Watching Apocalypse WWI

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Chipotlemonger
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AG
Question that came to mind while watching the 4th episode of this mini docuseries: Who is the "worst" General in US history? All the Haig stuff in this episode seems to be kind of damning. And that's a name I recalled coming into this miniseries from listening to the Carlin WWI podcast series.

Who else could vye for this unfortunate spot?
USAFAg
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Major General Lloyd R. Fredendall gets my vote. But the title "worst general" is pretty subjective. Probably need to ask "worst at what?". Benedict Arnold gets a nod for being a traitor, but apparently he was a fairly competent general militarily.

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Chipotlemonger
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I was thinking of leaving it open ended. The criteria could be whatever one wants, but just maybe explain the choice and why they are the worst.
BQ78
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There have been many non-functioning alcoholics that could be put on such a list.

There have also been rank physical and moral cowards that could be put on the list.

Which do you think is worst an alcoholic or a coward? Both are exceedingly dangerous to the men under them.
USAFAg
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Cool.

Fredendall - for the completely stupid defensive arraignments, terrible reaction to the attack and failure of leadership that was directly responsible for the disaster at Kasserine Pass. Arguably the worst US Army defeat of WWII. Not just defeat, but a massive route by a smaller force.

Good short and easy read below.


https://www.defensemedianetwork.com/stories/command-failure-lloyd-fredendall-and-the-battle-of-kasserine-pass/


Great read for more detail...

http://liberationtrilogy.com/books/army-at-dawn/

12thFan/Websider Since 2003
Rabid Cougar
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You mentioned drunk and a coward

Brigadier James Ledlie, Commander of the IX Corps' 1st Division at Petersburg at the Battle of the Crater.
At the last minute, Burnside selected his division to replace the USCT's that were originally going to lead the assault into the crater after the mine was blown. Meade was skeptical of the plan and didn't want the bad press of killing all of his USCTs if it failed.

Ledlies division were not properly trained on what to do when they enter the breach. When the assault went in, Ledlie was drunk in his tent. Needless to say his men were slaughtered.




Rabid Cougar
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I will also throw in Mark Clark and his planned assault across the Gari River in Italy in January 1944. My dad told me stories of old veterans that he worked with who took part in that battle. They hated Clark more than the Germans.
Belton Ag
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Horatio Gates always comes to mind when I think of worst Generals.

Straddles the line of "US" Generals, but Gideon Pillow should be on the list somewhere, both for his backstabbing of Winfield Scott during the Mexican-American war and his poor performance as a Confederate General in the civil war.

Smeghead4761
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William Hull - War of 1812; attempted to invade Canada, ended up surrendering Detroit

David Twigg - Civil War. Not so much for incompetence on the battlefield, but for turning over all of the arms and installations in Texas with no attempt to either remove or destroy them

MacArthur can be mentioned among the worst - initial defense of the Philippines, surprise by the ChiComs at the Yalu - and the best - New Guinea campaign, Inchon.
BQ78
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Ledlie and Pillow are the two I was thinking of as the drunk and the coward. Throw in Henry H. Sibley as another drunk. He was drunk in an ambulance and unable to mount a horse nearly the entire New Mexico Campaign.
Sapper Redux
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There's too many ways to categorize this. Drunks and cowards have been covered. If you want to go with leaders in WAY over their heads, you could point to Gates and Charles Lee during the Revolution; Hood and Burnside during the Civil War. I'm not sure where to put someone like Westmoreland. He wasn't incompetent, but he clearly didn't understand the enemy nor could he fundamentally read the political situation (which Clausewitz recognized as vital in the 19th century, let alone in the TV age).
Smeghead4761
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I'm willing to give Burnside at least a partial pass, because at least he recognized that the job was beyond his ability, and told Lincoln so, before going out and proving that he was right.
BQ78
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I'd give Hood a pass too, not sure what you wanted him to do in 1864 after Johnston backed up to Atlanta. Johnston falls into the bad general category quicker than Hood IMO. His flanking of Schofield at Columbia to Spring Hill was Jacksonian brilliant but it did fall apart from there.
Sapper Redux
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BQ78 said:

I'd give Hood a pass too, not sure what you wanted him to do in 1864 after Johnston backed up to Atlanta. Johnston falls into the bad general category quicker than Hood IMO. His flanking of Schofield at Columbia to Spring Hill was Jacksonian brilliant but it did fall apart from there.


Johnston recognized the limits of his position and did his best to slow Sherman and drag the conflict around Atlanta past the 1864 election. Hood abandoned that and did exactly what Sherman wanted. Johnston had his flaws, but strategically I'd say he was right about Vicksburg and right about Atlanta.

