Favorite historical fails.

[Kellerb]

oh dont worry, putting hitler in charge will be fine.

 

[megalomania]

Battle of Agincourt - 6,000 Englishmen against 20-30,000 French. Outcome? 10,000 dead Frenchmen and 5,900 laughing Englishmen.

'Twas all thanks to the Welsh archers.

Fair point. Welsh & English. Although it does say 'English' on wiki, I have doubts about this. I'm sure it was probably a mix - I'm pretty sure they didn't only recruit archers from Wales!

No, it's just that the English stole the Welsh long bow from the Welsh and used it as their special weapon.

It's not a computer game - self bows were common to most of Europe, England and Wales shared the same forest resources.

Following the English conquest of Wales (during which Welsh bowmen caused heavy casualties to the invaders), the English increasingly used longbowmen (including Welsh longbowmen) in their armies. This reached its peak during the Hundred Years' War, where the English use of massed longbows was effective against the French, particularly at the start of the war in the battles of Crecy (1346) and Poitiers (1356), and most famously at the Battle of Agincourt (1415).

The longbow was pretty exclusively a British thing actually; its made from Yew trees, which aren't especially rare but are a northern europe thing, the other reason people didn't use it is because the average draw of the 6.6ft bows was about 90 pounds, versus 60 for a smaller bow (geeks of the world, go and try to draw 90lbs on your chest expanders!). Not many archers had the strength to draw them; the brits did since they were born and raised with them!

 

[HerrBobo]

Mussolini is my favourite historical fail.

Even more than Hitler or Stalin?
Or maybe you're talking about the circumstances of his death, in wich case he is the embodyment of fail.

Eh, how did Stalin fail?

I don't know, doesn't being one of the worst criminal scum of the 20th century qualify as "Fail"?

Ah. Sorry, I thought you ment he lost a war or something.

@ Aedwynn. You make a fair point. However, once he recoverd form the intial shock of invasion Stalin proved himself to be fairly good, if ruthless leader. Then again he had to be ruthless, he was fighting for the life of Mother Russia. It is well documented that Stalin's decision to remain in Moscow in 1941 helped strengthen the reslove of the Red Army which in turned helped gring the German advance to a halt. He may have got off to a shakey start, but Stalian won the ground war in Europe and defeated the best army in doing so. Stalin FTW!

 

[Amethyst Wind]

Communism's some pretty epic fail.

 

[F17]

I remember reading in a New Zealand history textbook one time (I was taking the class) that the local Maori traded 10,000 acres of land for 36 hatchets. Sweet deal there, guys. They don't even get casinos out of it, either.

 

[Inverse Skies]

I quite like the recent pre-mix drink tax here in Australia, it came straight in without warning, was rejected by the senate 8 months later and now the federal government has to repay all the money they raked in from it. Oh how sad.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Napoleons invasion of Russia.

Silly Napoleon, you can't defeat winter.

 

[hazakura]

Maginot line, Ah, the greatest French failure of World War 2.

 

[Christemo]

Operation Valkyrie. if it wasnt for some gnat that moved the bag of explosives to the other side of the table, hiroshima would still exist.

and in all bush speakings where he fails.

 

[Hunde Des Krieg]

Every Invasion of Russia.
Every Invasion of Afghanistan.
Bay of Pigs.
The Third Riech.
The Soviet Union.
Custer's Last Stand.
G.H.W.B.
The list goes on...

 

[TheDean]

Mussolini is my favourite historical fail.

Even more than Hitler or Stalin?
Or maybe you're talking about the circumstances of his death, in wich case he is the embodyment of fail.

His death indeed was fail.
Thing is Hitler and stalin were good at what they did. Mussolini was not. Everything he did failed spectacularly.

 

[The Infamous Scamola]

Mussolini is my favourite historical fail.

Even more than Hitler or Stalin?
Or maybe you're talking about the circumstances of his death, in wich case he is the embodyment of fail.

His death indeed was fail.
Thing is Hitler and stalin were good at what they did. Mussolini was not. Everything he did failed spectacularly.

He did make the trains run on time.

 

[The Legendary Phoenix]

Hitler...nuf said.

 

[TheDean]

Mussolini is my favourite historical fail.

Even more than Hitler or Stalin?
Or maybe you're talking about the circumstances of his death, in wich case he is the embodyment of fail.

His death indeed was fail.
Thing is Hitler and stalin were good at what they did. Mussolini was not. Everything he did failed spectacularly.

He did make the trains run on time.

lololol. WEll, that's true. If only that had been of some use during the wr.

 

[The Infamous Scamola]

Mussolini is my favourite historical fail.

Even more than Hitler or Stalin?
Or maybe you're talking about the circumstances of his death, in wich case he is the embodyment of fail.

His death indeed was fail.
Thing is Hitler and stalin were good at what they did. Mussolini was not. Everything he did failed spectacularly.

He did make the trains run on time.

lololol. WEll, that's true. If only that had been of some use during the wr.

I'm glad the guy was a fail, otherwise history might have turned out a lot different.

 

[TheDean]

Mussolini is my favourite historical fail.

Even more than Hitler or Stalin?
Or maybe you're talking about the circumstances of his death, in wich case he is the embodyment of fail.

His death indeed was fail.
Thing is Hitler and stalin were good at what they did. Mussolini was not. Everything he did failed spectacularly.

He did make the trains run on time.

lololol. WEll, that's true. If only that had been of some use during the wr.

I'm glad the guy was a fail, otherwise history might have turned out a lot different.

That's true. It just amuses me that he was the worst dictator of all time. he got fired.

 

[Gestapo Hunter]

Flat Earth Society. And people thought i was crazy lol...oh wait...