Author Topic: Who were the greatest generals in history?  (Read 12043 times)

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Offline darmaster

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #30 on: July 27, 2014, 07:11:56 pm »
+2
Hannibal Saladin and Napoleon.

Alexander was a retard in the right place at the right time, his father was 10x better and there were dozens of better greek generals than him.
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Offline Herezy92

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #31 on: July 29, 2014, 09:36:29 am »
+2
Hannibal Saladin and Napoleon.

Alexander was a retard in the right place at the right time, his father was 10x better and there were dozens of better greek generals than him.
Yes probably he was stupid. I have no idea and i don't know enough his life to say anything.
But what is certain is that HE is the one who get all the prestige & glory for the conquests.
So maybe he wasn't a good general (i have no clue) but he was clearly smart to enough to receive all the prestige & glory from it. :)

Offline darmaster

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #32 on: July 29, 2014, 08:12:11 pm »
-2
ofc it's a bit exaggerated, but let's face it, he fought against nobody (persian empire was diying, i would have liked to see him against darius or cyrus persia, maybe things would have been different; greece ofc was already dead because they're fggts) and his incredible army was prepared by philly the second: as i've already said, right place and right time. also gg alexander, your empire couldn't last 1 second after your death, amazing job gg wp.

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Offline Oberyn

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #33 on: July 29, 2014, 10:59:18 pm »
+3
The Successor kingdoms lasted for hundreds of years. The "middle-east" and eastern medditteranean were culturally greek from Sicily to Bactria. You may have heard of it, this little thing called the hellenistic period. The cultural and linguistic legacy lasted up until the rise of Islam. They were the last chunk of the Roman empire and outlasted it by, again, hundreds of years in the form of the byzantines.
Not to mention Alexander is revered as the epitome of the conquering hero in literally every primary source regardless of origin, be it roman, persian, arab, greek, etc.. And that's without going into the deification by his own men while he was still alive. After he died his corpse and regalia were set up during every of his officer's meetings because the presence of his memory was the only thing that could momentarily keep them from each other's throats. Even once it broke into full-out war between the Successors Alexander's corpse was still an item of mystical power and authority over which they fought over.
TL;DR you're demonstrably wrong on every single thing you've said.
« Last Edit: July 29, 2014, 11:02:33 pm by Oberyn »
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Offline darmaster

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #34 on: July 30, 2014, 12:43:04 pm »
-1
bah please sicily and part of italy were considered magna grecia even before that fggt came out; same goes for other territories: most of conquers alexander made were already greek culturally and most of the ones that were not did not change much except for the name officially; egyptian territories mantained the egyptian culture more or less and persian territories maintained a persian culture more or less and so on. actually it was more him being fascinated by the cultures he conquered. as for the respect shown to him ofc they sjowed him respect; they fought and led under his command and they did conquer what they conquered, nobody could argue that but that doesn't change the fact he fought against nobody and his army (and campaign too for certain aspects) were prepaired by his father.
also the fact he was a fggt is not possibly counterable if it wasn't for the fact that he was a massive fggt. and the fact his empire got divided after his death doesn't mean it survived, actually could mean the opposite.
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Offline Christo

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #35 on: July 30, 2014, 06:19:12 pm »
0
Wow dar, what is up with the massive hate boner towards Alexander?

 :mrgreen:
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Offline darmaster

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #36 on: July 30, 2014, 06:57:26 pm »
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honestly I don't know :l I just don't like him getting credots for things he didn't do or were easier than how they're believed to be. I think he is the only historical person I hate probably
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Offline Tibe

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #37 on: August 01, 2014, 11:10:43 am »
0
Well there is one thing. He did conquer most of the known world. I suppose yea, his father was the one who set up the army, but i highly doubt his army was so strong that it could steamroll over everybody without any actual leadership and guidance. Also i highly doubt macedonia had the strongest army ever at that time and that alexanders enemies didnt have anything. Someone had to have a severe inpact. If not alexander than someone else. Also about his empire collapsing right after his death. He had enough time to conquer, not make sure it would maintain and govern. Unlike Charles the Great, who spent half his life invading and other half basically governing what he ruled.
« Last Edit: August 01, 2014, 11:16:47 am by Tibe »

Offline Corwin

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #38 on: August 01, 2014, 11:26:51 am »
+1
Rommel was no brilliant general, he was just lucky to have completely incompetent people opposing him. Gambler who was risking a lot, and was very lucky from time to time. People just forget about his disastrous decisions, or unusually high casualty rate in his units, mostly because of his leadership and too risky approach.

