungle & mountains against a home crowd of 80,000 warriors. And even with a sword, a crappy gun and a horse I wouldn’t like my odds against 476 guys armed with clubs.
Pretty bad-ass if you ask me. They sure did a lot better than the Empire did against the Ewoks.
Well, that’s sort of the point. Are we talking about the guy who defeated the most enemies in one on one fair fights, or the guy who defeated the most enemies? Because fair fights are for idiots.
So badass that fighting for one country wasn’t enough for him - he had to go on to find three new countries to fight for, all successfully, before returning to Britain.
So much for honour in battle. Anyone can kill lots of people with a variety of weapons designed to make doing so as easy as possible; that doesn’t necessarily make them a warrior, in my eyes.
They also had hordes of tribesmen from groups rebelling against Inca rule. Most of those killed on the 476 side of the given ratio were not killed by Spaniards.
Do you have a cite for this - I’ve never read about hordes of help for the Spanish?
Look - I know the 168 conquistadors were huge a-holes and there were many factors why they won (superior weapons, horses, small pox, too-highly centralized Inca command structure, etc. etc. etc.). I’m not trying to say they did a good thing.
But they went into the heart of an empire with 168 guys - they were vastly outmanned. They had better weapons but they were still mainly hand to hand weapons - its not like they had machine guns. They then proceeded to conquer the entire friggin country through whatever despicable means they had to use. And they did it. 168 guys.
And just having the guts to walk into an area like that so vastly outnumbered -they didn’t know victory was guaranteed. Pizarro and company were definately bad-ass warriors.
