A History of War in 100 Battles

by Richard Overy

  A poster announces the victory of the Polish and British Commonwealth forces at the Italian town and hillside of Cassino, finally secured on 18 May after months of fierce face-to-face combat. The final storming of Monte Cassino, with its destroyed monastery, was carried out by the 3rd Polish Carpathian Division.

  The Poles had much to prove and Anders was keen that his force achieve the impossible and ‘cover Polish arms with glory’. After a rest of a few days, spent precariously dug into the mountainside, a fresh assault on the mountains began on 17 May, coinciding with a heavy attack by the 8th Army in the Liri Valley that aimed to prevent the Germans from switching their shrinking reserves and artillery fire between the two fronts. Major General Sulik’s 5th Kresowa Division stormed the slopes of Phantom Ridge but failed to dislodge all German resistance while continuing to take high casualties. One unit ran out of ammunition and hurled rocks at the Germans, all the while singing the Polish national anthem. The 3rd Carpathian Division fought for Point 593 and Snakeshead Ridge above the monastery. Under heavy fire, the Poles struggled bitterly for every metre, taking, losing and retaking the Point several times. On the night of 17 May the Poles were forced to rest and consolidate their costly gains, but during the night German movements could be detected. The Polish assault had proved too much for their embattled enemy. The monastery was abandoned by the morning and an incredulous unit of Polish lancers cautiously approached it. Only the German wounded were left. An improvised Polish flag was hoisted to the cheers of the onlookers. At 10.15 a.m. a Polish bugler stood on the monastery walls to play the Kraków Hejnal, the historic Polish trumpet call, while Polish soldiers wept with emotion. Savage fighting continued on the other ridge where the trapped paratroopers fought to the last out of fear of Polish vengeance, but finally Colle Sant’Angelo was in Allied hands as well.

  The battle cost the Polish Corps 3,682 casualties, 860 of them killed. German losses are harder to calculate because the units moved during the battle to other fronts. After the battle German and Polish bodies could be found in a deathly embrace, having fought with knives and bayonets to the last, a brutal physical conflict with little quarter given. The hardships endured by the Polish attackers were exceptional but their courage under fire was unquestioned. Anders recommended one-third of the attackers for the Polish Cross for Valour. The dead were later buried in a cemetery between the monastery and Point 593. General Anders asked that he be buried beside them and when he died in 1970, his wish was fulfilled.

  CHAPTER 6

  IN THE NICK OF TIME

  A Japanese screen depicts the Battle of Sekigahara on 21 October 1600. This is an 1854 copy of the original Sekigahara Kassen Byobu created in the 1620s. A critical factor in the battle was the decision of important units to switch sides at the last moment, sealing victory for the Tokugawa clan and opening the way to 250 years of Tokugawa rule.

  At the height of the Battle of Adwa, in which a huge Ethiopian army destroyed an invading Italian–African force, General Matteo Albertone sent a laconic note back to the Italian commander: ‘Large enemy force before me. Reinforcements would be welcome.’ The help never came and Albertone’s force was destroyed, but his plight reflected the hope that any armed force caught in a closing trap was bound to have, that at the last moment it would be saved by the appearance of powerful friends. Just occasionally the absence of reinforcement in a critical situation could be survived. Troops coming to help at Rorke’s Drift, another African conflict in which a small European imperial force was surrounded by thousands of enemy tribesmen, saw the burning settlement in the distance and decided their assistance would come too late. The tiny garrison survived nevertheless, saved in the nick of time not by their compatriots but by the decision of the Zulu army to leave, just as their ammunition was running out.

  The nick of time is not entirely the same as luck (since a commander may well know that reinforcements are on the way) yet in many cases a piece of good fortune at the last moment has played a part in deciding a battle one way or another. The fall of Constantinople in 1453 depended on the discovery of a small gate left open inadvertently through which Ottoman troops could pour; the victory in the Pacific War at Midway depended on just ten bombs that found their target in the final attack, and disabled four aircraft carriers. The destruction of the Magyar army after the battle at Lechfeld was due to a lucky downpour of rain which no-one could have predicted. Luck operates in battle in a hundred different ways, large and small, though the advantage granted by luck often depends on the skill of commanders who can react to an opportunity with decisive improvisation.

