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Belisarius (or the Byzantine generals as a whole) is the most important general by far, probably one of the main reasons europe wasn't torn apart by barbarian tribes at a vulnerable time!
Subutai (or the generals of Ghengis Khan) was extremely gruesome but also one of the reasons Ghengis Khan razed the world for so long! Killing his own people to keep the troops in line for an insanely long time was the way to go.
Alexander the Great though his achievements were longer ago and therefore the sources are less accurate.
A lot of people are overrated because of superior weapons:
Attila the Hun really abused his superior bows and Julius Ceasar and his turtle shields come to mind. Modern warfare is a completely different beast! It's so much more a war of otrition in ww1 and 2. With the newer weapons (atomic bomb, long range missiles, hydrogen bomb, stealth aircrafts and more) we can only hope that a real war will never happen again and finding a masterfull general since ww 2 will be almost impossible.because of the limitless options!
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I prefer to call people who can adapt and be flexible military geniuses. There are way too many so called geniuses that play one trick pony strategies and 1a2a their way to GG in history. If they are lucky they may die before someone learns to break their shenenigans, if not their legacy ends in the same manner because they were a bit overratd in the first place.
Not that I'm trying to overly criticize generals who came up with good standardized tactics for their time. After all its hard to get a group of people (that are most often typically not geniuses) to coordinate and bring success, so that's a feat in of itself. But there has to be some balance away from rigid standardized practices to qualify as being an ingenious tactician. And that's why I think typical ww2 german tactics doesn't qualify as being good imo.
Certainly the russians played their war very well, but they were playing the cards they were dealt and played to their strength. While germans had the very opposite; terrible matchup and made blunders to exponentially make matters worse. If germans won it would've been extraordinary, otherwise I don't see anything all that remarkable.
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On February 24 2011 05:16 Adaptation wrote:
This post is gonna be fairly long and i will establish what i consider a must to evaluate a general to another. This is part of notes made by me and many other historical forumites. This list however is still in works, i do have some things that i have to review. Its very difficult to rank all of these, but for me the 1st one is a clear because he started from scratch and built the largest empire known to man.
Theres so many facets to consider that it makes it very difficult to evaluate. But here i go.
Evaluation of Generals
These are the primary facets to consider in evaluating generals’ skills:
1. Individual battlefield inspirational leadership—leadership of the soldier
a. Exemplary work/Personal bravery
b. Motivation
c. Discipline
d. Equipment (and hence innovation in equipment)
e. Logistics (small scale)
2. Tactical mastery—gaining success on the battlefield
a. Maneuver
b. Anticipation
c. Timing
d. Deception of intentions
e. Organization of army
f. Selection of ground for battle
g. Disposition of troops
h. Reconnaissance
i. Evaluating options
j. Audacity at proper times
k. Understanding the enemy
2.5. (Less important) Siege mastery—gaining success in sieges
a. Logistics
b. Engineering
c. Timing
d. Intelligence gathering
e. Motivation of troops
3. Strategic mastery—gaining success in campaign through maneuver or battle
a. Logistics
b. Maneuver on large scale
c. Understanding opportunities
d. Diplomacy with allied armies/generals
e. Forcing battle when necessary
f. Obtaining results from victories in battles
g. Limiting fallout from defeats in battles
h. Choosing when to siege and when to bypass strong points
i. Large-scale organization of army(s)
j. Audacity at proper times
k. Evaluating the enemy’s options
l. Defense—fortifications
4. Grand strategic mastery—gaining victory/the ends desired through the military campaigns (political victory/conquest)
a. Diplomacy with allies and foes
b. Intelligence gathering
c. Understanding when to go to war
d. Playing off rivalries
e. Properly using strategic victories
f. Choosing proper goals for campaigns
g. Peace negotiations
h. Pacification of inhabitants conquered
All of these must be considered in relation to:
1. The relative strength of each side in each of these 4 facets (Rommel and Lee come to mind, great tactically, however some strategic flaws)
2. The skill of opponents (caesar comes to mind, lots of victory's versus barbaric tribes)
3. The economy with which victory in each of these 4 facets was one (in money, destruction of property, and manpower).
4. Where the general was limited by influences out of his control (for instance, many generals had no opportunity to exhibit facet #4, grand strategy).
5. Where generals were stabbed in the back/not supported by their own nations( Barca, Hannibal.)
6. Whether the methods in which victories were gained were innovative or common practice (a small influence, but perhaps should be considered).
7. The time scale of victories
I keep saying i will post my top 100, i will just drop it. Boom. I will highlight the most popular.
