Worst Moment in Your Country's Millitary History

Gettysburg or Lee's surrender of the Confederate Army.

Gettyeburg turned the tide of the war and gave the Northern Army the momentum.

Lee's surrender of the Army was an utter humiliation one which he, and other southerners, have never fully recovered from.
 
I'm juggling between Vietnam and World War 1. In Vietnam we won many of the battles but failed to win the over the population that supported the VC.
It is not commonly known that the U.S. Army in the WW1 was horribly under equipped and under trained. When they arrived in Europe they used European arty pieces, European trucks, hell even European small arms(because of shortages of M1903s and the lack of LMGs). Though we did win significant victories in Meuse-Argonne, Chateau Thierry, and St. Mihiel, we did nothing more than pour in fresh manpower to the Western Front and stunned the Germans into surrender.
 
While the military made mistakes at Pearl Harbor and a time or two in Vietnam, the worst mistake the US Military EVER made was at Wounded Knee.

The Wounded Knee Massacre happened on December 29, 1890, near Wounded Knee Creek (Lakota: Cankpe Opi Wakpala) on the Lakota Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, USA. On the day before, a detachment of the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment commanded by Major Samuel M. Whitside intercepted Spotted Elk's (Big Foot) band of Miniconjou Lakota and 38 Hunkpapa Lakota near Porcupine Butte and escorted them 5 miles westward (8 km) to Wounded Knee Creek where they made camp.

The rest of the 7th Cavalry Regiment arrived led by Colonel James Forsyth and surrounded the encampment supported by four Hotchkiss guns.[1]
On the morning of December 29, the troops went into the camp to disarm the Lakota. One version of events claims that during the process of disarming the Lakota, a deaf tribesman named Black Coyote was reluctant to give up his rifle claiming he had paid a lot for it.[2] A scuffle over Black Coyote's rifle escalated and a shot was fired which resulted in the 7th Cavalry opening firing indiscriminately from all sides, killing men, women, and children, as well as some of their own fellow troopers. Those few Lakota warriors who still had weapons began shooting back at the attacking troopers, who quickly suppressed the Lakota fire. The surviving Lakota fled, but U.S. cavalrymen pursued and killed many who were unarmed

By the time it was over, at least 150 men, women, and children of the Lakota Sioux had been killed and 51 wounded (4 men, 47 women and children, some of whom died later); some estimates placed the number of dead at 300. Twenty-five troopers also died, and thirty-nine were wounded (6 of the wounded would also die).[3] It is believed that many were the victims of friendly fire, as the shooting took place at close range in chaotic conditions.[4]
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To me, this was the worst case of a military blunder of the first order in US history. On this day, the US Military committed one of the worst atrocities in recorded history (leaving out the holocaust).


Of course, there ARE many other instances where the military didn't perform at peak level .. but, blundered around making mistake after mistake after mistake. Wounded Knee was one of those blunders where one mistake was compiunded by another and another till innocent men women and children were slaughtered.


For more information about Wounded Knee:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wounded_Knee_Massacre
 
bulldogg said:
Gettysburg or Lee's surrender of the Confederate Army.

Gettyeburg turned the tide of the war and gave the Northern Army the momentum.

Lee's surrender of the Army was an utter humiliation one which he, and other southerners, have never fully recovered from.
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You mean gettysburg was the high point of US military history in the 19th century right? What with saving the country and putting an end to the rebellion?
 
For Norway it must be the day the Labour party started out on a pasifist campaign that eventually left the country open for Hitler to invade.
And as some people tend not to learn from past history, we're back down the same path now, and history has a tendensy to repeat itself...


Si vis Pacem, para Bellum.
 
That reminds me of what was probably Britain's worst hour; when Chamberlain returned home waving his little piece of paper with its dodgy worthless signature from Hitler, proclaiming peace to the world. :read:

Thank God for Winston Churchill.:salute2:
 
I think for China the worst moment was in 1900 when Beijing was captured by Eight-Nation alliance. We entered 20th century with our capital captured. That was so sad :(
 
By the end of the WWI, all ottoman forces out of today's Turkey borders were ordered to surrender. Passibly it's the worst.

1402 Battle of Ankara, between brothers. Turk against Turk. Actually it was a warning to stop cultural shift...

12 September 1982. Military coup. Caused nearly 200.000 people die. It stopped the socialist and counter-socialist activities. (counter socialist one is exceptionally interesting though, racist and fundamentalist, even Marx couldn't figure out what it was...)
 
The election and re-election of Bill Clinton was the most dishonorable day for the US Military; the worst day could have been the election of Jimmy Carter.
 
MontyB said:
Hmm well after much thought I will go with Monte Casino, repeated attacks on a well defended target with little if any strategic goal. It was a battle that showed Freybergs weaknesses as a commander something that I think should have become apparent after the Crete debarcle.

Essentially Galipoli while a defeat gave us a national identity, Crete wasnt pretty but in the scheme of things wasnt unexpected but all Casino gave us was a war grave.
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agreed. charging up a hill towards a bombed out building-when did that EVER work, just ask the Germans about Stalingrad
 
Yes, but what exactly makes it a candidate for worst moment in your history? I never considered it as holding any disgrace but as a very fierce proposition- have I missed something?
Non-confrontational question from someone with close relatives on both sides, with one survivor (senior and British).
 
Del Boy said:
Yes, but what exactly makes it a candidate for worst moment in your history? I never considered it as holding any disgrace but as a very fierce proposition- have I missed something?
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okay well then i would have to say the Gallipoli evacuation. running from a bit of land that we had gained with the blood of soldiers on what they thought was a "great adventure" (after the hopeless leadership of the Generals may i add) was extremly shamefull
 
As far as my danish-millitary history knowledge reaches, it would most definately be when the Nazi's army walked across the borders to Denmark.. As far as I recall there were only 14 danish soldiers fighting them, and they surrendered in less than 10 hours (understandable though).

It was not that the soldiers did not want to fight, I have been told that the soldiers guarding the waters sourrounding Denmark could easily have sunk alot of the german ships when they sailed uphere, but they were ordered by the "higher ups" to stand down, it was an extremely frustrating and demoralizing moment for the soldiers.
 
German losses on the occupation of Denmark on 9 April 1940 was 203 dead. 16 on the Danish side. 20 soldiers were wounded.

The Germans lost four tanks, 12 armored cars and several cars and motorcycles were damaged or destroyed. The total Danish force which saw action were 1,900 men.

The Navy and the government believed that resistance was futile. The army represented by the General Prior wanted to continue fighting and urged the king and the government to continue the fight. The king refused. The threat of bombing of Copenhagen, like the Germans inflicted on Warsaw in 1939, contributed to the choice to stop the fight.
 
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I'd say the Danish ground troops did put up a rather decent oposition against the invaders, at least when you consider the lack of will to fight on the political level, and that Denmark is a nightmare for a defender.
 
r.fox said:
okay well then i would have to say the Gallipoli evacuation. running from a bit of land that we had gained with the blood of soldiers on what they thought was a "great adventure" (after the hopeless leadership of the Generals may i add) was extremly shamefull
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Thank you. But I was not disregarding your first choice, and Monty B's of course, but I was intrigued, and I readily accept that MontyB and yourself are well versed on the subject; I must brush up.

Apologies for not making myself clear.
 
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