EPTGreat Military leaders of History? - Page 29
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FindMeInKenya
United States797 Posts
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Maenander
Germany4926 Posts
On February 25 2011 20:53 FindMeInKenya wrote: my bad it was 1376 The guy in question makes some great points but also says things like Archeology can only lend support to but not disprove what is recorded in the texts. and takes gold numbers from texts as fact, while freely admitting that there is no archeological evidence for it, and that later chinese empires did have orders of magnitudes less gold production. Mysterious, really. What I find interesting is that there seems to be much less factual knowledge about the Han empire than about the Roman empire. | ||
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Ghazwan
Netherlands444 Posts
Mehmed II aka Fatih Sultan Mehmed aka Mehmed the Conqueror: ![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/Portrait_of_Mehmed_II_by_Gentile_Bellini_%28Cropped%29.png) His biggest military achievement was no doubt the conquest of Constantinople and ending the Byzantium Empire. He himself devised a giant cannon to weaken the city's famous walls. He transferred light ships overland after a strong defense by dozens of Byzantium warships. Suleiman the Magnificient aka Suleiman the Lawgiver: ![[image loading]](http://www.nndb.com/people/916/000092640/suleiman-i-2-sized.jpg) Quote from wiki: "Suleiman became a prominent monarch of 16th century Europe, presiding over the apex of the Ottoman Empire's military, political and economic power. Suleiman personally led Ottoman armies to conquer the Christian strongholds of Belgrade, Rhodes, and most of Hungary before his conquests were checked at the Siege of Vienna in 1529. He annexed most of the Middle East in his conflict with the Safavids and large swathes of North Africa as far west as Algeria. Under his rule, the Ottoman fleet dominated the seas from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf." | ||
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mcc
Czech Republic4646 Posts
http://www.princeton.edu/~pswpc/pdfs/scheidel/020803.pdf It has some comparison of Han and Roman mining if someone is interested. | ||
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StorkHwaiting
United States3465 Posts
Also, Chinese of course used conscription, but they also trained conscripts for a full year before deployment. Roman forces on the other hand gave six months of training to their legionnaires before deployment. So, it's not even a case of peasant rabble vs elite legions. Legions had half the training and inferior equipment, especially when you consider the higher quality metallurgy and crossbow technology and armor crafting of the Han dynasty. But that's neither here nor there. The initial point is that Asian generals should not be overlooked because they regularly dealt with logistical and command issues orders of complexity above that of their European contemporaries of the BC era. A very simple point that mcc has somehow butchered, obfuscated, and then attempted to accuse me of backpedaling on, which I never have. He just somehow thinks anytime I don't explicitly state my exact point verbatim every single time it's referenced, then that somehow means I'm backpedaling. Kind of obvious at this point that mcc is not even trying to understand or learn anything, he's merely trying to "win" an argument. The debate was NEVER about which empire had more soldiers. The point was about FIELD armies and about the difficulty in generalship the generals of each empire faced. I brought up the army size merely as a barometer of logistical difficulty for the general who would have to command and care for that amount of men, because of the simple point that a hundred thousand men is harder to manage than thirty thousand. | ||
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Sm3agol
United States2055 Posts
So, I for one, have a REALLY hard time believing that Chinese generals routinely commanded armies in the excess of 200,000 men. That sounds like typical exaggerated ancient bs. 200,000 men is a nightmare to keep supplied and organized TODAY. And that's with an almost equal size force of non-combatants. Pure logisitcs-wise, I don't think it was possible to field armies of 200,000 men for more than a month or so at any time pre-modern era. What we do know about proven history supports my view on this. Once ancient armies got in excess of even 30 or 40,000 men, order almost disappeared, and the countrysides were ravaged when they passed through. At any one time, the armies would be spread over 10-15 square miles, just trying to find food. Maintaining 200,000 fighting men in the field....is just a logistical impossibility, imo. Sure, they might have 200,000 men under their command, spread out over 500 cities and towns, and sure, they might have have a few battles where they managed to muster all their forces for a big battle or something.....but throwing things out like "routinely commanded armies of over 200,000 mean" is just.....foolish, imo. You're going purely off ancient texts, many of whom could well be quoting the other. I've read Ceasar's "Conquest of Gaul" more times than I care to name.....and even with his comparatively puny sized army, with an almost equal sized force of non-combatants trying to keep it supplied.......supply was a huge problem in the field, and if he stopped marching, and camped for any period of time longer than a week or so, his army got spread out so wide trying to forage that is was almost worthless. And we're talking known professional armies here, with known dedicated supply personnel and supply lines. And even Caesar MASSIVELY exaggerated his opponent's troop numbers. | ||
