WW2 Allied Leadership

Freebird · Jul 11, 2009

michaelmaltby said:
I agree there are major omissions in my quick list.

MM

Yes indeed.

Waynos said:
You would probably want Churchill running your country but Eisenhower running your military to bring about victory, but not the other way round

No, for Strategic military leadership I would want the BEST Allied general of the war, British C.I.G.S. and Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff - General Sir Alan Brooke.

No other Allied General had a better understanding of combined operations the vital importance of logistics, it was his plan that was adopted for the European theater {The "Concentric" or "Mediterranean" plan}

Alright - a challenge to all of those on this thread: List a dozen {or top 5?} reasons for your picks for best leaders. Such as: brilliant ot important decisions, actions that were critical for success, that victory couldn't have been achieved without.

Vassili Zaitzev · Jul 11, 2009

Alright, I'll give it a shot. I'll start with one. Spruance as a military leader.

1. Was more pragmatic then Halsey, which I believe to be a better quality. Halsey jumped the gun at Leyte, and left Taffy 3 and the invasion beaches vunerable. I can't see Spruance making the same mistake.

2. Knew when to quit the fight. At Midway, he was smart in turning his fleet back to Pearl after sinking four IJN flaptops and one crusier, diminishing the chance for a surface fight with the IJN.

3. He listened to his staff, who knew more about carrier combat then Spruance himself, who was a crusier commander.

Crap, I can't think of up to five, probably since I'm half asleep.

Amsel · Jul 11, 2009

freebird said:
Ok, time too start ruffling some feathers...

I pick Churchill as one of Britains greatest political leaders, but also one of the WORST British military leaders ever! {He was Minister of Defence}

I think people misunderstand me when I say Churchill was a great wartime leader. War time leader does not mean general, because he wasn't. Political war time leader, yes.

I wouldn't worry too much about ruffling feathers, everyone has a different view on the same events. Arm chair generals are us.

stasoid · Jul 11, 2009

My vote goes to Zhukov for Khalkhin Gol, Battle Of Moscow and Battle Of Stalingrad. All three events became turning points in soviet military history. Under his strategic leadership all three turned from a defensive retreat into decisive victory. + Operation Bagration - the greatest military operation of WW2.

wheelsup_cavu said:
Not to disparage Zhukov too much but he was a master of sending men into the meat grinder.
Casualties meant nothing to him.
If a minefield was in the way he was willing to send his men through it first.

Chief Of the General Staff wouldnt normally deal with a particular minefield. Not his level.
Victory at all cost was his philosophy, that's true, but actual casualty rate under his command was lower then among other soviet commanders.

Soundbreaker Welch? · Jul 11, 2009

freebird said:
Don't guess Soundbreaker, pick the best guy and be prepared to explain WHY he was so good!

Ok, some of the reasons are:

1. Because his cooperation with the British, French, Canadians, ect. and the organizing of their forces in a strong offensive helped shorten the war by a lot in Operation Overlord.

2. He was a good military leader, who managed to stay out of politics. (At least until after the war. )

3. He was a leader that was good at keeping popular support and not abusing it, both as General and even after the war as President.

4. He was more likable than Patton and managed to avoid the power struggles MacArthur fell in to.

5. Except for operation Market Garden, most of Eisenhower's battles in the ETO were sucessful.

I like also General William Slim, for he was a good general, and a humble man.

michaelmaltby · Jul 11, 2009

Stasoid - I think Chuikov deserves credit for Stalingrad, not Zhukov.

Freebird - if I'd collected all the names that rightfully belong in the list - thought about it a while - etc. etc. - the thread never would have got posted That's what's great about this forum, I know you guys will put the picture straight if I hang it lop-sided.

Churchill:
Great experience .. in power and out of power
Very motivational - understood how to bring people together in crisis
Understood and appreciated the Americans
He was daring - sometimes (especially in earlier years) almost reckless
Realistic. More than anyone he knew what it would take to defeat the Nazis and how to treat Stalin (and Tito)
Visionary.

Marshall
Great military bureaucrat that understood how to make the system work
Recognized the talent Ike had to co-operate with peers and surpress his own ego
Knew how to use both military power and economic to liberate Europe and hold it
Understood the evil of communism and the value of aid as a reconstruction tool
Modest

I think Zhukov deserves great recognition for surviving Stalin's regime.

