HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
From: galan@netlink.cts.com (Greg Gross)
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 92 21:02:33 PDT
Organization: NetLink Online Communications, San Diego CA

z_copeab@ccsvax.sfasu.edu writes:

> In article <ROTEN.92Oct2142011@CUBA.gsfc.nasa.gov>, roten@CUBA.gsfc.nasa.gov 
> > In article <14621@chalmers.se> d9bertil@dtek.chalmers.se (Bertil Jonell) 
> > writes:
> > 
> >>In article <1992Sep29.143955.28999@newstand.syr.edu> 
> >>sawyer@erc.cat.syr.edu (Russell W. Sawyer) writes:
> >>>Battle at little big horn....  (Custer under estimating the Idians)
> >>
> >>  According to the park rangers(?) there the indians had twice as many
> >>winchesters as the cavalry had single shot rifles, so underestimating is an
> >>understatement. In hindsight, it is hard to see any possible outcomes 
> >>other than either custer avoiding the indians or his force goetting wiped o
> > 
> > If what I read a few years back in a National Geographic article about the 
> > battle is correct, it was worse than that.  
> > 
> > The Indians used _Henry_ _repeaters_, by choice.  You know, those nasty 
> > 14-shot tubular-magazine Civil War era assault rifles.  And the poor US 
> > cavalry had single-shot rifles.  Brrrrrrr .....   
> 
> 	Custer also decided not to take the pair of Gatling guns he had
> available, because he felt they would have slowed him down too much. :-)
> 
> Brandon Cope
> 


Custer's biggest problem was that he couldn't see past his own ego. And 
it got a lot of good men killed.
G.

--
Gregory Alan Gross      Welcome to life, where no good deed goes unpunished.
San Diego Union-Tribune         (619) 293-1270 (voice)
P.O. Box 191                    (619) 293-2333 (fax)
San Diego, CA 92112-4106        galan@netlink.cts.com (Internet)
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Date: 16 Oct 92 11:19:32 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

From article <1992Oct16.044913.26334@ucsu.Colorado.EDU>, by buckley@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (BUCKLEY  CHARLES RAY):
> In article <6028@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at> mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner) writes:
>>Kind of ironic that he still commanded four of the carriers at Midway
>>when the US carriers really were waiting.
 
> Not to ironic as Midway was only six months after Pearl Harbor. In any case, 
> the game plan for the Japanese was to draw out the US carriers. Which it did.

The irony is not in the time passed, but in the turn of events.  The
whole Midway plan was based on the idea that the US carriers were in
Pearl Harbor and would only sail once Midway had been bombed, whereas
in reality two of them were already on station near Midway and the
Yorktown was racing to catch up.  The plan was *not* based on the
assumption that the US would break Japanese codes and wait for the
Japanese.  :-)

> Nagumo was also worried about the air defenses at Pearl Harbor

True.

> They would have been meat to any of the carriers operating in the area if they
> had lost another 100 planes. It would have been Midway six months early.

Considering the fact that the US carriers were not acting in
coordination and were not really ready for action (the Enterprise, for
example, had been shuttling planes to Wake), plus the fact that the
Japanese were *aware* that the US carriers had to be somewhere around,
I'd say that outcome is not really probable.  But of course, Nagumo
had no way of knowing that, and he fully expected the US to lie in
ambush, which was enough.
-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: jbc4m@holmes.acc.Virginia.EDU (John B. Carr)
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Reply-To: jbc4m@holmes.acc.Virginia.EDU (John B. Carr)
Organization: University of Virginia
Distribution: all
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 22:05:34 GMT

In article <xjfrbcp@cck.coventry.ac.uk>, cbj005@cch.coventry.ac.uk (The
Mistress) writes:
|> >>
|> >>	World War II
|> >>
|> 
|> On a side note.....Montgomerys Eigth Army attacking Wittmans Tigers
at
|> Villers Bocage in 1944.
|> 
	Or anything Monty did in Europe outside of Sicily, like Market Garden
perhaps.


