Biggest Battle of all time

[Stormer]

I was thinking ehat is the biggest battle of all time where to arimes met on a battlefield.

i dont have a clue but i would say it is a napolionic battle?

[Knight Keimo]

I´d say that it might be some WW2 battle. Kursk, Berlin.. But not sure were they big enough after all..

There´s also some very, very weird stories about Persian-Greece/Macedonian wars. Some chronicles say that Persians did could bring one million http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif footsoldiers, over 200 000 medium- and 40 000 heavy cavalry to one single battle. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

But that´s very unreliable..

[Stormer]

Lol a nation on the move. world war 2 battles dont really count in what i mean cause they didnt really met each on the fie;d a;; facing each other.

[Lechev]

IMHO, the battle of the red wall is the biggest battle as combination number of fighting men in that battle is close to a million in one single campaign.

Btw, this battle was fought in China during the Three Kingdoms period between the armies of Cao Cao's ( Kingdom of Wei ) and Sun Quan's ( Kingdom of Wu ). http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wacko.gif

[Lazul]

Im not so good at numbers in history but i know that Saladin had a shitload of mamluks and syrians... but the exact number i dont know.

[Stormer]

I would of thought it be maybe the french 'grand army'

[Knight Keimo]

Quote[/b] (Stormer @ July 18 2003,07:47)]I would of thought it be maybe the french 'grand army'
Yup, it consist about 600 000 men, but did it ever even fight? I mean they march to Russia, towards Moscow but were forced to retreat when winter came too early. They lost most of theyr men during that http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif Run away Run away

[DemonArchangel]

i guess the biggest battle ever fought would be a battle in china, mainly due to the large population there. The largest battle ever fought in the western world would probably Stalingrad.

[deejayvee]

Quote[/b] (Knight Keimo @ July 18 2003,10:26)]Yup, it consist about 600 000 men, but did it ever even fight? I mean they march to Russia, towards Moscow but were forced to retreat when winter came too early. They lost most of theyr men during that http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif Run away Run away
Actually, up until the Russian campaign it was arguably the greatest army the world had ever seen. Battles like Austerlitz show that the Grand Army did not retreat like girls.

[Oaty]

They just had a 1 hour program on the history channel about the spartans and how they had held off the persians for 3 days till there decimation. This was the first largest army to appear in battle to that time. 2 spies had returned and had reported that there were 1 million men marching upon Greece, but this was very inaccurate because they had seen an army stretching over the horizon and history veers to 250,000 men is more of an accurate count.

I know very little of the chinese wars and cant make any comments here

The 2 biggest battles I can think of though would be stalingrad and berlin and don't know wich 1 had more troops and wich 1 had exhausted more troops. As far as the russian battle plan, ok evryone line up CHARGE Now how can you say this doesnt count as many Russians have seen the enemy face to face on the battlefield just usually not the next day. The Russians or actually Stalin was so eager to take control of territory because they knew once they ran into the allies there advance would stop unless they wanted to continue WW2. All I know that in the 3 day siege of Berlin (I believe it was 3 days) the Russians had lost more men than the United States had in the whole war. I'll look up on the internet on the exact #'s but I'm sure it won't be pretty.

[AvramL]

Ancient sources shouldn't be relied on too much,
and excepting the 20th century (with operations on such a massive scale who can really define a single "battle"?) quite possibly the largest battle of history was the battle of Leipzig in 1813 (the battle of the nations) fought by over 500 000 soldiers representing the armies of five major nations(France, Russia, Prussia, Austria and yes, Sweden too, not to mention a myriad of German states etc.), the battle took place both in and around the city itself. Eventually Napoleon was forced to withdraw his battered army and concede the field to the allies.

