Watch the conversation or read the condensed transcript. In the summer of 1967, the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) initiated a series of attacks in western Kontum Province. [1] During the darkest days of the rebellion, when Washington's army had been kicked out of New York and King George's star seemed ascendant, the "Conway cabal" of disgruntled officers and politicians unsuccessfully schemed to out Washington and appoint Gates. The Texans only suffered 2 casualties, as opposed to hundreds of Mexican casualties. The Worst Military Leaders in History is meant to be thought-provoking, and it surely is that." ARMY Magazine "Few subjects get military historians and history buffs talking like a debate over the best military leaders in history. Test yourself on the week of Feb. 25: Nigeria votes, Finland builds a border wall, and Israel escalates repression. Delivered Monday-Friday. Dispatched to India, he led campaigns to help subdue the subcontinent, replacing the crown jewel he had lost. Westmorelands general mistake: severely underestimating the Communists. He lacked the schooling and relevant experience to understand the war and devise a viable approach to prosecuting it. A key plank in the Democratic platform that year was, appropriately, not fighting, and McClellan lost in a rout. Pillow faced a court-martial for stealing a Mexican cannon and attempting to spirit it home in his personal baggage, but Polk intervened to clear Pillows record. Darius again was the first to flee the battle, abandoning all of his soldiers and his property to be taken by Alexander. Darius family would be captured and even lost the Battle of Gaugamela, where so many factors were in his favor. Many of the charges leveled against him have also been laid at the feet of . And if they not only fail to deliver, but wind up sinking their own side in the process, and change history, they earn a spot in the Hall of Military Shame. But there was something that not even the factories of New York and Chicago could produce, and that was time. Major General Sir Charles Vere Ferrers Townshend The idiot who, seeking self aggrandisement, led his army, Force D, to disaster at Kut in WW1. Starting with the battle of Long Island, he lost way more fights than he wonyet he managed to win the war. Lpez, possibly in a fit of madness, ordered the execution of hundreds of people, including some of his own family members. The last king of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia, Darius was not quite as qualified to rule a mighty empire as his predecessors were. Caepio reportedly lived out the remainder of his life in luxury, however. Westmorelands devotion to advancing his own interests, even when necessary by misrepresentation, was fundamentally at odds with what Scouting is all about. The loss of Fort Donelson opened the door to Kentucky and Tennessee to Union forces and marked the beginning of the end of Confederate resistance in the west. Think about how history would have been different if Hannibal had a military plan to outlast Roman might. Still, it is his world-changing defeat at Yorktown that merits memorializing. Quintus Servilius Caepio takes the cake amongst the worst Roman generals ever to take command of a legion though. You start by being the only thing that can frustrate Napoleon more than a Russian winter. 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. By the end of the conflict, America had unleashed the equivalent of 640 Hiroshima-sized atomic bombs on Vietnam. Sorley skillfully uses Westmoreland's own words to show time and again his duplicity at worst and his lack of touch with reality at best. Although Nelson was killed in combat at Trafalgar, Villeneuve outlived him only by six months. 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. He has been a guest speaker on numerous national radio and television stations and is a five time published author. He was responsible for coming up with the idea of using force to restore constitutional order in Chechnya. Over time Westmoreland asked for and received large numbers of U.S. troops, eventually totaling well over half a million. Some staff officers who briefed him one-on-one at deskside were dismayed when Westmoreland occupied himself by signing photographs of himself, one after another, during their presentations. While Muammer Al-Gaddafi isn't into the funny business in his politician reign, he most certainly is one of a highly egotistical leader and a member who represents more of the "self" rather than all else. These Vietnam War photos taken by U.S. Army photographers reveal a side of the conflict that few people have ever seen. Arminius cut off his head and sent it to another Germanic leader as a present. These are the incompetents, the idiots, the bumblers who have represented armies or nations at war only to lead them to defeat or shame. Franz Conrad von Htzendorf of Austria couldnt decide which country he wanted to invade, so the German General Staff eventually took his armies away. Indeed they are brave and proud, but their standards, tactics, and lack of command supervision throughout their ranks requires improvement in the national interest. And, he added, I would be less than frank if I did not say