How Great Generals Win

by Bevin Alexander

Overview

"An astute military historian's appraisal of what separates the sheep from the wolves in the great game of War." —Kirkus Reviews

If a key to military victory is to "get there first with the most," the true test of the great general is to decide where "there" is—the enemy's Achilles heel. Here is a narrative account of decisive engagements that succeeded by brilliant strategy more than by direct force. The reader accompanies those who fought, from Roman legionaries and Mongol horsemen to Napoleonic soldiery, American Civil War Rebels and Yankees, World War I Tommies, Lawrence of Arabia's bedouins, Chinese revolutionaries, British Desert Rats, Rommel's Afrika Korps, and Douglas MacArthur's Inchon invaders. However varied their weapons, the soldiers of all these eras followed a commander who faced the same obstacles and demonstrated the strategic and tactical genius essential for victory. "All warfare is based on deception," wrote Sun Tzu in The Art of War in 400 BCE. Bevin Alexander shows how great generals have interpreted this advice, and why it still holds true today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393342475
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	07/25/2011
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	322
Sales rank:	473,155
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Bevin Alexander is the author of How Great Generals Win, Lost Victories, and Inside the Nazi War Machine. He lives in Bremo Bluff, Virginia.

Editorial Reviews

Alexander ( Korea: The First War We Lost ) reveals how some of the great military men of history applied common-sense principles of warfare that ``nearly always will secure victory.'' Relying on deception, these generals usually won their campaigns with a surprise attack on the enemy's rear or flank. Leaving aside the killed-and-wounded advantage of such maneuvers, Alexander emphasizes the decisive psychological effect on enemy soldiers and their commanders. Generals whose deceptive, indirect, surprise tactics are considered here include Scipio Africanus (``The General Who Beat Hannibal''), Genghis Khan, Napoleon Bonaparte, Stonewall Jackson, William Tecumseh Sherman (``The General Who Won the Civil War''), Mao Zedong, Erwin Rommel and Douglas MacArthur. Alexander makes the interesting point that these principles are for the most part self-evident, yet most generals ignore them in favor of the direct frontal assault. He is surprisingly critical of the Confederacy's icon, Robert E. Lee, for his tendency to resort to direct (and costly) methods such as Pickett's charge at Gettysburg. He calls MacArthur ``a military Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, capable of both brilliant strategic insight and desolating error.'' This study is essential reading for students of military strategy and tactics. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Alexander analyzes the mindset that distinguishes a great commander from a merely good one, and tells the stories of the most successful commanders of all time--among them Hannibal, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Stonewall Jackson, Sherman, Rommel, and Mao Zedong. Includes maps and photographs. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

With maneuver, deception, and flank attacks, that's how, and Alexander selects chieftains involved in 10 conflicts, from the Punic Wars to Korea, that confirm the eternal verity. Dedicated enthusiasts of large-unit tactics will closely follow Alexander's accounts of the above axioms in action; using his maps--which did not appear in the galley--will be critical to their task. Nonetheless, Alexander's ideas are a bit derivative. For accounts of Hannibal and Fabius, he relies on historians Polybius and Livy; in his regalements of modern conductors of violence, such as William "make Georgia howl" Sherman and Heinz "Panzer Waltz" Guderian, the authoritative hand of B. H. Liddell Hart is plainly visible. A browser for lifelong armchair warriors.

Gilbert Taylor