10 Most Violent Battles in History
The Battle of Cannae
Top 10 Longest Battles in Human History
The Second Punic Wars For nearly two thousand years, the Battle of Cannae from the Punic Wars has fascinated historians. In 216 BC, the Roman military was the European master of war. Yet, Carthage’s Hannibal effected one of the most complete defeats in military history upon Rome’s legions. Outnumbered, Hannibal used a pincer movement to envelope 86,000 Roman legionnaires and absolutely massacred them. Only 14,000 escaped, the rest killed or captured. The battle created shockwaves throughout the Roman empire. Fearing disfavor with the gods, the Romans resorted to human sacrifice. Thanks to this and other defeats, Rome had lost one out of every five males of military age. It took another 14 years of bitter fighting for the Romans to ultimately defeat Hannibal.
The Battle of Okinawa (AKA “Operation Iceberg”)
Top 10 Bloodiest Battles in American History
World War II Survivors of the Battle of Okinawa called it ‘the typhoon of steel.’ In April, 1945, the Allies successfully launched the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific during the Second World War, but at great cost. At the end of the 82-day battle, between 84,166–117,000 Imperial soldiers were killed, and 50,000 on the Allied side. What also sets this fight apart, however, was the toll on the civilian population. In the years following the war, more and more reports came out about the indiscriminate killing of indigenous Okinawans, committed by both sides. The Japanese convinced many to take their own lives by claiming that the Americans would do worse. Some estimates have the island losing half of its pre-war population of 300,000.
The Siege of Leningrad
Top 20 Battles That Changed History
World War II The Siege of Leningrad lasted for 872 miserable, blood-soaked days - from September 8, 1941 to January 27, 1944. The city’s capture was one of the prime objectives of the Nazi’s Operation Barbarossa. Hitler wanted to destroy the city and give the land to his allies, the Finns. They looted and razed cultural landmarks and buildings. However, fierce resistance stopped the Axis forces in their tracks. Unfortunately, while the Soviets managed to resupply where they could, starvation ran rampant. Many modern scholars consider the siege a genocide. Over a million soldiers were killed, and over a million civilians.
The Battle of the Somme
Top 10 Battles That Ended Historical Wars
World War I This battle is still remembered bitterly to this day. A combined force of British and French soldiers intended to achieve a swift and decisive victory over the Germans in France in the summer of 1916. They bombarded the German position for a week with artillery. Thinking the enemy softened, they launched a frontal attack. But the Germans were still comfortably entrenched. In a single day, 20,000 British soldiers were killed and twice that wounded. For 141 days, both sides slugged it out in the mud, blood, and trenches. By the time that weather necessitated a pause in military operations, little ground had been gained, and one million men were dead. The Somme is remembered for its futility and massive loss of life.
The Battle of Stalingrad
Top 10 Bloodiest Medieval Battles in History
World War II The Battle of Stalingrad was the turning point on the Eastern Front. From August 23, 1942 to February 2, 1943, a combined force of Germans, Italians, Romanians, and Croatians fought desperately to seize the city. Stalingrad had strategic significance as an industrial and transport hub, but the stakes were also ideological, given the city’s importance to its namesake, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. The battle was fought street by street, sometimes even hand-to-hand. Germany's inability to resupply so deep in enemy territory proved too much. In February of 1943, the German 6th Army surrendered. The casualties were enormous - roughly 1.1 million on the Soviet side and 800,000 on the Axis side. The ground was littered with corpses and decimated German war machines.
Operation Ichi-Go
Second Sino-Japanese War Operation Ichi-Go was a major campaign in both the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Pacific Theater of World War II. An army of half a million Japanese invaded southeast China. Japan had several goals: they wanted to destroy air bases being used by Ameriocan bombers, topple the Chinese government, and avoid American submarines in the South China Sea. They were successful on all counts, pushing viciously for eight straight months from April 19 to December 31, 1944. Still, it was something of a Pyrrhic victory: Prime Minister Tojo resigned in disgrace due to military setbacks; U.S. military capabilities weren’t hindered; and Communist Chinese guerillas coalesced power. The Chinese suffered half a million casualties while the Japanese lost 100,000 men and large quantities of materiel.
The Battle of Berlin
Top 10 Smartest Military Operations in History
World War II After a long and costly war, Joseph Stalin wreaked bloody vengeance on Germany in April of 1945. The Red Army brought 2.5 million Russian and Polish soldiers to bear against the remnants of the Wehrmacht. The German defense forces - supplemented by police and Hitler Youth - numbered approximately 750,000. For two weeks, the Soviets rained destruction on Berlin as they surrounded the city. Street-to-street and house-to-house combat lasted for days. The entire defense force was captured, wounded, or killed. Hitler destroyed some of the city’s infrastructure and food supply before perishing. 22,000 civilians were killed as their city was torn to pieces.
The Battle of the Dnieper
Top 10 Famous Sieges in History
World War II The Battle of the Dnieper was one of the most massive military operations of World War II. The front was 870 miles long, with almost four million troops involved in combat. Over four months from August 26 to December 23, 1943, the Red Army bitterly clashed with the Wehrmacht and Romanian forces. At stake were control over the east bank of the Dnieper River and the Eastern Front. Both sides launched attacks and counterattacks by air, land, and on makeshift rafts. After losing 372,000 soldiers to death, injuries, disease, desertion, or capture, the Germans retreated. The Soviet casualties, even in victory, were staggering: 2.2 million wounded or sick, and 760,000 killed or missing.
The Brusilov Offensive (AKA the June Advance)
10 Surprise Attacks That Changed History
World War I In March 1916, Russia suffered a disastrous defeat during the Lake Naroch offensive against the Germans. General Alexei Brusilov wanted to turn that around. Desperate for a victory, the general begged his superiors to let him lead an attack. In June, Brusilov took 61 divisions - 1.7 million men - to present-day Ukraine. He waged a bloody three-month campaign against a combined force of Germans, Austro-Hungarians, and Ottomans. The enemy was not prepared for a well-conceived attack, and suffered terribly. The Russians eventually ran out of steam, but succeeded in loosening Germany’s grip in the west. At the end of the battle, the total casualties were somewhere between 1.2 and 1.9 million. The Russian army and Austro-Hungarians were effectively crippled for the rest of the war.
The Siege of Baghdad
10 Worst Prisons in History
Mongol Invasions In 1258, the Abbasid Caliphate was at the height of its Golden Age. It ended when Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis, laid siege to their capital, Baghdad, from January 29 to February 10. The caliph, unimpressed by the horde of over 100,000, dared the Khan to do his worst. Hulagu obliged. The Mongols pummeled the walls with catapults and conquered some of the defenses. The caliph tried to negotiate, but Khan murdered 3,000 envoys. The next week was one of the most violent in human history. The Mongols slaughtered hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children. Accounts claim that the Tigris ran black with the ink of destroyed knowledge and red with blood. The numbers are debated, but historians believe the Mongols killed between 250,000 to two million people!