1 Temujin (Genghis Khan) 1167 1227
2 Alexander the Great 356 BC 323 BC
3 Napoleon Bonaparte 1769 1821
4 Hannibal Barca 241 BC 183 BC
5 Timur 1336 1405
6 Khalid ibn al-Walid 584 642
7 Aleksandr Suvorov 1729 1800
8 Jan Žižka 1370 1424
9 Belisarius 505 565
10 John Churchill (Duke of Marlborough) 1650 1722
11 Subotai 1176 1248
12 Gustav II Adolf 1594 1632
13 Scipio Africanus the Older 237 BC 183 BC
14 Gaius Julius Caesar 100 BC 44 BC
15 Eugene of Savoy 1663 1736
16 Henri de La Tour d'Auvergne de Turenne 1611 1675
17 Heraclius 575 641
18 Sir Arthur Wellesley (Duke of Wellington) 1769 1852
19 Frederick II of Prussia 1712 1786
20 Maurice, comte de Saxe 1696 1750
21 Raimondo Montecuccoli 1608 1680
22 Philip II of Macedon 382 BC 336 BC
23 Stefan cel Mare (Stephen III) 1433 1504
24 Selim I 1470 1520
25 Gaius Marius 157 BC 86 BC
26 George Kastrioti (Skanderbeg) 1405 1468
27 Erich von Manstein 1887 1973
28 Nadir Shah 1688 1747
29 Robert Clive 1725 1774
30 Hán Xìn 196 BC
31 Gonzalo de Córdoba (El Gran Capitán) 1453 1515
32 Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke 1800 1891
33 Shapur I 272
34 Chandragupta Maurya 298 BC
35 Maurice of Nassau 1567 1625
36 Heinz Wilhelm Guderian 1888 1954
37 Robert E. Lee 1807 1870
38 Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson 1824 1863
39 Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé 1621 1686
40 Tiglath-Pileser III 727 BC
41 Thutmose III 1540 BC
42 Trần Hưng Đạo 1228 1300
43 Toyotomi Hideyoshi 1536 1598
44 Lucius Cornelius Sulla 138 BC 78 BC
45 Yue Fei 1103 1142
46 Babur 1483 1530
47 Louis Nicholas Davout 1770 1823
48 Janos Hunyadi 1387 1456
49 Duke of Parma (Alessandro Farnese) 1545 1592
50 Leo III the Isaurian 685 741
51 Paul Emil von Lettow-Vorbeck 1870 1964
52 Simeon I the Great 864 927
53 Hamilcar Barca 270 BC 228 BC
54 Nurhaci 1558 1626
55 Winfield Scott 1786 1866
56 Charles XII 1682 1718
57 Oda Nobunaga 1534 1582
58 Shivaji Bhosle 1627 1680
59 Francesco I Sforza 1401 1466
60 Stanislaw Koniecpolski 1590 1646
61 Claude-Louis-Hector de Villars 1653 1734
62 Louis Joseph de Bourbon, duc de Vendôme 1654 1712
63 Georgy Zhukov 1896 1974
64 Aurelian (Lucius Domitius Aurelianus) 214 275
65 Epaminondas 418 BC 362 BC
66 Jan III Sobieski 1629 1696
67 Alp Arslan 1029 1072
68 Constantine I the Great 272 337
69 Murad IV 1612 1640
70 Baibars 1223 1277
71 'Amr ibn al-'As 583 664
72 Emperor Taizong of Tang (Li ShìMín) 599 649
73 Sargon of Akkad
74 Suleiman I 1494 1566
75 Shaka Zulu 1787 1828
76 Charles Martel 688 741
77 François de Montmorency-Bouteville 1628 1695
78 Aleksandr Vasilevsky 1895 1977
79 Jebe 1225
80 Carl Gustav Mannerheim 1867 1951
81 Lautaro (toqui) 1557
82 Flavius Stilicho 359 408
83 André Masséna 1758 1817
84 Mahmud of Ghazni 971 1030
85 Ulysses Simpson Grant 1822 1885
86 Erwin Rommel 1891 1944
87 Uqba ibn Nafi 622 683
88 Muhammad of Ghor 1162 1206
89 Gazi Evrenos 1417
90 Robert the Bruce 1274 1329
91 Mustafa Kemal 1881 1938
92 Albrecht Wallenstein 1583 1634
93 Takeda Shingen 1521 1573
94 James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose 1612 1650
95 Pyotr Bagration 1765 1812
96 Ranjit Singh 1780 1839
97 Samudragupta 335 380
98 Michael the Brave 1558 1601
99 Ahmad Shah Durrani 1723 1773
100 Edmund Allenby, 1st Viscount Allenby 1861 1936
Ho Lee Shit.
I'm totally putting this list on my computer and researching these names!!!!
Thanks man :D.
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I love some of these total meta-picks for best general lol
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OP got nuked so i dont know what he meant by "general"
so i'll assume "military leader" that includes admirals, generals, commanders, strategists, etc.
1. yi sun shin
2. alexander
3. napoleon
4. nelson
5. sun tzu
extra 6. zhuge liang
i'm biased  but i think yi deserves to be #1 for not only as a strategist and military man but as a person in general, pun not intended.
