Dispatched to India, he led campaigns to help subdue the subcontinent, replacing the crown jewel he had lost. Despite fresh salvos of Western sanctions, Tehran and Moscow are buddying up on defense ties. Others were experienced military men who should have known better than to take the risks they took - or not take the risks they should have. Westmorelands first resort in claiming progress in the war was always body count, but in fact this was meaningless. Luckily for the colonists, the Empire also had Cornwallis, a peer of the realm and truly pitiful commander. The elder Lpez had bequeathed to his son a relatively powerful military by regional standards but had cautioned Francisco against using it to settle diplomatic issues. He lacked the schooling and relevant experience to understand the war and devise a viable approach to prosecuting it. This infuriated the Marines, who viewed it as evidence that Westmoreland lacked confidence in them. Yet, Hannibal nevertheless ranks as one of the worlds epic fails. The Worst Military Leaders in History Hardcover - March 22, 2022 The most important, and also the saddest, is that in Vietnam and thereafter Westmoreland was willing to shade or misremember or deny or invent the record when his perceived interests were at stake. Little Mac would prove himself to be a superb organizer who kept his army well supplied, efficiently run, and happy. Caepio was born into a noble family and became consul in 106 BC. Disobeying orders, he sailed for Cdiz instead of the Channel, allowing Nelsons fleet time to return and effectively scuttling Napoleons plans for a cross-Channel invasion. This did not, however, achieve the postulated outcome. Wrote Kevin Buckley in a scathing review, From the beginning Westmoreland probably expected to write a memoir of victory similar to Crusade in Europeand the defeat in Vietnam has not deterred him from this.. But the inducements encourage U.S. companies to invest only at homenot elsewhere. War is an extension of politics, and if commanders dont help secure the desired political ends, they get a failing grade. Many of the charges leveled against him have also been laid at the feet of . Who were the most feared soldiers in Vietnam? - 2023 Here are five of America's worst generals: Great generals have great talents, and usually egos and ambitions to match. Top 10 Worst Military Leaders in History - Toptenz.net In the summer of 1967, the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) initiated a series of attacks in western Kontum Province. These American commanders have lost the battle for history. Vast areas dotted with villages were blasted with artillery, bombed from the air. He was called the inevitable general. A West Point graduate, he served in World War II and Korea. General Failure - The Atlantic After eight years at Foreign Policy, here are the ten most popular Best Defense posts. Westmorelands strategy throughout the war was to win through Attrition Warfare (pounding the enemy through greater numbers and resources) which military strategists including Sun Tzu caution against using. 9 Worst Generals in History | Britannica After gaining ground trying to cut an escape path for the Confederates during the February 1862 siege of Fort Donelson by Union forces led Brig. standing, Ukrainians are determined to keep fighting, and the West has so far stayed resolute in its support of Ukraine. Santa Anna was found wearing a privates uniform, hiding in a marsh. But the worst of all was McClellan, the so-called "Young Napoleon" from whom Lincoln. A final humiliation came during Mexican-American War. It was anotherhistory-changingevent, the birth of a truly exceptional nation. Franz Conrad von Htzendorf of Austria couldnt decide which country he wanted to invade, so the German General Staff eventually took his armies away. Turncoats and Traitors - Seven Americans Who Defected to the Enemy in (The leg did get a state funeral). Todays list: The top ten reasons Gen. Westmoreland lost the war in Vietnam. He denied senior civilian officials accurate data on enemy strength and composition, during development of a 1967 Special National Intelligence Estimate imposing a ceiling on the number of enemy forces his intelligence officers could report or agree to and personally removing from the order of battle entire categories that had long been included, thus falsely portraying progress in reducing enemy strength. Vietnam Communist Party Nominates Vo Van Thuong as New President - Sources Antonio de Padua Mara Severino Lpez de Santa Anna. The General Who Lost Vietnam | TIME.com Officially labelled a defector by the Pentagon, many suspected Nolan, an African American, changed sides after suffering a lifetime of racial discrimination. I flew into Vietnam in June 1968 as a young . He retreated to Malta but was captured when that island fell to the British. By the way, here is the first review I have seen of Sorley's new biography of Westmoreland, which I read in galleys last summer, and enjoyed. Watchthe conversation onFP Live, the magazines forum for live journalism, orreada condensed transcript. The Russian president got many things wrong about invading Ukrainebut not everything. 