Ethnicity as a factor in military success

Lord Oda Nobunaga · Sep 28, 2018

arkteia said:
those ancient people who you consider Germanic and Slavic and Bactrian were probably ethnically as mixed as we are now...

Also, even the biologists who are studying the activity of MAO-A in the brain in respect to "warrior" traits, are off-mark, but at least it is newer...and you are chewing theories from 1940es...

No this isn't the least bit true and is easy to disprove using Haplogroups. Minority cases of interbreeding do not account for the entire group. Even in Germany where you have Slavic and Germanic influence in some cases, you would find that the majority of DNA is Germanic not only on a community level but also for an individual.

The second bit, this is still being studied and it never stopped. Associating it to Nazism doesn't make that any less true.

Gvelion said:
Georgians ? Do you know how many battles we lost and conflicts ? We had victories of course and periods of tough resistance, but our military record is not that good.

I think he means warlike qualities by which they resisted foreign occupation. You do have to admit that Georgians are really insular and pretty vicious when it comes to foreign invaders.

Someone like the Occitanians are the exact opposite.

Lord Oda Nobunaga · Sep 28, 2018

Duke Valentino said:
The "Persians" were not unwarlike. The Achaemenid armies were based on a central core of Persian soldiers who were the elite of the empire. You're probably referring to the Achaemenid Empire and a variety of its subject peoples who were certainly unwarlike.

Yeah OP is wrong on this one. The Persians, Medes, Bactrians, Parthians etc were extremely warlike. Only the eastern Iranians in places like Gedrosia were said to have not been warlike.

Duke Valentino · Sep 28, 2018

Even the Egyptian and Syrians don't appear to have been very warlike in the fourth century either though. If I recall correctly, the armies of the Egyptian rebellions against the Achaemenid Empire were very heavily composed of Greek mercenaries. Not entirely sure though.

Tokugawa Ieyasu · Sep 28, 2018

The list is absolutely ridiculous. It’s completely based on personal bias without scientific theory or historical examples as basis. And as someone said, it is totally the “overgeneralization”, not worthy for reference.

The Roman Emperor Julian : Why I lost so badly against the Sassanid Persians if they were the “non-warrior” while the Romans were ？

The next Roman Emperor Jovian even accepted the humilitative peace treaty from the “non-warrior” race Persia.

The Arabs : We defeated the Byzantines (Romans + Greeks) brilliantly in the decisive battle of Yarmuk in AD 636. Who dared to say that we were the “non-warrior” race ? We just defeated “two warrior races” the thread owner claimed. Weren't we actually the strongest warrior according to the logics ?

See, the epic failure of that logic.

Lord Oda Nobunaga · Sep 28, 2018

Tokugawa Ieyasu said:
The list is absolutely ridiculous. It’s completely based on personal bias without scientific theory or historical examples as basis. And as someone said, it is totally the “overgeneralization”, not worthy for reference.

The Roman Emperor Julian : Why I lost so badly against the Sassanid Persians if they were the “non-warrior” while the Romans were ？

The next Roman Emperor Jovian even accepted the humilitative peace treaty from the “non-warrior” race Persia.

The Arabs : We defeated the Byzantines (Romans + Greeks) brilliantly in the decisive battle of Yarmuk in AD 636. Who dared to say that we were the “non-warrior” race ? We just defeated “two warrior races” the thread owner claimed. Weren't we actually the strongest warrior according to the logics ?

See, the epic failure of that logic.

While I agree that OP's evidence is not the best, this does not mean that his premise is necessarily incorrect. Otherwise you would only be criticizing his methodology instead of his hypothesis.

Gvelion · Sep 28, 2018

Lord Oda Nobunaga said:
I think he means warlike qualities by which they resisted foreign occupation. You do have to admit that Georgians are really insular and pretty vicious when it comes to foreign invaders.

Someone like the Occitanians are the exact opposite.