  Soviet troops mass near the Don Steppe in southern Russia in preparation for the launch of Operation Uranus, the campaign that cut off the German army in Stalingrad in November 1942. The forces had to be moved into place in the utmost secrecy to maximize the impact of the deception against an unsuspecting Axis line.

  The most common examples of victory achieved or defeat avoided in the nick of time are the result of the appearance of reinforcements at a decisive moment. This is not the same as a force kept in reserve, though the timely exploitation of reserves has been a battlefield practice since the very first wars. Distant reinforcements may not arrive in time if they are held up or diverted, but when they do the effect can be deeply demoralizing for the side left without assistance. The victory at Stalingrad depended on the Soviet 64th and 62nd divisions holding on to a shrinking finger of riverside territory, bombarded from all sides, until when all seemed lost, a massive Soviet counter-offensive smashed into the enemy flank, encircled Stalingrad and saved the embattled urban fighters. The Battle of Waterloo may have been won by Wellington or it may not, but the approach of a large Prussian army forced Napoleon to divert troops at a critical time to hold off the prospect of a crushing attack on his right flank.

  The failure to co-ordinate forces so that they can all be brought to bear at once on the battlefield demonstrates how in just hours an expected victory turns into defeat. At Tannenberg in 1914, the Russian armies of General Samsonov desperately needed the Russian armies of General Rennenkampf to swing southwest and support his offensive, but help never came. At First Manassas in the American Civil War, a good proportion of Union troops never saw action, but their timely deployment in the heart of the fighting might have swung the battle the way it had been expected to go. Many battle post-mortems have consisted of speculation as to what might have happened if only help had arrived, whether in the form of ammunition, fuel or men. The margin can often be frustratingly small between triumph and failure, as Rommel found at Alam Halfa and Second Alamein, when a tanker or two of oil and a hundred more aircraft might have secured German conquest of Egypt.

  Battle after battle in the 100 selected here has hung on a knife-edge for many hours of evenly matched combat. Many victories have come in the nick of time for reasons not always easy to discern. The element of chance in war is one that historians are often loath to accept when a rational calculation of odds, whether of materiel, leadership or morale, suggests a historically plausible outcome. The element of chance is not everything in battle, but it is an element that an astute leader must be aware of even when things look at their worst: ‘If you engage in ten great undertakings,’ wrote Prussian king Frederick the Great at the height of the Seven Years War, ‘and are lucky in no more than two you make your name immortal.’ Shortly after, in the last of thirteen fruitless hours battling the Austrians at Torgau, when the Austrian commander had already left to report his triumph, the Prussians made one final desperate push and at the last moment it proved just enough for victory.

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  No. 86 BATTLE OF KADESH

  1285 BC

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  Kadesh (or Qadesh) is the earliest recorded battle for which there is definite information about both the forces involved and the operational sequence of events. It was long assumed to have been a major Egyptian victory because that is how the young pharaoh, Ramses II, portrayed it on his return from Syria to his Nile capita
l. He left both a ‘poem’ and a ‘bulletin’ (to accompany the relief carving of the battle), which were for years the only sources. Archaeological evidence has now come to light at Boghazköy in Turkey, which sheds light on the campaign from the point of view of Ramses’s Hittite enemy, Muwatalli II, and suggests that there was no clear winner at Kadesh. What seems certain is that Ramses might well have lost the battle entirely had it not been for the timely arrival of a division of mercenary allies. About this the sources seem as reliable as can be expected.

  The battle came as part of an Egyptian campaign in the thirteenth century BCE to recapture territory and influence in Syria, which was dominated by an amalgam of small communities owing allegiance to the Hittite kings. In the fourth year of his reign, Ramses set out from Egypt with an army reckoned at 20,000, divided into four divisions named after Egyptian deities – Amun, Re, Set and Ptah – and perhaps 2,000 chariots. Egyptian chariots were light two-man vehicles, allowing one man to fire his bow or use his spear while the other controlled the reins. Critical for the battle, as it turned out, was the addition of a body of mercenaries, probably from Canaan, described as the Ne’arin or nrrn.