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On February 24 2011 08:56 NIJ wrote:
I prefer to call people who can adapt and be flexible military geniuses. There are way too many so called geniuses that play one trick pony strategies and 1a2a their way to GG in history. If they are lucky they may die before someone learns to break their shenenigans, if not their legacy ends in the same manner because they were a bit overratd in the first place.
Not that I'm trying to overly criticize generals who came up with good standardized tactics for their time. After all its hard to get a group of people (that are most often typically not geniuses) to coordinate and bring success, so that's a feat in of itself. But there has to be some balance away from rigid standardized practices to qualify as being an ingenious tactician. And that's why I think typical ww2 german tactics doesn't qualify as being good imo.
Certainly the russians played their war very well, but they were playing the cards they were dealt and played to their strength. While germans had the very opposite; terrible matchup and made blunders to exponentially make matters worse. If germans won it would've been extraordinary, otherwise I don't see anything all that remarkable.
What? Do you fail to see the glaringly obvious point that those "one-tricks" you're talking about were revolutionary advances? It's not very easy to totally revolutionize warfare. I suggest you give it a try sometime and then talk about 1a2a3a. Blitzkrieg tactics were completely unseen in modern warfare before their usage, and it sure as fuck is not as easy as you try to make it sound when you're using masses of men and weapons never before seen to execute strategies never before done in a real war.
In essence, I think your analysis is terrible. Real easy to be an armchair general using hindsight binoculars.
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imo, Douglas MacArthur and Alexander the Great
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ummmm anyone ever hear of Alexander the Great? Or Napoleon Bonaparte? havent seen these names yet but i find both to be great leaders
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Wow adaptation's list is fucking legit. I don't agree with the exact ordering of every general but for a list done by someone that's not me it comes pretty close to being what I would accept. One major change I would make is to put Alexander the Great above Genghis Khan, though it's close.
On February 24 2011 11:00 FroZen(-_-) wrote:
ummmm anyone ever hear of Alexander the Great? Or Napoleon Bonaparte? havent seen these names yet but i find both to be great leaders
You don't read much do you? Or bother to use ctrl f?
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If you look into it it was only after he took control of the german forces did the allies cause significant advances in normandy. I'm sure the germans being SIGNIFICANTLY outnumbered had something to do with this as well. Also wasn't Rommel the most successful general for the axis?
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History has only ever been a small hobby for me, so I've never been that good at specific details, however I'd like to take this opportunity to do a nationalistic plug for two of my countrymen, who also happened to be outstanding generals. Not the greatest of all time, but they're certainly up there:
Gustavus the Great and Charles XII.
On the same topic I'd like to say that the Caroleans had among the coolest battle uniform of any regiment ever:
+ Show Spoiler +
I prefer it in a brighter shade of blue, but I suppose the darker shade gives a more realistic representation of how it probably looked. Still, if we would've actually got to wear stuff like that in the military these days, I might've considered joining.
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King Leonidas from 300 kinda off showed great leadership and excellent tactics with weaponary and that he had to work with little men in order to stop a pretty big army. But I would say that Zhuge Liang or Sun Tzu have to be the best in my book.
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Erwin Rommel
baddest mofo of them all...
He invaded france (1940), drove the british out of north africa (1941) and was responsible for the fortification of french coastlines prior to operation overlord (1944).
He was more of a practical front commander rather than a theorist, he gained a reputation for great courage, making quick tactical decisions and taking advantage of enemy confusion
Rommel is regarded as having been a humane and professional officer. His Afrikakorps was never accused of war crimes.
![[image loading]](http://users.skynet.be/fa101291/personen/foto/rommel4.jpg)
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On February 24 2011 11:21 starcraft911 wrote:Show nested quote +If you look into it it was only after he took control of the german forces did the allies cause significant advances in normandy. I'm sure the germans being SIGNIFICANTLY outnumbered had something to do with this as well. Also wasn't Rommel the most successful general for the axis?
Well, by the time Rommel was leading the Axis in France he was more than likely already involved in the July 20th plot. Many people don't realize that + Show Spoiler +Rommel actually was forced to commit suicide for his involvement. He wasn't killed because of his prestige, but rather allowed to take his own life
The best German General definetely goes to Von Manstein. If it hadn't been for Hitler's horrid decisions, he probably would have won the war on the Eastern Front.
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If it hadn't been for Hitler's horrid decisions, he probably would have won the war on the Eastern Front.
Thats not correct,without doubt hitler's decisions accelerated the process of defeat but no general would have been capable of stopping the russian war maschine as it gained momentum in later stages of war. The russians catched up in their military and technological abilities or even overtook the germans in certain fields. With the allies bombing german industry to the ground constantly and the russians massing overwhelming forces of almost equal quality the germans had no chance in the end. The late war wehrmacht was just a shadow of its former strength, poorly equipped and tired of fighting. Only some elite divisions were able to give some resistance to the allies.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://images.wikia.com/fireemblem/images/5/51/Ferd-tauroneo.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://static2.devote.se/gallery/big/20100815/8346fa2e1218584fd6f96b52290dba8f.jpg)