MM

Freebird · Jul 11, 2009

michaelmaltby said:
Stasoid - I think Chuikov deserves credit for Stalingrad, not Zhukov.

Freebird - if I'd collected all the names that rightfully belong in the list - thought about it a while - etc. etc. - the thread never would have got posted That's what's great about this forum, I know you guys will put the picture straight if I hang it lop-sided.

MM

Soundbreaker Welch? said:
Ok, some of the reasons are:

1. Because his cooperation with the British, French, Canadians, ect. and the organizing of their forces in a strong offensive helped shorten the war by a lot in Operation Overlord.

2. He was a good military leader, who managed to stay out of politics. (At least until after the war. )

3. He was a leader that was good at keeping popular support and not abusing it, both as General and even after the war as President.

4. He was more likable than Patton and managed to avoid the power struggles MacArthur fell in to.

5. Except for operation Market Garden, most of Eisenhower's battles in the ETO were sucessful.

I like also General William Slim, for he was a good general, and a humble man.

Good list Soundbreaker, although 1, 3 4 sound more like political attributes. Perhaps this guy should have run for some political office....

I would rate Eiesenhower as a "good" military leader, but not great. His failure to recognize the importance of capturing the Schelt at the same time as Antwerp gave the Germans time to dig in, and wasted weeks while the area could be cleared for shipping. Also the American refusal to accept the British offer to supply "Funnies" {specialty engineering tanks} for Overlord caused many needless casualties.

That being said, I like Ike, he was one of the best people to work with. Wouldn't have wanted anyone else to coordinate the various nations military forces.

OK, so far on my list:

Political Leader - Churchill All of the Allied leaders were "Strong" though, I could have easily picked Roosevelt

Builder - Marshall For his work modernizing the US Army, and for his re-building of Europe

Strategic Military Leader

Army - Alan Brooke - I will post my reasons in the next post..
Air - Hugh Dowding
Naval - ?? I think Pound did a very good job in the Admiralty, but I'd like to see the arguments for Nimitz first

Tactical Military Leader

Air - Kieth Park - His actions as commander of 11 group and as Air commander on Malta in 1942 won both these battles for the Allies against a SUPERIOR Axis force. One of New Zealand's best leaders! 8)
Naval Andrew Cunningham As commander in the Mediterranen with a smaller British fleet against a larger Italian force, he took took the fight straight to them, he was the one that planned the airstrike on the Italian fleet at Taranto, and his use of radar to engage the Italians at night, resulted in the larger Italian fleet withdrawing from the Southern Med.
Ground - ?? I'd like to see some more advocates for this.

BombTaxi · Jul 11, 2009

Churchill was a great figurehead and inspirational speaker. He also did much to build the very strong relationship with the US. OTOH, he was a serial dilletante in strategy (admittedly more so in WW1 that WW2), and was a highly divisive figure in British political life. He was not first choice to replace Chamberlain - but Lord Halifax didn't want the job, so Churchill ended up as PM almost by default.

His stint at the Admiralty prior to becoming PM was marked by the endless strea, of memos known as 'The First Lord's Prayers', as they usually began 'Pray tell me...'. His concept of the 'Unit of Search' (one carrier and one cruiser searching for submarines) was proved fatally flawed when HMS Ark Royal was attacked (fortunately without result) by U-39 11 days after the war started, and HMS COurageous, escorted by only two destroyers, was destroyed by U-29 three days later. And on 12 September, just three days after returning to office, Churchill published his thoughts on 'Operation Catherine', an attempt to resurrect the terminally flawed 'Baltic Design' of WW1. Overall, not a man to be let anywhere near the military side of the war. His role at the Admiralty was in fact political and he should never have had anything to do with operational matters - he just couldn't resist meddling.

Just a bit of food for thought - I certainly wouldn't list Churchill as a great war leader. I also agree that Spruance was the better commander than Halsey, for the reasons folks already listed. Dowding was a great commander in the early stages of the war - his decision not to send any more fighters to France and conserve them for the German campaign he knew would follow was courageous and far-sighted, even if it sacrificed some of France's trust in the UK (not that there was much left by that stage anyway). Cunningham also deserves a nod for his leadership of the RN in the Med.