3. Only FP subscribers can submit questions for FP Live interviews. He graduated second in his class at West Point (well ahead of classmates Stonewall Jackson, George H. Gordon, and George Pickett). The initial assault resulted in very high casualties for the Russians and an almost complete breakdown of morale in the Russian forces. A final humiliation came during Mexican-American War. rs worth well over $400 billion. Who was the worst general in history? When he made public his disagreements with President Truman, Truman rightfully fired him. The Worst Civil War Generals on the Confederacy Confederate Maj. Gen. Gideon Pillow. Fighter Aircraft of All Time). General William Westmoreland. From Kaiser Wilhelm to Hitler and Saddam Hussein and Gadhafi, there is no end of national leaders who squandered their nations blood and treasure in futile conflicts. Yes, Westmoreland was the general who lost Vietnam. Follow him on Twitter:@Mipeck1. Many historians credit Benedict Arnold and others with being the real victors of Saratoga. A very significant instance was his determination to arbitrarily hold down the estimate of enemy strength during a 1967 order of battle controversy. Cue the protests from other parts of the globe: A chorus of nations are accusing Washington of fostering unfair competition. The enemy simply kept sending more and more replacements to make up his losses. Villeneuve lost 20 ships, while Nelson lost none. Westmoreland was on a treadmill. The Americans lacked sufficient troops, supplies and air cover (when was the last time an American general had to fight a battle while being pounded by enemy bombers?). He was soon released, however, and, as more capable French admirals either died or somehow incurred Napoleons disfavor, a path to the top echelons of command was opened for Villeneuve. Francisco Solano Lpez managed to stumble into a war with pretty much all of that. He still had his defenders, but they were in the last trench, barely holding on. Because he never wanted to face a superior force, he refused to fight. Hannibal. The 1970s were scary times. Like it or not, the U.S. military would become the governing authority. Yet backstabbing your commander-in-chief in the middle of a war is taking ambition a little too far. Concurrently with hi. Xi Jinpings signature foreign policy is a shadow of its former self.. Hull, convinced that he was hopelessly outnumbered (he wasnt), surrendered Fort Detroit and its 2,000-man garrison without firing a shot. Top Ten Reasons Field Marshal Montgomery is Not so Great Not that Fredendall didn't have real issues that would have tried any commander. Marcus Licinius Crassus was a self-aggrandizing opportunist who started a pointless war with the Parthians, and Publius Quinctilius Varus lost three legions at Teutoburg Forest, but Proconsul Quintus Servilius Caepio manages to top them both with his actions at the Battle of Arausio. He is the dumb ass who gave the order to exfoliate the jungles with agent orange. Santa Anna, a lifetime gambler, was known for his risk taking in battle, but also his brutality. His poor tactical decisions resulted in his army being routed by a smaller force of Redcoats and Loyalists at the Battle of Camden in South Carolina in 1780. It is probably not a coincidence that corruption in the military appears to have escalated since 2006, when the number of military generals started to jump sharply. He was also supremely gifted at overestimating the size of his opponents armies to a degree that beggared belief. French defeated at Dien Bien Phu - HISTORY 9. McClellan and Burnside in particular. The Second Battle of the Somme was the first of a series of successful German offensives, but Ludendorff had failed to integrate these tactical victories into a broader strategic plan. He worked under Adolf Hitler's Third Reich as a leading general and gained fame from his battles in North Africa. Not only is Sorley a third-generation graduate of West Point a Vietnam veteran and a historian, but he worked for Westmoreland as well. James Jay Carafano is a leading expert in national security and foreign policy challenges. Lebanon (1982-1984) 240. Germanic tribes sacrificed Roman officers on altars