User blog:123chaseyoung/T.E. Lawrence vs Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck

T.E. Lawrence: British commando who united the Arab tribes in a revolt to ovethrow their Ottoman oppressors

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Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck: German cavalier who took a ragtag battalion of Africans against the thriple might of Britsh, Belgian and Portuguese armies.

It's a legendary fight to the death between two of World War I's greatest military commanders! Who waged guerilla war to annihalate their hated enemies!

Who is dealiest!?

T.E. Lawrence
Born on August 16, 1888, Thomas Edward (T.E.) Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia, was a British Army officer renowned especially for his liaison work during the Arab Revolt against Ottoman Turkish rule between 1916 and 1918. Lawrence studied history at Jesus College, graduating with First Class Honours and became a practicing archaeologist in the Middle East.Following the outbreak of World War I, he was co-opted by the British military to conduct a military survey of the Negev Desert.

During the war, Lawrence fought alongside Arab irregular troops under the command of Emir Faisal, a son of Sharif Hussein of Mecca, in extended guerrilla operations against the armed forces of the Ottoman Empire. Lawrence obtained assistance from the Royal Navy to turn back an Ottoman attack on Yanbu in December 1916. Lawrence's major contribution to the revolt was convincing the Arab leaders (Faisal and Abdullah) to co-ordinate their actions in support of British strategy. He persuaded the Arabs not to make a frontal assault on the Ottoman stronghold in Medina but to allow the Turkish army to tie up troops in the city garrison. The Arabs were then free to direct most of their attention to the Turks' weak point, the Hejaz railway that supplied the garrison. This vastly expanded the battlefield and tied up even more Ottoman troops, who were then forced to protect the railway and repair the constant damage. Lawrence developed a close relationship with Faisal, whose Arab Northern Army was to become the main beneficiary of British aid.

Lawrence was famous for his use of guerilla style warfare dubbed by historians as the "Phantom army", which was done by harassing and bombing key enemy posts such as trains, in an effort to divert enemy battalions to a different position, and launch an attack on the true objective. Lawrence applied this tactic at the Battle of Aqaba. Against a larger and more trained professional Turkish army, Lawrence used several raids on the train routes north of the position to trick the Turks into thinking he was going to attack Damascus. The Turks took the bait by launching a pursuit against the Bedouin raiders which left only a battalion to defend Aqaba and allowed Lawrence to take the strategic port city after a successful attack.

Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck
Paul Emil von Lettow-Vorbeck (20 March 1870 – 9 March 1964) was a general in the Imperial German Army and the commander of its forces in the German East Africa campaign. For four years, with a force that never exceeded about 14,000 (3,000 Germans and 11,000 Africans), he held in check a much larger force of 300,000 British, Belgian, and Portuguese troops. Essentially undefeated in the field, Lettow-Vorbeck was the only German commander to successfully invade imperial British soil during the First World War. His exploits in the campaign have been described by Edwin Palmer Hoyt "as the greatest single guerrilla operation in history, and the most successful."

Lettow-Vorbeck's plan for the war was quite simple: knowing that East Africa would only be a sideshow to the other theatres of war, he determined to tie down as many British troops as he could. He intended to keep them away from the Western Front, and in this way to contribute to Germany's eventual victory. In August 1914, during the early phases of the First World War, Lettow-Vorbeck was the commander of a small military garrison of just 2,600 German nationals and 2,472 African soldiers in fourteen Askari field companies.

His most prized tactic, is divert and attacking his enemies. During the Battle of Tanga, Vorbeck came upon a British force eight times his battalion's size. Knowing that attacking head on was suicide, Vorbeck instead orders his troops on a retreat to the jungle. The British forces chased him, but unknown to them, Vorbeck has already divides his troops to envelop the British, who are now trapped inside the jungle. Vorbeck manages to push the British out and put huge numbers of casualties.

X-Factors
Experience:

Lawrence: 76, Vorbeck: 87

Vorbeck had a colorful military career, ranging from the Boxer War to the Great War. Vorbeck fought more wars and more battles than the Britishman. During the War, Lawrence had a difficult time trying to get an assignment, and he spent much of his time being a deskman before his Arabian adventures.

Training:

Lawrence: 80, Vorbeck: 78

Both men are highly trained cavalry and army men, but Larence outshines Vorbeck due to branching out into tanks and the air force.

Leadership:

Lawrence: 89, Vorbeck: 79

This is where Lawrence upstages Vorbeck. His crowning moment of awesome was his will to unite the arab tribes and lead them into a revolution against the powerful Ottoman Empire. Vorbeck is a repsected commander, but nowhere near Lawrence's achievement.