What are you asking: Better question would be: Who had nothing and made it? (Self made MEN in MILITARY, from nothing to building the army to GENIUS COMMANDER). PERIOD. P.S: In the previous post and on this one, you been spelling great mens name without any respect.
Napoleon pulled off a pretty impressive victory at the Battle of Austerlitz. I got to disagree with Hitler, he lost.
Not at the Battle of Austerlitz he didn't. Regarded as Napoleon Bonaparte's greatest victory, Austerlitz was a sublime trap that destroyed the armies of his enemies Russia and Austria.
Cupid they may have been great military men, but they are just men . They are not god. My spelling was more of a typo than a mispelling. To me truely great men are men of peace and men who have intentions of peace. JFK, einstein etc etc
bochgoch you obviously dont know anything about hannibal. He had very little to work with. A good part of his miltary were killed during the march through the alps and he was never properely supported by the Elite carthaginian rich back home. What he did with what he had was nothing short of spectacular. Hr brought the worlds top military force to its knees for many years. Alot of people talk about his defeat by scipio in north africa but his army was a shell of its former self and was starving of food and weapons.
Genghis Khan is great for coming from nowhere to the worlds largest empire, but Alexander the Great is greater because his empire had a far greater CULTURAL impact on the nations he conquered/liberated. The Aghan's still speak fondly of Alexander the Great - they do not speak fondly of Genghis Khan. Alexander The GREAT was far greater than Khan because he molded people not only from Greece but through the known world to fight for him - a much great accomplishment.
Mohammed didn't do as much conquering or bloodshed for that matter, it is often falsely accused against him - I think you will find it was after his death that the 'Sword of Islam' really made progress and it was hundreds of years after his death that Muslims were pushing into Europe through Spain, North into Russian, and East into India. As a Christian I'm not trying to belittle Mohammed in any way here - but merely show he wasn't the bloodthirsty warrior that we are often portrayed falsely in the west. He was a spiritual leader who conquered Mecca and by the time of his death at 62 had united most of the Arabian Peninsula more through religious conversion than sword - the main piece of conquering he did was the conquest of MECCA whose tribes had been hostile to him and his message. It was after his death that EMPIRE building in the name of Islam (ironically meaning peace) occurred.
I also think CORTES deserved an honorable mention - with 300 troops he destroyed an empire with the worlds largest city - million inhabitants - Technoteclan - and the Aztec empire - though of course small pox and Aztec enemies also had a part to play. For pure number ratios through CORTES rates along with other great examples like Sparta's 300.
Technically I believe Alexander The Great was the best of the three. Although I admire Hannibal as his enemies were hard to defeat and he was very brave and creative. As far as Hitler, I would never support his aims, but technically he built an incredible war machine from almost nothing. Not that good as strategy, mainly because he was too much in a hurry. Outside the list of the three, Romans were maybe the greatest altogether, but Spartans were the greatest soldiers of the ancient times making life easy for their commanders. Nelson was great also, not to be forgotten, and Kitchener. Last mention goes to Captain Kirk, USS Enterprise and Commander Straker (SHADO)...