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Well duh, the article in question does not claim that Guderian did anything of the sort, in fact his name does not appear once in the article. IIRC the term was actually a British invention. The key to the article appears in this statement:
Somehow I doubt that the use of tanks was included in vernichtungsgedanken.
The current name is unpronoucable and not understandable in English. Unless it is the common name in the military science English books, I propose to move this article to 'annihilation thoughts doctrine' or at least to 'Vernichtungsgedanken military doctrine' (or something similar). -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 09:24, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The concept was of course that of the Vernichtungsgedanke, the "concept of annihilation". So it is singular, not plural!-- MWAK 08:57, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
I think the idea of annihilation in (particularly German) military theory merits an article. At the same time, it might be best to be quite rigorous about the extent to which it was an explicitly stated, prevalent military doctrine. That is to say, the "excellence" of Cannae was long recognized; the battles of Frederick the Great were often bold and aggressive and, particularly at Rossbach and Leuthen, really crushing. Clausewitz and the "Clausewitzian" military ideas were a natural fit with the idea of annihilation tactics.
But, at any of these times: the era after 216 BC, the era of Frederick, the period in which Clausewitzian military theory became popular (surely more meaningfully after 1862 rather than 1832-1862?) can we really argue that this idea of annihilation was at all as explicit as it was after Moltke and Schlieffen? IMO, an article like this should at least strive to describe how an idea was popularized and adopted by significant numbers of people, in specific places and times. We certainly know that constant reference to Cannae and annihilation aims were ubiquitous after Schlieffen, with his staff-studied on Cannae around the turn of the century. We know that Hans Delbrück was deriving a lot of diachronic ideas about war from classical warfare at around the same time - but he's a different sort of figure than Schlieffen. I'm unclear of the extent to which Moltke had -talked- about annihilation as an aim, but obviously Sedan and Metz both resulted in 100% casualties for the opponent, inclusive of prisoners captured.
Do we look further in the past than Moltke? Between Clausewitz and Moltke, is the idea of annihilation present in the same form, or just implicit? An even bigger question, to my mind, is looking farther in the past than Clausewitz. Frederick (or for that matter Napoleon) clearly aimed for extremely decisive results, and on occasion achieved them. But even lopsided results like Rossbach and Leuthen were strictly victories of 'destruction' rather than 'annihilation' if one defines the latter strictly as one in which the entire opposing force is taken prisoner or otherwise made casualties.
So here's one theory: "The idea of annihilation became prevalent in Prussian-German military thought after the victories against Austria and France in 1866 and 1870. It offered a framework for understanding these decisive victories in terms of an eternal military ideal - 'Clausewitz' through the lens of 'Cannae.'" It'd then try to specifically date when this idea became A Really Big Idea that everyone in the Prussian military elite would have been familiar with: I'm not sure if this is a Moltke thing, a post-Moltke thing, a Delbrück thing, or an Alfred von Schlieffen thing - but my sense is that the timing is somewhere in that 1870-1910 period.
The victories of Frederick, the disaster at Jena, and Clausewitz are all meaningful in understanding how the idea was framed in the Prussian-German context, but the Moltke-Schlieffen impetus provided the idea of "encirclement" and "100% casualties," which to my mind are the two defining characteristics of Vernichtungsgedanke as opposed to, I dunno, some alternative "Zerstörungsgedanke" that would have combined a Clausewitzian emphasis on neutralizing the enemy with the idea of "great decisiveness" rather than that of "complete military neutralization through death or captivity." 99.192.48.185 ( talk) 16:41, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
This article is rated Stub-class on Wikipedia's
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Well duh, the article in question does not claim that Guderian did anything of the sort, in fact his name does not appear once in the article. IIRC the term was actually a British invention. The key to the article appears in this statement:
Somehow I doubt that the use of tanks was included in vernichtungsgedanken.
The current name is unpronoucable and not understandable in English. Unless it is the common name in the military science English books, I propose to move this article to 'annihilation thoughts doctrine' or at least to 'Vernichtungsgedanken military doctrine' (or something similar). -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 09:24, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The concept was of course that of the Vernichtungsgedanke, the "concept of annihilation". So it is singular, not plural!-- MWAK 08:57, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
I think the idea of annihilation in (particularly German) military theory merits an article. At the same time, it might be best to be quite rigorous about the extent to which it was an explicitly stated, prevalent military doctrine. That is to say, the "excellence" of Cannae was long recognized; the battles of Frederick the Great were often bold and aggressive and, particularly at Rossbach and Leuthen, really crushing. Clausewitz and the "Clausewitzian" military ideas were a natural fit with the idea of annihilation tactics.
But, at any of these times: the era after 216 BC, the era of Frederick, the period in which Clausewitzian military theory became popular (surely more meaningfully after 1862 rather than 1832-1862?) can we really argue that this idea of annihilation was at all as explicit as it was after Moltke and Schlieffen? IMO, an article like this should at least strive to describe how an idea was popularized and adopted by significant numbers of people, in specific places and times. We certainly know that constant reference to Cannae and annihilation aims were ubiquitous after Schlieffen, with his staff-studied on Cannae around the turn of the century. We know that Hans Delbrück was deriving a lot of diachronic ideas about war from classical warfare at around the same time - but he's a different sort of figure than Schlieffen. I'm unclear of the extent to which Moltke had -talked- about annihilation as an aim, but obviously Sedan and Metz both resulted in 100% casualties for the opponent, inclusive of prisoners captured.
Do we look further in the past than Moltke? Between Clausewitz and Moltke, is the idea of annihilation present in the same form, or just implicit? An even bigger question, to my mind, is looking farther in the past than Clausewitz. Frederick (or for that matter Napoleon) clearly aimed for extremely decisive results, and on occasion achieved them. But even lopsided results like Rossbach and Leuthen were strictly victories of 'destruction' rather than 'annihilation' if one defines the latter strictly as one in which the entire opposing force is taken prisoner or otherwise made casualties.
So here's one theory: "The idea of annihilation became prevalent in Prussian-German military thought after the victories against Austria and France in 1866 and 1870. It offered a framework for understanding these decisive victories in terms of an eternal military ideal - 'Clausewitz' through the lens of 'Cannae.'" It'd then try to specifically date when this idea became A Really Big Idea that everyone in the Prussian military elite would have been familiar with: I'm not sure if this is a Moltke thing, a post-Moltke thing, a Delbrück thing, or an Alfred von Schlieffen thing - but my sense is that the timing is somewhere in that 1870-1910 period.
The victories of Frederick, the disaster at Jena, and Clausewitz are all meaningful in understanding how the idea was framed in the Prussian-German context, but the Moltke-Schlieffen impetus provided the idea of "encirclement" and "100% casualties," which to my mind are the two defining characteristics of Vernichtungsgedanke as opposed to, I dunno, some alternative "Zerstörungsgedanke" that would have combined a Clausewitzian emphasis on neutralizing the enemy with the idea of "great decisiveness" rather than that of "complete military neutralization through death or captivity." 99.192.48.185 ( talk) 16:41, 26 July 2009 (UTC)