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mcc
Czech Republic4646 Posts
On February 25 2011 21:48 StorkHwaiting wrote: OK so basically everyone else so far in this thread has come around to agree that the Han regularly fielded armies much larger than Rome. Then there's mcc, who is still trying to argue his absurd point that the Han did not, quoting Roman battles as proof, despite the fact that they are some of the most epic struggles in the history of Rome that are universally acknowledged as the peaks of Roman military engagement. Whereas vast majority of the engagements for Han forces numbered into the hundreds of thousands. Also, Chinese of course used conscription, but they also trained conscripts for a full year before deployment. Roman forces on the other hand gave six months of training to their legionnaires before deployment. So, it's not even a case of peasant rabble vs elite legions. Legions had half the training and inferior equipment, especially when you consider the higher quality metallurgy and crossbow technology and armor crafting of the Han dynasty. But that's neither here nor there. The initial point is that Asian generals should not be overlooked because they regularly dealt with logistical and command issues orders of complexity above that of their European contemporaries of the BC era. A very simple point that mcc has somehow butchered, obfuscated, and then attempted to accuse me of backpedaling on, which I never have. He just somehow thinks anytime I don't explicitly state my exact point verbatim every single time it's referenced, then that somehow means I'm backpedaling. Kind of obvious at this point that mcc is not even trying to understand or learn anything, he's merely trying to "win" an argument. The debate was NEVER about which empire had more soldiers. The point was about FIELD armies and about the difficulty in generalship the generals of each empire faced. I brought up the army size merely as a barometer of logistical difficulty for the general who would have to command and care for that amount of men, because of the simple point that a hundred thousand men is harder to manage than thirty thousand. I never argued (that does not mean I agree or disagree) most of the stuff you wrote, especially nothing about who had better quality of soldiers or equipment. This is just your psychological projection, because you think I am some Rome fanboy and I care about those basically unsolvable problems. No matter if you meant field armies or total armies, point of contention was your claim 4-5 times(even 2-3) the size. If you merely said larger I might have disagreed, but since they were pretty similar I would definitely not try to argue it too much as it would be pointless. So yes you are backpedaling since our debate was about your statement "4-5 times"(which you never conceded btw) not merely "larger", you are just now acting like you never said anything like that. Another point was about population, but since you never responded to the numbers I suppose you conceded. | ||
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mcc
Czech Republic4646 Posts
On February 25 2011 21:52 Sm3agol wrote: I love ancient history, and if there's anything I learned, it's that ancient sources are pretty much 100% crap when it comes to numbers. The ancient civilizations had a really difficult time supplying and keeping order of large numbers of troops. I believe in the famous battle of Guagemala, the Persian army was said to be over 1,000,000 strong by many "sources". Close research, however, revealed it was much closer to 50,000. 50,000 men......most of which were lightly armed and trained. So, I for one, have a REALLY hard time believing that Chinese generals routinely commanded armies in the excess of 200,000 men. That sounds like typical exaggerated ancient bs. 200,000 men is a nightmare to keep supplied and organized TODAY. And that's with an almost equal size force of non-combatants. Pure logisitcs-wise, I don't think it was possible to field armies of 200,000 men for more than a month or so at any time pre-modern era. What we do know about proven history supports my view on this. Once ancient armies got in excess of even 30 or 40,000 men, order almost disappeared, and the countrysides were ravaged when they passed through. At any one time, the armies would be spread over 10-15 square miles, just trying to find food. Maintaining 200,000 fighting men in the field....is just a logistical impossibility, imo. Sure, they might have 200,000 men under their command, spread out over 500 cities and towns, and sure, they might have have a few battles where they managed to muster all their forces for a big battle or something.....but throwing things out like "routinely commanded armies of over 200,000 mean" is just.....foolish, imo. You're going purely off ancient texts, many of whom could well be quoting the other. I've read Ceasar's "Conquest of Gaul" more times than I care to name.....and even with his comparatively puny sized army, with an almost equal sized force of non-combatants trying to keep it supplied.......supply was a huge problem in the field, and if he stopped marching, and camped for any period of time longer than a week or so, his army got spread out so wide trying to forage that is was almost worthless. And we're talking known professional armies here, with known dedicated supply personnel and supply lines. And even Caesar MASSIVELY exaggerated his opponent's troop numbers. Most of the accounts are exaggerated, Chinese ones also. But both empires were able to field 200000 armies. Yes you are right it was logistical nightmare, but it was manageable. Caesar's operation was not the standard military operation with frontlines and such, so it is not a good point of reference. EDIT: But you were right I highly doubt they were routinely doing so, they were doing it when necessary. | ||
