Who is the greatest military leader of all-time?

[notyoueither]

BTW. Nappy was still better than all the rest.

If it weren't for Horse's spamming he'd be winning hands down.

[TheStinger]

Originally posted by Tingkai


I thought the House of Lords still had hereditary members.

There are, i think 92 heriditaries left out of about 700 total members left.

Ive got more of a problem with bishops being allowed in.

The house of lords in any case can only delay an revise legislation and in connection with finance cannot do anything.

BTW I do not think the British system is perfect, but to say its not democratic is IMO wrong

[Tingkai]

700 members in the House of Lords. Now there's a pork barrel. And I thought the Canadian senate was bad.

[TheStinger]

Originally posted by Tingkai
700 members in the House of Lords. Now there's a pork barrel. And I thought the Canadian senate was bad.

Its a retirement club of old/useless politicians,union leaders,generals etc

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Tingkai
700 members in the House of Lords. Now there's a pork barrel. And I thought the Canadian senate was bad.

HAH!

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Boshko

Actually the Mongols had quite sophisticated siege operations manned largely by the Chinese they had conquered who were quite good at that sort of thing.

Thank you for saving me the trouble of correcting Chris and all that that entails.

[Sikander]

I am inclined to vote for Alexander mainly because I know about him in much more detail than I know about Ghengis Khan. There are many other good and great generals who have been mentioned. Julias Ceasar is certainly one of them, with several of his battles being worthy of mention as textbook examples of military brilliance.

I only tend to consider those generals who were able to show that that they had the complete package. Tacticians such as Rommel and Patton (or even Zhukov) don't make this very high level of discussion, as able as they were in their sphere. IMO the best have to show excellence in three areas to be considered:

Tactical skill
Strategic vision
Logistical excellence

I leave political skill out mainly because this is a thread about military leaders, and while political skill is often a crucial part of military leadership, it sometimes does not matter all that much. Ghengis Khan, Alexander and Julias Ceasar all make the grade IMO, and they all had not an inconsiderable amount of political skill to boot, which was important in their cases as they were also political leaders. Robert E. Lee is extremely overrated IMO, and doesn't belong here. Napolean was a brilliant tactician, but he overextended himself early and often, and was worn down by all the attention he managed to garner for himself and his nation. Shaka doesn't even belong in the poll IMO, this isn't just about whipping the locals but showing brilliance of a sort that attracts the attention of historians who have read hundreds of battle and campaign histories. Scipio Africanus belongs in the poll, but doesn't get my vote. Charlemagne is an interesting choice, and I admit that I would have to refresh my memory on his military exploits, but I tend to think that like Shaka the level of his opponents did not do him sufficient honor, and that a lot of his fame came for more political reasons than military.

[Boris Godunov]

I will give a special award to Alexander, just because he also slept with men.

[Ecthy]

so many definitelies... how can that be possible?

[Adalbertus]

The greatest leader of all times is Adolf Hitler (self-declared).

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Tingkai
I define modern democracy as a political system where the leader is elected by the people.

No, that's a republic...which, by definition, a monarchy is not.

[TheStinger]

Originally posted by Zkribbler


No, that's a republic...which, by definition, a monarchy is not.

The leader in the UK is elected and therefore it is a democracy. The head of state is not elected, however they have no power and therfore this makes no difference.

BTW a republic does not have to have its leader elected by the people.

[Keygen]

Originally posted by Ned

Actually, there is a grain of truth in the "revisionist" description of the battle with Porus even if one assumes that Alexander won. Alexander may have lost so many of his quality cavalry and infrantry that he simply did not have the resources to carry on and defeat another Porus.

In other words, the battle of Jhelum was in a sense a Pyrrhic victory.

Just as you said, AH, Alexander must have now realized that a campaign in India was not to be more "mop up" as he had experienced in the Persian Empire.

But where is the truth? All we really know is that Alexander did not end up ruling Porus's kingdom and Alexander did leave India.

According to the sources I have found so far Alexander lost 300 cavalry and 700 infantry while Porus lost 12000 to 23000 men and two of his sons. He was captured as prison as well. This doesn't sound like a Pyrrhic victory to me. Though the number might not be true the most likely is that it was a great victory with much more casualties on behalf of Porus compared to Alexander. Alexander gave Porus his kingdom back and forced him to make peace with the king of Taxila, who had originally called Alexander to halp him against Porus, and gather his rest of his army to aid Alexander in a future campaign against other Indian kingdoms. He established two new cities, Nikaia (which means win in Greek) near the victorious battlefield and Voukefala (in the name of his horse which died from fatigue with the end of the battle) in the crossing point of the river.

He moved north to Kasmir to meet a king who had allied with Porus. He submitted without fight.
Then he moved east conquering without fight around 37 cities and many smaller towns and villages and gave them all to his new ally, Porus. After that he besieged - with fight this time - Sagaly (not sure for the spelling) which is beleived to be the current Lahore losing 100 men and 1200 wounded and killing some thousands and enslaving even more. He stopped in a river east of Amritsar where he had crossed 1500 Km since the day he cossed the Indian river. He was planning to attack another Indian kingom located in the Ganges river and much larger than Porus' kingdom. From local information he learned that that kingdom had around 250000 army and some thousands elephants but the king having encroached the thrown was not popular among his subjects. But rumors that his soldiers wanted to return home made him call his generals. He told his generals a beutiful story that their destination to fight and conquer hadn't came into an end and stuff like that. They answered that the army was exausted and they advised him to return back. Alexander got upset and remained under his tent for a couple of days. He adviced his astrologers who said to him that the gods where against this time. He was very disappointed and he decided to return. Three months after the battle with Porus he decided to return. Alexander deleived that his destiny was to conquer the world.

The truth is somewhere between I beleive. The army was tired indeed, the moral low, they were under severe rainfall for lot of weeks and - important - they were not permitted to loot the conquered lands that had submitted without fight (almost all). Not even Porus' kingdom.

From the above you can easily conclude that the only battle or war he lost was to convise and inpire his army and his generals to follow him. He never lost to Porus in any form.

Originally posted by Chris 62

To help you better to understand the Mongols and their armed forces, please read:

The Campaigns of Chingas Khan Translated from Chiese text prepared during Kublai Khan's reign by Pelliot and Hambliss
Medieval researches from Eastern Asiatic Sources English translation of contemporay Chinese sources by Bretschneider
The Ancient art of warfare by Boudet
The Mongol Empire by Brent
The Mongols in Russia by Curtain
The military life of Gengis Khan:Khan of Khans by Dupuy
Decisive battles of the western world by Fuller
History of the Mongols by Howorth
The Devils' Horsemen by Chambers.

This should clear up some misconceptions you have about them and their way of war.

Chengis Khan was great indead but perhaps you should consider that the mongol empire during his rules was a little larger than Alexander's and he ruled the twice years Alexander ruled. The true is than during the first 10 years of Chengis Khan's rule his empire was significantly smaller than Alexander's while I think the Mongol lands before the expantion was also larger than Macedonia was before Alexander's expantion (not sure though about the latter).

Originally posted by Azazel

paiktis: alexander indeed influenced lots of cultures. For example, in judea, people were honoured to call their children alexander, and the jewish writings respect him very much, because he gave the jews a religious autonomy, his name was "Alexander Mokdon", Alexander the Macedonian . Some Kings of the Hashmonaite dynasty that followed, after the jews revolted against the selecid greeks , that opressed them. As the ritual goes in jewish tradition, this revolt is depicted in grandeur , and is celebrated each year.

Interesting

Originally posted by Shi Huangdi

And while you are at it, stop claiming the works of the Macedonian Hero Alexander to be Greece's own.

Here we go again...

[Keygen]

Originally posted by TheStinger

There are, i think 92 heriditaries left out of about 700 total members left.

Ive got more of a problem with bishops being allowed in.

The house of lords in any case can only delay an revise legislation and in connection with finance cannot do anything.

BTW I do not think the British system is perfect, but to say its not democratic is IMO wrong

As far as I know the Perliament of the Lords was abolished a couple of years during the service of the prime minister Blair or was removed as part of the ordinary parliament.

[Keygen]

Edit: I deleted my bull here...