Well, I agree in that regard. It's one of things our nation is proud of. We were able to preserve our culture, language, identity and religion despite many invasions throughout thousand of years and surrounded by antagonistic forces. Plus, still have our own independent country, though without some historical Georgian territories.

Though, we had big problem with inner fighting throughout the centuries and it probably weakened country as much as foreign invasions.

Gvelion · Sep 28, 2018

Duke Valentino said:
Even the Egyptian and Syrians don't appear to have been very warlike in the fourth century either though. If I recall correctly, the armies of the Egyptian rebellions against the Achaemenid Empire were very heavily composed of Greek mercenaries. Not entirely sure though.

Yeah, Egypt often relied on mercenaries. Also had help of Athens during their 459 - 454 expedition in Egypt, however it ended in disaster for them.

Gvelion · Sep 28, 2018

Lord Oda Nobunaga said:
Yeah OP is wrong on this one. The Persians, Medes, Bactrians, Parthians etc were extremely warlike. Only the eastern Iranians in places like Gedrosia were said to have not been warlike.

Well, yeah. Those nations showed their courage and fierceness during Greco - Persian Wars as well, which Herodotus noted. I remember him calling Persians as the best and bravest out of Achaemenid forces during Battle of Plataea, who faced off Spartans themselves and resisted them well for quite a while, until Mardonius fell. Still, after that Persians put up serious resistance to Spartans and Athenians storming their camp. Also at Mycale Persians fought well at first and stood their ground for a while. Plus, Diodorus and Curtius describe their courage and sacrifices at Battle of Issus and Gaugamela. Arrian as well has moments where Macedonians had serious troubles or moments of crisis against them.

Duke Valentino · Sep 28, 2018

The Persians composed the core and the best part of the Achaemenid army, if it was actually fully assembled and led by the king. Usually, the satraps would just raise local forces.

PoitierFrance · Sep 28, 2018

Duke Valentino said:
The "Persians" were not unwarlike. The Achaemenid armies were based on a central core of Persian soldiers who were the elite of the empire. You're probably referring to the Achaemenid Empire and a variety of its subject peoples who were certainly unwarlike.

The persians mostly fought other near eastern groups, many of them not enjoying some greater advantage in height or physical strenght. The greeks, while maybe a little more physically robust people, I would still not put them in the same category of other warrior peoples like the germans, slavs, mongols, celts etc. That is to say the persians certinantly could a have better chances facing a greek in combat than anyother individual from a warrior people.

They are unable However to engage in close fight with warrior peoples. Infact in Roman strategic works, and other litteratures, it is always noted that they are not good at hand to hand combat.

Duke Valentino · Sep 28, 2018

Not really, the Persians are typically described by Herodotus as capable fighters, though Achaemenid armies were more notable for their cavalry and skirmishers, rather than their infantry.

PoitierFrance · Sep 28, 2018

Gvelion said:
Well, yeah. Those nations showed their courage and fierceness during Greco - Persian Wars as well, which Herodotus noted. I remember him calling Persians as the best and bravest out of Achaemenid forces during Battle of Plataea, who faced off Spartans themselves and resisted them well for quite a while, until Mardonius fell. Still, after that Persians put up serious resistance to Spartans and Athenians storming their camp. Also at Mycale Persians fought well at first and stood their ground for a while. Plus, Diodorus and Curtius describe their courage and sacrifices at Battle of Issus and Gaugamela. Arrian as well has moments where Macedonians had serious troubles or moments of crisis against them.

Yes, I think I wrote about this myself in this thread. Herodotus seems to be the only one to describe persians as fighting formidably. If I remember there might other scattered references in Plutarch that mentions this aswell.

However, as i mentioned earlier the persians seems to have given the overaall impression that they were not as formidable warriors in general. I also remember, though I have to find the reference, Herodotus mentioning that the medes were not as physically strong as the persians. Furthermore, he notes that persians skull were less thick than Egyptian skulls.

