Fiercest Battle in History
sleepyscout
Active member
To me i think it would be preaty hard to determin the ferocity of a battle I could not imagine doing what soliders did 150 years ago during the american cival war at places like the bloody lane were the irish brigade marched within a 100 meters of the enemy and just stood there exchanging lead, now thats balls. but then again storming a castle doenst sound like much fun, nor does living in the trenches of the somme.
r031Button
Active member
I'd probly say the Somme or one of the battles of Ypres. More the battles of Ypres though; the Somme was carnage, but I'm not sure if I'd call it fierce, as most of the casualties were just mowed down like grass.
AussieNick
Forum Digger
the battle of Isurava 29th and 30th August 1942 on the Kokoda Trail. Between Japanese and Australian soldiers. Although not a huge body count like the Somme or Stalingrad it was incredibly brutal in tacitcs and nature. It became a horrible mess of bayonet fighting and grenade throwing for 2 days straight. Due to the terrain most times they didn't see each other until they were close enough to touch each other, hence the hand to hand combat. Nobody who recieved an abdomen wound during the battle lived, due to the impossibility of treatment or evacuation from the Owen Stanley Ranges.
Doppleganger
Active member
Snauhi said:
Could be a few urban battles of the Eastern Front but Stalingrad is a good choice.
Anya1982
Banned
roman
THE ROMAN CONQUEST 43AD - 51AD
Ok I am going back in time but its interesting how britian was fored to now and how a super power came to term
43AD (May) – ROMANS INVADE
An enormous army of 40,000 Roman troops led by Claudius has landed at Richborough in Kent. British resistance has been heavily crushed and Caractacus, a British resistance leader, has fled north.
46AD – NORTHERN TRIBE ARE ROMAN CLIENTS
(North)
The Brigantes, a huge tribe whose territory stretches from the Pennines of southern Yorkshire to north of the Tyne, are recognised as a client kingdom of the Romans – they have not been conquered by the Romans but, hoping to be left in peace, accept the invaders as their rulers. The Brigantes’ queen is Cartimandua. Female leaders are quite acceptable to these war-like Britons. Their language resembles Welsh and is yet to be influenced by the Latin speech of the Romans.
THE ROMAN CONQUEST 43AD - 51AD
Ok I am going back in time but its interesting how britian was fored to now and how a super power came to term
43AD (May) – ROMANS INVADE
An enormous army of 40,000 Roman troops led by Claudius has landed at Richborough in Kent. British resistance has been heavily crushed and Caractacus, a British resistance leader, has fled north.
46AD – NORTHERN TRIBE ARE ROMAN CLIENTS
(North)
The Brigantes, a huge tribe whose territory stretches from the Pennines of southern Yorkshire to north of the Tyne, are recognised as a client kingdom of the Romans – they have not been conquered by the Romans but, hoping to be left in peace, accept the invaders as their rulers. The Brigantes’ queen is Cartimandua. Female leaders are quite acceptable to these war-like Britons. Their language resembles Welsh and is yet to be influenced by the Latin speech of the Romans.
victortsoi
Active member
perhaps thermopylae.
EagleZtrike
Active member
Black Hawk Down
I would say Stalingrad also, it holds the Guinness World Record for Bloodiest Modern Battle; "The greatest death toll in a battle has been estimated at 1,109,000 in the Battle of Stalingrad, USSR (now Volgograd, Russia), which started in the summer of 1942 and ended with the German surrender on January 31, 1943. Approximately 650,800 Soviet soldiers were wounded but survived.
Many experts consider Stalingrad to be the crucial turning point of World War II. The battle, which raged fiercely from the summer of 1942 until January 31, 1943, marked the fullest extent of Nazi Germany's incursion into Russia. Stalingrad, because of its commercial and industrial importance, was seen as a major prize.
One obvious reason behind the battle's terrible destructiveness was the importance of Stalingrad. Russian soldiers were ordered never to "take a step backwards". Stalin, the Soviet leader, knew that losing the city that bore his name would be of immense symbolic and military significance.
Hitler, the German leader, was equally determined. He showed a lack of military judgement by not allowing the Nazi armies to retreat even when they were almost completely encircled by the Russians. The Germans were made to remain and face near total annihilation by the ultimately victorious Russians."