that I feel somewhat insecure with the situation in Quang Tri province, in view of my knowledge of their shortcomings. General and presidential candidate Douglas MacArthur (1880 - 1964) at his headquarters in Yokohama, Japan with US Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright (1883 - 1953) (right), and British Lieutenant-General A E Percival (1887 - 1966) (left) who were taken prisoner by the Japanese after the US retreat in the Bataan peninsula and released in 1945. Fortunately, along came Reaganif not for that, Westmorelands military reversals could well have signaled the beginning of our end. The latest news, analysis, and data from the country each week. McClellan was a superb organizer, a West Point-trained engineer who did much to build the Union army almost from scratch. As for the British, they had lost the most valuable jewel of the Imperial crown. Delivered Wednesday & Sunday. Jamie founded Listverse due to an insatiable desire to share fascinating, obscure, and bizarre facts. In fact, he did a lot to ensure that Germany would find itself in another war that it couldnt win, but, since he died in 1937, he gets extra credit for being a bad World War II general from beyond the grave. Even now, the easiest way to get into an argument at a V.F.W. Is Weiss correct? Many historians credit Benedict Arnold and others with being the real victors of Saratoga. Who was the worst general in history? 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. The Persians had a mixed record against the Greeks. He gritted his teeth and wore down the Confederacy with incessant attacks until the South could take no more. 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. Lpez was the son of Carlos Antonio Lpez, a dictator who had done much to modernize Paraguay in the mid-19th century. Hull responded by ordering the evacuation of Fort Dearborn, and the garrison was promptly massacred by a Potawatomi war band upon leaving the fort. The 1970s were scary times. Jessica Chen Weiss, formerly a senior advisor for policy planning at the State Department under the Biden administration, makes the case that the United States is becoming consumed by competition with China, a strategy that could lead to dangerous conflict. Its quite exclusive: combat leaders who had the fate of their people in their hands and squandered it all. rs worth well over $400 billion. Darius did not take the field against Alexander until a year and a half after Granicus, at the Battle of Issus. But the award for the biggest Persian loser goes to Darius III. Thomas E. Ricks' daily take on national security. 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. He also issued orders to his troops in a personal code that no one else understood, such as this gem of command clarity: Move your command, i. e., the walking boys, pop guns, Baker's outfit and the outfit which is the reverse of Baker's outfit and the big fellows to M, which is due north of where you are now, as soon as possible. Because he never wanted to face a superior force, he refused to fight. Woefully inexperienced U.S. soldiers found themselves against Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps veterans. The 5 Worst Generals in U.S. History. Watchthe conversation onFP Live, the magazines forum for live journalism, orreada condensed transcript. The American Civil War was a factory for producing bad generals such as Braxton Bragg and Ambrose Burnside. Elmo Zumwalt was a U.S. admiral and commander of American naval forces in Vietnam. Some captured Romans were placed in wicker cages and burned alive, others were enslaved or ransomed. Its prewar population was reduced by more than half, and perhaps 90 percent of Paraguays fighting-age men perished. George McClellan is one of those generals who really looks great on paper. (You May Also Like: 5 Israeli Weapons of War ISIS Should Fear). As a military commander, Napoleon may have thebest batting averageof all time. Simultaneously, he contacted Maximilian to offer the young emperor his services. The British blockaded the port at Cdiz with a numerically inferior force, and Villeneuve, upon learning that he was to be relieved of command, rashly struck out at Nelsons fleet. A U.S. ship conveyed him to Mexico, and upon his arrivalto the surprise of virtually no onehe executed a volte-face and took charge of the Mexican troops. In his single-minded pursuit of that objective, Westmoreland (despite his repeated claims to the contrary) essentially ignored two other crucial aspects of the war, improvement of South Vietnams armed forces and pacification. While there were a host of bad generals serving on both sides during the American Civil Warmostly on the Union side unfortunatelythe one that usually gets the most credit for dragging out the war as long as he did is Union General George McClellan. 