I've been reading about this guy lately and his pretty remarkable career. He led armies against more powerful and better equipped forces over and over again. War after war and decade after decade. I think he might be one of the most underrated military commanders of the 20th century.
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Vo Nguyen Giap, the finest strategist we ever fought against?
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Last: 2 mo ago by Tanker123
Never fought a war against the unmitigated power of the United States. Could have bombed the northern cities backed to the Stone Age and sunk every ship that tried to approach the Haiphong Harbor. . Should have never let up on the Linebackers Missions.
A mind bender about Vietnam...if the French had not tried to recolonize would it have ever fallen to the communists
https://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/wadsworth.pdf
I just started reading this. It seems like a pretty comprehensive overview of Giap and what he did.
I just started reading this. It seems like a pretty comprehensive overview of Giap and what he did.
What would any of that have accomplished?Rabid Cougar said:
Never fought a war against the unmitigated power of the United States. Could have bombed the northern cities backed to the Stone Age and sunk every ship that tried to approach the Haiphong Harbor. . Should have never let up on the Linebackers Missions.
Before you start talking about more linebacker missions or leveling North Vietnamese cities you have to ask what did winning look like. I don't think there was a way to win that war in a conventional sense. There was never going to be a conventional surrender. So bombing missions, sinking ships, leveling cities, none of it would have mattered.
Winning looked like destroying the offensive capability of the Viet Cong like we did in early 1968, destroying the capability of the NVA to project into the south and turning it over to SV when Vietnamization might have worked.
Assuming you think Israel won't be able to destroy Hamas either.
Assuming you think Israel won't be able to destroy Hamas either.
But for how long? The Chinese and Russians were willing to poor more weapons and trainers in to rebuild that capability. Destruction of a military capability would have been temporary and the NVA were comfortable waiting till that capability rebuilt and then would project south again.
Standing here today, is Vietnam a communist country allied with China and Russia against the USA? The answer is no, they are growing capitalist society that is deeply invested in the textile industry in the USA and our military's leaders share lunch when our Navy does port calls.
To your question about Hamas I answer how do you kill an idea? Has bombing an idea ever worked?
That does not mean I don't support Israel's attacks on Hamas. What Hamas did was inexcusable and had to be responded to with the most extreme methods. Will it reduce Hamas capabilities to do harm to Israeli civilians for a period of time, yes. But I think Hamas knew that would happen anyway. Those murderers that went across the boarder didn't take any kind of support along with them. They didn't even have water or backpacks to carry medical supplies or food. Their intent was to kill as many people as they could kill until they were killed. There was no plan to sustain themselves and take back ground or even return to Gaza.
Standing here today, is Vietnam a communist country allied with China and Russia against the USA? The answer is no, they are growing capitalist society that is deeply invested in the textile industry in the USA and our military's leaders share lunch when our Navy does port calls.
To your question about Hamas I answer how do you kill an idea? Has bombing an idea ever worked?
That does not mean I don't support Israel's attacks on Hamas. What Hamas did was inexcusable and had to be responded to with the most extreme methods. Will it reduce Hamas capabilities to do harm to Israeli civilians for a period of time, yes. But I think Hamas knew that would happen anyway. Those murderers that went across the boarder didn't take any kind of support along with them. They didn't even have water or backpacks to carry medical supplies or food. Their intent was to kill as many people as they could kill until they were killed. There was no plan to sustain themselves and take back ground or even return to Gaza.
We would have kept pouring equipment to the south after we left, if Vietnamization had worked but we completely whiffed on the religious differences that divided the south. We would have easily outspent Russia and China in Vietnam. China didn't love the north all that much anyway and went to war with them after we left.
"The devastating results of the Easter offensive shocked the Politburo. Combat deaths were so high and expenditures of material so great that even the most avid Politburo supporters of conventional war against the South were forced to face facts. The offensive had unleashed Nixon's fury, and the North was now reeling from air attacks of a magnitude never seen before. With their country in ruins and their army repulsed, their only option now lay in Paris. The North Vietnamese ordered their negotiators to get serious and work out a settlement."CT'97 said:What would any of that have accomplished?Rabid Cougar said:
Never fought a war against the unmitigated power of the United States. Could have bombed the northern cities backed to the Stone Age and sunk every ship that tried to approach the Haiphong Harbor. . Should have never let up on the Linebackers Missions.
Before you start talking about more linebacker missions or leveling North Vietnamese cities you have to ask what did winning look like. I don't think there was a way to win that war in a conventional sense. There was never going to be a conventional surrender. So bombing missions, sinking ships, leveling cities, none of it would have mattered.
Major Clinton D. Wadsworth, United States Marine Corps
Now think what the outcome would have been if they had unleashed the B-52's and F-105's with no restrictions in 1966.
Post deleted
I think those are some very big ifs and your assumptions aren't supported by history. They're just aren't any other examples of anything like that working.
Add to that the US political situation and it just wasn't going to happen. They were more worried about appearance on the national stage than they were winning or losing the war.
Add to that the US political situation and it just wasn't going to happen. They were more worried about appearance on the national stage than they were winning or losing the war.
Erwin Rommel
I'm not that knowledgeable about Rommel. What made him a good strategist? I assume that's something different than a tactician?LMCane said:
Erwin Rommel
Rabid Cougar said:"The devastating results of the Easter offensive shocked the Politburo. Combat deaths were so high and expenditures of material so great that even the most avid Politburo supporters of conventional war against the South were forced to face facts. The offensive had unleashed Nixon's fury, and the North was now reeling from air attacks of a magnitude never seen before. With their country in ruins and their army repulsed, their only option now lay in Paris. The North Vietnamese ordered their negotiators to get serious and work out a settlement."CT'97 said:What would any of that have accomplished?Rabid Cougar said:
Never fought a war against the unmitigated power of the United States. Could have bombed the northern cities backed to the Stone Age and sunk every ship that tried to approach the Haiphong Harbor. . Should have never let up on the Linebackers Missions.
Before you start talking about more linebacker missions or leveling North Vietnamese cities you have to ask what did winning look like. I don't think there was a way to win that war in a conventional sense. There was never going to be a conventional surrender. So bombing missions, sinking ships, leveling cities, none of it would have mattered.
Major Clinton D. Wadsworth, United States Marine Corps
Now think what the outcome would have been if they had unleashed the B-52's and F-105's with no restrictions in 1966.
The North Vietnamese weren't launching a massive armored offensive in 1966. I'm not sure what it would have accomplished separate from everything else accomplished by the bombing campaigns in North Vietnam. Also, the North still held and reinforced territory in the South after the Easter Offensive. It was a failure overall, but not a complete failure.
This is a rabbit hole separate from the original post but I'll chase it.
I think Rommel was out of his depth beyond division command and even there got extremely lucky with the circumstances and had a single event gone different he would have faded into obscurity as just another nazi general.
If one French armor unit had turned and cut off Rommel's lead element he and his lead unit of light tanks would have been cut off and decimated. That unit was preparing for that attack when they received orders to turn and pull back. If that attack goes ahead they wipe out Rommel's lead element and he disappears from the face of history. He was over extended exposed on all sides with no way of being reinforced he was so far ahead of his own lines.
Our current image of Rommel is largely born of post war efforts to paint him as an anti-Nazi so that the German people could have something to look up to and say "look we weren't all bad." When in fact Rommel was one of Hitler's favorites. The only people who got close access to Hitler, especially as the war drew on were hard core Nazi's. They bought in and agreed with him. The dissenting generals were sent to the eastern front and died in obscurity. Rommel's career was the exact opposite of that. He was moved from choice position to choice position despite his failures at every position he held above division command.
So no, Rommel isn't tactically or strategically even in the same ball park.
I think Rommel was out of his depth beyond division command and even there got extremely lucky with the circumstances and had a single event gone different he would have faded into obscurity as just another nazi general.
If one French armor unit had turned and cut off Rommel's lead element he and his lead unit of light tanks would have been cut off and decimated. That unit was preparing for that attack when they received orders to turn and pull back. If that attack goes ahead they wipe out Rommel's lead element and he disappears from the face of history. He was over extended exposed on all sides with no way of being reinforced he was so far ahead of his own lines.
Our current image of Rommel is largely born of post war efforts to paint him as an anti-Nazi so that the German people could have something to look up to and say "look we weren't all bad." When in fact Rommel was one of Hitler's favorites. The only people who got close access to Hitler, especially as the war drew on were hard core Nazi's. They bought in and agreed with him. The dissenting generals were sent to the eastern front and died in obscurity. Rommel's career was the exact opposite of that. He was moved from choice position to choice position despite his failures at every position he held above division command.
So no, Rommel isn't tactically or strategically even in the same ball park.
I starred you- but would disagree.CT'97 said:
This is a rabbit hole separate from the original post but I'll chase it.
I think Rommel was out of his depth beyond division command and even there got extremely lucky with the circumstances and had a single event gone different he would have faded into obscurity as just another nazi general.
If one French armor unit had turned and cut off Rommel's lead element he and his lead unit of light tanks would have been cut off and decimated. That unit was preparing for that attack when they received orders to turn and pull back. If that attack goes ahead they wipe out Rommel's lead element and he disappears from the face of history. He was over extended exposed on all sides with no way of being reinforced he was so far ahead of his own lines.
Our current image of Rommel is largely born of post war efforts to paint him as an anti-Nazi so that the German people could have something to look up to and say "look we weren't all bad." When in fact Rommel was one of Hitler's favorites. The only people who got close access to Hitler, especially as the war drew on were hard core Nazi's. They bought in and agreed with him. The dissenting generals were sent to the eastern front and died in obscurity. Rommel's career was the exact opposite of that. He was moved from choice position to choice position despite his failures at every position he held above division command.
So no, Rommel isn't tactically or strategically even in the same ball park.
you are focusing on his actions as the leader of the 7th Panzer Division during the conquering of France in 1940.
You are ignoring his years in the desert as the head of the Afrika Korps where every day he was outnumbered by the Allies but literally came within a few miles of the Nile. He held off vastly numerically superior enemies for nearly two years.
he also had the strategy to attack the Anglo-American landings in Normandy on the beaches and to station Panzer and SS near to the beach.
but he was overruled by the OKW/OKH who wanted mobile reserves behind the front.
It was exactly his time in Africa that I think is the example that he was out of his depth above division command. He failed to make it to the Nile because he failed to consider his logistical restraints. His tanks literally had to stop fighting because they didn't have enough fuel. He did great at the front leading from his scout car but only had at best control over the 2 regiments he was close to. He couldn't communicate with his headquarters many times leaving his deputy commander to effectively manage the larger battle without input from Rommel.
He did a poor job, if one at all, of interfacing with the Luftwaffe and ensuring a unity of effort. Almost as if the Luftwaffe didn't exist and it was the British air force who effectively cut him off from his supplies and then worked tirelessly to harass and break up his retreating units. It's baffling almost the damage that the British air force was doing to him and yet he didn't work to combine efforts with the Luftwaffe. Yet, Alexander put's the British desert air force command in the same camp as Montgomery where they have to live and eat together and essentially making the first combined military staff in history.
As a Corps or Army commander it's your job to ensure the logistics is in place for the efforts of your ground commanders and to interface with other branches to ensure a combined effort. He failed at this in North Africa.
Rommel wasn't present for most of the retreat as he was back in Germany convalescing from a variety of stomach ailments. He only returns at the end to take over the defense of Tunisia at which point the Germany Afrika Corps fate has been decided. He's out maneuvered again and is pulled back to Italy so Germany doesn't have one of Hitlers favorite stars suffer the embarrassment of defeat or capture.
Normandy and France I put on Hitler. He's growing distrustful of Wehrmacht officers and wants to keep his SS units under SS command because he thinks they will better follow his orders. The argument of closer vs further back was given it's due but never truly considered by Hitler despite Rommel traveling to visit him in person and argue. Hitler just didn't trust the Wehrmacht to execute his orders. This was further driven home after the assassination attempt in July barely a month after the invasion. After which Hitler just further consolidated control and distrusted his field commanders in the Wehrmacht. Hitler Issues stand and fight to the death orders that once again result in a major part of the German army getting encircled and destroyed.
Rommel is wounded at this time and back in Germany recovering and will finally be assassinated by Hitler as a cover up of the fact that the gestapo can't find or root out the true planners. So Rommel takes the fall for something there is no evidence of him being a part of even to this day. But that sets him up to be thought of as the "good guy" who just wanted what was best for Germany and was following orders. Which is the prevalent story told about him today. Dig a little deeper and I think you find a different answer.
He did a poor job, if one at all, of interfacing with the Luftwaffe and ensuring a unity of effort. Almost as if the Luftwaffe didn't exist and it was the British air force who effectively cut him off from his supplies and then worked tirelessly to harass and break up his retreating units. It's baffling almost the damage that the British air force was doing to him and yet he didn't work to combine efforts with the Luftwaffe. Yet, Alexander put's the British desert air force command in the same camp as Montgomery where they have to live and eat together and essentially making the first combined military staff in history.
As a Corps or Army commander it's your job to ensure the logistics is in place for the efforts of your ground commanders and to interface with other branches to ensure a combined effort. He failed at this in North Africa.
Rommel wasn't present for most of the retreat as he was back in Germany convalescing from a variety of stomach ailments. He only returns at the end to take over the defense of Tunisia at which point the Germany Afrika Corps fate has been decided. He's out maneuvered again and is pulled back to Italy so Germany doesn't have one of Hitlers favorite stars suffer the embarrassment of defeat or capture.
Normandy and France I put on Hitler. He's growing distrustful of Wehrmacht officers and wants to keep his SS units under SS command because he thinks they will better follow his orders. The argument of closer vs further back was given it's due but never truly considered by Hitler despite Rommel traveling to visit him in person and argue. Hitler just didn't trust the Wehrmacht to execute his orders. This was further driven home after the assassination attempt in July barely a month after the invasion. After which Hitler just further consolidated control and distrusted his field commanders in the Wehrmacht. Hitler Issues stand and fight to the death orders that once again result in a major part of the German army getting encircled and destroyed.
Rommel is wounded at this time and back in Germany recovering and will finally be assassinated by Hitler as a cover up of the fact that the gestapo can't find or root out the true planners. So Rommel takes the fall for something there is no evidence of him being a part of even to this day. But that sets him up to be thought of as the "good guy" who just wanted what was best for Germany and was following orders. Which is the prevalent story told about him today. Dig a little deeper and I think you find a different answer.
Regarding Vietnam, you can't ignore how terrible south Vietnam's governments were.
When Ngo Dinh Diem started jailing Buddhists in 63, and then closed all universities and schools and people were lighting themselves on fire in the streets in protest of him, we should have withdrawn right there and said "we can't support this guy."
Bombing campaigns don't win wars.
Boots on the ground do.
But if you aren't willing to send those boots where they need to go (after Korea, we were not going to invade NV) then you need to be realistic about what can and can't be accomplished.
Regarding Hamas… Israel needs to decide if it's willing to occupy the Gaza Strip to eliminate Hamas. And if it is, then what's the exit strategy and what losses are acceptable? Israel is so bad at PR that the bombing campaign is arguably doing it more harm than good. But sending troops into a heavily populated urban battlefield that Hamas has had 15 years to prepare is a recipe for tremendous Israeli casualties. And there's still the question - ok, you kill Hamas, what about Islamic Jihad? What about the next group that takes Hamas's place? How do you keep that area secure?
But the what's the cost of doing nothing? Then you're just waiting for Hamas to strike again. That is unacceptable.
There are no easy answers. But israel needs to play the PR game better. War is just politics by other means. Israel needs to remember this - what is the objective? Better PR needs to be part of the strategy.
When Ngo Dinh Diem started jailing Buddhists in 63, and then closed all universities and schools and people were lighting themselves on fire in the streets in protest of him, we should have withdrawn right there and said "we can't support this guy."
Bombing campaigns don't win wars.
Boots on the ground do.
But if you aren't willing to send those boots where they need to go (after Korea, we were not going to invade NV) then you need to be realistic about what can and can't be accomplished.
Regarding Hamas… Israel needs to decide if it's willing to occupy the Gaza Strip to eliminate Hamas. And if it is, then what's the exit strategy and what losses are acceptable? Israel is so bad at PR that the bombing campaign is arguably doing it more harm than good. But sending troops into a heavily populated urban battlefield that Hamas has had 15 years to prepare is a recipe for tremendous Israeli casualties. And there's still the question - ok, you kill Hamas, what about Islamic Jihad? What about the next group that takes Hamas's place? How do you keep that area secure?
But the what's the cost of doing nothing? Then you're just waiting for Hamas to strike again. That is unacceptable.
There are no easy answers. But israel needs to play the PR game better. War is just politics by other means. Israel needs to remember this - what is the objective? Better PR needs to be part of the strategy.
Thanks and gig'em
I dispute the premise. Having the insight that America was divided and couldn't sustain the war does not make you a good strategist. A great strategist figures out everything that no one else knows, not things everybody knows.
The NVA lost the war in pretty much every way. The Tet Offensive was a complete failure, and people like to say, well it turned opinion against the war. Yes and no, but that doesn't take away from how utterly annihilated the NVA/VC forces were.
This was a case of simply waiting out an enemy. This has happened plenty of times in history. George Washington did it, and I'm not even sure that I'd call him a stragegic genius. He was better than average, but not great. And that's with some actual good battlefield victories to his credit.
Name one North Korean victory in the entire war beyond squad level. Regardless of the outcome, there is no world in which Side A loses 1.1 million dead and side B loses 200K dead (South) and 58K dead (US) for a total of 250,000 and you're the winner. Not to mention the civilian dead, and the fact that since this is a civil war, the South Vietnamese dead are kind of a loss to the north too. A pyrrhic victory like that is no victory at all.
The NVA lost the war in pretty much every way. The Tet Offensive was a complete failure, and people like to say, well it turned opinion against the war. Yes and no, but that doesn't take away from how utterly annihilated the NVA/VC forces were.
This was a case of simply waiting out an enemy. This has happened plenty of times in history. George Washington did it, and I'm not even sure that I'd call him a stragegic genius. He was better than average, but not great. And that's with some actual good battlefield victories to his credit.
Name one North Korean victory in the entire war beyond squad level. Regardless of the outcome, there is no world in which Side A loses 1.1 million dead and side B loses 200K dead (South) and 58K dead (US) for a total of 250,000 and you're the winner. Not to mention the civilian dead, and the fact that since this is a civil war, the South Vietnamese dead are kind of a loss to the north too. A pyrrhic victory like that is no victory at all.
That is an interesting view point, makes a lot of sense. Based what you write above, would you say Giap et.al were pretty good at what they did, given what they had to work with and who they were working against?
In much of the reading I have done on VN an undertone I have always picked up on is one of "with all we have and can do, we should be way better off than we are". Conversely, there is immediate blame given to the political control of the war and I have often wondered how much of that oft used excuse is possibly overblown.
In much of the reading I have done on VN an undertone I have always picked up on is one of "with all we have and can do, we should be way better off than we are". Conversely, there is immediate blame given to the political control of the war and I have often wondered how much of that oft used excuse is possibly overblown.
It is interesting to think that the American Revolution may have been a Vietnam of sorts for the British. Like Giap, George Washington faced a superior foe in the British Army of the day. We fought battle after battle under his leadership, never gave up, and the British Parliament and public slowly lost the will to continue the war. George Washington was not Napoleon Bonaparte, otherwise we might have won in two years instead of eight, but he was able to wear down arguably the world's most powerful nation.
There are similarites, but also differences. There was a large population in England that supported the Colonial viewpoint, like Edmund Burke and Mary Wollstonecraft. But you can't really compare that to the anti-war movement in the US because in this case, the people were of the same stock as the people rebelling and it was effectively an inter-English Civil War, not a foreign war.Quote:
It is interesting to think that the American Revolution may have been a Vietnam of sorts for the British.
I do stand by my main point of how you cannot compare them. Washington won battles. Where is Giap's Trenton?
There is none.
We weren't involved but I would go with Dien Bien Phu.
Washington is considered to be one of the finest revolutionaries in world history because he wore so many hats. He willed America to victory. He was handicapped for a period of time when the Continental Army had shrunk to a few thousand men. In 1776 he spent most of the year avoiding the much larger British forces. His victories at Trenton and Princeton in late 1776 and early 1777 respectively, gave hope to the country that it could win battles and the war. Mao said a key step for his revolution was building up his army to be relevant in the fight against governmental forces. At the end of the American Revolution, the combined army of Americans and French were superior in numbers to the British.
Green2Maroon said:
We weren't involved but I would go with Dien Bien Phu.
Dien Bien Phu I think can really be chalked up to a French defeat rather than an NVA victory, if that makes sense.
With hindsight powers, I honestly think a reasoned argument could be made that we lost at Khe Sanh. I think it ultimately boils down to what you think the NVA goal really was. Diversion for Tet? I can buy that and probably worked to some extent. Actual control of the area? Well, they definitely won it if that is the case.
I don't have as much knowledge of Vietnam as I do other conflicts but from what I do know man, what a depressing, short sighted, and ignoble war that was.
Perhaps serious analysis should have been done on Dien Bien Phu. The Viet Minh had 80,000 soldiers and moved heaven and earth to move artillery through the rugged jungle to place them on the high ground. The French occupied the low ground. Therefore, they could shower the base with innumerable artillery rounds. Actions would prove the waves of Viet Minh infantry were far larger than the French could repel. This was some major combat power and showed an iron will to win.
Yeah, I get Eliminatus' thought that the French did lose the battle, through mismanagement but you can't take away that the Viet Minh did win the battle.
They really wanted their independence and were willing to do anything to get it.
Green2Maroon said:
They really wanted their independence and were willing to do anything to get it.
There is a military term called Center of Gravity (COG). The COG is the true strength in warfare. Their ideology of an independent state and the people were COGs when they were fighting the French and the US. When ideology is a COG, it is significantly difficult to defeat or negate. Ideology often is a generational thing.
We Americans also had those two COGs in our War of Independence. I firmly believe George Washington and the militia were COGs as well.
A COG analysis for Ukraine would be intersting.
We can apply the COG concept to the football team as well.
- S&C
- QB
- Hopefully Elko
- LBs
However there is room for debate.
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