to their gods. Explore the benefits of your FP subscription. He was uninterested in other viewpoints on how the war might be prosecuted, dismissing the PROVN Study sponsored by Army Chief of Staff General Harold K. Johnson (which concluded that Westmorelands way of war was not working and could not work) and basic disagreements with Westmorelands organization and approach voiced by his brilliant classmate General Bruce Palmer Jr. 7. A former British officer, Gates rose to fame as Continental Army commander during the momentous American defeat of a British army at Saratoga in 1777. Under Westmorelands command, the Vietnam war began smoothly as the U.S. won every battle. But in 1968, when Westmoreland became Army Chief of Staff, Communist forces baited Westmoreland into committing nearly 40% of his strength to the military outpost at Khe Sanh, then attacked cities and towns throughout South Vietnam. He was found guilty of 11 counts, and only the intervention by Pres. What does that mean for trade and globalization? For the most accurate and up-to-date information, consult individual encyclopedia entries about the topics. When it came to military command, Westmoreland was everybodys all-Americanuntil he met his Waterloo. Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam, Chinas Censors Are Afraid of What Chatbots Might Say, The U.S. Yes, eminently. 151. Elmo Zumwalt was a U.S. admiral and commander of American naval forces in Vietnam. Seriously, who represents The British Empire; had the worlds greatest navy, enough cash to hire half the mercenaries of Europe, and the advantage of having a pretty pathetic-looking foe: a rag-tag army of ill-equipped rebels. What does that mean for trade and globalization? Panama (1989) 2. The heavily forested, swampy terrain made the Legions maneuvers impossible. With high hopes set upon his shoulders at the beginning of the American Civil war, quickly becoming General-in-Chief of the Union Army, McClellan would earn the distinction as a general of little action. Delivered Thursday. Cornwallis later did redeem himself militarily. The U.S. military has estimated that between 200,000 and 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers died in the war. The 5 Worst Generals in U.S. History | RealClearHistory Although Nelson was killed in combat at Trafalgar, Villeneuve outlived him only by six months. Ludendorff is one of historys greatest examples of a general who can win battles but still loses the war. America, the Middle East and the rest of the world are still reaping the consequences of those omissions. Somalia (1992-1994) 2. When it came to military command, Westmoreland was everybody's all-Americanuntil he met his Waterloo. Haste risked casualties and defeats at the hands of a formidable opponent like Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia. When the Germans shattered his troops and his reputation at Kasserine Pass in Tunisia in early 1943, Fredendall was only a major general and a corps commander. Santa Anna would lose Texas at the Battle of San Jacinto. - 3 Best: 1987 Los Angeles Lakers. While there are plenty of books that analyze the keys to success, The Worst Military Leaders in History offers lessons of failure to avoid. Quintus Servilius Caepio takes the cake amongst the worst Roman generals ever to take command of a legion though. Not later than the autumn of 1966 the leaders of both services involved in fighting the ground war in VietnamArmy Chief of Staff General Harold K. Johnson and Marine Commandant General Wallace Greeneboth saw Westmorelands approach as fatally flawed and agreed on a viable alternative. But Gates could have doomed the American Revolution. bar is to mention Vietnam. However, not even they managed to get themselves court-martialed and sentenced to death for ineptitude on the battlefield. The 1970s were scary times. - 4 Worst: 1990 Cleveland Cavaliers. But his persistence and inspiration kept the Continental Army in the field through the worst of times, which is why his face is on the one-dollar bill. Who is Che in NBA 2k20? - Sport-net Woefully inexperienced U.S. soldiers found themselves against Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps veterans. In the famous Battle of the Alamo, Santa Anna struggled to defeat about 250 Texans with 2,400 Mexicans and subsequently lost nearly 600 men. 88,594. As a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he theoretically had some influence there, at least to the extent he could shape the collective viewpoint, but even then LBJ and McNamara were famously impervious to advice from the Joint Chiefs. After early success in the Mexican War for Independence, the rest of his career didnt pan out