[The_Emperor]

Quote[/b] (DemonArchangel @ July 18 2003,19:52)]i guess the biggest battle ever fought would be a battle in china, mainly due to the large population there. The largest battle ever fought in the western world would probably Stalingrad.
yep, over 2 million died in that one battle. I'd have to say its a serious contender

[Mega Dux Bob]

Perhaps it was in the Tia Ping (sp?) rebellion in China in the mid 19th century. It is supposed to be the bloodiest war before WWI.

[DemonArchangel]

The Taiping rebellion was the most devastating peasant REVOLT in history. Notice, it's a revolt, not a battle. But it did kill 10 million + people.

[Mamushi]

Kursk was the largest armour battle ever,and as far as meeting face to face,tanks were firing at each other from 30 feet,sometimes less. Sure sounds like face to face to me

[Leet Eriksson]

Quote[/b] (Lechev @ July 17 2003,14:59)]IMHO, the battle of the red wall is the biggest battle as combination number of fighting men in that battle is close to a million in one single campaign.

Btw, this battle was fought in China during the Three Kingdoms period between the armies of Cao Cao's ( Kingdom of Wei ) and Sun Quan's ( Kingdom of Wu ). http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wacko.gif
I heard the Battle of Red Cliffs,but not Red wall,could you go in detail on this battle in particular?

[Tachikaze]

I vote for the Battle of the Somme.

[redrooster]

Quote[/b] (faisal @ July 21 2003,10:30)]
Quote[/b] (Lechev @ July 17 2003,14:59)]IMHO, the battle of the red wall is the biggest battle as combination number of fighting men in that battle is close to a million in one single campaign.

Btw, this battle was fought in China during the Three Kingdoms period between the armies of Cao Cao's ( Kingdom of Wei ) and Sun Quan's ( Kingdom of Wu ). http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wacko.gif
I heard the Battle of Red Cliffs,but not Red wall,could you go in detail on this battle in particular?
battle of red cliff and the battle at red wall is the same.
Red wall is just a direct translation of the name of the red cliffs (Chi Bi)

[Leet Eriksson]

That explains,thanks alot http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Kalle]

Hello folks.

To answer the question of the biggest battle a definition of the term battle is needed i think. Should Stalingrad be considered a battle just like Austerlitz or Poltava for instance.

The battle for Stalingrad, Kursk, Somme and other epic actions lasted for several weeks or months and could thus hardly be compared to battles such as Austerlitz or Poltava where the battle was fought between two armies over the course of a day or a few days.

Battles like Stalingrad to me seems more like entire campaigns that are named battles to make it easier to talk of them in schoolbooks for instance.

But if these "campaigns" are to be counted aswell then my vote would be one of the battles of ww1. Or maybe the battle of Kiev in ww 2 where the germans took about 600000 prisoners or Kursk as mentioned earlier by someone.

Also the Japanese and Russians fought some very massive battles during the war 1904 - 1905 but maybe these battles also were more like "campaigns", im not sure. Anyways the armies they used were the biggest ones so far in history.

Napoelons grand army in russia did indeed fight not only advance and then retreat. Borodino was a very big battle of the more traditional type. Im not sure how big though.

Is also true that for ancient battles one should not believe the incredible numbers described. Litterature that speaks of armies of millions of men fielded by Persians, Chinese, turks or whatever should be viewed upon with big critiscism, though these accounts surely are not lies they probably are very inaccurate.

If i should narrow down the term battle not to include Kursk and so on then maybe some american civilwar battle comes into question but im not sure.

Kalle

[Vanya]

GAH

Biggest battle of all time: has not happenned. Time is infinite, and the possibility of a future hostile calamity is endless.

Biggest battle from the past: well... that we can define. Vanya sez the biggest battle of all time is the modern day "Battle of the Bulge". Have you ever seen so many fat-arse mofos running around raiding Jenny Craig and eating mulch and grass extract in order to shed a few pounds? The "body count" is in the MILLIONS The raw poundage is in the MILLIONS of TONS There is enough fat in Ohio alone to coat the entire surface of the earth 3 times, and still have enough to deep fry another twinkie

GAH

[The Sword of Cao Cao]

LOL ^


I'd hafta say the Battle of Sekigahara.

