Page 55 - All About History - Issue 18-14

10 Greatest Military Leaders

Sultan Bayezid depicted as a PATTON
prisoner in front of Timur
El Guettar
23 March - 3 April 1943, Tunisia
Patton redeems the US Army on the rocks of North Africa

reshlypostedtoheadtheUSIICorpsinNorth Rommel’s North African army, and they’d made it
Africa following the disastrous Battle of Kasserine look like a duck hunt.
F Pass – a humiliating baptism of fire for Pressingtheadvantage,Pattonadvanced
thenewlyarrivedAmericanforces – intothemountains,smashingthrough
Lieutenant-General George S Patton theAxisdefencesonHill772and
Was it genius?
wasdeterminedtorescuetheslightly Though Patton built his myth turning their guns on Hill 369 when
bruisedreputationoftheUSArmy. on opportunistic dashes, El orders came in from the British line
On 17 and 18 March 1943, the 1st Guettar proved he could play to secure Hill 772 – 16 kilometres
Infantry Division and 1st Ranger a waiting game too, laying (ten miles) further behind the lines.
Battalion took the town of El Guettar a trap so effective that it The larger campaign ended in a
obliterated a battle-hardened
near the eastern dorsal of the jagged Panzer division. stalemateastheAlliesultimately
Atlas Mountains. Emboldened by their failed to outflank the Axis line, but it
TIMUR victoryatKasserinePass,on6amon23 was a triumph for Patton, who had proven
TheBattleofAnkara March, 50 German tanks from the 10th Panzer theUSArmyaforcetobereckonedwith.
Division, accompanied by elite Panzergrenadiers,
20 July 1402, Turkey swept from their defensive positions in the mountain A US soldier hands out cigarettes to Italian
prisoners in the aftermath of El Guettar
GenghisKhan’sheirdefeatstheOttomans passtowardtheUSpositionsintheElGuettar valley.
with dirty tricks QuicklyoverrunningtheUSfrontlines,everything
seemed to be going the way of the Führer’s finest
elf-proclaimed successor to Genghis Khan, Timur except onesmallbutvital ‘but’–theplanofattack
setaboutrebuildinghisancestor’sempirefromhis
hadbeeninterceptedbytheSignalCorpssixhours
Sheartlandinwhatisnow Kazakhstan.The expanding
earlier, giving Patton time to prepare. The 10th Panzer
bordersof‘theSwordofIslam’broughthimintocontact
withtheOttomanEmpire,soin1402Timurdecided Division foundoutthehardwayas itrolledstraight
tostrikeagainstSultanBayezidjustashehimselfwas intoaminefield.Then,withathunderousboom,the
layingsiegetothewaningByzantineEmpire’scapitalat heavyartilleryandM10tankdestroyershiddeninthe
Constantinople.HearingofTimurid’sadvance,Bayezid hillsoverlookingtheroadtoElGuettaropenedfire.
liftedthesiegeandturnedhisarmyeasttomeet Timur, As the Nazis retreated, they left 30 of the 50 tanks
buttheymissedeachother.Timur’sarmyarrivedat behindthemasuglyhunksofburning,twisted
Ankara so soon after the Ottomans had left that they metal.USinfantryhadthrownbackanassaultfrom
tookadvantageofthevacatedcampsite. battle-hardened motorised regiments, the terror of
AstheenemybeganmarchingbacktoAnkaraacross
theCurbukcreek.AstheOttomanforcesarrived,thirsty “ With a thunderous boom,
the hot Anatolia plateau, Timurid engineers dammed up
V
andwearyfromtheirmarch,theTimuridarmygathered
onthebanksofthestream.Thefirstfreshwatersupply the heavy artillery and M10 US ARMY AXIS ARMY
theOttomansoldiershadseenformilesrandrybefore tank destroyers hidden in Innovation:
them in what was a tactical masterstroke from Timur. Boldness:
Despitetheirthirst,theOttomansnumbersalmost the hills opened fire”
overrun Timur’s army and a devastating Ottoman Prudence:
cavalrychargethrewtheirrightflankback. Butaround Planning:
midday,Ottomanstrengthbegantodeflateandthe
tidebegantoturn.Withboth armies made up of Three of history’s most disastrous militarycommanders
Turkic soldiers from
Central Asia, many
on the Ottoman General Robert Nivelle Antonio Lopez de Santa GeneralDouglasMacArthur
Force commanded: Anna Force commanded:
side changed sides
French Force commanded: USA
as Timur had Author of the poorly Mexican Despite a formidable
the mountains planned Nivelle Despite his victory reputation, MacArthur’s

surrounded to Offensive in April at the Alamo in 1836, thinking wasn’t exactly
prevent escape for and May 1917, Nivelle almost everything the guided by strategic
promised victory in ‘Napoleon of the West’ imperatives. After the
his vanquished foe.
48 hours. The whole touched turned to crushing US defeat in the
terrible plan had been leaked to the humiliation. One infamous battle lasted Philippines in which he forbade his men
Was it genius? Germans in advance, and despite only 15 minutes and ended with his entire from withdrawing (and then withdrew
TIMURID EMPIRE OTTOMANEMPIRE Timur may have been outnumbering the enemy two to one, surviving force captured, including Santa himself) in 1942, he worked to reclaim the
a Mongol Khan, but he 187,000 British and French troops were Anna himself, who was found wearing a island for the sake of his ego. The ensuing
Battle of Leyte Gulf was the largest Naval
private’s uniform and hiding in a marsh.
killed, wounded and captured with zero
Innovation: was no barbarian and gains. The operation ended with the His further misadventures included campaign of WWII and resulted in the
used engineering and
Boldness: cunning to overcome French army threatening to mutiny and losing his leg and surrendering to the death of 2,800 Allied servicemen, but its
strategic value is questionable.
French in the Pastry War of 1838-9.
Nivelle was sacked.
Prudence: the Near East’s
mightiest empire.
Planning:
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