General MacKelvie's 90th division Division landed at Utah Beach a few days after the initial D-Day landings, and within days, had become bogged down and almost passive - despite the rapid gains American troops were making elsewhere. As the story goes , MacKelvie's assistant commander found the general cowering in a ditch during an enemy bombardment and berated him until he stood up. With the division losing so many soldiers that it had a replacement rate of over 100%, MacKelvie was sacked after just five days in command - likely the quickest replacement of any American general in the conflict. Facing Rommel's elite Afrika Korps, Lloyd Fredendall was totally unsuited to the task of commanding American forces in the field. He was well-liked by superiors, but very hands-off in the field and issued orders in an incomprehensible personal slang code. One order typical of Fredendall's gibberish read: "Have your boss report to the French gentleman whose name begins with J at a place which begins with D which is five grid squares to the left of M." Beyond that, he infuriated Eisenhower by ordering an entire battalion to construct a giant command bunker 100 miles behind the front that he'd never have to leave. He left other commanders out of his decision-making process and had no grasp of how or where to position units to form a defensive line. The result was the US Army's humiliating defeat at Kasserine Pass. Soon after the fight, Eisenhower removed Fredendall from command.
A callous and bumbling military Luddite, Marshall Kulik was given command of the Soviet Artillery Directorate, despite loathing tanks and motorized artillery. He disdained modern tech like the machine gun, believed the field would be forever ruled by horses, and meddled in the construction of the iconic T-34 tank by ordering it to be armed with an inferior cannon. Kulik's interference in industrial production ensured the Soviet army was totally unprepared when Germany infiltrated in June 1941, leading to horrific casualties. A totally ineffective field commander (his motto was "jail or medal"), Kulik was nonetheless put in charge of the Leningrad Front - and led it so poorly that the iconic city was surrounded almost immediately, leading to a three- year siege. Kulik somehow survived the conflict, but was detained in a post-conflict purge, and then slain in 1947.
The commander of American forces infiltrating Italy in September 1943, Clark dithered on breaking out after his initial landing, which nearly let the German's push the Allies back. Then, in January 1944, in a glory-seeking effort to take the strategically critical ancient abbey Monte Cassino, he sent an under-strength infantry division on a dangerous river crossing against dug-in German defenses. Predictably, the division was nearly wiped out and Clark was later the subject of a Congressional inquiry. Finally, Clark's troops had the elite German 10th Army on the run after breaking out of the Anzio landing . But at that critical moment, Clark switched gears to capture Rome - despite it having no strategic value. Rome was taken with no resistance, and Clark rode in as a conqueror, but the bulk of the German force escaped, necessitating nearly another year of vicious combat - and 44,000 more Allied casualties.
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Poster Comment:
My faves are the ameriKan demigods, of course ;)
While MacArthur has a reputation as one of the most innovative and courageous generals in US history, he also committed inexplicable blunders at multiple points in the conflict. After the strike on Pearl Harbor, MacArthur was ordered to carry out strike plans on Japanese bases but gave no reply. As a result, Japanese planes immediately struck, wiping out his air force. His thinly spaced and poorly supplied US and Filipino forces crumbled, and he was ordered to evacuate Manila with his command staff. 150,000 Allied troops had been slain, wounded, or captured. His bold conduct over the next four years gained him a justifiable reputation as a hero. But he was also reckless, arrogant, careerist, saw his role as the occupational governor of Japan as a stepping-stone to running for president, and pardoned Japanese war criminals involved in human experimentation.
The Eisenhower case should have been here. They used his portrait for the series thumbnail but didn't include his blunders!!??!!