--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 John Carr                           UNIX Support Specialist
 jbc4m@virginia.edu                  Academic Computing, Gilmer Hall
 804/982-4710                        University of Virginia
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From: mcgrew@dropout.rutgers.edu (Charles Mcgrew)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Date: 8 Oct 92 03:51:09 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.


	It did however, save the lives of the other columns. This was
	also aided by Reno's cold feet. As one of Reno's troops said
	later - If we hadn't have been led by a coward , we would all
	be dead now. (Or at least a paraphrase of his statement).

... its not clear to me that men of the 7th actually thought Reno a
coward.  The regiment soon after later petition to have Reno named
commander of the 7th.  Certainly he did the only possible thing that
could have saved his command.

   Custer is ultimately the bad-guy here; splitting his force into
three parts (Benteen, Reno, and himself commanding a part each), and
formulating a, shall we say, incautious battleplan.  I think Custer's
best bet would be to try and push the hostiles toward Terry, and in
conjunction with Crook (whom Custer did not know was stopped at the
Rosebud fight), crush the hostiles.  That is, Custer should have
skirmished; to be generally offensive while being specifically
defensive (if that's vague enough for you.)  Of course, he couldn't be
sure how many hostiles he was dealing with when he made the plan, but
once he *did* know, his actions were reckless.

   He may have thought that the only chance to save Reno was to attack
himself, although it is not clear that he knew what Reno's situation
actually was (certainly he would have heard the firing from Reno's
fight.)   

   There is another factor: that the commanding officers all around
thought that the major danger was that the hostiles would disperse,
rather than coming to battle.  Custer probably thought that once he
was committed to a fight, his only option was all-out attack with the
forces to hand.  Unfortunately, his "forces to hand" had been diluted
so badly (by Custer himself), that he was overwhelmed.  (Of course,
his political ambitions had something to do with it too, he having
peddled himself as The Great Indian Fighter, he could hardly have
anything but a great victory on his belt.)

	In any case the battle at Little Bighorn only accounted for
	some 300 casualties on all sides. I for one think that it will
	forever be relegated to second string status.

... quite.  The "battles" of the Indian Wars were, by European
standards, insignificant.  The impact of the Greasy Grass fight were
the totality of the disaster (the Fetterman disaster involved the loss
of significantly fewer troops), the rarity of complete defeats of the
US Army in fights with the hostiles, and the relative well-known-ness
of the commander involved.  As far as the overall subjugation of the
West goes, it didn't matter a whole heck of a lot (since the hostiles
dispersed after the Custer fight anyway.)

	Strategically, Terry's forced retreat sealed Custers fate
	and decided the capaign long before Custer even arrived in the
	Little Bighorn Valley.

... uh, don't you mean Crook?  (If you're thinking of the fight on
the Rosebud, that was Crook's force.)

Charles
From: mcgrew@dropout.rutgers.edu (Charles Mcgrew)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Burnside was awful (was Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All time)
Date: 8 Oct 92 04:37:00 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.


	pdunn@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Patrick L Dunn) writes: 
	About six months ago I really cut into Burnside in another
	thread.  Burnside was a walking disaster.

...as well you should.  Burnsie was a walking, running, sitting,
riding, kneeling and lying-down disaster.  He is the centerpiece of
the title chapter of Charles Fair's "From the Jaws of Victory" (Simon
and Schuster, 1971), and even rates the dedication:  "To the memory of
Ambrose E. Burnside -- One of the greatest in a tradition still very
much alive".   "From the Jaws" is a highly readable discussion of
military idiocy.  I recommend it (the book, not military idiocy.)

