# Tactical victories that were strategic disasters \[Military history\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 16, 2006, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828 "2006-04-16T00:40:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/1 "2006-04-16T00:40:43Z")
Inspired by the thread in GD [Military/History Question [What battle had the most surprising outcome?]](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=367228) I thought I would persue a similar topic. What battles in history would you mark as tactical victories but (with hindsight) were strategic failures? I suppose many such battles might be counted among those so I am looking for the more notable instances of this. For instance, the one that springs to my mind is the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. A smashing tactical victory but of course it led to the United States entering WWII which ultimately doomed Japan. Details would be good too if you are so inclined. Again going with the Pearl Harbor attack on the face of it the attack looked to be a huge success. Yet Nagumo, despite advice to do follow on attacks, backed off leaving the oil storage facilities and dry docks at Pearl intact. I suppose it is debatable whether taking those out would have done anything more than extend the war in the Pacific but still it was a major miss in that attack. Any others? I suppose my above example might open the door to things such as Operation Barbarossa but I am trying to think more of a single engagement that while at first looked to be a success but ultimately was not a success in the bigger picture. That said don’t hold back and have fun with this as you like. ---
**Author:** ![Gladstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/90db22/32.png) [@Gladstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gladstone)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/2 "2006-04-16T01:17:29Z")
The Battle of Breed’s Hill The Tet Offensive (a tactical US win with dire strategic political ramifications) McArthur’s plan to invade and occupy all of North Korea The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan The Suez Canal Crisis of 1956 ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/3 "2006-04-16T01:29:24Z")
> [@Gladstone](#): > > The Battle of Breed’s Hill Do not know this one. > [@](#): > > The Tet Offensive (a tactical US win with dire strategic political ramifications) That was a tactical victory for the US? Inasmuch as it wasn’t a tactical victory for the Vietnamese I thought they found the effort worthwhile. > [@](#): > > McArthur’s plan to invade and occupy all of North Korea I am unclear whether the US really thought the Chinese would step in. Of course it still fits the OP (despite it not really being a single engagement)…just saying I have never been clear on that point. > [@](#): > > The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan Kind of misses the OP. More like Operation Barbarossa. Just a bad move overall rather than a winning battle with a longer term strategic downside. > [@](#): > > The Suez Canal Crisis of 1956 Can you elaborate on this? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/4 "2006-04-16T01:36:25Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > [@Gladstone](#): > > > > The Battle of Breed’s Hill > > Do not know this one. Is this more popularly known as the Battle of Bunker Hill? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/5 "2006-04-16T01:39:05Z")
**Breed’s Hill** (Bunker Hill) was a British victory, but it cost them over 1000 casualties. General Henry Clinton: “A dear bought victory. Another such would have ruined us.” **The Tet Offensive** was a tactical disaster for the Viet Cong. It finally brought them out into the open, where US forces could engage them in a battle we were trained for. The VC were wiped out. From that point on, they were no longer a viable force in the field. However, the offensive rocked the US population, and kicked the demand for withdrawal into high gear. For the first time, Middle America started questioning the war. Strategic victory went to the Communists. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/6 "2006-04-16T01:43:47Z")
Sack of Constantinople by the Crusaders, 1204. Although they took the city and thus were able to take control of the immediately region of Constantinople for decades, it was only at the cost of permanently severing East-West Christian relations. They never got to the Holy Land either. Invasion of Russia, 1812. Although Napoleon won tactically and a “strategically” in that the Russians were forced to withdrawl, in advancing toward Moscow Napoleon doomed his army to wither away over winter, as the absolutism of Russia meant that the Czar only had to capitulate if he felt like it, and he didn’t. The Russians lost as badly (they weren’t as winter-hardy as is popularly believed,) but just like the Germans in WWII, every French troop lost was much harder to replace than Allied. If you want to narrow it down to a specific battle, the Battle of Borodino let Napoleon capture Moscow, but it might have been better to just retreat to the nearest large city to shorten his supply line. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/7 "2006-04-16T01:56:41Z")
Well, there’s always the original [Pyrrhic Victory.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrrhic_victory) ---
**Author:** ![Gladstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/90db22/32.png) [@Gladstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gladstone)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/8 "2006-04-16T02:07:51Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > I am unclear whether the US really thought the Chinese would step in. Of course it still fits the OP (despite it not really being a single engagement)…just saying I have never been clear on that point. McArthur’s complete rout of the North Korean army was a total tactical victory. That neither he nor the US seriously considered that the Chinese would feel their interests were at stake and intervene was the strategic disaster. While China only became red in 1949, few of the Allies seemed to really consider the power, and certainly not the mindset of the Chinese as they watched a joint Soviet-Chinese satellite state crumble. > [@](#): > > Kind of misses the OP. More like Operation Barbarossa. Just a bad move overall rather than a winning battle with a longer term strategic downside. Possibly, but unlike Barbarossa, the Soviets pretty much conquered Afghanistan. They just couldn’t fully control all of it at once, nor did they consider that it would draw in financial and manpower support from neighboring Muslim countries. > [@](#): > > Can you elaborate on this? The Suez Crisis of 1956 essentially involved a single battle. Egyptian strongman Nasser seized the Suez Canal in '56 (which had been under British control just a few years before but was under private control at the time). This gave him control over a then-vital route for commercial shipping. Britain, France, and Israel put pressure on Nasser to leave, but he refused. A few months later, all three countries planned for an Israeli invasion of Egypt in order for the Israelis to take the Canal. After Israel had begun its invasion, Britain and France would “intervene” to stop the fighting - but really to support the Israelis and help them consolidate the Canal. The invasion was a complete victory militarily. The US and the USSR, condemned the invasion strongly, however, and made it abundently clear that the invading forces should leave. The USSR portrayed the invasion as just another example of an imperialist, colonialist plot by capitalist nations. In order to prevent Egypt and other Arab nations from fully going over to the Soviet side, the US also refused to condone the invasion and called for a complete withdrawal. The US also threatened to sell its currency reserves of the British pound if Britain did not withdraw. When the British agreed to withdraw, the French felt obligated to do so as well. So, militarily, the Suez Canal invasion was a success but the implications of that success were a strategic and political disaster. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/9 "2006-04-16T03:04:01Z")
Would the **Battle of the Alamo** qualify? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/10 "2006-04-16T03:29:48Z")