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. Despite reports of the build-up of German forces and even knowing the date of the Germans attack, Gamelin did nothing, stating that he would await events. Grachev played a key role in initiating and leading the First Chechen War. Only FP subscribers can submit questions for FP Live interviews. There are a number of contenders for the top places on such a roster. Along with Communist China and other Communist movements in the region, who were fighting to reunite the Vietnams under the red banner, there were other belligerent, free countries in the region who had an interest in keeping South Vietnam away from the Commies. Still, he choked in the big game. If Gates had been in command, we might be paying for our groceries with shillings and pence. Persian Gulf War (1990-1991) 24. But the worst of all was McClellan, the so-called "Young Napoleon" from whom Lincoln. 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Eschewing a direct overland march to the Confederate capital of Richmond, McClellan orchestrated an impressive amphibious landing of more than 100,000 troops at Fort Monroe, at the southeast end of the peninsula between the James and York rivers. Not only is Sorley a third-generation graduate of West Point a Vietnam veteran and a historian, but he worked for Westmoreland as well. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. The United States entered the war, forcing Ludendorff to accelerate his time line for a conclusive battle against the Allies on the Western Front. 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. British Gen. Isaac Brock possessed a remarkable ability to anticipate his opponents moves and reactions, and it was not long before he had taken full measure of Hull. Listing MacArthur as one of America's worst generals will be controversial. They kept it as a war trophy, exhibiting the leg at. Yet backstabbing your commander-in-chief in the middle of a war is taking ambition a little too far. 0. He was certainly nave, but the Boy Scouts need to be defended here. Your guide to the most important world stories of the day. Critics say that Franks and senior officials, such as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, concocted an invasion plan that used too few troops. Following on from our list of the greatest and most successful military commanders, we are presenting this list of the worst. His senior staff lacked diversity of experience and professional outlook, consisting mostly of people with backgrounds similar to his own, especially airborne. At Yorktown, he allowed himself to be taken by surprise and outmaneuvered by Washington and the French fleet. While there are plenty of books that analyze the keys to success, The Worst Military Leaders in History offers lessons of failure to avoid. Operational Culture General Training LREC SME Support Training Course Catalog Cognitive Dimension Training Additional Resources . [i] However, the list is subjective, and open to debate, as top 10 lists tend to be. And what then? In order, from most culpable down. Contrarily, I would not so stigmatize another important player often criticized by others, Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge. General William Childs Westmoreland (1914- 2005) with President Johnson in South Vietnam #1. His invasion of Canada came to an abrupt halt when he failed to capture Fort Malden, a British position that was a laughably short distance from Hulls headquarters at Fort Detroit. Keep up with the world without stopping yours. 151. The world over, countries are embarking on ambitious projects of industrial policy. This infuriated the Marines, who viewed it as evidence that Westmoreland lacked confidence in them. Maximus managed to form up his men but to no avail. 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. It was anotherhistory-changingevent, the birth of a truly exceptional nation. The British gained control of the fort, dozens of cannons, the brig USS Adams (recommissioned the HMS Detroit), and virtually the entire Michigan Territory. It would be nice if all American generals were great. How do you measure military leaders? The inept Luigi Cadorna of Italy fought a dozen battles on the Isonzo before his army completely collapsed at Caporetto. He would eventually be betrayed and killed by a friend. And how might that be impacting the world? General William Westmoreland. Their orientation, indeed the core of Scoutings values, is selflessness and service to others. Francisco Solano Lpez managed to stumble into a war with pretty much all of that. General William Westmoreland. After achieving moderate success in Libya and Ethiopia, the Butcher of Ethiopia became Commander-in-Chief of the Italian Royal Armys General Staff and of Italian North Africa at the start of World War II. 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. 