Most Pointless Battle

[King Kurt]

Revisiting this thread I am reminded of Monte Cassino from WW2. Here, the Allies as part of their slog up the Italian Peninsula, slugged it out with a handfull of German defenders - mainly paratroopers from memory. Massive amounts of munitions were dropped on the monastry and the town and monastry were severly damaged. You could argue that the whole Italian campaign was a waste, but why the allies didn't use their air/naval superioity to outflank resistance by landing behind them, I never know.
I visted Monte Cassino about 15 years ago and was really moved - how could such a beautiful place be the centre of a terrible battle and how on earth did the allies even think of attacking it - the monastry is perched upon a sheer mountain - almost impossible to approach, let alone attack. From memory it finally fell when the sledgehammer tactics were replaced by stealth and good quality infantry infiltrated the german lines. I would recommend anybody to go there - it is truely a moving place.