Hood followed up Atlanta by again doing exactly what Sherman wanted and even one-upped Sherman by destroying his own army with terrible decisions at Franklin and Nashville.
Sapper Redux
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Smeghead4761 said:

I'm willing to give Burnside at least a partial pass, because at least he recognized that the job was beyond his ability, and told Lincoln so, before going out and proving that he was right.


I'd also take this time to mention that Hooker doesn't get enough credit for reorganizing and revitalizing the Army of the Potomac. Meade inherited a much more effective fighting force because of Hooker's post-Burnside reforms.
BQ78
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Ugh, Johnston was a moral coward going back to that affliction. His strategy would have had the AoT flanked out of every position until he surrendered at Key West or found a way to get his army on to the keys.

His Vicksburg strategy was self-fulfilling and he directly disobeyed Davis to assist Pemberton. He was reinforced from the AoT and still sat there while the city fell. A man with moral courage would have gone to Richmond and sell his plan versus ignore direct orders and let Vicksburg fall.

Johnston was such a moral coward that he only launched two offensive operations in the war, one at the beginning and the second at the end. Both huge failures on his part.

Hood was a pretty bad corps commander to Johnston but he was a great brigade commander, a serviceable division commander and an army commander with a good strategic vision but poor tactical performance for a multitude of reasons. His plan for the TN campaign was not unlike Lee's after Richmond fell. Attack Nashville then join up with Lee's Army in the Virginia theater. But options were pretty slim in the fall of 1864 and playing thrust and parry with Sherman in Georgia was not going to change anything.
YZ250
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Smeghead4761 said:

MacArthur can be mentioned among the worst - initial defense of the Philippines
To blame MacArthur for the defense of the Philippines is wrong. I'm curious what your reasons are. It ignores the history of the US in the Philippines since the Philippine War. Since we had been there, there were different beliefs of the defense among and within both the army and navy. At one extreme some thought that they were indefensible and that we should withdraw the military. The other extreme is full commitment. In my opinion anything in between the two would result in failure. The lack of funding in the 1930s of the Pacific Army is probably the number one culprit followed by the navy's plan to get out of dodge if war came. As always, this created a situation in the Philippines such that the mission of the garrison exceeded its capabilities.

In the mid-1930s the navy waited for General Embick to become head of the War Plans Department. Embick was against defending the Philippines and instead supported a withdrawal to Alaska-Hawaii-Panama in case of war. A month before the attack the navy had 29 subs in the Philippines. By December 31 all had left. During that time they inflicted no damage to the Japanese. Additionally, when the war started there was a convoy of ships that were headed to Manila. They were diverted to Australia. Admiral Stark never told Admiral Hart that it was for MacArthur but that the supplies would be good for Darwin.

MacArthur's plan for beach defense was not unique. Many previous commanders said they would do the same thing. It was sound in that it attacks the Japanese where they are most vulnerable. It buys time for the Philippine reserves to activate and for the air force to operate. A lot of people blame MacArthur for not retreating immediately to Bataan. Doing so sacrifices all of our planes and airfields and supplies, does not give time for the Philippine reserves to activate. It guarantees a quick fall which allows the Japanese to allocate forces elsewhere. Regardless of what plan MacArthur followed, the plan was contingent on lasting up to 6 months which was the time needed for the navy to bring reinforcements.
Rabid Cougar
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Sapper Redux said:

Smeghead4761 said:

I'm willing to give Burnside at least a partial pass, because at least he recognized that the job was beyond his ability, and told Lincoln so, before going out and proving that he was right.


I'd also take this time to mention that Hooker doesn't get enough credit for reorganizing and revitalizing the Army of the Potomac. Meade inherited a much more effective fighting force because of Hooker's post-Burnside reforms.
Hooker was not a bad commander and better than most. He was aggressive and never shied from a fight. He wasn't fired for being beaten by Lee at Chancellorsville.. Didn't do a bad job in the western theater either until Howard got promoted over him to command the Army of the Tennessee after McPherson was killed at Atlanta.

Cow Pie & Fries
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Braxton Bragg. I would be writing all night. Whatever success the Army of Tennessee enjoyed was in spite of him.
Put Cleburne in command of that Army & there is no telling what might of happened.
Propane & Accessories
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Cow Pie & Fries said:

Braxton Bragg. I would be writing all night. Whatever success the Army of Tennessee enjoyed was in spite of him.
Put Cleburne in command of that Army & there is no telling what might of happened.

