 |
|
Lord Merciless
|
|
I agree that Somme is the largest battle ever fought, in terms of manpowers involved. On the first day of the artillery bombardement, the British army used more artillery shells than their total prewar inventory.
On the first day of the infantry assault (7 days after the initial artillery bombardement), the British suffered 60,000 casuaties, of which 20,000 were killed.
At the end of the 4 months long Battle of Somme, the Entente lost 650,000 men, while the Germans lost 450,000.
As a comparison, the total number of combatants at Gettysburg was around 200,000.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lord Merciless
|
|
But I think Verdun might have seen the most number of combatants. This battle lasted from February 1916 until almost October, and more than 2/3 (!) of the French army had served in Verdun through a rotational system. In the end, the British Somme offensive and the Russian Brusilov offensive relieved the French.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lord Merciless
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by notyoueither
Beaten to the punch.
Unfortunately, it also broke their will. The German's very nearly gained their goal, Pyrrhic though it would have been. |
That also reflected in their 'dreaded' Maginot Line.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lord Merciless
|
|
The largest tank war was actually the Gulf War 1, with 4000 allied tanks facing 3000 Iraqi tanks. In the Operation Zitadelle, the German side had only about 2000 tanks at the start of the offensive, the Russian side had even less. Also, there were far more APC, IFV, SP Artilleries, and other motorized vehicles involved in Gulf War 1.
The honor of the largest single tank engagement happened indeed during the Operation Zitadelle, at Prokhorovka on July 12 1943, where 1000 tanks from sides collided near that tiny village...
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Drogue
|
 |
Omnipresent conscience
Oct 2002
time: 05:27
|
|
Depends on what you mean by largest. In terms of casualties, it would have to be Stalingrad, in terms of overall impact on the world, I'd say the Somme. However, since a battle is fought in one place, I think the 'largest' might not be the right phrase. If it is, maybe the Battle of Britain. That was over much or England, and parts of France/Germany.
quote:
Originally posted by Boshko
What about the biggest battle in Asia?
I can't think of anything that beats the fighting around Shanghai in August of 1937. About 250K Chinese casualties and 40K Japanese if you add in the civilian casualties and strech for the Rape on Nanjiang its definately up there.
Also Verdun and Somme shouldn't really count, a battle that last most of the year is a series of battles.... |
Yes, but I think battles can last any length of time, but are continuous in one particular location. I could be wrong though 
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lord Merciless
|
|
The biggest battles in Asia occured between forces of Chinese Communists and Nationalists. The "Battle of Huai-Hai" saw the destruction of several Nationalist armies with up to 600,000 men.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lord Merciless
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by korn469
i wonder which single battle involved the largest percentage of the entire's world population since 1492
see if you history people can find that one out |
Somme is still the winner. Assuming a KIA rate of 20% (very high already), a total of 4.5 million men would have participated. Given the population to be around 2 billion in 1916, it means 0.225% of the world population had fought in this battle.
|
|
| |
All times are GMT. The time now is 05:27.
Apolyton Time is 00:27. |
top of page
|
| archivepost |
|
Forum Rules:
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
|
HTML code is ON
vB code is ON
Smilies are ON
[IMG] code is ON
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-04-2003 10:57
|