[Michiel de Ruyter]

The biggest battle in history that is verifiable is the battle of the Nations, or, as more commonly known in the Western world, the Battle of Leipzig, 14 - 19 October 1813, and then specifically on the 19th.

Forces involved:

French under Napoleon: 190,000 [/list]

Allies:

Prussia under Blücher: 55,000
Sweden under Bernadotte: 66,000
Austria/Russia under Schwarzenberg: 150,000
[/list]

Thsi brings the total up to 461,000 men on a single battlefield on a single day.

For the cmapaign, Napoleon had a field army of 440,000 men available, the allies a field army 512,000 (incl reserves and such this is over 840,000).

Source: Osprey Campaign Vol. XXV.



At Waterloo the numbers brake down in this fashion:

Britsh/Allied under Wellington: 106,000.
Prussians under Blücher: 90,000 (three out of four Corps).[/list]

France:

Grande Armee under Napoleon: roughly 75,000
[/list]

This makes a grand total of 271,000 men

Total number of men for the campaign is about 362,000 men.

Source: Osprey Campaign Vol. XV.



For Sekigehara, the numbers are as follows:

Eastern Army under Tokugawa Ieasu: 89,000
Western Army under Moi Terumoto (Ishida): (82,000).

The forces involved in the whole campaign were much larger... the lobsidedness, and massive amount of casualties is basically due to the betrayal of some of the Western Army's commanders.

Source: Osprey Campaign Vol. XXXX.


AFAIK most consider the battle of Leipzig as the biggest battle in history, going by the classical image of a battle

I do not think that Kusrk or Stalingrad qualify, just because of the sheer distances and time-span involved... The last to qualify as "battlefield" battles (IMHO) took place around the Civil War, with a few instances later...

[Trax]

The Battle of Königgrätz(Sadowa) July 3, 1866
was almost as big as Leipzig
Austria and Saxony ca 215 000 men
Prussia ca 220 000 men

Some pictures:
http://pages.zdnet.com/wassman/id16.html

[Cebei]

To what extent do you guys (history buff ones) believe Herodotus' accounts of Thermopylae are right.. I mean come on, 5 million Persians??

[Stormer]

5 million is a load of Bull S**T the real number was more like 250,000 max

[Cebei]

Humm... did you see last samurai? Professor Tom Cruise decreased that number to one million . http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif

[solypsist]

Battle of the Somme?

A million casualties, I'd say they faced each other, just from trenches.

[Rosacrux]

Some insight on Xerxes' expedition to Greece.

- The Persian emperor at the time would not travel under any circumstances to run a campaign of conquest without a full imperial army, and that is 300.000 footmen and 60.000 cavalry (360.000 men in total). In many instances (conquest of a strong nation) they would mobilize two imperial armies, bringing the total up to 720.000 men.


- The Persian nobles, officers and elites would not travel on a long expedition without taking with them their wives, servants and others. That means several thousand of Xerxes' men had a following of 3-10 people each. Not to mention the standard followers of each army (hookers, merchants etc. etc.).

- If one reads the descriptions of how Xerxes organized his logistic support, one would surely admit that the sheer size of that effort was accustomed to a humangous army. Hundreds of depots were constructed in northern Greece alone and a huge fleet of 800-1000 merchant ships were shipping in everyday provisions from the huge depots in Ionia.

- The Persian, according to each and every account, had more than 1600-1800 ships with them - the warships being about 700-800. If you know a bit about ancient ship business, you should know that a warship needs lots of people to move. 120 is the smallest number (for a petty bireme) and the great Phoenician triremes of the time (the bulk of the Persian naval force) took about 200 men only for rowing. And of course there were several "marines" aboard. So, 150 men in average, at least. Do the math: 800X150=120.000.

