Most incompetent generals and military commanders in military history

He outperformed most of his contemporaries, his predecessor Sir John French cracked under the pressure of the same position, the French went through something like 5 commanders during the war.

File: luigi.jpg (322KB, 589x844px) Image search: [Google]

322KB, 589x844px

>>2748779

>>2748779
t. David Lloyd George

>>2748779
Elphingstone has to have my vote.

File: cuck.jpg (32KB, 479x599px) Image search: [Google]

32KB, 479x599px

Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer

File: 1493695282855.jpg (176KB, 1920x1080px) Image search: [Google]

176KB, 1920x1080px

>>2748869
>when you can plan your offensives on a 1:1 scale map

File: erwin-rommel-225.jpg (19KB, 225x300px) Image search: [Google]

19KB, 225x300px

>Rommel I want you to defend Libya
>Alright I'll charge into Egypt
>Wait what
>Send more supplies man
>wtf are you doing Rommel
>EASTERN FRONT IS FOR NERDS, SEND MORE SUPPLIES
>Rommel pls
>Thank you for losing me North Africa assholes

>>2748869
/thread

Really can't beat this level of incompetence

>>2748869
Don't finish the thread so fast, faggot.

>>2748865

WWI had a lot of incompetence to go around, England was before and since cautious about taking major causalties. Not Haig though...

>>2749153
> Not Haig though
You say this as if it was Haig's own buffoonery that caused the static conditions of the Western Front, as if another man could have simply walked into his shoes and waved away the technological and geographical limitations that made it a war of attrition.

Simply pointing at the appalling conditions of the Western Front and the seemingly futile offensives that characterized trench warfare and saying "what an inept fool, wasting thousands of lives for nothing!" without taking into consideration the circumstances that caused those conditions to be that way and without taking note of the limitations in what any man could have been capable in the same situation doesn't really do justice to history.

>>2748980
Don't forget how he had to abandon most of his supplies for lack of ability to transport them.

>>2748779
If you think Haig was a bad commander, you don't know your history, what is your genius alternative to huge casualties using the technology at the time. I can guarantee anything you think of was either tried or was impractical.

le lions led by donkeyy

>>2749528
What so bad about him?

File: lmao.png (37KB, 239x779px) Image search: [Google]

37KB, 239x779px

>>2749535

File: Capture.png (150KB, 322x636px) Image search: [Google]

150KB, 322x636px

>>2749535
taking weeks to win a siege against a force almost a tenth the size of your own, AND THEN loosing more than a quarter of your army is pretty fucking incompetent

>>2748958
Im a noob, tell me why this is bad

>>2748869
what did he do?

>>2749774
Cadorna started 12 battles at the Isonzo river and lost to the Austrians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luigi_Cadorna

>>2749294
>what is your genius alternative to huge casualties using the technology at the time
Playing defense and mowing down thousands of Germans while taking practically no losses. Worst case the Germans stop coming and then you don't need to go begging for help from anyone that will listen.

>>2748779
haha dank

Balisiscus may have legitimately been retarded

File: 220px-Marcus_Licinius_Crassus_Louvre.jpg (20KB, 220x357px) Image search: [Google]

20KB, 220x357px

Crassus

File: yougotme.jpg (17KB, 500x281px) Image search: [Google]

17KB, 500x281px

>>2749969
Don't know if that was politically viable though.

>>2750049
Fucking was all his life jelly at Pompey. He did eventually get rid of the Spartacus uprising, right?

>>2749969
Your solution is to hand all tactical and strategic initiative to an enemy generally considered to be superior on a tactical level to yourself?

So basically you want to play to your enemies strengths while nullifying your own

>>2750560
Yeah beat spartacus, honestly crassus was a decent commander nothing special but not a meme. Pompey is overrated as well imo, great logistician and morale raiser but tactically he wasn't amazing, got his ass kicked by sertorius as well.

>>2749652
1:1 is full size.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Cottage

>>2750610
/reddit/

>>2749774
>make a plan for the offensive
>plan fails
>repeat the same plan 11 times
>fails every time
>blame your generals

but also, after all that
>austrians make one offensive
>they absolutely destroy your armies and almost force your country out of the war

>>2749245
hans, where we are going we don't need supplies

>>2748779
le epik blackadder goes forth amirite m'gentlesirs wwi commanders were so dum xD

File: pasha.jpg (170KB, 800x987px) Image search: [Google]

170KB, 800x987px

>>2748779

File: gota go fast .jpg (245KB, 1500x1500px) Image search: [Google]

245KB, 1500x1500px

>>2748980
One of the shites generals ever

>>2750590
doesnt the clusterfuck that was his parthian invasion elevate him to meme status?

