Military Blunders

[thedrifter]

What do you think are the greatest Military Blunders..of all time.....?



The Raid on Dieppe: August 19, 1942

http://users.pandora.be/dave.depickere/Text/dieppe.html


Iraqi invasion of Kuwait

http://napoleone.tripod.com/iraq/invasion.htm


Sempers,

Roger

[ivalis]

Operation Market Garden 1944

German Invasion of The Soviet Union

Soviet Union Invasion of Afghanistan

US Invasion of Canada

[montana]

the invasion of privecy ???

[ivalis]

tana, keep it quiet, they're listening

[greybeard]

Too late-they already heard.
Agree with Market Garden.
Galliope 1 & 2
Bay of Pigs
From the Chinese standpoint--Chosin was a disaster.
For me personally-The failure to totally nuke Hanoi and Haiphong
But the biggest blunder? Pearl Harbor.

[ivalis]

Pearl Harbor? which side?

[greybeard]

Both sides. Our lack of preparation and their inability to envision the dire consequences.

Perhaps a bigger blunder was the failure to whack the Nazis in the mid 30's, but that, like a lot of others mentioned here, was more of a political screwup than military.

[ivalis]

Short & Kimmel dropped the ball at pearl. The Japs screwed up by not taking out the fuel farm/pipelines.

[MillRatUSMC]

Those so many in history, that it's hard to chose one.

The ambush of troops under Major General Edward Braddock during the French and Indian War has to rate among the great of military blunders.
He had no idea of how the French and Indians were used to fighting, not in the method used in Europeans wars.

We already mention Napolean's invasion of Russia, it wasn't the Soviet Union, that laid ahead some 80 to 90 years in the future.

The forcing of the Dardanelles and Gallipoli was one of the Allies great disasters in World War One. Gallipoli was the plan thought up by Winston Churchill to end the war early by creating a new war front that the Central Powers could not cope with.

Russia's invasion of Finland resulting in the death of many Russians.

We could include LBJ, McNanamara and General Westmoreland under estimating the forces they were fighting.
General Giap brings out that they knew they would never be able to defeat us in the field of battle.
They were seeking a stalemate brought on by them bleeding us to death.
That led to us leaving Vietnam and them than defeating the South Vietnamese.
Yet Vietnam, was only one battle in the Cold War, the principals suppling North Vietnam, lost a great deal of income.
That in turn led to the dissolving of the Soviet Union.
This too was a great military blunder...
All these have been from modern history, we won't even go into the Persians invading what now is Greece...

Semper Fidelis
Ricardo

[greybeard]

.
By 1968, NVA morale was at it's lowest point ever. The plans for "Tet" '68 was their last desperate attempt to achieve a success, in an effort to boost the NVA morale. When it was over, General Giap and the NVA viewed the Tet '68 offensive as a failure, they were on their knees and had prepared to negotiate a surrender.
At that time, there were fewer than 10,000 U.S. casualties, the Vietnam War was about to end, as the NVA was prepared to accept their defeat. Then, they heard Walter Cronkite (former CBS News anchor and correspondent) on TV proclaiming the success of the Tet '68 offensive by the communist NVA. They were completely and totally amazed at hearing that the US Embassy had been overrun. In reality, The NVA had not gained access to the Embassy--there were some VC who had been killed on the grassy lawn, but they hadn't gained access. Further reports indicated the riots and protesting on the streets of America.
According to Giap, these distorted reports were inspirational to the NVA. They changed their plans from a negotiated surrender and decided instead, they only needed to persevere for one more hour, day, week, month, eventually the protesters in American would help them to achieve a victory they knew they could not win on the battlefield. Remember, this decision was made at a time when the U.S. casualties were fewer than 10,000, at the end of 1967, beginning of 1968.
Today, there are 58,000 names on the Vietnam Wall Memorial that was built with the donations made by the American public. Although Giap did not mention each and every protester's name in his book, many of us will never forget the 58,000 names on the Wall. We will also never forget the names of those who helped in placing those additional 48,000 names there: Bill, Jane, Tom, Cronkite, and others.

[namgrunt]

The Pharoah's army chasing the fleeing Isrealites across the opened Red Sea. He had to have ignored the flaming column running interference for the former slaves. After all the plagues, he must have known he was messing with something bigger than he was.

[MillRatUSMC]

Greybeard, I was thinking about Tet of 68 on the VC/NVA side.
It had to be a big BLUNDER on their part.
The Viet Cong were no longer a player in the war.
The North Vietnamese Army took over the conduct of the war.
Many of their large units took to the field.
Still conducting small unit operations coupled with mines and booby traps to try and bleed us till the American people said "Enough is a enough".
That came after Lt. Calley and company at My Lai...
Hanio Jane, Hanio John Forbes Kerry and the rest of those protesting inspired those ready to negotiate a surrender to hold to their plans on fighting what we now know as the Vietnam War...

Semper Fidelis
Ricardo

[usmc4669]

When they allowed John Kerry to join the Navy. LOL

[thedrifter]

Lady Be Good


http://www.qmfound.com/lady_be_good_...r_recovery.htm

[usmc4669]

thedrifter Yes This must be the Military Blunders of all times.