- The Persian empire at the time had - according to the historians - a population between the 21 and 25 million people. Greece (from Thessaly downwards) had circa 1 million. Since the Greeks managed to put together for the battle at Plateaes a force of 100.000 men (I haven't seen anyone doubting that number) what makes you think the 20-25 times bigger Persian empire couldn't send at least a million or two?

Perhaps Herodotus is exaggerating (btw he is not talking about 5 mi. - half that numbers comes up if you do his math) but not vastly. I'd say that the fighting force was anywhere between 360.000 and 720.000 men, while the accompanying horde of wives, mistresses, servants, whores, merchants would add 1/3 of that number on the top of it. Plus, if you add the ship crews (not only the 120.000 of the warships but also those of the merchant ships) the numbers grows even more.

So, I'd say the whole Persian force was between 650.000 and 1 mi. people (depending if you pick 360K or 720K as the main fighting force).

So, Platees should qualify for largest ancient western battle, considering that the Greeks only had about 100.000 men - presumably, Mardonios had at least the same number himself. Probably many more.

P.S. I wouldn't qualify any of the WW1-WW2 battles as eligible in this "poll". They were campaigns more than battles. If we count them in, they dwarf anything fought in the previous centuries, by far.

[Knight Keimo]

Quote[/b] (Cebei @ Feb. 21 2004,14:10)]To what extent do you guys (history buff ones) believe Herodotus' accounts of Thermopylae are right.. I mean come on, 5 million Persians??
Ermh... I don´t find a post about 5 million Persians?
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-help.gif

[Cebei]

Quote[/b] ]Ermh... I don´t find a post about 5 million Persians?

There is none. Some overexcited sources prefer that number as Persian forces' number. It is a well known account so I asked that right away. Nobody in this thread said that.

[Somebody Else]

I have to add another mention of the Somme, or maybe Verdun. Both being massively pointless "meat-grinders"

World War One was considerably bloodier that WWII, as battlefield tactics had not yet caught up with technological advances - think of it this way, WWI was ~90 years ago, 100 years before that, Napolean was rushing around doing his thing...

[Knight Keimo]

Quote[/b] (Cebei @ Feb. 22 2004,07:13)]
Quote[/b] ]Ermh... I don´t find a post about 5 million Persians?

There is none. Some overexcited sources prefer that number as Persian forces' number. It is a well known account so I asked that right away. Nobody in this thread said that.
Okay, I see. BTW, I just had never heard that before.

[The Sword of Cao Cao]

Quote[/b] (Lechev @ July 17 2003,14:59)]IMHO, the battle of the red wall is the biggest battle as combination number of fighting men in that battle is close to a million in one single campaign.

Btw, this battle was fought in China during the Three Kingdoms period between the armies of Cao Cao's ( Kingdom of Wei ) and Sun Quan's ( Kingdom of Wu ). http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-wacko.gif
sounds an awful lot like Chi Bi to me lad. we thinking of a diff battle?

[John86]

Quote[/b] (The_Emperor @ July 19 2003,08:20)]
Quote[/b] (DemonArchangel @ July 18 2003,19:52)] The largest battle ever fought in the western world would probably Stalingrad.
correct me if im wrong, but i think The citadel aggressive at kursk was much larger then Stalinrad. I just finished reading books on both. Kursk had 1.3 million germans vs 1.5 millions russians. Stalingrad had less.

[John86]

Quote[/b] (Knight Keimo @ Feb. 26 2004,10:13)]
[QUOTE=Quote ]Ermh... I don´t find a post about 5 million Persians?
Did anyone see the last samurai? lol, it said thermoplae was 1 million to 300. LOL. It was more like 200,000 to 300 hoplites and 700 citizens.

