We've had best, worst, underrated, and favorite...all the good ones are taken, so heres one of mine. Monty is the first to come to mind, but McArthur and Patton qualify too. Any thoughts?

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"If your gonna buy the angel s**t, you might as well go for the zombie package as well."
-George Carlin

Mark Clark !!

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Isn't this just one of the symptoms of High Command? Can you become a senior commanding officer without a teflon ego? I suppose it is a sliding scale from the self-effacing to the outrageously ego-maniacal. MacArthur I don't think qualifies fully until after his stint occupying Japan.

Patton and Montgomery have to take joint prize, although their ego sprang from different sources. Monty in particular was emotionally repressed and naturally shy, seems to have created this shell around himself. I don't know enough about Patton to have any thoughts as to where his personality went wrong.

Jumbo

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"Capital! We're nearly out of ammunition! Now we can get at them with the bayonet!" General Paddy Gough, 1st Sikh War

Hermann Goring tops my list. Wearing rouge and perfume, painted nails and different uniforms (costumes) for every occasion. Hmmmmm. Can't beat that.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

Good topic idea!

Right off the bat, I'd have to say Monty would be the obvious choice. But PzJgr has a good point- Goering was a real jackass, with a real big ego. At least Monty had some success here and there. Did Goering ever really accomplish anything other than his ego?!?!

[ 13 August 2002, 12:51 PM: Message edited by: CrazyD88 ]

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Seriously, all today is missing is free cotton candy and the annual Bay State Hooker Parade to make it any better.

I think Goering was doing alright with the luftwaffe until the Battle of Britain, but he was definitely strange. I read somewhere he carried a bullwhip around with him...

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"If your gonna buy the angel s**t, you might as well go for the zombie package as well."
-George Carlin

I dont beleive Macarthur was egotisical at all, he knew how to get the job done and how to rehabilitate japan. Monty was the most egotistical.

"Patton will not take Messina, that is reserved for the British Eighth army and me !"

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Macarthur not egotistical?

I think Truman would disagree with you. I got the impression from Korea that his almost god-like status in Japan had gone to his head. There is the famous film of him walking Syngham Rhee arm in arm through the South Korean Parliament to "install" him back in office. It's quite odd..

As for Monty he too had let things go to his head by Sicily, but he was always an odd fish even before the outbreak of war.

Goering seems to have started to go wrong when the war broke out. His ruthlessness and ability to ignore facts were fine for a politician but bad news for a service commander.

Who was the German General that Guderian nearly fought a duel with?

Jumbo

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"Capital! We're nearly out of ammunition! Now we can get at them with the bayonet!" General Paddy Gough, 1st Sikh War

Lots of good choices guys. I´m sure they all were full of themselves. Anyway, after having read about Theodore Eicke, I´ll go for him.

Some weird stories:

One man from totenkopf wanted to go away. Eicke said " You can go ". he sent the man to a concentration camp for no SS man wants to leave the troops!

Wherever Totenkopf stayed Eicke made sure there were bordels to keep the men happy. yet he had ordered the doctors to tell him of any man who had a venereal disease! That man would be sent to...a concentration camp!

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I think Goring, MacArthur and Monty share the prize equally.......

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Lost are only those, who abandon themselves) Hans-Ulrich Rudel.

Monty, definately. McArthur and Patton. Nice choices all!

And PzJgr, I was just first reading this thread and I thought inmediately about Hermann Göring. And then BANG! you beat me! Indeed, he was a man with an enormous and unjustified ego. He did achieve quite good stuff, coordinating other genious like Udet and Milch to build the Luftwaffe and then took them to the victories of France, Poland and let's say the USSR in some way. But after that, he started believing his own lies and ruined all...

I can think a bit on several others who had an ego (as we all have) but do not qualify as enormously egotistical.

But I can think an example of a general without ego, very humble. Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von Runstedt, who was the eldest and most experienced officer in the entire Wehrmacht. He was a field marshal in 1940 and in WWII never leaded anything below an Army Group. However, he rarely wore his medals (quite a lot). He never wore the field marshal's golden cap nor the fancy batton given by Hitler. He rarely wore the general and field marshal's collar tabs nor his shoulder boards. If you were a soldier in the field and saw him you would have believed he was a very old captain...

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Fat "Iron man" Goering was the only one who came to mind. But I believe he had a close follower in Hugo Sperrle.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

Yes, he is another who liked fancy uniforms, caocktails, hunting and all kinds of luxuries. But even so, he was not as egotistical as his chief.

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Definitely Fat Herman for No 1 egotist. Not only did he have the prettiest uniforms for every occasion, he made sure his personal guard also had the best quality as well. Even in the end.

Did you know he had a different pair of kid leather gloves for every occasion ?

And he had his "hunting lodge" rebuilt with marble floors and walls that had to be kept clean every day even when he wasn't around. Just in case.

I agree though that Gerd von Rundstedt would definitely be the least egotistical. Even when things were hard he always had a joke. When his son was his Ia in Normandy, one day during a bombing raid he ordered his father into the bomb shelter (he sometimes used to go for walks while the raids were on), and after the raid had passed he politely asked "son, can I come out now??"

Definitely my favourite German General.

Hitler once said about Hugo Sperrle: "He is one of my two ugliest looking Generals". I have to agree with Der Fuhrer on that one, Sperrle sure wasnt a poster boy for Irish Spring soap.

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Lost are only those, who abandon themselves) Hans-Ulrich Rudel.

( Have to agree with you there, Carl. Whenever I see Sperrle's photo, it looks like someone auditioning for a part in the movie 'Where Eagles Dare' )

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Carl, and who was the other ugly general?

Most of them were old men. How could they be handsome? Well, Rommel does not qualify here. Beside, did you know that "People" magazine made some research to find out who had been the 100 best dressed people of the XX century and the name Rommel appeared? I agree with that also.

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Was Rommel really one of the 100 best dressed people of the century?

Cool if he was!

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"If your gonna buy the angel s**t, you might as well go for the zombie package as well."
-George Carlin

Sperrle's nickname was "The Monocled Elephant"

Jumbo

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"Capital! We're nearly out of ammunition! Now we can get at them with the bayonet!" General Paddy Gough, 1st Sikh War

Thanks for the agreement...

Also, as for the second most sinister or UGLY looking General--I dont know if Hitler actually had another choice but, I would bet to believe that he would probably choose someone like Eicke or Sepp Dietrich. Both were VERY sinister looking.

As for best dressed Generals--heh heh heh, certainly Gotthard Heinrici couldnt compete. he liked wearing his uniforms till they started to frazzel.

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Lost are only those, who abandon themselves) Hans-Ulrich Rudel.

Well, agree on Gotthard Heinrici.

I think Fedor von Bock was also an "extremely elegant man" in my Opa's words. And I don't think that the best would fit here; Gerd von Runstedt never wore his uniforms correctly... But still...

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

This certainly deserves to be within the best dressed and OK, let's say good looking:

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Now THATS a well dressed GFM... Pour leMerite as a Leutnant, and RKT in ww2.