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. In 1847, U.S. troops once again surprised Santa Anna and captured his prosthetic leg. So what is the standard of shame for induction? Here is a list of the 10 most famous Chinese generals in history. The problem begins with the fact that nobody in the chain of command was really competent to critique Westmorelands performance. By Lewis Sorley Best Defense Saigon bureau chief. Percival was off mistreating Irish Republican Army (IRA) leaders during the Anglo-Irish War before commanding British Malaya in World War II. At the Battle of Gaugamela, he helped make Alexander great by losing half his army to the Macedonian upstart. But its not just the United States. George Custer at the Little Big Horn and Lord Chelmsford at the Battle of Isandlwana leap to mind. bar is to mention Vietnam. But the worst of all was McClellan, the so-called "Young Napoleon" from whom Lincoln and the Union expected great things. James K. Polk. One-stop digest of politics, economics, and culture. What defines Santa Anna is his utter failure to subdue the Texican rebels and block American expansion. Ulysses S. Grant made his Civil War debut at the Battle of Belmont against Confederate Gen. Gideon Pillow. up as tough on Beijing, even seeking to contain the rise of the worlds second-biggest economy. Fighter Aircraft of All Time, his army being routed by a smaller force of Redcoats and Loyalists at the Battle of Camden in South Carolina in 1780, 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, Listing MacArthur as one of America's worst generals will be controversial, 5 Israeli Weapons of War ISIS Should Fear, But MacArthur's strategy certainly helped unleash 300,000 Chinese "volunteers" who inflicted significant casualties on United Nations forces, But Franks, who commanded the invasion, made a bad situation worse, Critics say that Franks and senior officials, such as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, concocted an invasion plan that used too few troops. While Hull dithered, Brock captured Fort Michilimackinac, establishing British control of the Straits of Mackinac. In 1975, when the Vietnam War ended, the Vietnamese army had only 36 generals, but by 2018, peace-time Vietnam had 415 military officers holding general ranks. Then, in an ill-advised comeback, he met his Waterloo. Nor is being a bad battlefield commander, by itself, sufficient to make the cut. 3. Heres the inaugural class: 6. What was the worst battle of Vietnam? Panama (1989) 2. Diem's family was one of the earliest to convert to Catholicism, a religion he took . At Brownstown, south of Detroit, two dozen warriors under Tecumseh routed more than 200 American militiamen escorting a supply column intended for Detroit. The Western Front was a much bigger stage upon which to fail, however, and British commander Douglas Haig made the most of the opportunity. Sure, he was the greatest commander of the Second Punic War, a titanic contest between Carthage and Rome. 1 Erwin Rommel Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel, popularly known as the Desert Fox, was a German field marshal of World War II. But the argument is unbalanced. Muammar Al-Gaddafi. He continued to view attrition as the most effective strategy for defeating Germany; the British lost some 420,000 men at the Somme. A very significant instance was his determination to arbitrarily hold down the estimate of enemy strength during a 1967 order of battle controversy. What can we glean from the current state of play on the battlefield? Luckily for the colonists, the Empire also had Cornwallis, a peer of the realm and truly pitiful commander. Not until 1995 did Vietnam release its official estimate of war dead: as many as 2 million civilians on both sides and some 1.1 million North Vietnamese and Viet Cong fighters. The stabbed in the back myth did much to propel the ascent of Adolf Hitler, and Ludendorff was a key participant in the Beer Hall Putsch. Here are five of America's worst generals: Great generals have great talents, and usually egos and ambitions to match. But the worst of all was McClellan, the so-called "Young Napoleon" from whom Lincoln and the Union expected great things. Explore the benefits included in your subscription. Haste risked casualties and defeats at the hands of a formidable opponent like Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia. Jessica Chen Weiss, formerly a senior advisor for policy planning at the State Department under the Biden administration, makes the case that the United States is becoming consumed by competition with China, a strategy that could lead to dangerous conflict. The resulting Peninsular Campaign (AprilJuly 1862) was a marvel of planning but something of a farce in execution. 10 Redvers Buller 1. Had Lincoln retained McClellan in command of the Union armies, many former Americans might still be whistling "Dixie.". 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. What will another year of war look like? 3. See the vast swaths of land to the north and south that arent Paraguay? McClellan truly disappointed president Lincoln at the Battle of Antietam where the North and South would fight the bloodiest battle of the war. Overseas during World War II he had limited line duty (16 months of battalion command, then 13 months in staff positions) and of 14 months of command during the Korean War and its immediate aftermath he spent eight months in reserve in Japan and only six months in Korea, and that during the mostly static final months of the war. How does an admiral make a list of the worst generals? This strategy inevitably failed as the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong maintained control over how the war was fought which was through guerilla warfare. I flew into Vietnam in June 1968 as a young . 