PoitierFrance · Sep 28, 2018

Tokugawa Ieyasu said:
The list is absolutely ridiculous. It’s completely based on personal bias without scientific theory or historical examples as basis. And as someone said, it is totally the “overgeneralization”, not worthy for reference.

The Roman Emperor Julian : Why I lost so badly against the Sassanid Persians if they were the “non-warrior” while the Romans were ？

The next Roman Emperor Jovian even accepted the humilitative peace treaty from the “non-warrior” race Persia.

The Arabs : We defeated the Byzantines (Romans + Greeks) brilliantly in the decisive battle of Yarmuk in AD 636. Who dared to say that we were the “non-warrior” race ? We just defeated “two warrior races” the thread owner claimed. Weren't we actually the strongest warrior according to the logics ?

See, the epic failure of that logic.

The sassanian persians relied heavily on foreign troops, including the favourite dailamites.

The battle of Yarmouk and other battles in general are first mentioned later. The medieval arab historian Al-Waqidi provides the most detailed accounts of the engagements, and he is not reliable, even noted so by other arab historians.

The byzantines were not maybe so large a force, especially after the exhaustive campaigns against Khosrow II. It could have been local levied Levanten troops facing arabs.

When we move to later Ummayad and Abbasid periods the battles are better documented. Of course, by that time the arabs employ large numbers of foreign fighters from peoples with good reputation as warlike

AlpinLuke · Sep 28, 2018

Lord Oda Nobunaga said:
I don't disagree with the basic premise. When I was in South America I was speaking to some soldiers who were out on road duty (basically looking at people's papers to see if they are illegals, criminals or insurgents). One thing they said is that whenever they get trained by American officers they struggle because the Americans have Anglo-Saxon standards. What they mean by this is that the locals are usually not as big as "Anglo-Saxons" so they struggle in keeping up physically and sometimes have trouble carrying all of their equipment. From what I've heard this is also true in South Korea. One officer told me "if a war breaks out I hope we don't have to drag them with us... our guys are better on the ground and our other services are also better". Granted he wasn't only talking about differences in size and strength but that was a factor. There was also an interesting observation during the Boxer Rebellion and the Russo-Japanese War that the Japanese were generally smaller and this put them at a slight disadvantage when they were in close combat. There was also the claim that the Japanese made up for it by carrying out savage charges, which then resulted in huge casualties.

Britain, United States, Australia, India, Germany, France, Austria-Hungary, Italy, Japan

As can be seen the average Japanese soldiers was much shorter than the average regular army requirements.

ERRATA CORRIGE
"If I remember well, in that picture the third one is a Russian, not and Australian"

In the alliance there was also Russia, but in the picture a Russian soldier is missing [Boxer Rebellion - Wikipedia]. The third soldier is Australian.

Gvelion · Sep 28, 2018

PoitierFrance said:
Yes, I think I wrote about this myself in this thread. Herodotus seems to be the only one to describe persians as fighting formidably. If I remember there might other scattered references in Plutarch that mentions this aswell.

Diodorus and Curtius Rufus too, when describing Alexander battles and his campaigns. Arrian also has some moments.

Duke Valentino · Sep 28, 2018

Indeed. The problem, as Delbruck has pointed out, is that the ancient sources have both attested to the courage of the Persian warriors, but also their numbers. But both cannot be correct, or else it would be inconceivable that the Greeks defeated them many times. The Persians had an empire comparable to feudalism, and they made quality armies, not mass armies.

aggienation · Sep 28, 2018

Lord Oda Nobunaga said:
That's because it isn't racist. I've spent most of my life around Middle Easterners and North Africans and the first thing I can tell you is that they can't fight worth a damn. The second thing I can say is that they are usually very short or tall and skinny. They don't have strong arms or broad shoulders and basically no physical characteristics that imply physical strength, on average. What some of them do have is long thin legs which is useful for horseback riding. Long thin noses are helpful for breathing in the heat and for keeping sand out of your nose. It isn't a decisive advantage but it is a clear difference.