[mercian billman]

Actually Kursk was the largest, and last true set piece battle in history. The planning, and build up to Krusk started months before the main battle ever took place. The Russians brought 1,300,000 men, 3000 tanks, 2700 aircraft, and 10,000 artillery pieces. The Germans brought 900,000 men, 2500 tanks, 2500 aircraft, and 5000 artillery pieces. The culminating action of the battle took place outside of a small town (can't remember the name) where 800 russian tanks, and 700 germans tanks fought on a open prairie.

Im not sure if the number of 'men' I listed counts just infantry, or if it includes support personnel, or the total size of the armies. The Germans lost an estimated 540,000 (more than Stalingrad) and the Russians lost an estimated 900,000.

Im not absolutely sure on the numbers (it's been a while since I've studied Kursk) but I believe Kursk was the largest set piece battle in history due to the preperation both armies undertook to ensure victory (The Germans sped up production of Panther and Tiger tanks, and the Russians built a whole rail line to move supplies in the area to assist their preperation) and the fact both armies knew the battle would be at Kursk.

[Hetman]

Quote[/b] (mercian billman @ Mar. 06 2004,14:43)]
The name of the village is Prohorovka ( or something similar), called the largest tank battle ever, however uncorrectly - more tanks were used ( and lost) in 1941 in Ukraine area.

I don't believe that most of the 20th century battles should count anyway - these lasted too long and can be compared to campaigns (or wars) in the earlier ages.
I believe the largest battle ever was fought at Leipzig - lots of Napoleon's French, Germans and THE POLES vs. Russians, Austrians, Germans and so on, it should be noted that these numbers are almost certainly correct - before that time these were exaggerated most of times simply it was the question of some kind of 'hiring lists'.

But I can also add something probably unknown to most of You - the battle at Beresteczko in 1651 during Cossack Chmielnicki rebellion in Poland.
There were about 80 000 - 100 000 Poles* vs 100 000 - 150 000 ( maybe more) Cossacks rebels and their Tatar allies. Probably the largest battle between ancient times and the Napoleonic wars in Europe.

There were really several such big battles in eastern Europe, though mostly unknown.

* The word 'Poles' means the citizens of the multinational country which Poland was at that time + some mercenaries of course.

Regards Hetman/Cegorach

[mercian billman]

Kursk counts in the sense that it was a set piece battle. The beginning of Barbarossa was really a fighting retreat for the Russians. So I wouldn't count these actions as set piece battles.

[SwordsMaster]

Biggest battles...Hmmm...
Cannae, you all know it 70.000 romans and 34.000(?) Carthagenians.
And more recently i would say Borodino, (the Napoleonic battle for Moscow) The curious thing about the latter, was that both armies finished the battle at the same place where they started it, the french couldnt break through the russians, and the russians couldnt wipe out the french...
So the night after the battle the russians just left because they lost so many men, that if they stayed for another day, their army would be destroyed (and the Napoleonic too, but the corsican was more persistent).

Another battle you may want to have a look at was Narva (or something similar) 1700, russians agains Swedish somewhere in Livonia(?).

[Trax]

Borodino was big, but certainly not the biggest Napoleonic battle, that would be Leipzig (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Leipzig),
which lasted 3 days.

As I have already posted in this thread the biggest single day engagement is probably Königgrätz (Sadova)

The battle of Narva had some 8000 Swedes against ca 40000 Russians

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

I'm a little puzzled because no one mentioned a very big and important battle of the Middle Ages. Maybe not the biggest up until that time, but one of the biggest:

Las Navas de Tolosa 1212

-Allied Catholic armies: Castille, Aragon, Navarre and Portugal. Totaling 100,000men.

-Muslim army: Almohads. Totaling 200,000men.

Total men involved in the battle: 300,000men.

[ElmarkOFear]

I am not sure of the biggest battle, but I believe the battle with the most casualties/deaths in one day, occured during the U.S. civil war, in a battle at Antietam. The South used a different name than the North at the time to name the battle so you may know this battle as something different. I will give the figures when I get a chance to look at my info. at home.