the way he would have liked. On the night of August 15, 1812, Tecumseh led his forces across the Detroit River, and Brock followed the next morning. Feel free to mention any others you may know of in the comments. You start by being the only thing that can frustrate Napoleon more than a Russian winter. Hull was thoroughly outclassed. Assuming you believe the subtitle to be accurate, who were GEN Westmorelands biggest accomplices in the loss? Top 10 Most Underrated Military Generals. Then, in an ill-advised comeback, he met his Waterloo. Watchthe conversation onFP Live, the magazines forum for live journalism, orreada condensed transcript. General Wheeler was often just flat wrong in what he told the President. They dramatically upped their game, pressing the U.S. worldwide. Answer (1 of 4): The former Cham general/leader Che Bong Nga was killed in the battle against the enemy Dai Viet (old Vietnam) but Che Bong Nga was LUCKY to be mentioned by the enemy Dai Viet historians to allow people to remember him. Westmoreland held a press conference in which he categorically denied any such loss of confidence. By December 1864 Paraguay was at war with Brazil, and, when Argentina denied a request for the transit of a Paraguayan army across its territory, Lpez declared war on that country as well. Marine Corps Casualties 1775-2016 - Marine Corps University While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. In the opening month of World War I, Ludendorff and Paul von Hindenburg scored a crushing victory over the Russians at Tannenberg. But the award for the biggest Persian loser goes to Darius III. Thus, almost by default, Westmoreland was left to go his own way, year after bloody year. General Harold K. Johnson was an authentic battlefield hero, and as noted above was fundamentally at odds with Westmorelands approach, but he was not in the chain of command. Instead he simply sent more and more replacements to make up his losses. The war soon ended in a Russian defeat, with hundreds of thousands of military and civilian casualties. Download the new FP mobile app to read anytime, anywhere. He was responsible for coming up with the idea of using force to restore constitutional order in Chechnya. Jacob Zuma is a cherry on the top of the world's worst leader cake. History: Military History. [i] However, the list is subjective, and open to debate, as top 10 lists tend to be. These are the incompetents, the idiots, the bumblers who have represented armies or nations at war only to lead them to defeat or shame. My daughter thinks 2018 was the worst year ever. I'd nominate 1968 George Custer at the Little Big Horn and Lord Chelmsford at the Battle of Isandlwana leap to mind. But the worst of all was McClellan, the so-called "Young Napoleon" from whom Lincoln. Not good, Hannibal. The resulting Peninsular Campaign (AprilJuly 1862) was a marvel of planning but something of a farce in execution. Yes, the landing at Inchon unhinged the initial North Korean offensive. After an initial attack drove back Grants troops, Pillow snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by retreating to the fort rather than breaking through Union lines to Nashville. Most younger officers who worked around General Westmoreland, excepting only a very few among his many aides-de-camp or executive officers and the like, had no personal relationship with this difficult and distant man. That dubious distinction falls to William Hull, the only general officer in American history to be ordered before a firing squad for cowardice and dereliction of duty. For many soldiers, a major tipping point happened when Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in 1968, news of which reaches the soldiers in Da 5 Bloods during one particularly stirring scene . . Hull was taken prisoner by the British and was court-martialed upon his return to the United States. In 334 BC, Alexander the Great invaded the Persian Empire. Corruption is the Worst Enemy of the Vietnamese Army This might have ended okay for Germany, provided they didnt do something like provoke a previously neutral country with Allied sympathies and an effectively bottomless war chest. Lincoln relieved McClellan but reinstated him after the devastating Union defeat at the Second Battle of Bull Run. Worst US General of all time? | O-T Lounge - TigerDroppings Sure, he won big at the Alamo. His bad luck didnt end at San Jacinto. General Westmoreland had complete freedom of action in deciding how to prosecute the war within South Vietnam. Sure, he was the greatest commander of the Second Punic War, a titanic contest between Carthage and Rome. Test yourself on the week of Feb. 25: Nigeria votes, Finland builds a border wall, and Israel escalates repression. Who was the worst US general during the Vietnam War? He underestimated the enemys staying power, maintaining that if he could inflict enough casualties the communists would lose heart and cease their aggression against South Vietnam. These are the incompetents, the idiots, the bumblers who have represented armies or nations at war only to lead them to defeat or shame. 