doc mcb | 22 Jan 2015 4:09 p.m. PST |
I am not speaking of battles in which weather affected the outcome -- there must be hundreds of examples of THAT -- but battles where a commander DELIBERATELY planned to use a weather effect as a weapon -- and it worked! I can think of two: At the river Trebia, in wintery conditions, Hannibal ensured that his troops stayed warm right up until time to fight, and provoked the Romans to cross the river and then fight wet as well as cold. At lake Trasimene, Livy notes that the lake district was well known for fog, and Hannibal made his dispositions accordingly in setting up an ambush. Hannibal's goal, in both cases, was to prevent (at Lake Trasimene) or render moot (at Trebia) the manipular shuffle replacing tired troops with fresh. At Lake Tras there was no room, and at Trebia the whole Roman army was exhausted by their exposure. Can folks think of other battles in which a general used weather offensively and deliberately? |
Sundance | 22 Jan 2015 5:18 p.m. PST |
The Russians against both Napoleon and Hitler. They knew the effects of winter better than either of their invaders. |
FABET01 | 22 Jan 2015 5:22 p.m. PST |
Supposedly the German's launched the Bulge offensive at a time to take advantage of the bad weather grounding allied aircraft. |
ochoin | 22 Jan 2015 5:30 p.m. PST |
I'm thinking Moses. Raining blood, freak parting of the waves….he had it down pat but did have some 'inside help'.
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doc mcb | 22 Jan 2015 6:25 p.m. PST |
Yeah. But I'm thinking a little smaller scale . . . . |
Temporary like Achilles | 22 Jan 2015 9:25 p.m. PST |
Scipio used a tidal phenomenon in taking Carthago Nova if that counts. Caesar also used the wind (or lack of it) in the sea battle against the Veniti, but that was probably luck rather than planning, but with Caesar you never quite know ;-) |
advocate | 23 Jan 2015 3:24 a.m. PST |
The Yorkists at Towton. With the wind (and snow) behind them, they shot a single volley of arrows that just reached the Lancastrians. The lancastrian bowmen returned the complement, emptying their quivers, to no effect. The Yokists collected the arrows and commenced a fire that the Lancastrians had to attack though. |
MajorB | 23 Jan 2015 4:49 a.m. PST |
The Yorkists at 2nd St Albans. Due to the rainy weather, they posted archers inside the buildings in the town. With their bowstrings dry they were easily able to repulse the first Lanacastrian attack. |
David SCWG | 23 Jan 2015 5:39 a.m. PST |
Austerlitz. Napoleon has help from the early morning mist to hide his attacking troops. |
ColCampbell | 23 Jan 2015 8:57 a.m. PST |
The D-Day landings at Normandy were planned at low tide so the German beach defenses would be exposed. The Germans had thought the Allies would land at high tide so as to reduce the time spent crossing the beach. Jim |
Great War Ace | 23 Jan 2015 10:21 a.m. PST |
Saladin at Hattin, used the known heat of high summer to exhaust the Crusaders, and even added to it by lighting brush fires up wind from their camp, thus adding to their misery of thirst with smoky air to breathe…. |
Great War Ace | 23 Jan 2015 10:23 a.m. PST |
Funny, how many non Acmed posts are included here…. |
Mako11 | 23 Jan 2015 1:04 p.m. PST |
It wasn't really planned at D-Day, but when the weather got bad, and then improved just a little, we landed, catching the Germans by surprise, since I suspect they didn't think that would occur in those conditions. Also, during the Battle of the Bulge, Hitler counted on predicted bad weather and overcast for the first week or so, to neutralize Allied airpower. That worked quite well, for a fairly long period of time. |
Apache 6 | 23 May 2017 1:29 p.m. PST |
The Chinese commitment to operations in South Korea, which caught the UN forces by surprise was done at the beginning of a period of expected sever weather which offset the UN airpower considerably. Since that was seasoned veteran commanders, I'm fairly certain that was by intent rather then coincidence. |
Great War Ace | 23 May 2017 3:51 p.m. PST |
Necromancy! Another ancmed one: Nevsky used the ice by making the Teutonic Knights attack across it. Of course, how could he know it would break as the crusaders withdrew back across the lake? Still, it worked out that way. |
Deuce03 | 24 May 2017 10:18 a.m. PST |
Towton was mentioned, but it struck me earlier that the Wars of the Roses seem to have had a disproportionate number of battles with unusual weather effects (often decisive in the battle itself): the triple helis at Mortimer's Cross, the fog at Barnet*, the snowstorm at Towton. Even at Second St. Albans the damp weather played an important role. *admittedly, this was not entirely natural. This might also count as "generals planning to take advantage of weather" – Edward deliberately advanced into the fog in early morning hoping that it would hinder the Lancastrian deployment. |
Thomas Thomas | 24 May 2017 1:32 p.m. PST |
Weather is largely luck – it almost worked against Edward at Barnet – though in the medieval mind it was not luck as they attributed the fog that witch/fairy Elizabeth Woodville. Snow storm at Towton may be legend – it was fought on Palm Sunday in April. Snowstorm story appears only in late "sources" (I believe Hall first mentions it). TomT |
Swampster | 25 May 2017 8:58 a.m. PST |
You may be right that the snow is a later addition but the date certainly wouldn't preclude it – snow around Easter isn't uncommon in the UK, even in the last week of March as with Towton. This year, the same area had snow which settled in late March. |