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FindMeInKenya
United States797 Posts
On the part of Rome and Hans logistical capacities, post 1329 has shown that Han has greater degree of mobility and coverage of range. You might find that to be a interesting read. | ||
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StorkHwaiting
United States3465 Posts
On February 25 2011 22:07 mcc wrote: I never argued (that does not mean I agree or disagree) most of the stuff you wrote, especially nothing about who had better quality of soldiers or equipment. This is just your psychological projection, because you think I am some Rome fanboy and I care about those basically unsolvable problems. No matter if you meant field armies or total armies, point of contention was your claim 4-5 times(even 2-3) the size. If you merely said larger I might have disagreed, but since they were pretty similar I would definitely not try to argue it too much as it would be pointless. So yes you are backpedaling since our debate was about your statement "4-5 times"(which you never conceded btw) not merely "larger", you are just now acting like you never said anything like that. Another point was about population, but since you never responded to the numbers I suppose you conceded. I didn't concede anything. Jesus Christ, what is wrong with your reading comprehension. Here, if it makes you feel better, I will explicitly state that I still think the Han dynasty regularly fielded armies 4-5x bigger, and that they had a bigger population. You have yet to convince me otherwise. | ||
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FindMeInKenya
United States797 Posts
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StorkHwaiting
United States3465 Posts
On February 25 2011 21:52 Sm3agol wrote: I love ancient history, and if there's anything I learned, it's that ancient sources are pretty much 100% crap when it comes to numbers. The ancient civilizations had a really difficult time supplying and keeping order of large numbers of troops. I believe in the famous battle of Guagemala, the Persian army was said to be over 1,000,000 strong by many "sources". Close research, however, revealed it was much closer to 50,000. 50,000 men......most of which were lightly armed and trained. So, I for one, have a REALLY hard time believing that Chinese generals routinely commanded armies in the excess of 200,000 men. That sounds like typical exaggerated ancient bs. 200,000 men is a nightmare to keep supplied and organized TODAY. And that's with an almost equal size force of non-combatants. Pure logisitcs-wise, I don't think it was possible to field armies of 200,000 men for more than a month or so at any time pre-modern era. What we do know about proven history supports my view on this. Once ancient armies got in excess of even 30 or 40,000 men, order almost disappeared, and the countrysides were ravaged when they passed through. At any one time, the armies would be spread over 10-15 square miles, just trying to find food. Maintaining 200,000 fighting men in the field....is just a logistical impossibility, imo. Sure, they might have 200,000 men under their command, spread out over 500 cities and towns, and sure, they might have have a few battles where they managed to muster all their forces for a big battle or something.....but throwing things out like "routinely commanded armies of over 200,000 mean" is just.....foolish, imo. You're going purely off ancient texts, many of whom could well be quoting the other. I've read Ceasar's "Conquest of Gaul" more times than I care to name.....and even with his comparatively puny sized army, with an almost equal sized force of non-combatants trying to keep it supplied.......supply was a huge problem in the field, and if he stopped marching, and camped for any period of time longer than a week or so, his army got spread out so wide trying to forage that is was almost worthless. And we're talking known professional armies here, with known dedicated supply personnel and supply lines. And even Caesar MASSIVELY exaggerated his opponent's troop numbers. No, it's not foolish. That's how Chinese dynasties fought their wars. Mass mobilization of huge numbers of troops for campaigns. Of course, after the campaign the army would disperse. But that was simply how they fought. You can't really sweep the northern steppes and encircle tribes of nomadic horsemen without bringing a vastly larger amount of men. And you can't really win against another Chinese general if he is willing to mobilize all his men and put them under arms. Therefore, Chinese armies were simply bigger. You also have a broken analysis. Ceasar's conquest of Gaul involved marches into wild territory without good stone trade roads or any Roman infrastructure built up in the area. Many Chinese wars occurred within China's borders, where there were huge cities to draw resources from and tons of countryside to pillage and roads, supply lines, logistical routes were already mapped out for use in peace times. So, you're using a really bad example to try to make an argument for what the logistical capabilities were for the Han dynasty. It's also senseless to me to try to use Roman limitations to artificially set them on Han dynasty. Is it impossible for you to grasp that another empire might have just done things better than the Romans? | ||