2. He ran as a Democrat against Lincoln in the 1864 presidential election. Commanders of Chaos: The 5 Worst Generals in U.S. History He effectively pledged to become an agent for the U.S. but found that he had been deposed upon his return to Mexico. The War of the Triple Alliance devastated Paraguay. There are issues around killing and counting unarmed civilians (non-combatants) as enemy combatants, as well as inflating the number of actual enemy who were killed in action (KIA).For search and destroy operations, as the objective was not to . Many have described his activities as "possibly the worst intelligence disaster in US history." 3 Nidal Malik Hasan Nidal Malik Hasan was a U.S. Army Major, and the sole suspect in a shooting at the Fort Hood military base, only weeks before he would have deployed to Afghanistan. Instead of holding a natural defense line around Pyongyang, which would have given the United Nations control of most of the peninsula, the UN troops retreated all the way back into South Korea in a humiliating reverse for U.S. power after the crushing victory of World War II. The unprecedented violence of battles such as Shiloh, Antietam, Stones River, and Gettysburg shocked citizens and international observers alike. He deprived the South Vietnamese of modern weaponry, giving U.S. and other allied forces priority for issue of the new M-16 rifle and other advanced military wherewithal. Keep up with the world without stopping yours. Abraham Lincoln. He earned a B.A. Fifty years ago today, President Lyndon Baines Johnson announced his fateful decision to double the number of U.S. troops in Vietnam. Over time Westmoreland asked for and received large numbers of U.S. troops, eventually totaling well over half a million. Not one to let his own failings stand in the way of personal glory, Pillow submitted fanciful accounts of his actions at the Battles of Contreras and Churubusco to various newspapers, incurring the wrath of overall American commander Winfield Scott. A common view holds that 138,708 Allied personnel surrendered or were killed by fewer than 30,000 Japanese. Saul David reviews a surprising study of military failure and names his own five most infamous generals Saul David Thursday February 17 2022, 12.00am , The Times The Germanic fighters demolished the three Roman legions. Best Defense: What he did not divulge publicly was that the United States. Maximus managed to form up his men but to no avail. Find Paraguay on a map of South America. Despite Lincoln's pleas for aggressive action, his Army of the Potomac moved hesitantly, its commander McClellan convinced himself that the Southern armies vastly outnumbered him when logic should have told him that it was the North that enjoyed an abundance of resources. As military professionals, we should think about more . Delivered Wednesday & Sunday. It would be nice if all American generals were great. 7. What myths or misperceptions surround Westmoreland that you would like to clear up, if any? At Brownstown, south of Detroit, two dozen warriors under Tecumseh routed more than 200 American militiamen escorting a supply column intended for Detroit. He was an artilleryman who missed out on the Armys great schools system, never attending the Command & General Staff College or the Army War College. James Bond Stockdale was flying his A-4 Skyhawk on a mission over North Vietnam, just days after the Gulf of Tonkin incident, when his plane took fire and hurtled d On the other side of the trenches in World War I was Erich Ludendorff, commanding the armies of Germany. Ulysses S. Grant, who replaced McClellan, understood this. Hull withdrew after a series of harassing attacks by Tecumsehs highly mobile raiding parties. Join FPs Ravi Agrawal for a frank discussion about the Biden administrations China policy and alternatives that it ought to consider. Vietnam War - Encyclopedia Britannica | Britannica Weekly update on developments in India and its neighbors. Whatever its military wisdom or lack thereof, it was a decision that should not have been made by generals under the American political system. Varus placed his legions in a position where their fighting strengths would be minimized and that of the Germanic Cherusci tribesman maximized. Grachev once said that only an incompetent