2. Vice President, Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute. Assuming you believe the subtitle to be accurate, who were GEN Westmorelands biggest accomplices in the loss? He served as a National Socialist member of the German parliament before authoring a book about how humanity exists in a state of perpetual war and why that is a good thing. Vast areas dotted with villages were blasted with artillery, bombed from the air. He was also supremely gifted at overestimating the size of his opponents armies to a degree that beggared belief. Join in-depth conversations and interact with foreign-policy experts with. Following on from our list of the greatest and most successful military commanders, we are presenting this list of the worst. Yes, eminently. Implementing the attrition strategy, Westmoreland typically employed a series of large unit sweeps conducted in the deep jungle regions along South Vietnams western borders. Thus it was under Darius rule that the Persian Empire fell and was conquered. A final humiliation came during Mexican-American War. But MacArthur's strategy certainly helped unleash 300,000 Chinese "volunteers" who inflicted significant casualties on United Nations forces. After early success in the Mexican War for Independence, the rest of his career didnt pan out the way he would have liked. Sure, he won big at the Alamo. Johnston was wounded on the first day of the Battle of Seven Pines, six miles east of Richmond, and he was replaced by Robert E. Lee. Some historians are a little more sympathetic towards Percivals legacy nowadays arguing that Percival had been dealt an unusually bad hand. His bad luck didnt end at San Jacinto. Thus, on July 1, 1916, Haig ordered his men to go over the top at the First Battle of the Somme, and 20,000 of them had the audacity to die almost immediately (there were 60,000 total British casualties on the first day of the attack). Innumerable battlefield commanders have had disastrous days at the office. Fort Bragg was named in 1918 during the Jim Crow era. What a Lovely War and then in the 1989 television comedy series Blackadder Goes Forth. His battlefield losses marked the end of the Persian Empire. This week marks exactly one year since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his troops to invade Ukraine. 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 . What myths or misperceptions surround Westmoreland that you would like to clear up, if any? Thats the point. Seldom included in. But for whatever reason, some American commanders have lost the battle for history. If there was a saving grace for America, it was that he wasn't commanding an army. Many of these generals had their worst defeats when their countries were least prepared for conflict, such as the hapless Soviet generals who faced the German infiltration of Russia in 1941. Ukraines economy and infrastructure have been dealt blows that will take decades to recover from. Nearly as many men died in captivity during the Civil War as were killed in the whole of the Vietnam War. Casey was an Army insidera four-star general and the son of the highest-ranking American casualty of the Vietnam War, a division commander who was killed in a July 1970 helicopter crash. Even a string of bad days does not guarantee entry. What can we glean from the current state of play on the battlefield? Cue the protests from other parts of the globe: A chorus of nations are accusing Washington of fostering unfair competition. The initial assault resulted in very high casualties for the Russians and an almost complete breakdown of morale in the Russian forces. Two of the more prominent of these mistakes, both with wide and sweeping results, were the June 22, 1941 invasion of the USSROperation Barbarossaand the December 11, 1941 unprovoked and unwarranted declaration of war on the United Statesagainst the advice of Hitler's Foreign Minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop. After eight years at Foreign Policy, here are the ten most popular Best Defense posts. Unfortunately the fates of the former Republic Vietnam (Sout. Todays list: The top ten reasons Gen. Westmoreland lost the war in Vietnam. Again fighting outnumbered Texans, this time Santa Anna would lose the battle stunningly. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, Pillow pulled the troops back to the fort to resupply them. On September 2, 1945, hours after the Japanese signed their unconditional surrender in World War II, communist leader Ho Chi Minh proclaimed the independent Democratic Republic of Vietnam, hoping. Rommel is by far the greatest military general of the . Explore the benefits of your FP subscription. Seared into all who fought it and many who merely lived through it that conflict remains a bitter stew of second-guessing and recriminations. Varus himself, seeing all hope was lost, committed suicide. Todays list: The top ten reasons Gen. Westmoreland lost the war in Vietnam, Want to read more on this topic or region? If Putin had hoped to weaken NATO, the very opposite has happened, with Finland and Sweden on the cusp of joining the transatlantic military alliance. There's an entire myriad of generals from the American Civil War that fought for the Union that were incredibly inept. 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. Ulysses S. Grant, who replaced McClellan, understood this.
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