>>2750673
if you read about it he made the right decisions but didn't have the right forces (enough cavelry) and the enemy was well prepared. For example he waited for the enemy to run out of arrows but they had like 3000 camels resupplying the archers.

Honestly even Caesar couldn't have won that battle with the same forces.

>>2750670
evner was actually pretty chill during the italian-ottoman war

File: macarthur.gif (122KB, 364x370px) Image search: [Google]

122KB, 364x370px

Douglas "nuke the chinks" MacArthur

File: 220px-Phil6france (1).jpg (29KB, 220x301px) Image search: [Google]

29KB, 220x301px

Phillip the autistic

File: IMG_1449.jpg (158KB, 735x959px) Image search: [Google]

158KB, 735x959px

>>2749774

>>2749605
Supposedly the average Mexican soldier didn't even know how to aim a gun. I have no source for that, just an anecdote.

In contrast, the average Texan was a stereotypical American and was super familiar with guns.

>>2748869
>Leave Austria to me!

>>2750569
What if your strengths are more harmful to your own side than the enemy? Surely anything is better than sending your forces out to slaughter - and you know it will be a slaughter since it was a slaughter the previous dozen times or so.

>>2750620
t. Murrican

>>2751151
>What if your strengths are more harmful to your own side than the enemy
Well then it isn't a strength obviously

>>2751162
Precisely my point. He just kept throwing people at machineguns. Surely it couldn't be worse to let the Germans have that sort of tactical initiative.

>>2751176
>He just kept throwing people at machineguns.

Will you people cut it out with the meme history already? Crossing no-man's land and taking the opposing trench wasn't as big a deal as it's made out in pop culture, the difficult part was resisting the enemy's counterattack once their supply lines had shortened and yours had lengthened. Trench lines would be taken and then retaken due to the attacker's inability to hold on to them.

File: fhd004ALR_Raz_Degan_005.jpg (102KB, 1280x528px) Image search: [Google]

102KB, 1280x528px

>dude what the fuck am I doing haha
>wait where is my weed
>maybe it's behind those very strechted out phalanxes

>>2751188
What was the most common cause of casualties? Machine gun fire or close combat in the trenches? I'm suspecting it wasn't artillery here. I'm asking seriously, not contradicting you.

>>2751330
90% sure it was artillery or disease.

>>2751332
Well I am 90% sure it was machine-guns and suicidal attacks, right after shitty medical treatments.

>>2748779
john bell hood
in the battle of franklin he chose to launch a suicidal frontal assault because he felt his army had to regain their fighting spirit or something like that
attacking when he really shouldn't have was par for the course for him (his "defense" of atlanta, his choice to invade tennessee instead of trying to prevent sherman from burning everything)

File: 1491091431059.png (518KB, 830x541px) Image search: [Google]

518KB, 830x541px

>>2751336
artillery created over 75% of casualties. remember artillery was often firing whereas machine guns were only used in the event of an attack, and for rattling off a few rounds every now and again.

>>2751355
I don't believe you, it seems like you're just propagating your opinion and it seems that is even less grounded on actual knowledge of the history than mine is.

>>2751413
about 58.3 percent of German deaths were caused by artillery, 41.7 percent by small arms. Whalen, Bitter Wounds 1984, pp. 41-2.

>>2751423
See. Nowhere near 75%.

File: 1486115847412.jpg (61KB, 551x600px) Image search: [Google]

61KB, 551x600px

>>2751432
Still the majority brainlet and that was only for german troops. Machine guns plus all small arms ins't even 50%

>>2751336
>Well I am 90% sure it was machine-guns and suicidal attacks, right after shitty medical treatments.
t. clueless memester

>>2751446
>>2751449

Why the abuse? I'm not the one here posting meme images. *About* 58.3% is less than "over 75%". Doesn't change the fact that I was wrong too, I would have to admit.