I'd give Bragg a bit of a pass too, he had a major handicap in having to have Polk as a Corp commander. I mean look at his Kentucky campaign the plan relied on both Bragg's Army and Kirby Smith's Army to work in tandem but, Smith liked having his name in the Papers so he left Bragg high and dry at many stages in the campaign and the Confederates could of made the battle of Perryville a strategic victory if they had Smith there.
cbr
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Im pretty sure the current batch of woke political appointees would take the cake if they are ever tested.
Sapper Redux
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So which groups do you need to be a complete ******* towards in order to demonstrate strategic competence?
agracer
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YZ250 said:

Smeghead4761 said:

MacArthur can be mentioned among the worst - initial defense of the Philippines
To blame MacArthur for the defense of the Philippines is wrong. I'm curious what your reasons are.
Because he sat on his ass for 12+ hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor, left provisions in place for the Japanese when they invaded instead of moving them, and was an all around narcissists.

Maybe not the worst, but by far the most over rated.
YZ250
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agracer said:

YZ250 said:

Smeghead4761 said:

MacArthur can be mentioned among the worst - initial defense of the Philippines
To blame MacArthur for the defense of the Philippines is wrong. I'm curious what your reasons are.
Because he sat on his ass for 12+ hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor, left provisions in place for the Japanese when they invaded instead of moving them, and was an all around narcissists.

Maybe not the worst, but by far the most over rated.
He did delay in taking action but it wasn't 12+ hours. He received word at 0330. A state of war was declared. He had been talking to Sutherland and had talked to Washington at 0530. He didn't talk to Brereton until 1010. What do you think he should have done in your "12+ hours"?

Provisions were ordered to be taken and anything that couldn't be taken to Bataan was ordered destroyed by MacArthur. There is controversy here as Lt. Col. Alexander at Fort Stotsenburg said that very little of value was left behind whereas General Drake said only a portion had been removed. But nothing was intentionally left behind and there was a shortage of vehicles in the Philippines even with the commandeering of civilian vehicles. None of this or his personality caused the fall of the Philippines. December was a bad month for everybody. What about the rest of the war?

Now how do you feel about the build up due to MacArthur? He didn't take command until the end of July 1941 but once he did he requested a ton of supplies and equipment. At that time the army only had 22,532 men. By December he had added 120,000 Filipinos. In August, the only modern aircraft they had were 31 P-40Bs. He got 35 B-17s, 104 tanks, 40 105mm guns, 1,100,000 gallons of fuel, 500,000 C rations, hospital equipment, 50 P-40s with more to come, 6 radar sets were on there way, he set up and early warning system. Much more was to come. He also requested supplies for the Filipinos but most was rejected. This included helmets, anti-aircraft machine guns, Garand rifles, mortars, engineering equipment, signal equipment etc…
whoop1995
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AG
Don't know if this counts as worst but Custer made a tactically fatal decision.
aggiejim70
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whoop1995 said:

Don't know if this counts as worst but Custer made a tactically fatal decision.
The OP's question precludes Custer from making the list, as he has not a general at the time of his last defeat.
The person that is not willing to fight and die, if need be, for his country has no right to life.

James Earl Rudder '32
January 31, 1945
LMCane
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Chipotlemonger said:

Question that came to mind while watching the 4th episode of this mini docuseries: Who is the "worst" General in US history? All the Haig stuff in this episode seems to be kind of damning. And that's a name I recalled coming into this miniseries from listening to the Carlin WWI podcast series.

Who else could vye for this unfortunate spot?
so many choices

John Carlos Buell
Henry Halleck
Dan Sickles
George B McClellan
Horatio Gates
Loyd Freedandall
Benedict Arnold
BQ_90
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I haven't read every post, but gotta throw in Major General Benjamin Lincoln suffering the worst defeat of the Revolution
dead
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Depending on if Confederate generals are thrown in the mix, Albert Sidney Johnston turned pretty sour at the end
some of yall need to take a break from texags before the internet brain worms set in for good
BQ78
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I think he was worse than sour by the end of the war, since he died in April 1862.
dead
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BQ78 said:

I think he was worse than sour by the end of the war, since he died in April 1862.
I meant the "shot and ended up at death's door without realizing during the most important battle for the South" part
some of yall need to take a break from texags before the internet brain worms set in for good
Martin Cash
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Mark Milley
Chipotlemonger
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Finished up the miniseries finally (Apocalypse WWI, which set off this thread question). Good series if you want to see more footage of that time and event, but I think that the Hardcore History podcast series left a more lasting impact for me and I learned quite a bit more from it. I guess that is pretty obvious considering the length of material between the two.
AgBQ-00
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I feel like that this series was kind of the outline for Carlin's series. And with this as the framework he was able to deep dive in specific areas. I really appreciate both and believe that most people could be extremely edified by watching this series.
Communists aren't people. They are property of the state.
Chipotlemonger
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AgBQ-00 said:

I feel like that this series was kind of the outline for Carlin's series. And with this as the framework he was able to deep dive in specific areas. I really appreciate both and believe that most people could be extremely edified by watching this series.
Great point. This event was not that long ago! The rapid change of the 20th and 21st centuries make WWI seem further away from us than it really is.
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