Everything you and the OP wrote is utterly ridiculous, racist as all hell.

I am part Arab. And I've fought other Arabs in actual real life combat that ended with dead human beings eaten by dogs. There are graveyards full of highly trained US servicemen who'd disagree they aren't good fighters (they aren't good modern soldiers, but they are natural fighters and raiders especially). Most of the world's current wars are happening with them right now, in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, etc.

This thread is ridiculous I'm bailing out.

Edric Streona · Sep 28, 2018

deleted.

Edric Streona · Sep 28, 2018

Basic premise is wrong.

PoitierFrance said:
Greetings fellow avid history readers. As a new member on this forum this is my very first thread.

One of my main interests is military history with a special focus on textual description of engagements between armies, spanning the whole ancient and medieval periods.

One of my conclusions is that some ethnicities seem to both physically and mentally better geared for war, with the result that they always give the impressions to their enemies as formidable warriors, both as victors But even as defeated.

Here is my list of these warrior in no particular order:
Germanics
Slavic
Ural-Altaic (Turks, mongols etc)
Thracians
Illyrians
Celts
Bactrian
Schytian
Armenians
Georgians
Circassians
Romans
Greeks

Peoples i consider to belong to a non-warrior people:
Syrians
Hebrews
Phonecians
Persians
Arabs
Egyptians
Indians
Chinese
Berbers

I’ve reached this conclusion based on accounts (quite a few of them eyewitness accounts), clearly conveying the impression that the above mentioned peoples either as belong to a warrior type people or not.

Definition of a warrior people: Strong body, often a mesomorph body type or endomorph type. Mentally tough, oftens withstand enemy attacks for a very long time, inflicting heavy casualties on their enemies even when they lose.

Definition of non-warrior people: medium to small body type, either ectomorph or at best case a combination of ecto-mesomorph type. Mentally not very tough, often needs to be assured of its numerical superiority, or knowing they have their enemies trapped in ambush. Can not sustain enemy charges for a very long time, if at all. Easily routed, seldom initative to perform individual feats.

That’s my take. Feel free to agree or disagree with explanation.

Warrior people and cultures exist for sure. But ethnicity has little to do with it.
You would be hard pushed claim the French and English and Scots today, who are taller and fitter... and fatter and lazier than their warrior ancestors yet are of the same ethnicity.

Aztecs were a martial and warrior people. But not on your list. As were the Masai and Zulu... I don’t think you could argue the “warrior body” as anything but laughable...

Japan was a VERY warrior and military based culture. China had bigger and bloody wars than any little German-Celtic skirmish. They both had smaller Asian bodies.

Edric Streona · Sep 28, 2018

Shtajerc said:
May I ask at whom we're looking here? I asume it goes left to right: British, American, Russian, Indian (Sikh?), German, French, Austrian-Hungarian, Italian, Japanese. Yay or nay?

Yes. I believe it is
British Army, US Army, Russian Sailor, Indian (Bengal lancer), German Army, French Army, Austro-Hungarian Navy, Japanese Army.

Notice how the non warrior Indian is bigger than the warrior Frank, German, Austrian and Italian (Roman)... and that the little Japanese chap would give some good beatings to the taller Anglo-Saxons, Slavs and Germanic Dutch.

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Ethnicity as a factor in military success

Lord Oda Nobunaga

Lord Oda Nobunaga

Duke Valentino

Tokugawa Ieyasu

Lord Oda Nobunaga

Gvelion

Gvelion

Gvelion

Duke Valentino

PoitierFrance

Duke Valentino

PoitierFrance

PoitierFrance

AlpinLuke

Gvelion

Duke Valentino

aggienation

Edric Streona

Edric Streona

Edric Streona

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