Search results
- Alexander the Great. With Alexander the Great, it's often impossible to separate fact from fiction regarding his brilliant career, but if even a fraction of what is said about him is remotely true, he clearly stands alone as history's greatest commander.
- Julius Caesar. There are only a few names in history as famous as that of Julius Caesar. Thought to be born in 100 B.C., Caesar began his career as a junior officer in the Roman army, and at one point earned the prestigious Corona Civica award for his actions of saving a fellow soldier.
- Genghis Khan. Few names are as synonymous with military excellence as the Asian ruler Genghis Khan. Born in 1162 in northern Mongolia as Temujin, Khan first started to build his reputation as the ultimate warrior when he rescued his wife from captivity as a teenager.
- Napoleon. The subject of countless biographies, Napoleon Bonaparte is perhaps history's greatest modern commander. Born in 1769 in Corsica, France, Bonaparte became educated at military academies as a boy and was already commissioned in the artillery by the time he was a teenager.
Dec 11, 2014 · To Clausewitz, war was a contest of wills, and in the military genius, a commander must possess the ability to withstand single setbacks, and multiple setbacks over time. As such, a military genius had strength of mind and character.
Leaders educated in such a manner are less likely to accept the world as it is or permit tradition and cultural practices to control their actions. Instead, they see themselves as controlling their own fate, able to change the course of events rather than being controlled by them.
- Charlemagne
- Saladin
- Peter The Great
- Adolf Hitler
- Genghis Khan
- Napoleon Bonaparte
- Hannibal Barca
- Richard The Lionheart
- Julius Caesar
- Alexander The Great
Also known as Charles the Great, Charlemagne was King of the Franks and founder of the Carolingian Empire, the medieval predecessor of what is now modern France. Born to Pepin the Short, King of the Franks, and Bertrada of Laonthe, Charlemagne expanded the Frankish kingdom, conquered the Lombard kingdom in northern Italy, and in 800 AD was crowned ...
An-Nasir Salah ad-Din was an Arabized Kurdish Muslim leader born in Tikrit, Iraq. He founded the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt and extended his empire to Arabia, North Africa, Nubia, Syria, Mesopotamia, Palestine, and Transjordan. Saladin's armies united the Muslim world by force. Saladin also helped repel Frankish invaders and hold off the Third Crusad...
Pyotr Alexeyevich Romanov was one of Russia's greatest Tsars, ruling from 1682 to 1721.He was born in Moscow, then Russia's capital. As ruler, he introduced elements of Western culture to Russia, making his courtiers shave their traditional beards and adopt the fashions and manners of their Western European counterparts. He sent foreign delegations...
Adolf Hitler was born in Austria to a poor family. As a young man, he was a painter who failed to get into the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. He served in the Bavarian Infantry as an Austrian citizen in World War I and was wounded at the Battle of the Somme. After Germany's defeat in World War I, Hitler became involved in local politics, ultimately b...
Genghis Khan was born an illiterate peasant named Temüjin. He died the emperor of the Mongol Empire, the largest contiguous empire of all time. As a teenager, Temüjin was introduced to life on the battlefield after being captured by members of a rival tribe who held him in a wooden stockade. He escaped, and the incident had a profound impact on him...
The greatest military commander and political leader of Revolutionary France was actually not French at all. Napoleon was born to a noble family in Ajaccio, Corsica and moved to France for school as a young man. He was accepted to a Brienne-le-Château—a military academy—a decade before the French revolution. In the late stages of the French revolut...
Hannibal was a Carthaginian military commander born in 247 BC in the city of Carthage, in what is now north-eastern Tunisia, and lived during the ascending years of the Roman Republic. Leading the forces of Carthage, he fought against Rome during the Second Punic Wars. He is most well-known for leading the Carthaginian army, mounted on elephants, a...
Richard I of England, also known as Richard the Lionheart, was an English king in the twelfth century. He was born in Oxford, England. His reputation as a great military leader and warrior has earned him the title of Richard the Lionheart. Richard I led the Third Crusades; medieval military campaigns mandated by the Roman Catholic Church—largely ag...
Coming in second is Julius Caesar, Rome's most famous leader and military commander. Born in the Roman Republic, his early life can be mapped onto a tumultuous period in the Republic's history. In this atmosphere of political disarray, Caesar earned fame by commanding Roman forces through invasions of western Europe and by putting an end to the unr...
Alexander III of Macedon, known as Alexander the Great, was born in Macedon. Alexander inherited his throne as well as a strong army with a high level of training and discipline. Alexander united the Greek city-states, re-established the Corinthian League, and went on to conquer the Persian Empire. Alexander's army invaded Anatolia (also known as A...
Jun 14, 2019 · The story of Julius Caesar’s military career is the story of the special relationship between a brilliant commander and an elite fighting force. The legions of the Late Republic were superb instruments of war.
- Seema Syeda
Oct 24, 2014 · Others are debatable: Some would say a professional military education from institutions such as West Point is a necessity, while Vo Nguyen Giap, the schoolteacher who became the general...
People also ask
What makes a great commander?
Who is the best military commander in history?
What factors are relevant to the emergence of a great commander?
Is a professional military education a necessity?
Was Eisenhower a good commander?
Why is intelligence important to history's great commanders?
Jul 7, 2019 · And the greatest commander of the legions in Roman history was surely Julius Caesar. He was both an imperialist – a conqueror of new provinces – and a civil-war generalissimo, the destroyer of the Republic and the creator of the Empire. Our special this time reflects both roles.