commander would order tanks into the streets of central Grozny, where they would be vulnerable. Yet near the end of the war he did exactly that. While this century witnessed many great leaders, such as Franklin D. Roosevelt, Dr. Martin Luther King, Winston Churchill, Mahatma Gandhi . As Lincoln well knew, the only way the Union could lose the war was if the North eventually grew tired and agreed to allow the South to secede. In considering who should receive such a dubious honor, Ive consciously excluded bad leaders. But MacArthur's strategy certainly helped unleash 300,000 Chinese "volunteers" who inflicted significant casualties on United Nations forces. Gates thought otherwise, and fancied himself a better commander than George Washington. Is the Biden administrations China policy too hawkish? Simultaneously, he contacted Maximilian to offer the young emperor his services. Creighton Abrams was an U.S. Army General who commanded American military operations in the Vietnam War from 1968 to 1972. As the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles crippled Germany, Ludendorff effectively sabotaged the Weimar Republic by propagating the belief that he and his armies had been undefeated on the battlefield. The Viet Cong Committed Atrocities, Too - The New York Times Historian Lewis Sorley author of 1999s well-regarded A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of Americans Last Years in Vietnam now zeroes in on General William Westmoreland. There's an entire myriad of generals from the American Civil War that fought for the Union that were incredibly inept. Although he eventually disavowed Hitler, by that point Ludendorff had become so deeply involved with mysticism that few took him seriously. If Gates had been in command, we might be paying for our groceries with shillings and pence. General William Childs Westmoreland (1914- 2005) with President Johnson in South Vietnam #1. After only an eight-day siege, he surrendered his entire armya third of all British forces in America. 1. Instead of sweeping around the French defenses in a massive flanking movement, the Germans were checked at the First Battle of the Marne. 336 pages | 16 halftones | 6 1/4 x 9 1/4. In 1847, U.S. troops once again surprised Santa Anna and captured his prosthetic leg. Join FPs Ravi Agrawal for a frank discussion about the Biden administrations China policy and alternatives that it ought to consider. Military This is, obviously, a problematic quality when ones title is general-in-chief of the entire Union army. Stay updated on the topics you care about with email alerts. What can we glean from the current state of play on the battlefield? Westmorelands own book about himself gives some indication of how he would react to this more recent one. FPs Ravi Agrawal spoke with two of the very best Russia experts:Angela Stent, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author ofPutins World: Russia Against the West and With the Rest, and Michael Kofman, the research program director of the Russia studies program at the Center for Naval Analyses. You may opt out at any time. 0. Publication of the PROVN Study, whose precepts were later implemented with great success by Westmorelands successor, illustrated a matter of fundamental importance. Where is Carthage you ask? Although Westmoreland denied it, he imposed a ceiling on the reported number of enemy by instructing his intelligence officers to adhere to a command position of not more than 300,000, even though newly acquired and more accurate data developed in his own headquarters then indicated a much higher figure. The American Civil War was a factory for producing bad generals such as Braxton Bragg and Ambrose Burnside. Have your boss report to the French gentleman whose name begins with J at a place which begins with D which is five grid squares to the left of M. The Kasserine disaster had repercussions. 3. Westmorelands general mistake: severely underestimating the Communists. FPs Ravi Agrawal spoke with two of the very best Russia experts:Angela Stent, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author ofPutins World: Russia Against the West and With the Rest, and Michael Kofman, the research program director of the Russia studies program at the Center for Naval Analyses. Seared into all who fought it and many who merely lived through it that conflict remains a bitter stew of second-guessing and recriminations. The pandemics outbreak brought rare reporting freedoms. George Brinton McClellan, a self-proclaimed Young Napoleon, ran dreadful campaigns, but he doesnt make the grade because he was canned before he could lose the entire war.
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