Freebird · Jul 11, 2009

BombTaxi said:
Churchill was a great figurehead and inspirational speaker. He also did much to build the very strong relationship with the US.

Just a bit of food for thought - I certainly wouldn't list Churchill as a great war leader.

Are you talking Military or Political?

I am much in agreement, Churchill was a great figurehead and inspirational speaker. He also did a good job to keep political unity in the UK during the war, it was only on the "Strategy" side that things fell apart.

You obviously know your history details

And the "prayers" did not end with his stint as First Lord, Admiral Pound was constantly called to explain every minute detail, too much Admiralty time was wasted answering all of Churchills queries.

As Minister of Defence, his biggest blunders were the deployment of the PoW Repulse without Air support {against the advice of Pound the Admiralty}, also the withdrawl of the forces from Africa to be sent to Greece ended up losing both battles

syscom3 · Jul 11, 2009

timshatz said:
Would add Spruance and Nimitz in there as well. Also Slim.

Don't think Halsey was better than Spruance. Definitely not better than Nimitz.

Slim has my vote over Harris and Montgomery.

Nimitz was the perfect commander of the Pacific fleet. He wrote the textbook on how to organize the command structure for such a massive fleet. Not to mention his personality and temperament were perfect for the job.

Halsey was a "fighting admiral". There's no doubt he lit a spark in the sailors when he took command. I rate him a notch or two above Spruance.

BombTaxi · Jul 11, 2009

Halsey blundered at Leyte precisely because he was a fighting admiral. He concentrated too much on trying to fight a glorious action against the Japanese fleet instead of the less glamourous job of protecting the beaches and completing the mission. In so doing, he exposed Taffy Three, and the invasion beaches beyond them to mortal danger. Had it not been to Taffy Three's tin cans and their spirited stand, the invasion could have been severely compromised. That is enough to put him behind Spruance in my estimation.

freebird, not sure what Churchill comes under when he was at the Admiralty - he was a politician as opposed to a military man, but was heavily involved in military decision making, mainly when he shouldn't have been. Bit of a grey area I suppose

Oh, and forgot to mention, the bits about Churchill at the Admiralty were drawn from Corelli Barnett's Engage The Enemy More Closely: The Royal Navy in the Second World War - highly recommended for anyone interested in the period, although it a bit of a beast at 1052 pages. Rest of the post was from general education and reading

renrich · Jul 11, 2009

The interesting thing about this discussion is that for every "authority" who holds up a leader as a "great" one, there is another "authority" who states that that particular leader was an unmitigated disaster. For instance, I have always thought that MacArthur was an outstanding wartime general, both in WW2 and Korea,( up until he got fired) not to mention his job in Japan postwar. Just finished a modern book by a Brit who has almost nothing good to say about MacArthur as a general in WW2 and makes some good points to support his position. What it boils down to is that they were all human and if they did not make mistakes, they propbably were not doing anything and a lot depends on one's perspective in judging them. One leader who has not been mentioned is Truman, for the way he handled himself in the closing months of the war. I would submit that he had a better handle on the menace that the Soviets represented than did FDR and the world might have been better off if Truman had been president from 1944 on instead of FDR.

BombTaxi · Jul 11, 2009

True ren, there is always going to be much subjectivity in this kind of debate. I rate leaders who completed the mission higher than leaders who went after glory at the expense of their mission - so Halsey and Monty will never be big scorers for me, whereas Spruance and Dowding will.

Interesting point about Truman too. However, I don't see how the course of post-1945 European history could have been changed short of an armed confrontation of some kind with the USSR. This was difficult - only the US and UK were really in a position to do anything of the sort in 1945, as the rest of Europe was recovering from occupation and had little in the way of armed forces of it's own - the Germans were, after all, beaten or too politically suspect to be allied against the USSR.Furthermore, Churchill had comissioned a plan for a war with the USSR starting on July 1st (Operation Unthinkable - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia), but the Army had included that Operation Unthinkable was also impossible. That would have left the USA potentially trying to finish off the Japanese and confronting, maybe even fighting a resurgent Red Army - not an edifying prospect for Truman.