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StorkHwaiting
United States3465 Posts
On February 25 2011 22:27 FindMeInKenya wrote: People need to stop saying most number posted here are exaggerated while multiple sources have point to be the same. So unless you have credible informations that can overturn that, you are not helping and are making people more confused. Well in essence, they're just saying, "Yeah, we think Rome is the best, so if they can't do it, then of course nobody else can. And if Rome exaggerated their numbers, then the rest of the world did." Basically, they refuse to understand that Rome could in any way, shape, or form be outclassed by another empire. It's beyond their comprehension of the world. And yes, mcc has not posted a single source to contradict, he has merely said he does not believe any of the sources listed. Pretty convenient way to win an argument when you can just deny everything and say that it's all lies. | ||
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Maenander
Germany4926 Posts
On February 25 2011 21:48 StorkHwaiting wrote: Also, Chinese of course used conscription, but they also trained conscripts for a full year before deployment. Roman forces on the other hand gave six months of training to their legionnaires before deployment. So, it's not even a case of peasant rabble vs elite legions. Legions had half the training and inferior equipment, especially when you consider the higher quality metallurgy and crossbow technology and armor crafting of the Han dynasty. It is really futile to compare the quality of the troops. They never met, they never even had a common foe, there aren't even any reports of anyone who has seen both armies fight and could compare them. Russian early-war tanks were superior to german ones, given that and the knowledge of their numerical superiority one could have immediately inferred that the russians would easily win a war, which was not the case. It is impossible to predict the outcome of theoretical scenarios like the encounter of a roman and a chinese army, there are so many factors. | ||
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FindMeInKenya
United States797 Posts
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StorkHwaiting
United States3465 Posts
On February 25 2011 22:41 Maenander wrote: It is really futile to compare the quality of the troops. They never met, they never even had a common foe, there aren't even any reports of anyone who has seen both armies fight and could compare them. Russian early-war tanks were superior to german ones, given that and the knowledge of their numerical superiority one could have immediately inferred that the russians would easily win a war, which was not the case. It is impossible to predict the outcome of theoretical scenarios like the encounter of a roman and a chinese army, there are so many factors. Well, in my mind it's pretty obvious who would win, because it was not at the level of tanks vs better tanks. It was more like short swords versus crossbows. The Chinese crossbows would have decimated Roman troops. And the one weakness Chinese armies had, extremely mobile cavalry, was not part of the Roman arsenal until the Byzantine era. You're talking a melee infantry focused army vs ranged infantry focused army, with the ranged army having superior technology and equipment. It's no contest. Then when you add in things like the chukonu, well... Chinese vs Roman is like stim marines vs slowlings. | ||
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StorkHwaiting
United States3465 Posts
On February 25 2011 22:45 FindMeInKenya wrote: Stork, Han actually did not have a bigger population than Rome. The peak of Han dynasty's population is estimated 58 mil. While the low end estimation of Rome's population to be 70-80 and high end at 100 mil. Interesting, eh? What years of the Roman Empire are you referring to? | ||
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Maenander
Germany4926 Posts
On February 25 2011 22:46 StorkHwaiting wrote: Well, in my mind it's pretty obvious who would win, because it was not at the level of tanks vs better tanks. It was more like short swords versus crossbows. The Chinese crossbows would have decimated Roman troops. And the one weakness Chinese armies had, extremely mobile cavalry, was not part of the Roman arsenal until the Byzantine era. You're talking a melee infantry focused army vs ranged infantry focused army, with the ranged army having superior technology and equipment. It's no contest. Then when you add in things like the chukonu, well... Chinese vs Roman is like stim marines vs slowlings. Crossbows are better suited against cavalry than against heavily shielded infantry actually, but I refuse to discuss such nonsense. | ||
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FindMeInKenya
United States797 Posts
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FindMeInKenya
United States797 Posts
What years of the Roman Empire are you referring to? 2nd century AD. | ||
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