>>2751460
75% total, 58 for german troops. anyway it's not like they kept super precise records about how people died but if you do a very basic look at ww1 history you will see that artillery was king, soldiers died on defense in their trenches, they died when they left their trenches to attack and they died sitting in their trenches for weeks from artillery while never seeing an enemy soldier.

>>2751473
>a very basic look at ww1 history you will see that artillery was king,

Depends on the front. In Belgium certainly, not so sure about the others.

File: IMG_0450.jpg (181KB, 996x1400px) Image search: [Google]

181KB, 996x1400px

>>2748779
At least they won in the end.
This retard is primarily responsible for the German defeat.

File: 1492799391172.png (12KB, 420x420px) Image search: [Google]

12KB, 420x420px

>>2751489
WW1 was a war that was decided before it began, how many doods, factories you got, how strong is ur national will but mostly the doods, if we can trade one of our dudes for one of urs and we have more we win.

the realities of technology meant things like encirclements which could eliminate hundreds of thousands of men in a stroke were just not realistic on any significant scale.

>>2751460
>says retarded shit
>gets called out on it
>haha but I see you didn't get a percentage figure exactly right tough luck pal

>>2751504
>technology develops to a point where a defensive, slow approach is optimal
>your battle plan consists of rushing through everything as quick as possible

Germany would have had the neccisary resources to win the war (hell, they capitulated Russia) had they not wasted them on the Schliffen plan.

>>2751548
Maybe but time was against them, especially in retrospect. as soon as US got involved the war was over.

>>2748779
Saddam Hussein.
When he declared war with Iran he used a presidential decree to appoint himself the highest military rank and personally took control of the war strategy, I'm sure most know how that turned out.

>>2751547
>technology develops to a point where a defensive, slow approach is optimal
>your battle plan consists of rushing through everything as quick a second possible

1. WWI battles usually stretched out over the course of months, define quick
2. Casualties were fairly even between the attacker and the defender (sometimes the attacker suffered less casualties than the defender, as in Verdun) so attacking could make sense even from a manpower perspective to "bleed your opponent white"

>>2751543
What would you have me do, admit defeat?

>>2748779
>not knowing about the counterattack
>>2748869
legitimately retarded

File: Vonmoltke.jpg (98KB, 400x600px) Image search: [Google]

98KB, 400x600px

>>2748779
>Be German Army Chief of Staff
>Schlieffen Plan going bretty well
>Crown Prince Rupprecht asks to go on the offensive and charge into French fortresses even though the plan you're supposed to be following requires him to withdraw to lure the French further into Germany
>Like a little beta cucklet, you give in and let your subordinates fuck up the master plan
>Russians send insignificant meme force into East Prussia
>Sperg out and divert 150,000 men from the Schlieffen plan to deal with the Russians
>Based von Hindenburg defeats them without their help, rendering the reinforcements completely useless
>French exploit gap at the Marne and cuck you out of taking Paris
>Panic and order your men to give up a retarded amount of ground, dig in and start a wasteful, unwinnable war of attrition that leads to the complete and total destruction of your empire

>>2751552
They would've had an unlimited amount of time if that fucking nitwit von Tirpitz didn't ram through "muh unrestricted submarine warfare." If they had just listened to Bethmann-Hollweg and not sank ships without warning the US would've stayed out and the Germans would've broken through to Paris.

>>2748980
>>2750672

DELET THIS

File: 1481301221020.jpg (132KB, 990x743px) Image search: [Google]

132KB, 990x743px

>>2749203
You make a good point, but hindsight is always 20/20.

World War 1 occupies a moment in history when commanders who were still stuck in the classical mindset were given command of armies in an industrial age.

The classical mindset was that when the warring season arrived, you mustered your army, trained them, marched them around for several months, spent weeks doing field maneuvers around the enemy army trying to secure the best possible position, and then line up your men in block formations and order the frontal assault, with cavalry/support protecting the flanks. Few casualties occurred during the melee (most happened during the rout) and were more akin to shoving matches, trying to disrupt your enemy's ranks long enough to break their morale. You didn't use irregulars because blocks of infantry were simply better at projecting force

What they mostly didn't realize is all that goes out the window in an age of rifles and railroads. Populations are huge enough that if the government has the willpower and the line of credit, it can make more soldiers show up. Marching around in formations and having a snazzy, brightly colored panoply becomes less important than land-nav, marksmanship, and cardio training wearing simple, functional fatigues. Armies could get from one place to another with extreme rapidity, traveling in a single day what would have taken many weeks of marching on foot. Digging in becomes more important than maneuvering around, but fixed static positions like forts are worse than useless. Rifles and machine guns are simply too efficient killing devices to justify full frontal assaults. Winning battles in an industrial age means replacing battlefield losses faster than your enemy can.

