History's Greatest Army?

[vonGarvin]

Do you know who actually invented the Blitzkrieg tactic?

The Germans invented "Blitzkrieg" as we know it today

 

[vonGarvin]

My vote would be (modern era) the Red Army of WWII. They mastered operational art and defeated a very modern and well-equipped Western Army on the way to Berlin.

 

[ballz]

Does anyone know where this article is? Haven't heard and Id be curious to read it

for you my good fellow, and anyone else who hasn't read it yet:

Sunday Telegraph Article From today's UK wires:

Salute to a brave and modest nation - Kevin Myers, The Sunday
Telegraph LONDON

Until the deaths of Canadian soldiers killed in Afghanistan , probably
almost no one outside their home country had been aware that Canadian
troops are deployed in the region. And as always, Canada will bury its
dead, just as the rest of the world, as always will forget its
sacrifice, just as it always forgets nearly everything Canada ever does.
It seems that Canada 's historic mission is to come to the
selfless aid both of its friends and of complete strangers, and then,
once the crisis is over, to be well and truly ignored.
Canada is the perpetual wallflower that stands on the edge of the
hall, waiting for someone to come and ask her for a dance. A fire breaks
out, she risks life and limb to rescue her fellow dance-goers, and
suffers serious injuries. But when the hall is repaired and the dancing
resumes, there is Canada, the wallflower still, while those she once
helped Glamorously cavort across the floor, blithely
neglecting her yet again. That is the price Canada pays for
sharing the North American continent with the United States , and for
being a selfless friend of Britain in two global conflicts. For much of
the 20th century, Canada was torn in two different directions: It seemed
to be a part of the old world, yet had an address in the new one, and
that divided identity ensured that it never fully got the gratitude it
deserved. Yet its purely voluntary contribution to the cause of freedom
in two world wars was perhaps the greatest of any democracy.
Almost 10% of Canada 's entire population of seven million people
served in the armed forces during the First World War, and nearly 60,000
died. The great Allied victories of 1918 were spearheaded by Canadian
troops, perhaps the most capable soldiers in the entire British order of
battle. Canada was repaid for its enormous sacrifice by
downright neglect, it's unique contribution to victory being absorbed
into the popular Memory as somehow or other the work of the 'British.'
The Second World War provided a re-run. The Canadian navy
began the war with a half dozen vessels, and ended up policing nearly
half of the Atlantic against U-boat attack. More than 120 Canadian
warships participated in the Normandy landings, during which 15,000
Canadian soldiers went ashore on D-Day alone. Canada finished the war
with the third-largest navy and the fourth largest air force in the
world. The world thanked Canada with the same sublime
indifference as it had the previous time. Canadian participation in the
war was acknowledged in film only if it was necessary to give an
American actor a part in a campaign in which the United States had
clearly not participated - a touching scrupulousness which, of course,
Hollywood has since abandoned, as it has any notion of a separate
Canadian identity. So it is a general rule that actors
and filmmakers arriving in Hollywood keep their nationality - unless,
that is, they are Canadian. Thus Mary Pickford, Walter Huston, Donald
Sutherland, Michael J. Fox, William Shatner, Norman Jewison, David
Cronenberg, Alex Trebek, Art Linkletter and Dan Aykroyd have in the
popular perception become American, and Christopher Plummer, British.
It is as if, in the very act of becoming famous, a Canadian
ceases to be Canadian, unless she is Margaret Atwood, who is as
unshakably Canadian as a moose, or Celine Dion, for whom Canada has
proved quite unable to find any takers. Moreover, Canada is
every bit as querulously alert to the achievements of it's sons and
daughters as the rest of the world is completely unaware of them. The
Canadians proudly say of themselves - and are unheard by anyone else -
that 1% of the world's population has provided 10% of the world's
peacekeeping forces. Canadian soldiers in the past half cent ury have
been the greatest peacekeepers on Earth - in 39 missions on UN mandates,
and six on non-UN peacekeeping duties, from Vietnam to East Timor, from
Sinai to Bosnia. Yet the only foreign engagement that has
entered the popular on-Canadian imagination was the sorry affair in
Somalia , in which out-of-control paratroopers murdered two Somali
infiltrators. Their regiment was then disbanded in disgrace - a uniquely
Canadian act of self-abasement for which, naturally, the Canadians
received no international credit. So who today in the United
States knows about the stoic and selfless friendship its northern
neighbour has given it in Afghanistan ? Rather like Cyrano
de Bergerac , Canada repeatedly does honourable things for honourable
motives, but instead of being thanked for it, it remains something of a
figure of fun. It is the Canadian way, for which Canadians
should be proud, yet such honour comes at a high cost. This past year
more grieving Canadian families knew that cost all too tragically
well.

 

[TCBF]

My vote would be (modern era) the Red Army of WWII. They mastered operational art and defeated a very modern and well-equipped Western Army on the way to Berlin.

- And they did it after having executed a large part of their effective officer corps only three years before they were invaded.  Hence their horrific losses. 

 

[Koenigsegg]

Although the Red Army was very good, I would not say they were the greatest because of how they fought.  They certainly made use of what they had (numbers), but to such a degree that they were throwing lives away.  They knew the Germans had limited supplies and ammunition, so if they kept throwing men at the German lines eventually something good would happen.
But for being masters of the cold, they have my vote.

 

[Infanteer]

This thread is retarded.  I vote for the Transformers because they had the Allspark....

 

[tomahawk6]

Clearly the best Army in history is the US Army. ;D

 

[Red 6]

- And they did it after having executed a large part of their effective officer corps only three years before they were invaded.  Hence their horrific losses. 

