Pick three favorite officers from history, and say why you picked them.

[Lancer]

For me it has to be Rommel, Manstein and Lee.

Rommel put together an amazing all out damn the flanks drive into France in '40. Then he kicked butt in Africa and continued to do so long after the balance had turned against him. His use of the .88 anti aircraft gun was genious. His defense of France wasn't a bad effort considering the mission was impossible. In the end he opposed Hitler and paid for it with his life.

I named my Golden Retriever 'Rommel', a fact which amazed some Germans who came to my bookstore ages ago. They said they were going to write about it in Germany, but I don't know if they ever did.

Mansein held in the East with a fluid defense holding up Soviet armies of much greater strength. Movement and ambush, he was the master.

Lee kept the Confederacy in the fight with inferior forces through superb generalship. He was aided by inept leadership of Union armies and had excellent officers under his command. He comes third because of Gettysburg, that great mistake which may have saved the Union.

[BeBMan]

Nelson, de Ruyter, Ushakov - because I always had a faible for the age of sails.

[Lancer]

Ushakov ? Who?

[Qilue]

Originally posted by Lancer
Ushakov ? Who?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyodor_Fyodorovich_Ushakov

[Saras]

Sharpe, Hornblower and Capt.Winters of Easy Company, 506 PIR.

[BeBMan]

It's an Russian admiral from 18th/beginning of the 19th century (so ca. same period as Nelson), not very known in the west maybe, but he fought several successful battles in the Black Sea against the - often superior - Osman Fleet.

edit: ahh too late.

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Saras
Sharpe, Hornblower and Capt.Winters of Easy Company, 506 PIR.

Band of Brothers

[Lancer]

Aubrey could whip Hornblower.

[Tattila the Hun]

Er, I don't think either Jack Aubrey or Horatio Hornblower actually existed...

But I'd still put my wager on Hornblower.

Though, I liked Aubrey's stories in MAC:FSOTW. "Always pick the lesser of two weevils." and "Young man, could you pass me the salt?", a profound and thoughtfull quote from Admiral Nelson.


Oh, I pick Lauri Törni, Viljam Pylkäs and Simo Häyhä.

[Proteus_MST]

Generalfeldmarschall Rommel
Admiral Don Juan de Austria
(who commanded the catholic/venezian fleet at the battle of Lepanto)
Fregattenkapitän Karl von Müller
(who commanded the light cruiser Emden during WW I, which became famous as
1. it functioned as a raider [and the only german warship] in the Indian ocean [which was almost totally controlled by the english forces] sinking a lot of vessels, capturing many others and forcing the entire english fleet within the area to hunt the ship at least until finally an australian cruiser named Sydney by chance discovered the ship and sunk it
2. Captain and Crew of the Emden showed great chivalry in treating all of the sailors captured as well as the own crew, giving them the same rations as the crew even if food was scarce and releasing them as quickly as possible as long as they didn´t want to become members of the regular crew)

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Tattila the Hun
Er, I don't think either Jack Aubrey or Horatio Hornblower actually existed...

And I think people knew that

[Harovan]

Since a lot of people seem to choose only high command officers, I'll choose some of those who did the actual work. Here's my German WWII collection. There are without doubt outstanding subordinate officers in the previous wars, but the farther you go back in time, the less often mere lieutenants and captains are mentioned in the history books. And there are without doubt outstanding subordinate officers in other armies as well, but I am limited to 3, so name your favorite brits/americans/french/russians etc. yourself.

Michael Wittmann

Erich Alfred Hartmann

Günther Prien

[Al B. Sure!]

Hannibal Barca
Belisarius
Khalid ibn al-Walid

[Ecthy]

Prien

Only superceded by KaLeun Lehmann-Willenbrock

[Al B. Sure!]

Hartmann had 352 kills! the greatest fighter pilot ever.