Charles
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: sdr57@cas.org ()
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Organization: Chemical Abstracts Service, Columbus, Ohio
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 12:13:43 GMT

In article <Oct.7.23.51.08.1992.16252@dropout.rutgers.edu> mcgrew@dropout.rutgers.edu (Charles Mcgrew) writes:
>
>       It did however, save the lives of the other columns. This was
>       also aided by Reno's cold feet. As one of Reno's troops said
>       later - If we hadn't have been led by a coward , we would all
>       be dead now. (Or at least a paraphrase of his statement).
>
>... its not clear to me that men of the 7th actually thought Reno a
>coward.  The regiment soon after later petition to have Reno named
>commander of the 7th.  Certainly he did the only possible thing that
>could have saved his command.
>
>   Custer is ultimately the bad-guy here; splitting his force into
>three parts (Benteen, Reno, and himself commanding a part each), and
>formulating a, shall we say, incautious battleplan.  I think Custer's
>best bet would be to try and push the hostiles toward Terry, and in
>conjunction with Crook (whom Custer did not know was stopped at the
>Rosebud fight), crush the hostiles.  That is, Custer should have
>skirmished; to be generally offensive while being specifically
>defensive (if that's vague enough for you.)  Of course, he couldn't be
>sure how many hostiles he was dealing with when he made the plan, but
>once he *did* know, his actions were reckless.
>
>   He may have thought that the only chance to save Reno was to attack
>himself, although it is not clear that he knew what Reno's situation
>actually was (certainly he would have heard the firing from Reno's
>fight.)
>
Just an aside - there is some reason to think Custer himself may have
been wounded or killed relatively early on in the "last stand."
This is based on the apparent movements of his group (as determined
by post battle (this century) ballistics studies of who was shooting
from where - they looked at bullets found on the battlefield).

I don't know much more than that - my original source was an old
Smithsonian magazine.
******************************************************************************
Renegade academician. They're a dangerous breed when they go feral,
academics are...a chemist, too.
		    -(James P. Blaylock in "Lord Kelvin's Machine")

My organization hasn't agreed with any of my opinions so far, and
I doubt they'll start now.

Stanley "Ya nee speon" Roberts
From: ravis@axion.bt.co.uk (Richard Avis)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Date: 12 Oct 92 14:03:50 GMT
Reply-To: ravis@axion.bt.co.uk (Richard Avis)
Organization: British Telecom Research Labs


In article <6018@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at>, mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner) writes:
|> From article <KETIL.92Oct11024703@bark.ii.uib.no>, by ketil@bark.ii.uib.no (Ketil M. Malde):
|> > In article <1992Sep28.165259.17464@linus.mitre.org> bwise@hemlock.mitre.org (Barry Wise) writes:
|> >    The Arabs attacking Israel(anyone of numerous times)
|> > Yep.  Never underestimate an opponent. :-)
|> 
|> >    Pearl Harbor
|> > Still, I don't see why on earth Japan should attack the US?
|> 
Hold on, we're forgetting some of the British Army's greatest:

1) The Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimea 
(in fact the whole Crimean war for that matter).

2) The attempted incursion into Afghanistan in the 19th century 
(nearly everyone was killed or died).

3) Virtually any offensive up until 1918 during WW1.

4) Gallipoli (ask any ANZAC).

5) Anzio (WW2)

6) Last, but best - Operation Market Garden, the attempt to grab the bridge at Arnhem. 
Left roughly 8000 British Airborne troops dead, wounded or captured. A REAL disaster!




--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Richard Avis (Mr. Forgettable)

EMail : ravis@axion.bt.co.uk
Mail : BT Laboratories,
       Martlesham Heath,
       Ipswich,
       Suffolk,
       IP5 7RE.

"We had to destroy Ben Tre in order to save it." - Unknown U.S. Army Major

===========================================================================
From: cmort@NCoast.ORG (Christopher Morton)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military luck-outs of all time
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:44:06 GMT
Reply-To: cmort@ncoast.org (Christopher Morton)
Followup-To: alt.war
Organization: North Coast Public Access *NIX, Cleveland, OH



One of the best examples is the Japanese commander whose collection of elderly
reservists kept getting lost trying to find the Allied lines during the 
Japanese invasion of the Philippines.  They were ordered to attack the US/
Philippine line and set off into mountainous jungle to reach the objective.
Wandering for days, they finally emerged no nearer to their objective.  Their
next echelon commander sympathised with their CO and told him to stand down.
Thinking that the CO was angry with him, their commander took the (regiment?)
back into the jungle to recover their honor.  They AGAIN became hopelessly 
lost.  Unfortunately for MacArthur this time they emerged BEHIND a 
Philippine army unit which had advanced far ahead of its flanking units for
similar reasons that the Japanese were perpetuating their quixotic attack.
Panic in the Allied lines ensued and the line collapsed, allowing the Japanese
to carry the day.

