A military historian on the Siege of Gondor - The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum

William Cloud Hicklin · 03-08-2020, 01:20 PM

Excellent! Thank you!

Especially significant- and Clausewitzian - were his comments on the "morale battle," and why it is dispositive in warfare*- something that Tolkien knew, and PJ evidently did not.

*Short version- you don't win a battle by killing the enemy, but by making them run away. Killing some is just a means of getting the rest to run.

03-08-2020, 01:20 PM	#4
William Cloud Hicklin Loremaster of Annúminas Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 2,330	Excellent! Thank you! Especially significant- and Clausewitzian - were his comments on the "morale battle," and why it is dispositive in warfare- something that Tolkien knew, and PJ evidently did not. Short version- you don't win a battle by killing the enemy, but by making them run away. Killing some is just a means of getting the rest to run. __________________ The entire plot of The Lord of the Rings could be said to turn on what Sauron didn’t know, and when he didn’t know it.