The Confederate capture of Fort Sumter. Dunkirk (Hitler’s victory marred by failure to capture/eradicate British forces). An ultimate morale-booster for the Allies. The second (current) invasion of Iraq may ultimately prove to be the classic example in modern times of a sweeping tactical win and a strategic disaster. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/11 "2006-04-16T06:04:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Dunkirk (Hitler’s victory marred by failure to capture/eradicate British forces). An ultimate morale-booster for the Allies. Not bad, but I’d say this was more a lack of complete tactical failure by the British, and therefore a lack of complete tactical success by the Germans. The ~300,000 men saved and the morale boost had strategic implications, but It didn’t mean that Germany’s conquest of France had backfired. As Churchill put it, wars are not won by evacuations. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/12 "2006-04-16T06:52:49Z")
> [@NDP](#): > > Would the **Battle of the Alamo** qualify? Not really. I suppose one might make the case that the killing of all prisoners at the Alamo and Goliad might have inspired more ferocity among the Texans at San Jacinto, but really they were simply battles that were won in a campaign that eventually failed. There was no strategic disaster that resulted from the deaths of 183 (sometimes 187) men in one lopsided battle. ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/13 "2006-04-16T07:24:56Z")
One has to observe about the Suez crisis, had the British, French and Israeli forces been allowed to get on with it, then there would not have been any 6 day war, nor any occupation of the part of Jordan now known as Palestine, and with Egypt pretty much taken care of, there’s little chance that Syria would have taken the path it did in Lebanon. It’s one of those ‘what if’ scenarios, how would ME politics have developed ? ---
**Author:** ![DWMarch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwmarch/32/1010_2.png) [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 8:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/14 "2006-04-16T08:40:40Z")
How about [The Day of the Rangers](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_3_1993_Battle_of_Mogadishu)? About 160 US soldiers versus the whole city of Mogadishu. The Rangers kicked ass and took names, suffering (comparatively) light casualties themselves. Their reward for the victory? From the linked article: > [@](#): > > The Battle of Mogadishu led to a profound shift in American foreign policy, as American politicians became increasingly reluctant to use military intervention in Third World conflicts, allowing the genocide in Rwanda in 1994, and affected America’s actions in the Balkans during the later half of the 1990’s. President Clinton preferred to use the “air power alone” tactic and hesitated to use U.S. ground troops in fighting Serbian military and para-military ground forces in Bosnia in 1995 and in Kosovo in 1999, out of fear of losing American soldiers in combat, as well as fear of repeating what happened in Mogadishu in 1993. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/15 "2006-04-16T11:36:12Z")
> [@DWMarch](#): > > How about [The Day of the Rangers](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_3_1993_Battle_of_Mogadishu)? About 160 US soldiers versus the whole city of Mogadishu. The Rangers kicked ass and took names, suffering (comparatively) light casualties themselves. Their reward for the victory? From the linked article: Good example-I think that the whole intervention in Somalia was a mistake. So what if the US managed to capture Adid? he was just one of of many warlords who would have stepped into the leading role. As far as i know, Somalia continues to be a lawless hellhole. Basically. the Us FORCES WALKED INTO A TRAP. tHERE WAS NO PLAN TO EXTRICATE THEM, AND NO BACKUP FORCE AVAILABLE TO RESCUE THEM. tHE us MANAGED TO “ACHIEVE” TWO THINGS IN sOMALIA: (1) WE MANAGED TO appear to be weak and indecisive (2) we wound up killing a lot of innocent people, because we fought in the center of the city. It was a complete mistake. Coming after the slaughter of 18 pakistani troops (at the hands of Adid’s men), it made the UN reluctant to do anything more.I think the slaughter of the Pakistanis was meant as a warning-one that we chose to ignore. A complete disaster with no redeeeming features. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/16 "2006-04-16T15:33:18Z")
I think it should be worth distinguishing between tactical victories that were “merely” costly (e.g. the Alamo) versus victories that ultimately turned out to be a loss for the temporary victor. ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/17 "2006-04-16T15:42:47Z")
The assault on Arnhem, 1944. Bridges taken, British bridgehead later wiped out, threw a spanner in the works of Allied offensive plans and killed the idea of mass use of paratroopers for some time. ---
**Author:** ![Gladstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/90db22/32.png) [@Gladstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gladstone)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/18 "2006-04-16T16:29:15Z")
> [@Crusoe](#): > > The assault on Arnhem, 1944. Bridges taken, British bridgehead later wiped out, threw a spanner in the works of Allied offensive plans and killed the idea of mass use of paratroopers for some time. But Arnhem wasn’t even a tactical victory since they didn’t take all of the bridges they set out to. It was a straight up defeat. ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/19 "2006-04-16T17:30:04Z")
Oops. Poor memory - my mistake. I had visions of the British holding both ends of the bridge, which wasn’t the case. ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828/20 "2006-04-16T17:42:07Z")
Would the Battle of Valcour Island count? The British forces clobbered Benedict Arnold’s flotilla of papier mache boats, but did not advance on Crown Point and Fort Ticonderoga, wasting a golden opportunity to smash the rebels. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tactical-victories-that-were-strategic-disasters-military-history/352828.md?page=2)