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Westmorelands first resort in claiming progress in the war was always body count, but in fact this was meaningless. Following on from our list of the greatest and most successful military commanders, we are presenting this list of the worst. Who was the worst US general during the Vietnam War? Routed by U.S. forces under Winfield Scott, Santa Anna was again driven into exile. In considering who should receive such a dubious honor, Ive consciously excluded bad leaders. A final humiliation came during Mexican-American War. There was no warmth, no apparent interest in his associates as people. Michael Peck is a contributing writer at Foreign Policy and a writer for War Is Boring. Born in 1901 in Quang Binh Province (part of North Vietnam), Diem was the son of a well-educated mandarin (Vietnamese civil servant who took part in running the country) who served as the Minister of Rites and Grand Chamberlain to Emperor Thanh-Thai (1889-1907). While there were a host of bad generals serving on both sides during the American Civil Warmostly on the Union side unfortunatelythe one that usually gets the most credit for dragging out the war as long as he did is Union General George McClellan. Driven into exile in 1845, he contacted U.S. Pres. Santa Anna, a lifetime gambler, was known for his risk taking in battle, but also his brutality. Watch the conversation or read the condensed transcript. The 20th century is the most violent century in history. Westmoreland held a press conference in which he categorically denied any such loss of confidence. His prestige restored by his conduct during the Pastry War with France, Santa Anna once again claimed dictatorial powers. Many historians credit Benedict Arnold and others with being the real victors of Saratoga. The early days of the 2003 Iraq War were bound to be a graveyard for military and political reputations, given the misperceptions and misjudgments behind America's ill-fated adventure in regime change and nation-building. Jamie founded Listverse due to an insatiable desire to share fascinating, obscure, and bizarre facts. Military. Diem's family was one of the earliest to convert to Catholicism, a religion he took . In a war that saw more than its share of unskilled politically appointed generals, Pillow was arguably the worst on either side. Once again, McClellan worked his organizational magic, restoring the morale of a shattered Union army. He ran as a Democrat against Lincoln in the 1864 presidential election. James Bond Stockdale was flying his A-4 Skyhawk on a mission over North Vietnam, just days after the Gulf of Tonkin incident, when his plane took fire and hurtled d The Germanic fighters demolished the three Roman legions. Military Reviews - Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam After only 10 weeks into the Pacific War, Percival became responsible for the largest surrender of British-led forces in history. Military greatness can most easily be defined by comparison. Although Westmoreland denied it, he imposed a ceiling on the reported number of enemy by instructing his intelligence officers to adhere to a command position of not more than 300,000, even though newly acquired and more accurate data developed in his own headquarters then indicated a much higher figure. The Worst American Civil War Generals and Commanders Like it or not, the U.S. military would become the governing authority. Many of these generals had their worst defeats when their countries were least prepared for conflict, such as the hapless Soviet generals who faced the German infiltration of Russia in 1941. On the night of August 15, 1812, Tecumseh led his forces across the Detroit River, and Brock followed the next morning. Washington also suffered his share of defeats. He graduated second in his class at West Point (well ahead of classmates Stonewall Jackson, George H. Gordon, and George Pickett). Some would say that failure on the battlefield warrants censure. A monthly digest of the top articles read by FP subscribers. Scott claimed that Pillow was ''the only person I have ever known who was wholly indifferent in the choice between truth and falsehood. When talk of secession reached Pillows home state of Tennessee, he helped organize the state militia and was appointed a brigadier general in the Confederate army. It was anotherhistory-changingevent, the birth of a truly exceptional nation. These are the incompetents, the idiots, the bumblers who have represented armies or nations at war only to lead them to defeat or shame. How might Vietnam or Iraq have turned out if a George Washington, a Ulysses Grant or a George Patton had been in command? In a war that saw more than its share of unskilled politically appointed generals, Pillow was arguably the worst on either side. He was called the "inevitable general." A West Point graduate, he served in World War II and Korea. If Putin had hoped to weaken NATO, the very opposite has happened, with Finland and Sweden on the cusp of joining the transatlantic military alliance. So what is the standard of shame for induction? In 1975, when the Vietnam War ended, the Vietnamese army had only 36 generals, but by 2018, peace-time