Needless to say, massing armies for pitched field battles seems pointless and stupid to us, but that's because we know better. It would have taken a man of true vision to see through the fog of history and make these kind of connections

>>2754137
>Needless to say, massing armies for pitched field battles seems pointless and stupid to us
This is where I disagree with you entirely. It doesn't 'seem stupid' because literally how the war was won, and the only way it could have been won given the present circumstances. If you didn't mass those armies then you would have been overwhelmed by the other guy who did.

The solutions to trench warfare were more technological than doctrinal. In fact, breakthroughs were common even in WW1, but consolidating them was the real problem because primitive communication and motorization made it difficult to reinforce the breakthrough before they could be dislodged with a counterattack.

It wasn't that the commanders were 'stuck in the past' quite the opposite, they were constantly updating and evolving their stratagems & incorporating new technology to meet the new problems they encountered, it's that they were bereft of the tools necessary to overcome the challenges presented by the western front in a quick and decisive fashion.

>>2749774
You know all those stereotypes about Soviet generals? Just throw men at the enemy, machine-gun your retreating troops, all that? Cadorna was that BUT FOR REAL. IIRC he even decimated units that failed at one point.

File: 1481462679912.jpg (175KB, 1244x787px) Image search: [Google]

175KB, 1244x787px

>>2754181
good points, I confess that my WWI history isn't as sharp as it could be, which is why I'm painting with broad strokes and don't mind being corrected. But you do see the same basic mistakes being made by both sides in almost every war after Napoleon and before Adolf.

>If you didn't mass those armies then you would have been overwhelmed by the other guy who did.
Wouldn't it make more sense to just keep massing soldiers into defensive positions and forcing your enemy to match your ability to raise and maintain troops and outlast his economy? Especially if they were that keen to funnel themselves into your grinders and therefore had to replace much more soldiers every time they gambled successfully on a victory, only to see it snatched from them because they overextended themselves?

>breakthroughs were common even in WW1
But it seems like the most common result were inconclusive slaughters like Somme.

>quite the opposite,
Clever tactics is something different from strategic vision, though you need both in order to succeed. They were looking for new ways to beat the enemy soldiers in the field, to maximize inflicted casualties. What they weren't looking for was new ways to destroy their ability to make those soldiers appear in the first place.

Horatio Gates

>>2749969
Germans just head out East and knock out the Russians and then the Italians and then come back for you then.

>>2754347

The issues at the Somme were the use of the wrong artillery rounds by the British and the the fact that the British never had the need to engage in an offensive other than to help the French. Who were the defenders against a German offensive at verdun. And we're getting plastered. Verdun was almost an effective offensive until higher command fucked it up.

Localized breakthroughs were super common in throughout the war, it was the act of exploiting those into meaningful gain that was hard as shit.

And commanders were motivated to commit to offensives because everyone wanted to win the war without the massive cost of attrition, their underestimation of defensive capability is glaring, but could anyone really just sit back and be okay with a far longer bloody artillery duel that went on for years and years?

>>2754524
>The issues
but isn't that the point? That there will always be "issues" that seem totally obvious in hindsight?

Seems to me like they would have been better off investing in their navies and bulking up their investments in emerging technologies which would have made a difference: good dependable personal vehicles, earth moving vehicles, aircraft which were more than glorified kites with a machine strapped to it and could carry cargo or drop soldiers, etc.

Like you said, the problem was primarily logistics related, if they couldn't capitalize on their victories, then why gamble on them at all? Why waste your time inventing new machine guns when you should be inventing new back end technologies which boost your military's logistic capacity to capitalize on victory?

>could anyone really just sit back and be okay with a far longer bloody artillery duel that went on for years and years?
Well, the soldiers themselves. Often times they'd get to know the soldiers on the other side and time their artillery fire so that they would land harmlessly and not hurt anyone. At one point on Christmas night there was the famous story of the two sides hearing each other singing the same Christmas carols, met in no mans land, played football, traded rations, and refused to fight each other the next day.The generals called it the "disease of peace" and stamped it out by rotating soldiers so that they could never properly humanize the soldiers on the other side of the trench. It made it easier to funnel them into the grind.