  Ramses led his force north through present-day Israel and Syria to recapture the cities of Amurru and Kadesh. His first division, Amun, reached the town of Shabtuna on the approach to the fortified city of Kadesh. It was here that Muwatalli positioned two nomad spies, intending that they should be caught. The spies told Ramses that the Hittite army was 200 kilometres (120 miles) away near the city of Aleppo. Relieved, Ramses established a camp for his lead division, Amun. The other divisions were still some distance behind, dangerously spaced apart. When Egyptian scouts brought in two Hittite prisoners, they were tortured into confirming the previous intelligence, but instead revealed the dismaying truth: Muwatalli was only a few kilometres away, hiding behind the town of Kadesh with a large force.

  The Hittite army was composed of infantry and chariots. According to modern estimates, there were perhaps 20,000 foot soldiers and 3,000 chariots; Hittite chariots each carried three men, making them slower and less manoeuvrable than those of the Egyptians, but nevertheless they were the ancient version of a heavy tank attack when massed together. The Hittite king exploited the element of surprise perfectly. As the second division, Re, approached the Egyptian camp on the exposed banks of the River Orontes, the first wave of Hittite chariots forded the water and overwhelmed the exposed division in front of them. The survivors fled to the Amun camp, pursued by the enemy chariots. Amid the panic of retreating soldiers and looting Hittites, Ramses gathered his personal bodyguard and any soldiers still fighting and charged at the chariot force, driving them back, probably to the shelter of Kadesh. Muwatalli then released another 1,000 chariots to attack the Pharaoh, and it was during this second confrontation that the Ne’arin arrived after a march from the coast and fell on the Hittite flank.

  This carving from the second pylon of the Ramesseum Temple in Luxor was ordered by Pharaoh Ramses II after his victory at Kadesh in 1285 BCE. The scene shows enemy Hittites from the army of Muwatalli II crushed beneath the wheels of Egyptian war chariots. The battle was in the balance until the arrival of Ramses’s mercenary allies, the Ne’arin.

  According to the existing accounts, it was now the Hittites’ turn to panic and flee. They abandoned their chariots and tried to cross the Orontes ‘as fast as crocodiles swimming’, according to the Egyptian version of the battle. The nimbler Egyptian chariots, though less stable than the heavier Hittite vehicles, were ideal for the pursuit. What happened next is not known with certainty, but it seems clear from both the Egyptian and the Hittite texts that Ramses failed to capture Kadesh and subsequently withdrew his army back to Egypt. The Hittite king had used only the chariots, which had been repulsed, but the rest of his army was still intact. Most modern accounts describe the battle as a draw, since Ramses was denied his goal, but nevertheless inflicted a local defeat on Muwatalli. Without the timely arrival of the Ne’arin, the outcome might have been very different since the other Egyptian divisions were still on the road moving north towards Kadesh, too far away to offer any assistance.

  No-one in Egypt would challenge Ramses’s version and the relief carving shows the victory for all time. But in truth, the Egyptian campaigns in the eastern Mediterranean were futile attempts to stem the encroachments of the Hittites and their allies. In 1258 BCE, the first surviving peace treaty was drawn up between the two empires demarcating their territorial spheres. The tablets are now in a museum in Istanbul, but there is a copy in the United Nations building as the first example of an agreement for peace in a region now plagued again by conflict. Kadesh was a first in every sense – the first recorded battle; the first evidence of the use of mass chariots; and, following Ramses’s fortunate escape, the clash that paved the way for the first brief recorded armistice in centuries of war.

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  No. 87 BATTLE OF ZAMA

  202 BCE

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  The Battle that decided the long struggle between the Romans and the African empire of Carthage, in the Second Punic War, was fought by two armies led by veterans of the disastrous Roman defeat at Cannae. Hannibal Barca had been the victor at Cannae, while his opponent, Publius Scipio (‘Africanus’ as he became known), had been on the losing side, surviving the massacre by luck. This time, the Battle of Zama, in present-day Tunisia, was finely poised, but Scipio had learned important lessons. At the last moment, the Roman cavalry did to Hannibal what he had done to the Romans fourteen years earlier. It was a narrow margin, but enough to seal a historic triumph for Rome and the start of centuries of Roman domination.