The story is contained in Toland's "The Rising Sun".

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------  

"Well whose opinions did you THINK these were...?" 
------------------------------------------------------------------
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: What if there had been no Pearl Harbor?
Keywords: WWII, Pearl Harbor
Date: 8 Oct 92 13:21:15 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna


A question that has been bugging me for quite a while...  What if the
Japanese had not attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7?

The reasoning behind Japanese strategy was always that if they were
successful enough militarily, they would be able to get the US to the
negotiation table and be able to negotiate from a strong position,
with their conquered territories in the East Indies as a strong
bargaining chip.  Now the long-range Japanese assessment of US
military power tended to be quite accurate in places (such as the July
1942 wargames that predicted the retaking of the Philippines in
November 1944, or Yamamoto's prediction of half a year of
superiority), and as late as Midway, the Japanese still hoped they
could get the US to grow tired of the war.  Of course, the hypothesis
was never tested, since they botched it on both cases, first at Pearl
Harbor, by attacking before the official declaration of war, thus
providing a the outrage needed for unanimous war support in the US,
and at Midway, well, everybody knows what happened there.

So, here are the questions: Would the Japanese have had any chance of
getting the US to agree to negotiations if

(a) the Japanese diplomats had not fumbled the translation of the
declaration of war, i.e., the attack would have happened, say, an hour
or even a few minutes after the declaration;

(b) the attack on Pearl Harbor had been timed to happen on the day
after the declaration? 

(c) at Midway, despite the attack on Pearl Harbor occurring as it did
historically, they had achieved their goal of sinking the US carriers? 

These questions are obviously quite independent of each other, so the
answers to each might be different.  They are also mainly political
questions, not military ones, since the answer depends on
considerations of public sentiment and political reactions to the
attacks (which is why I ask question b, even though the Japanese
probably never would have dared to include that kind of delay in their
plans).  Comments, anyone?

-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis)
Subject: Re: What if there had been no Pearl Harbor?
Keywords: WWII, Pearl Harbor
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. of Biological Sciences.
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 18:20:09 GMT

In article <6007@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at> mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner) writes:
>
>A question that has been bugging me for quite a while...  What if the
>Japanese had not attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7?
>
>
>So, here are the questions: Would the Japanese have had any chance of
>getting the US to agree to negotiations if
>
   First, I don't think _negotiations_ were ever part of Japanese
strategy. The were trying to establish the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity
Sphere. I haven't heard that they had any territorial ambitions outside
that area, and had no intent of giving up any of the included territory.
   They needed to reduce the military of the 'big-nosed foriegn devils' (to
use the chinese term). That meant Britain, the US, Australia, and other
small European countries. Britain, Australia and other European countries
would be taken care of pretty much by the war in Europe.
   The real ojective was to reduce the US presence in the area. That would take
the form of the capture of the American bases (as happened), but would also
require an attack on the naval forces of the Pacific.
   Regardless of Yamamoto's pessimisn, putting yourself back to that time
should make you feel that the attack was a great success. Who could have
known that the US would build 65+ carriers in the next 3 years?

>(a) the Japanese diplomats had not fumbled the translation of the
>declaration of war, i.e., the attack would have happened, say, an hour
>or even a few minutes after the declaration;
>
>(b) the attack on Pearl Harbor had been timed to happen on the day
>after the declaration? 
>
   I don't see the importance of timing in the attack. Always attack
with suprise if you can. I don't think there would have been any less
shock and horror in the American public if the attack had came later.
   We would probably have attacked them eventually for violating the
naval treaty we forced on them even if they hadn't attacked.

>(c) at Midway, despite the attack on Pearl Harbor occurring as it did
>historically, they had achieved their goal of sinking the US carriers? 
>
   No effect. Even if Midway had been a total Japanese victory. Midway
was not a real important objective. In fact there is a theory that 
t was only attacked because the Japanese military was embarassed by 
Doolittle's raid and concluded that it came from Midway. Since Japan
had no intention of invading NA, the loss of more US carriers would have
only delayed our offensives on the order of months.