File: solano_lopez.jpg (36KB, 514x600px) Image search: [Google]

36KB, 514x600px

DUDE IM NAPOLEON LMFAO

>>2750728
>Douglas "Eat Bok Choy Get The Little Boy" MacArthur
>Douglas "Invaded by Japan, Get The Fat Man" MacArthur
>Douglas "Commies From Beijing Get The Sting" MacArthur
>Douglas "Mao Ze-bomb" MacArthur
>Douglas "Glass The Gooks" MacArthur

>>2751631
Yes you utter wretch, you are wrong.

>>2754817
Being wrong didn't stop Haig from his one-trick-pony offensives, why should I be any better, especially since I'm not putting anyone's life at stake?

>>2751631
Read a book.

https://www.amazon.com/Chief-Douglas-Haig-British-Army/dp/1845137698/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1493907897&sr=8-1&keywords=the+chief+douglas+haig

File: George_B_McClellan_-_retouched.jpg (116KB, 1108x1385px) Image search: [Google]

116KB, 1108x1385px

Boggles my mind some of the shit he pulled. A shame, since he was excellent at actually organizing the army.

>>2756631
McClellan was an excellent bureaucrat.

He was a foppish and indecisive military commander and the worst kind of compromise weasel as a presidential candidate.

File: 1491703214753.png (444KB, 733x881px) Image search: [Google]

444KB, 733x881px

>>2750728
mcarthur was actually an okay general, his only major flaw being his personality.

>>2748779
Fuck off lloyd george you lying cunt.

>>2758908
this tbqh

>>2748869
This guy finished the thread too soon

>>2758021
>oh no we're encircled in Korea
>wants to have the force try to break out to the north
FLAWLESS PLAN

File: greeks freedom fighters.jpg (9KB, 188x251px) Image search: [Google]

9KB, 188x251px

>>2754788
this is the best thing in this thread
thank you

>>2748934
>>2748943
Literally who?

File: BurgoyneByReynolds.jpg (438KB, 1084x1384px) Image search: [Google]

438KB, 1084x1384px

>Nice army you have there King George. It'd be a shame if somebody lost it.

>>2754524
>Verdun was almost an effective offensiv
Verdun ate 10% of german yearly ammo production in just two weeks, a good chunk of that in the first couple of days.
It also required like half a year of preparation and infrastructure build up.
And it still ended up a failure.

Verdun was not an example of offense being viable.

>>2749969
Yeah that totally worked for tactically superior Germans at Verdun.

>>2751504
>the realities of technology meant things like encirclements which could eliminate hundreds of thousands of men in a stroke were just not realistic on any significant scale.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tannenberg

>>2761275
>the realities of technology meant things like encirclements which could eliminate hundreds of thousands of men in a stroke were just not realistic on any significant scale, when facing competent opponents.

also 1914, 1914, trench warfare wasn't established.

>>2759898
Burgoyne was pretty cool desu

>>2761839
Burgoyne had a chance to win the war and he fucked it up. And then he kept fucking up. He fucked up so badly that the French decided to rub salt in the wound and joined the war. The fact that Americans do not revere Gentleman Johnny as a saint baffles me.

>>2761275
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tannenberg
Russia was a mistake

>>2749153
Haig wasn't incompetent, per se. He just didn't give a shit. His previous battles, like when he avenged Gordon in the Soudan, showed him to be (and was reported by his soldiers) incredibly cold-hearted.

>>2750049
Lets make a square

>>2762061
"Great crowds lined the streets ... come to do honour to the chief who had sent thousands to the last sacrifice when duty called for it, but whom his war-worn soldiers loved as their truest advocate and friend."

he was cold hearted but he spent lives, he didn't waste them, you can't be some bitch who is scared about getting soldiers killed.

>>2748869
ITS OVER LUIGI I HAVE THE HIGH GROUND!

>>2762220
You underestimate my meatballs

File: tenor[1].gif (705KB, 244x280px) Image search: [Google]

705KB, 244x280px

Haig was made a scapegoat after the war.
Much easier to blame a general than have people actually think about the problems with imperialism and nationalism