Vietnam had 415 military officers holding general ranks. Finally, there was MacArthur's insubordination. George Brinton McClellan, a self-proclaimed Young Napoleon, ran dreadful campaigns, but he doesnt make the grade because he was canned before he could lose the entire war. Abraham Lincoln. Scilit | Article - A Slow March from Social Evil to Harm Reduction These battlefield bumblers serve to provide that contrast. Here's What You Need To Remember:The Soviets saw the American humiliation in Vietnam as a turning point. Copyright 2023 Center for the National Interest All Rights Reserved, as Continental Army commander during the momentous American defeat of a British army at Saratoga in 1777, The Five Best U.S. Westmoreland was on a treadmill. It doesnt matter if theyve won more often than theyve lost. Lewis Sorleys new book, Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam, is being published today by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Westmoreland established a headquarters known as MACV Forward in the northern provinces of South Vietnam and put his deputy, General Creighton Abrams, in charge, placing him over the Marines and also the Army forces in that region. He continued to view attrition as the most effective strategy for defeating Germany; the British lost some 420,000 men at the Somme. To that Hollings responded, "Westy, the American people don't care about the ten. He was soon released, however, and, as more capable French admirals either died or somehow incurred Napoleons disfavor, a path to the top echelons of command was opened for Villeneuve. While serving in Vietnam . The United States entered the war, forcing Ludendorff to accelerate his time line for a conclusive battle against the Allies on the Western Front. - 1 Best: 1996 Chicago Bulls. He effectively pledged to become an agent for the U.S. but found that he had been deposed upon his return to Mexico. See the vast swaths of land to the north and south that arent Paraguay? When it came to military command, Westmoreland was everybody's all-Americanuntil he met his Waterloo. As the commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam, he faced a two-front war, an insurgency in the South and an invading army from the North. Read More. Saul David reviews a surprising study of military failure and names his own five most infamous generals Saul David Thursday February 17 2022, 12.00am , The Times Elmo Zumwalt was a U.S. admiral and commander of American naval forces in Vietnam. From Kaiser Wilhelm to Hitler and Saddam Hussein and Gadhafi, there is no end of national leaders who squandered their nations blood and treasure in futile conflicts. Villeneuve lost 20 ships, while Nelson lost none. He was called the inevitable general. A West Point graduate, he served in World War II and Korea. Francisco Solano Lpez managed to stumble into a war with pretty much all of that. Despite Lincoln's pleas for aggressive action, his Army of the Potomac moved hesitantly, its commander McClellan convinced himself that the Southern armies vastly outnumbered him when logic should have told him that it was the North that enjoyed an abundance of resources. Yes, the landing at Inchon unhinged the initial North Korean offensive. 15. Not later than the autumn of 1966 the leaders of both services involved in fighting the ground war in VietnamArmy Chief of Staff General Harold K. Johnson and Marine Commandant General. He retreated to Malta but was captured when that island fell to the British. If pressed to rank the miscreants, I would place Wheeler first, then LBJ, and then McNamara, with all entitled to recognition as important accomplices in dooming the endeavor. As the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles crippled Germany, Ludendorff effectively sabotaged the Weimar Republic by propagating the belief that he and his armies had been undefeated on the battlefield. Grant left politics to the politicians and did what had to be done. The unprecedented violence of battles such as Shiloh, Antietam, Stones River, and Gettysburg shocked citizens and international observers alike. Defining that is like defining a bad meal. Fighter Aircraft of All Time, his army being routed by a smaller force of Redcoats and Loyalists at the Battle of Camden in South Carolina in 1780, When the Germans shattered his troops and his reputation at Kasserine Pass in Tunisia in early 1943, Fredendall was only a major general and a corps commander, Listing MacArthur as one of America's worst generals will be controversial, 5 Israeli Weapons of War ISIS Should Fear, But MacArthur's strategy certainly helped unleash 300,000 Chinese "volunteers" who inflicted significant casualties on United Nations forces, But Franks, who commanded the invasion, made a bad situation worse, Critics say that Franks and senior officials, such as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, concocted an invasion plan that used too few troops. Best Defense: The Legion numbers XVII, XVIII and XIX never again appeared in the Roman Armys order of battle due to the shame and ill luck they carried. He decided to conduct of a war of attrition, using search and destroy tactics, in which the measure of merit was body count.