-- 
    "I think it is a little premature to attribute the failures of American
     foriegn policy to Carl Kadie."
                                                     -Mike Godwin
This article for entertainment purposes only.
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: jeffj@cbnewsm.cb.att.com (jeffrey.n.jones)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Date: 16 Oct 92 19:57:44 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: AT&T

>British, since it was loaded with a dozen Chinook heavy-lift helos.  The loss of
>virtually all their tactical airlift resulted in that fun little slog across the
>Falklands by the infantry.

A friend of mine was in the Brtish army at the time and he was one of 
those infantry that got to slug across Falklands. He also said that
the Argentine snipers love to shoot at strecher bearers as a means to
disrupt morale. He said that it was very effective. He also mentioned 
that trench foot and other assorted nasties from WWI reapeared once again.
All and all not a fun time for him to say the least!

Jeff

-- 
 Jeff Jones  AB6MB         |      If we do not succeed,
 jeffj@seeker.mystic.com   |      then we run the risk of failure.
 Infolinc BBS 415-778-5929 |      Vice Pres. Dan Quayle
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: mpinnock@casper.cs.uct.ac.za (M B Pinnock)
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Organization: Computer Science Department, University of Cape Town
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 08:50:17 GMT

In <6018@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at> mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner) writes:

>From article <KETIL.92Oct11024703@bark.ii.uib.no>, by ketil@bark.ii.uib.no (Ketil M. Malde):
>> In article <1992Sep28.165259.17464@linus.mitre.org> bwise@hemlock.mitre.org (Barry Wise) writes:

>>    Pearl Harbor
>> Still, I don't see why on earth Japan should attack the US?

>Then I would suggest you read your history books again.  There is no
>question that those in power in Japan at the time had a very peculiar
>mindset, but given their long-range goals and their past experience,
>it obviously looked like a logical move to them, same as Hitler's
>attack on Russia probably looked sane to him.

Pearl Harbour would have been a masterstroke had the US carriers been
in at the time. Also no major fuel or ammunition was destroyed. The Japanes
placed no real emphasis on submarines either and so failed to destroy US
submarine bases at the same time. If they had carried it out correctly i.e.
destroyed all the above targets as well as not bungled the declaration of
war, the US may have fought a limited war and then sued for peace. The
original Japanese plan I think.

As for Hitler, if he had not had to clean up Mussolini's mess in Greece and
North Africa , operation Barberossa would have taken place at least 6 weeks
earlier. This may have changed the course of the war and subsequent world
history.

Brian Pinnock

Computer Science Dept.       | Sam! 
University of Cape Town.     | I like green eggs and ham! 
South Africa.                | I do! I like them, Sam-I-am! 
mpinnock@casper.cs.uct.ac.za |                                 Dr. Seuss.
From: mcgrew@dropout.rutgers.edu (Charles Mcgrew)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military Blunders of All Time
Date: 8 Oct 92 15:24:16 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.


	sdr57@cas.org (Stanley "Ya nee speon" Roberts) writes:
	Just an aside - there is some reason to think Custer himself may have
	been wounded or killed relatively early on in the "last stand."
	This is based on the apparent movements of his group (as determined
	by post battle (this century) ballistics studies of who was shooting
	from where - they looked at bullets found on the battlefield).

... yes, according to some witnesses, parts of the 7th made it as far
as the river, then someone was hit or killed actually in the river
(the supposition is that it was Custer himself), and they retired back
to the hills.  Under this assumption, the actual "last stand" leader
was one of the other Custers (probably Tom), or maybe Keogh.  The
difficulty is that Custer was found with one the last groups alive,
rather than at the river, or Medicine Tail Coulee, or someplace else.

   Also, it seems unlikely (to me, anyway) that Custer would go
himself with only a few troops to the river (if Custer was leading,
he'd take 'em all); and also unlikely that the hostiles would be so
courteous as to take his body back up to the place of the last-stand
from wherever he fell.

Charles