Freebird · Jul 11, 2009

syscom3 said:
Nimitz was the perfect commander of the Pacific fleet. He wrote the textbook on how to organize the command structure for such a massive fleet. Not to mention his personality and temperament were perfect for the job.

Syscom I'm inclined to agree with you, that's why I'm leaning towards Nimitz for "Strategic Naval Leader"

BombTaxi said:
freebird, not sure what Churchill comes under when he was at the Admiralty - he was a politician as opposed to a military man, but was heavily involved in military decision making, mainly when he shouldn't have been. Bit of a grey area I suppose

Oh, and forgot to mention, the bits about Churchill at the Admiralty were drawn from Corelli Barnett's Engage The Enemy More Closely: The Royal Navy in the Second World War - highly recommended for anyone interested in the period, although it a bit of a beast at 1052 pages. Rest of the post was from general education and reading

That's wat I do credit him for, his "never surrender" attitude. Too bad he didn't fire the Defence Minister as PM though...

I thought Brooke's book was excellent for it's insights into the aspects of WWII planning command, I liked Eisenhower's book, although I got the feeling that he was pulling some punches, he didn't want to hurt his political career by telling what he REALLY thought about some of the players.

Guys, what's your criteria for "Best Political Leader"?

Juha · Jul 11, 2009

Air:
Doolittle, as offensive commander
Park, as defensive commander
Cochrane, as bomber commander

Ground:
Brooke
Konev
Patton
Auchinleck, in spite of some of his Corps commander selections
O'Connors
Pips Roberts

Sea:
Nimitz
Cunningham
Spruance

stasoid · Jul 11, 2009

michaelmaltby said:
Stasoid - I think Chuikov deserves credit for Stalingrad, not Zhukov.

I think Zhukov deserves great recognition for surviving Stalin's regime.

MM

Chuikov was a tactician - an army general. In particular at Stalingrad he was in command of 62nd Army defending the city and did a good job exosting german troops in the initial phase of the Battle, but strategic planning (Operation Uranus) was developed and executed under Zhukov's command.

It is remarkable how outspoken he was in his critics of Stalin's decisions on many occasions that cost him many posts in his up and down military career. Stalin feared Zhukov's popularity among troops but couldnt let him go, he needed Zhukov's t brilliant strategist talent.

syscom3 · Jul 11, 2009

I would put General Marshall as the most capable senior army officer of the war. He is the one who helped oversee the industrial mobilization of the US, the expansion of the US army from a couple of divisions to several million men, trained them [think thats not important?] and helped plan the general guidelines to defeat the axis.

And he did this with broad support and approval from the FDR, Congress and the public. And that is extremely tough to do.

WW2 clearly demonstrated that in a global war, macro level logistics counts for far more than tactics.

syscom3 · Jul 11, 2009

BombTaxi said:
......Furthermore, Churchill had comissioned a plan for a war with the USSR starting on July 1st ......Operation Unthinkable - .......

I never heard of that.

That is interesting to know.

BombTaxi · Jul 11, 2009

I'd never heard of it til this afternoon either It doesn't surprise me though, Churchill was no fan of the Left in general - he had suggested turning machine guns on the picket lines during the General Strike of 1926. He didn't much like the Russians either, despite his insistence on providing them with support throught WW2, and his personal role in ensuring the Artic convoys went through at all costs.

I would say, sys, that you undervalue tactics somewhat. The relationship between tactics and logistics is, IMHO, symbiotic - force cannot be applied without logistical support, but there is no point turning out thousands of weapon systems and shipping them all over the globe if they are a failure in combat, through defective design, manufacture or employment. It cuts both ways.

michaelmaltby · Jul 11, 2009

Truman is on the original list of Political Leaders .....

...because by 1944 he was in far better shape than FDR. People "misunderestimated" Harry ... but personally , I think Harry had more guts than FDR.

Korea in '50 was just an "after-shock" ... and going nuclear on China would have been the biggest mistake the US ever could have made. And the man who said "yes" to bombs 1 and 2 knew he had to say "no" to the General who wanted to use bomb 3 ++.

I am thoroughly enjoying this thread ... dissing politicians and generals is different than dissing nations.

MM

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