[mercian billman]

30,000 rebel troops were lost that day. Not sure about Union casualties though.

http://www.civilwarhome.com/mcclella.htm

[Hakonarson]

60-70,000 Romans were KILLED at Cannae - and virtually all of them close up and personal.

IIRC Borodino had something like 120-130,000 casualties total in the 1 day - the Russian army went from 80-90,000 down to about 45,000, the French from 120,000 to about 80,000.

but although both were large battles they certainly don't come close to Leipzig or some of the other battles mentioned..

[ElmarkOFear]

hehe Hako has a winner I believe Makes Antietam look rather smallish :)

[ElmarkOFear]

I believe that first day at Antietam holds the distinction of being the largest number of war casualties the U.S. has ever had in a single battle, not the largest numbers of casualties of any battle ever. :) Now that I am awake, I realize my error. hehe

[Crash]

Quote[/b] (WarlordMasterHiji @ Mar. 06 2004,07:18)]
Quote[/b] (The_Emperor @ July 19 2003,08:20)]
Quote[/b] (DemonArchangel @ July 18 2003,19:52)] The largest battle ever fought in the western world would probably Stalingrad.
correct me if im wrong, but i think The citadel aggressive at kursk was much larger then Stalinrad. I just finished reading books on both. Kursk had 1.3 million germans vs 1.5 millions russians. Stalingrad had less.
I just read an article in Military History magazine that said Operation Bagration in June 1944 involved 1.7 million troops - 1.2 million Soviets versus 500,000 Germans. It was a far bigger battle than the Invasion of Normandy, and cost the Nazis 300,000 casualties - more than the total number of Germans facing the Allies in France.

Of course I can't vouch for the accuracy of any of these numbers, but I thought you all might be interested in the subject.

[ShadesWolf]

Interesting question.

Might be an ide to break this down into time periods, ie

- Ancient (Pre 450AD)
- Medieval (450 - 1500)
- 1500 - 1800
- 1800 - 1900
- Post 1900

This way we could fit info into each one

[ShadesWolf]

Battle of the Somme for a starter...


Quote[/b] ]Torrential rains in October turned the battlegrounds into a muddy quagmire and in mid-November the battle ended, with the Allies having advanced only 8km (five miles). The British suffered around 420,000 casualties, the French 195,000 and the Germans around 650,000. Only in the sense of relieving the French at Verdun can the British have claimed any measure of success.

[Axeknight]

In terms of casualties, either Stalingrad, Kursk, Leipzig or Borodino http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif Almost all in Russia

I think.

[mercian billman]

Leipzig was in Germany.

[Axeknight]

The other three were in Russia or the countries that used to be part of Russia. That's why I said 'almost'. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

Also, nice sig. I like Family Guy too.

[mercian billman]

My mistake then.

Ancient Battle- Cannae

1900- Kursk

I really don't know alot about the other periods to make a choice.

Family Guy's great I never really got into until it came out on DVD though. Thank God for DVD http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[Efrem Da King]

FIrst day of the somme.



NO quistion. THe somme is a campaing not a battle. There are like 50 different "battles" during the somme and are classified as their own seperate battles. Say Bullecourt or um... I know others but not well.

[SpetzNatz]

Biggest battle according casualties was Stalingrad (Soviet army was biggest), soviets lost 27 000 000 men in ww2 and total casualties on borh sides were about 1 200 000 dead.
Second biggest was Battle of Catalaunian fields, 300 000 casualties. I don't know who won, I thing, that no one, but that was Pyrrhos victory. Huns weren't able to attack Romans and Romans weren't able to proceed against Huns.

[Efrem Da King]

300, 000 as the second biggest battle in terms of casualties???

THe somme has upwards of 1,400 000.

[Sulla]

Germany suffered 1.6 million casualties on the Eastern front; the 56,000 German casualties at Kursk accounted for only 3 percent of that total. Russia endured a staggering 7.8 million casualties in this period, with the 178,000 Soviet casualties at Kursk only comprising 2.3 percent of this total (from a website). (This is in a certain timeperiod, dont know if its all 4 years of war on the eastern front).