Agreed TCBF. At the moment I'm reading (coincidentally) "Life and Fate" by Vassili Grossman, which is a biographical novel of World War II, specifically the campaign for and around Stalingrad, as seen through the lens of the Russians who took part in the battle. One of the underlying themes is the purges and how Stalin and his henchmen thoroughly gutted the command structure of the Red Army. Another aspect of the Red Army's defeat was how completely it was controlled by the commissar system.

cheers, Mark

 

[vonGarvin]

Other than the Transformers, the Red Army (as an ARMY, not as individual divisions), was large enough of a thinker to have operational art to a science.  It wasn't simply a matter of pounding head on into the Wehrmacht that won it the war (that method failed miserably in 1941-42).  By late 42 and especially by mid 1944, the Red Army was able to fool the Germans time and again,able to meet most of their aims.  Their losses weren't only due to useless tactics at the lower level, but because of the steadfastness and ability of the Wehrmacht to inflict those losses.  In the end, with or without D-Day and the strategic bombing campaign, the Red Army was destined to defeat the Wehrmacht.

And for the record, Decipticons rock.

 

[Michael OLeary]

This thread is retarded.  I vote for the Transformers because they had the Allspark....

What, not this one?

 

[the 48th regulator]

This thread is retarded.  I vote for the Transformers because they had the Allspark....

Pfft,

G.I Joe from 25 years ago whupped Cobras aise from this side of the Globe to the other.

The Roman Army Under Julius Ceaser for the aspects of the Infantry, Theodosius' army commanded by Stillicho and his use of the Calvalry.

As for the term Barbarians, the Mongols were not the ones referred to as Barbarians, the Germanic Tribes were for their Barbas, the beards they wore.

Other than that, the only other one I see is the 48th Highlanders in the 90's, specifically the First Platoon of Alpha Company, fondly known and feared for their name "The Regulators".

Such prowess they had...

dileas

tess

 

[marshall sl]

Seaforth Highlanders of Canada, A Coy 1 Platoon 1 Section  circa 1977-1979 even with Danjanou in it!!!

 

[Ex-Dragoon]

Pffft
you guys know SFA if you have listed all the above. Everyone knows the greatest army of all time is the CBLA (Cape Breton Liberation Army) under that god of a tactician General John Cabot Trail. :

 

[CougarKing]

Pfft,

As for the term Barbarians, the Mongols were not the ones referred to as Barbarians, the Germanic Tribes were for their Barbas, the beards they wore.

Apparently the Mongol hordes never met Asterix and Obelix the Gauls with their tribe's magic potion!!!!  ;D

Or the knights of NITZ who have a SHRUBBERY!!!!!!!!!!!  >

 

[Michael OLeary]

Pffft
you guys know SFA if you have listed all the above. Everyone knows the greatest army of all time is the CBLA (Cape Breton Liberation Army) under that god of a tactician General John Cabot Trail. :

And the Royal Cape Breton Air Force.

 

[RTaylor]

I was playing World of Warcraft, my guild is the best army around.

-joke-

I'm not sure, but the current US Army if they fought like armies did long ago (without fear of reprisal or much care of how they won) would be 1 nasty dish to go around.

 

[ghyslyn]

As for the term Barbarians, the Mongols were not the ones referred to as Barbarians, the Germanic Tribes were for their Barbas, the beards they wore.

Really? I thought it was greek for "stranger"

edit:

1. a person in a savage, primitive state; uncivilized person.
2. a person without culture, refinement, or education; philistine.
3. (loosely) a foreigner.
4. (in ancient and medieval periods)
a. a non-Greek.
b. a person living outside, esp. north of, the Roman Empire.
c. a person not living in a Christian country or within a Christian civilization.
5. (among Italians during the Renaissance) a person of non-Italian origin.
–adjective
6. uncivilized; crude; savage.
7. foreign; alien.

 

[the 48th regulator]

Really? I thought it was greek for "stranger"

edit:

1. a person in a savage, primitive state; uncivilized person.
2. a person without culture, refinement, or education; philistine.
3. (loosely) a foreigner.
4. (in ancient and medieval periods)
a. a non-Greek.
b. a person living outside, esp. north of, the Roman Empire.
c. a person not living in a Christian country or within a Christian civilization.
5. (among Italians during the Renaissance) a person of non-Italian origin.
–adjective
6. uncivilized; crude; savage.
7. foreign; alien.

Who were the Greeks?

dileas

tess

 

[TangoTwoBravo]

This thread is retarded.  I vote for the Transformers because they had the Allspark....

I'll raise you one General Veers AT-AT legion on Hoth.  They could pretty much pwn anybody.  Even a Jedi had to run before them.

The Normans should be considered as well, along with the Roman army from the time when Scipio Africanus was in charge against the Carthaginians until the later battles when they crushed the Diadochi (the Macedonian Successors).  They ran the table around the Med against some pretty tough opponents.  Later Roman armies were great as well, but those battle-hardened legions of the Punic Wars carried Rome through some dark times.

Back to your regular scheduled programming.

 

[Danjanou]

Seaforth Highlanders of Canada, A Coy 1 Platoon 1 Section  circa 1977-1979 even with Danjanou in it!!!

Also known as the recruit depot for the Rhodesian Light Infantry 8)

BTW Dave and I were in 2 section under Haggis and later Ian.

You know I was going to use my special mod decoder ring to move this tho mil history as a serious topic, but as the fridge tech has ignored my pleasit's staying here in radio chatter. It gets any worse and I'll move it to the chat room.