Praxus

The military exists to end a threat to the United States. Generals exist to lead the military. Therefor Generals exist to win wars. At that, Sherman was one of the best.

Would you also call Sherman a leader of a mob? How about Empaminondas?

Cowboykiller

Hannibal laid siege on Italy for 15 years?

FlyingCaddy

I am dumbfounded how you can speak in such absolute terms just becasue you throw two names at me and give some sweeping statement you completely disprove me!!! Look I already explained why Shermans was mediocre, he was behind enemy lines, it was 1864 what defense was the confederates throwing up after multiple defeats and heavy losses at such places like Vicksburg, and the Tennessee campaign? IT doesnt take a great general or even a good one to keep an army in the field under some order as they raise farms, factories and other means of war. As a matter of fact it was amiracle that the MArch tot he sea didnt turn into a route, Sherman winged it and decided to live off the land, if the Confederates could have used a scorced earth policy, and has a sufficent foces to counter Sherman could have been crushed.

Now Forrest I am a little less aware of him, however, the man lakced any formal military training therefore unlike his peers he did not have the same mentality, and if you read my statement correctly I said the flaw with civil war generals is they have the same experiences and training. The equivalent of Forrest in the civil war would be some European general joining the Civil war, he doesnt think the same therefore his opponents have less ability to anticipate his moves. Also in Forrest's case he had good luck and idiot opponents in spades, http://ngeorgia.com/people/forrest.html.

Praxus

And in the end accomplished nothing but the destruction of his own nation.

Praxus

FlyingCaddy, what are you talking about. You made a statement; "To me Civil war leaders are like football coaches playing with the same book, they all have the plays and everybody else knows how to counter them."

The fact that there were generals that did not use the "same book" and instituted strategies that the enemy could not counter, proves this statement wrong. Now your going to argue with me and claim that I didn't read your statement correctly?

You made a blanket statement about Civil War leaders. You made no such exclusion.

Amled

IMO you can’t really call Sun Tzu a Civil War general. At the time in question China was a hodgepodge of independent feudal nations in constant conflict with each other. Much like Northern Europe in the early Middle Ages.
As the quote shows he was apparently not just a theoretician, but also able to put into practice what he wrote.
Also his stroke of genius was to be able to compile and collate wisdom and knowledge garnered from thousands of years of warfare.

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troung

If taking the war into the enemies heartland, behind their lines with a well supplied force that one keeps supplied and that army rips that heart out of the enemy is the mark of a bad commander...

Play books can change awfully fast.

He put on and kept on pressure.

Anon

"
And in the end accomplished nothing but the destruction of his own nation."

Um, not exactly true.

The battle of Cannae is still required teaching in every major military academy in the world, and well.......you know his name don't you?

FlyingCaddy

No taking the war to the enemy's heartland isnt the making of a bad commander, but it also doesnt make you the second comming of Alexander.

If play books can change awfully fast then home come formation and volley tactics were used until after the US Civil War, and then trench tactics took thier place until WWII?

EricTheRed

king phyrric was the best

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Punjab Ki Fauj

There is alot i dislike about him and what he did, but i voted for Alexander the Great.

For the original poster, are you sure Xerxes was the greatest of the Achaemenid Persians?

sparten

Hannible thought that King Phyrrus was second only to Alexander.

As far as American Civul War is concerned, Grant was the best. Lee was excellent as a field commander but he lacked strategic thought, during the overland campaign he battled Grant well, but did not realize that the destruction of his army, not capture of Richmond was Grants objective. Not until he was pinned down in Petersburg that is.

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Praxus

I read that in Livy as well (or Polybius, I forget which). He also implyed that Scipio was beyond the best, saying that if he had defeated Scipio he would have been far beyond Alexander and Phyrrus in military achievement.

Simullacrum

Alexander the great.................
By almost any historical standard, the life and achievements of Alexander the Great have to be considered among the most spectacular (albeit bloody) in human history. In a little over a decade, he took a splintered and fragmented group of Greek city-states and united them, and challenged the greatest military powers of his day, the Indians and the Persians. Not only that, but he actually won, defeating all comers and establishing a short-lived empire that wouldn't be surpassed until the coming of the Romans centuries later.

troung

Philip the Second created the Macedonian war machine, defeated the Greeks and was ready to enter Persia before his death...

Alexander was given a powerful army when he became king.

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