Thing is you can't compare the different timetables. World war 2 was World consuming. Same with World war 1. Maybe this sounds stupid but during Napoleon, many soldiers died but A: There werent that many battles (large ones anyway), B It was basicly only europe. In world war I and II, people were dying on a daily basis for 4 to 6 years. Germany invaded Russia in 1941 and the war ended in 1945. Battles where fought every day. I never hear anyone about Leningrad, where a lot of soldiers died. Or the offensive of the russians during 1944.

Let's say you have an 1810 army and a 1943 army. 1810 army could consist of around 100.000 till 500.000 men. Same with wwI and II, except the germans had a lot more armys then napoleon did. (Thats why they invented a thing called army group.) Casualties listed btw, arent allways dead.

Also the war in the west was consuming a lot of lives. The battle of the bulge cost the germans around 90.000 casualties. Thats more then Kursk.

WWI is a totally different story. It was a combination of Modern weapons and outdated tactics.

I would have to say:

wwI the Somme.
wwII Stalingrad (it was indeed a battle. War was fought differently, cannot be compared to pre-1900 battles)
Napoleon, not an expert.
I would call Antietam and Gettysburg pretty big battles.

Sulla

[mercian billman]

Kursk had more involved than Stalingrad so I'll stick to Kursk.

[oblivious maximus]

the question for me is, are we talking about battle taking place in one single day or one over a period of several days?

[Efrem Da King]

Very VERY few post 1900 battles took only a day, mainly because in older ages battles simply couldn't be fought at night so one side normally retreated, or rarly held on, leipzig is the only example comeing to mind. The organization simply wasn't good enough for long battles.

[TheSilverKnight]

Verdun, I believe is quite large. That and Bordino, Austerlitz, and Waterloo. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif Large numbers of men fighting massed ranks with artillery bombardments and romantic cavalry charges That's the stuff of novels and poets. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/bigthumb.gif

[Efrem Da King]

verdun had high casualty rates but happening at the same time as the somme really wasn't that big.

[monkian]

Wasn't one of the battles of the English Civil war one of the biggest ? Or was that the bloodiest ?

[Gawain of Orkeny]

I would say the bloodiest for the amount of men involved was Iwo Jima.

[monkian]

Quote[/b] (Efrem Da King @ May 01 2004,11:39)]WTF????



ARE YOU F*CKING CRAZY


300, 000 as the second biggest battle in terms of casualties???

THe somme has upwards of 1,400 000.


What you are smoking to consider 300,000 a larger number than 1,400,000 I don't know but I want some.


Its that or your a f*cking moron of epic porportions.
Thats hardly called for http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

There were about 800,000 deaths from the Battle of the Somme

source (http://www.hi.is/~joner/eaps/somme.htm)

[Rosacrux]

Remember that the term "casualties" as in the modern interpretation and use, includes:

- Dead
- wounded (relatively seriously)
- deserters
- those taken prisoners

According to military statistics and the relative low survival rates of seriously wounded in WW1, 100.000 casualties would be like 50K Dead and the rest in the other three categories (most in the "taken prisoners" one).

[Beirut]

Terrible

That response was completely out of line.

What are you going to do if someone gets a historical date wrong, write an entire page of ridiculous, embarrasing profanity trying to prove your mental superiority?

You insulted everyone here by writing that.

[Rosacrux]

Beirut, Efrem is a spoiled 13year old, don't pay attention and it 'll eventually shut up. That applies to every spoiled little brat who doesn't know didly about polite conversation http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

[Beirut]

I yield to your better judgement. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-toff.gif

[Efrem Da King]

4. My comments including the ones in this post were and are way out of line and I apologise.


http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-oops.gif

Edit by TosaInu: I agree.

[Nowake]

Kursk http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif