My favorite commander would have to be Hannibal. The man went behind enemy lines, against a superior enemy for 10 years, gave birth to military strategy as we know it, and even became a pirate to spite Rome after Carthage lost the wars.

As for theorists, I like Tukhachevsky. He invented deep battle, which is currently the best strategy in use by any military today.

sun tzu literally wrote the book on war...

Yeah, I debated putting him down for mine, but I knew someone else would. Dude was a frigging genius.

haha you seen my oold sig i quoted him ive also read art of war twice...some close ones for me as well

napeleon, alaxander the great, hannibal, george washington....


and actually a personal hero of mine is Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry who commanded the US fleet agisnt the british on lake erie in the war of 1812...usin inferior materials, undermanned, out gunned... for the first time in history he forced an entire british fleet to surrender... he was a great naval officer and leader...

Yes, a lot of early American commanders get overlooked. Just look at Andrew Jackson. Outnumbered 4-1, with ragtag militiamen against crack British troops, and he wiped the British out, taking only about two dozen casualties.

Gonna have to go with Nelson.

indeed... there are tales throughout american history of great military commanders upsetting the odds...

I'll pick some more obscure ones because I'm like that:

Suravov: Russian leader who defeated the Ottoman Turks and then led a smallish Russian expeditionary force and defeated the French in Switzerland. Remarkable--and he was a reasonably astute writer on warfare also.

Epominondas - Theban general whose oblique tactics shattered the power of the Spartan phalanx, freed the helots from Sparta's oppressive rule, and even helped teach Philip of Macedon (father of Alexander the Great) how the Greek hoplite could be tweaked to increase its tactical flexibility.

Belisarius: Justinian's general managed to take over North Africa in less than a week, free Italy from the Ostrogoths with a force of 15,000, and even conquer Southern Spain from the Visigoths. All this while working for a paranoid general afraid that he would overthrow him in a coup. He served loyalty despite deliberately given few troops, and managed to win despite of the mistrust he suffered.

Aetius: Late Roman general who managed to cobble together a coalition that defeated Atilla the Hun at Chalons. He was a Goth who served Rome loyally, even though a paranoid and insecure Roman emperor had him killed because he was a threat. Needless to say, the Roman empire did not long survive him.

ALK_ wrote:My favorite commander would have to be Hannibal. The man went behind enemy lines, against a superior enemy for 10 years, gave birth to military strategy as we know it, and even became a pirate to spite Rome after Carthage lost the wars.

As for theorists, I like Tukhachevsky. He invented deep battle, which is currently the best strategy in use by any military today.

Carthage is my country tunisia now

ALK_ wrote:Yeah, I debated putting him down for mine, but I knew someone else would. Dude was a frigging genius.

True, but even more, Sun Tzu's insights extend far beyond warfare. I've seldom encountered thinkers who possess his clarity of purpose without simultaneously lapsing into amoral pragmatism or sheer Machiavellianism. Tzu clearly sees suffering and death as an inevitable consequence of the campaign, yet also evaluates military effectiveness in terms of one's ability to efficiently subdue the enemy without a waste of lives; he also predicts that in a struggle between sovereigns, whoever is imbued with moral law will have the advantage. He also enjoins future commanders to serve their country and their sovereign without being blinded by the restrictions their sovereign places on them - even in serving the sovereign, there are some commands which "must not be obeyed." A careful thinker soon sees that these and many other passages from Sun Tzu's Art of War hold wisdom not only for generals, but men of all walks of life.