  A bronze head of the Roman general Publius Scipio Africanus from the Naples Archeological Museum in Italy. Though a brilliant commander, Scipio succeeded in defeating Hannibal at the Battle of Zama only when his cavalry returned to the fray at the last moment.

  The Second Punic War was fourteen years old when Scipio, who had taken most of Spain from the Carthaginians, set out from Sicily in 204 BCE with 40 warships and 400 transports to attack the enemy on their home territory in North Africa. The aim was to finish the war once and for all and to force Carthage to acknowledge Roman supremacy. For Scipio, given temporary supreme command of Roman forces, the campaign was designed to secure his political position in Rome against his jealous rivals. He faced two opponents in Africa, not only Carthage but also the Numidian kingdom ruled by King Syphax, who had long supported his neighbour against Rome. Political rivalry among the Numidians, however, brought Scipio an important bonus. Prince Masinissa took 2,000 of the fine Numidian cavalry over to the Roman side and fought against his former master. In the first engagement between the two sides in the early summer of 203 BCE, Scipio and Masinissa destroyed the Carthaginian and Numidian camps in the Battle of the Great Plains. After marching towards Carthage, Scipio exacted tough armistice terms from the alarmed Carthaginian senate. Masinissa pursued Syphax to Numidia, where he defeated him and declared himself king.

  In secret, the Carthaginian assembly summoned Hannibal and his army back from southern Italy, where they had stayed on after Cannae, in the hope that the legendary general could turn the tide in Africa. By spring 202 BCE, the Carthaginian leaders were more confident that the armistice could be overturned and Scipio defeated. Hannibal gathered a new large army, estimated at 36,000 infantry and 4,000 cavalry drawn from all over North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula. The host fielded a variety of weapons, including the long Greek sarissa pike and the fearsome curved falcata steel sabre, which could cut through a Roman shield. Scipio had a mix of mercenary soldiers and veteran legionaries, some 29,000 in number, supported by 6,000 Roman and Numidian cavalry. They carried the conventional Roman spear, short sword and dagger. The two forces settled in camps a few miles apart at a site known as Zama, though its exact location remains uncertain. Modern estimates suggest a small plain near the present-day town of Sidi Youssef. It was here, halfway between the two armed camps, that Hannibal asked Scip
io to meet him for a parley, to see if he could extract terms and avoid an unpredictable battle. Scipio is said to have asked for unconditional surrender. Hannibal turned on his heel and the two commanders prepared for combat on the following day.

  Hannibal planned his battle predictably, which helped Scipio a great deal. He placed his infantry in three ranks, one behind the other, first mercenaries, then the Carthaginian levies, and finally his veterans from the Italian campaign. On either flank were placed 2,000 cavalry, while 80 elephants, the tanks of the ancient world, were placed at the front. Hannibal’s plan was to break up the opposing infantry with an elephant charge and deploy his cavalry, as at Cannae, to drive back the enemy flanks and envelop the entire enemy force. Scipio understood all this. His infantry were drawn up in three similar ranks, mercenaries at the front, hardened veterans at the rear. The novelty in Scipio’s plan was to create corridors concealed by lightly armed infantry, the velites, through which the elephants would be ushered to the rear and killed or incapacitated, while the ranks of Roman soldiery closed up behind them. Once the charge was over, Scipio planned to release his two superior cavalry forces, including Masinissa’s Numidians, to destroy Hannibal’s horsemen. What would happen next was in the lap of the gods, to whom both sides commended themselves before the battle.

  It was later recorded that Scipio had addressed his soldiers on the eve of battle with the stark demand that they ‘conquer or die’. Certainly both commanders realized that a great deal depended on the battle. The contest began when Hannibal released his elephants, backed by the first lines of infantry, against the Roman army. No battle had ever used so many animals, and neither side was quite sure what would happen. Scipio’s plan did not go perfectly, but it worked well enough. Some of the elephants ran through the corridors to be finished off at the rear; others were so terrified by the deliberate blare of Roman trumpets that they stampeded from the field or turned back, trampling the Carthaginian cavalry. Seeing the disorder, the two cavalry commanders – Masinissa on the right, Gaius Laelius on the left – charged Hannibal’s two cavalry wings and routed them with such enthusiasm that they were chased well beyond the battlefield, leaving the contest for the moment as a simple clash of infantry.