Also the condition of the city with all of the house to house (CQB) combat would be a surreal experience. Don't forget there wasn't any set tactics for room clearing. Plus the amount of overall military units in the city would help place it as the Fiercest Battle in History. At least in my opinion.
Many experts consider Stalingrad to be the crucial turning point of World War II. The battle, which raged fiercely from the summer of 1942 until January 31, 1943, marked the fullest extent of Nazi Germany's incursion into Russia. Stalingrad, because of its commercial and industrial importance, was seen as a major prize.
One obvious reason behind the battle's terrible destructiveness was the importance of Stalingrad. Russian soldiers were ordered never to "take a step backwards". Stalin, the Soviet leader, knew that losing the city that bore his name would be of immense symbolic and military significance.
Hitler, the German leader, was equally determined. He showed a lack of military judgement by not allowing the Nazi armies to retreat even when they were almost completely encircled by the Russians. The Germans were made to remain and face near total annihilation by the ultimately victorious Russians."
Also the condition of the city with all of the house to house (CQB) combat would be a surreal experience. Don't forget there wasn't any set tactics for room clearing. Plus the amount of overall military units in the city would help place it as the Fiercest Battle in History. At least in my opinion.
Doppleganger
Active member
Vitaly said:
Have to make a couple of comments regarding Hitler's decision not to allow 6th Army to retreat from Stalingrad.
To begin with, it was a decisive battle but in isolation it probably wasn't by itself as big a turning point as is popularly believed. It was the beginning of the reversal of fortunes on the Eastern Front but after Stalingrad Germany were still very much in it, although they had lost the chance to decisively beat the USSR. Stalingrad AND Kursk together marked the true turning point of WW2.
Secondly, much has been made of the foolishness of Hitler in allowing 6th Army to march into the centre of Stalingrad and insist that there was no retreat. Whilst Hitler's reasons for ordering a 'no retreat' policy were flawed and for selfish personal reasons, the net result was probably the correct military decision once the German flanks had been smashed by the Red Army. There were 3 good reasons why 6th Army should not have retreated from Stalingrad once it had been encircled.
1. The units in 6th Army were battered, exhausted, demoralized and very low on supplies. If they had attempted a break-out in harsh winter conditions these units would have been cut to pieces. Although not one of the better German commanders, Paulus was not an idiot and must have been well aware of this.
2. 6th Army tied up an immense amount of Soviet formations, 61 to be precise. This allowed the rest of the German southern line the chance to stabilize and to retreat in an orderly manner. If 6th Army hadn't been tieing up all these Soviet formations, then they would have been free to unleash themselves against the fragile German line, likely causing even more German casualties than was historically recorded.
3. 4th Panzer Army, which was the principal German armored force in the area, did not have enough fuel supplies and was in the wrong position to assist in any break-out.
Sometimes, there were occasions where Hitler did the right thing but for the wrong reasons. This happened to be one of those occasions.
Yes I certainly agree that the battle in the Pacific Theatre were among one of the fiercest in history.
However, the Eastern Front was fiercest judging from the boiling hatred between two opposing sides, property damage, unspeakable Civilian death toll, toils, endurance, staggering casualty rates, and the brutality of nature.
The Eastern Front was definetly fiercest in terms of size and numbers.
Locke
Active member
Re: hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
what about the british 1st Airborn Div @ Arnhem during operation market garder. while the casualties weren't high compared to some fights,
taken from wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_1st_Airborne_Division
thanks for that anya, i wanted to post, but you put it a lot better than i would have!!!!!Anya1982 said:
what about the british 1st Airborn Div @ Arnhem during operation market garder. while the casualties weren't high compared to some fights,
taken from wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_1st_Airborne_Division
now thats impressive!!!
AussieNick
Forum Digger
I still say the New Guinea campaign by Australia. We suffered the same casualty rate as the German army in the "Kessel" of Stalingrad, and this is often recognised as the worst casualty percentage in the European campaign. To put it into perspective in the Pacific campaign, we lost double what the US lost in Guadalcanal.
