Who was the greatest WW2 military strategist/tactician?

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I'm going for Orde Wingate. I won't explain why just yet. It'll be worth waiting for- trust me.

In the meantime, who are your picks?

[Will9]

I'd say Abrams. He actually came up with the much of the plan Patton used to break the Battle of the Bulge.

[BeBMan]

By the end of WWII Hitler had become such a military genius that he operated with armies that didn't exist

[Cort Haus]

Isoroku Yamamoto

[Grandpa Troll]

Dwight David Eisenhower for heading up a coalition of prima donna's (Strategist)

Pictured here with George Patton on right and in center Omar N Bradley

[LordShiva]

Captain Sam Manekshaw

[Last Conformist]

Göring Just look at his decorations

[TheStinger]

Stalin, he crushed the Finns

[Tattila the Hun]

Originally posted by TheStinger
Stalin, he crushed the Finns

You do know, FDF was never militarily defeated... By a hair's width, granted.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

My own choice- Orde Wingate.

Wingate pioneered what we now know as special forces operations- relatively small elite forces operating behind enemy lines to create chaos. In Ethiopia his Gieon Force (never more than 1700 strong) took over 15,000 Italian prisoners and drove back two armies.

However it's for his Burmese actions that he's best remembered. He founded the Chindits- a small force of fast-moving guerillas supplied by air that repeatedly cut Japanese supply lines. The Chindits were the first British forces to really hurt the Japanese advance, and made them look horribly vulnerable.

Wingate was howlingly eccentric, and had to be placed in extremely hazardous commands- in safe postings he became depressed, and when placed in a desk position in Cairo he attempted suicide. He was also a hugely enthusiastic nudist, and rarely wore clothes while giving staff briefings.

[Kuciwalker]

Interesting. I remember reading about Merril's Marauders, who were apparently inspired by the Chindits.

[Dr Strangelove]

But what about Monty?

I mean clearly Operation Market Garden was a stroke of mad genius.

[Grandpa Troll]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
But what about Monty?

I mean clearly Operation Market Garden was a stroke of mad genius.

Q F T

[Saras]

In defense of Monty and Market Garden - audacity, audacity-always audacity. Was it a gamble? Yes. Were the losses staggering? Yes. Was it doomed from the outset? Absolutely not. Were the fruits of success worth the risk? Of course. The whole of postwar Europe might have looked different, i.e. the Russians would be further away. Maybe even the Cold war would have been less cold.

I am of course biased, in a sense that maybe, just maybe, there would be an armistice with Russians halfway through Poland, and with Germany under control of Western Allies, Eastern Europe would not have been sold down the drain in Yalta...

[Hercules]

Arguably, General Georgi Zhukov (Russian) or Field Marshall Alan Brooke (British).