Manstain was the best German general by far. If we are speaking about doctrines than it HAS to be Guderian, who wasn't a bad field commander either. Also, he was one of the very few who engaged himself in shouting matches with albert.

I also think history was rather unfair towards Model, probably because he was a devout chocolate chip cookiei. Master of defense, of salvaging what can be salvaged after disasterous decisions of his predecesors.

On the allied side, Patton was definately one of the great. But overall, German senior officers, especially in first two thirds of the war, were mostly superior to allied and Russians. 
I mean, what have you got to lose? You know, you come from nothing, you're going back to nothing, what have you lost? Nothing!

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Offline darmaster

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #39 on: August 01, 2014, 12:30:24 pm »
0
Well there is one thing. He did conquer most of the known world. I suppose yea, his father was the one who set up the army, but i highly doubt his army was so strong that it could steamroll over everybody without any actual leadership and guidance. Also i highly doubt macedonia had the strongest army ever at that time and that alexanders enemies didnt have anything. Someone had to have a severe inpact. If not alexander than someone else. Also about his empire collapsing right after his death. He had enough time to conquer, not make sure it would maintain and govern. Unlike Charles the Great, who spent half his life invading and other half basically governing what he ruled.

nobody argues the fact he conquered most of the known world and led his army, but i argue the fact it was as hard as people are trying to show; his army was prepared by his father, his army was undoubtedly the strongest, highly prepared, heavily and well equipped, if i remember correctly macedonian hoplites had even longer spears than greek's ones, his enemy, if not anything, were still really close to shit (persia was a long dead empire, which army never really came out as outstanding if not for the number, greeks after peloponnesian war never really came out again, and, eventho he had to "reconquer" them, the greeks were conquered by philip) and about time yes, i can't argue with that, but i believe that a weak man, after conquering persian and its gold would have done what alexander did, followed his lust, while a strong man (not necessarly great) would have stopped and started ruling over his empire;
 i always believe a contextualization is need everytime and, yes, he was leading his army, but that's a thing that many good generals could have done (as i said he was there at the right time and at the right place), therefore it's not something that qualifies you as great; and for sure keeping your army fighting new enemies and conquering territories recklessly until your very army mutiny and force you to go back surely doesn't either.

before people could rightly argue with the fact that napoleon too didn't stop when he should have so i shouldn't consider him a great general/leader, he's great because he faced certain nations as russia spain sweden portugual netherland prussia england and austria in his time :/
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Offline Xant

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #40 on: August 01, 2014, 05:44:08 pm »
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Well maybe you should stop painting giant neon "THIS IS A BAIT" signs all over your baits, then.
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Offline the real god emperor

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #41 on: August 01, 2014, 05:57:36 pm »
0
Hannibal Barca , Alexander the Great , Ghengis Khan , Timur (=Tamerlan?) , Tiryaki Hasan Pasha (my favourite Ottoman! :D) , For WW1 ; My vote goes to Mustafa Kemal,not because I am a Turk, because his role is very big in Çanakkale Wars , and that was one of the bloodiest parts of the war. Also the only victory of Ottoman Empire in the war. .For WW2 , I have no idea but, whoever came up with the Blitzkrieg thing must be a good general.

I don't think Napoleon was a "great" general because he made some stupid mistakes.

Offline Herezy92

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #42 on: August 11, 2014, 08:53:06 pm »
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I don't think Napoleon was a "great" general because he made some stupid mistakes.
There is a difference between strategy & tactic.
He was a great military tactician, but he made some really bad mistakes in strategy.

Offline Christo

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #43 on: August 11, 2014, 08:54:12 pm »
+1
There is a difference between strategy & tactic.
He was a great military tactician, but he made some really bad mistakes in strategy.

His ego got to him and caused his own downfall, among other things
« Last Edit: August 11, 2014, 09:15:26 pm by Christo »
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Offline caglar1905

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Re: Who were the greatest generals in history?
« Reply #44 on: August 15, 2014, 01:06:48 am »
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Mehmed the Conqueror