Silence of the Elves

[inglorion]

With enough elves on his side, he may have won the War of The Ring, since the have keen eyesight, knowledge, and are able to use most any weapon, he would be virtually un-stoppable. What I don't get is, if Tolkien described Sauron as being a smart but wicked being, wouldn't he have thought of bringing elves to his evil ways?

I don't see the need for Sauron to persuade elves into his armies. He had men, orcs and trolls and most important of all his nine nazgûl. Their were few elves in ME who could stand against the nine, or even against a few of them. If Sauron really wanted to become unstoppable he had to persuade elves as Glorfindel, Celeborn and Galadriel or Elrond. Their ain't many elves left in ME of their stature and with that kind of power in arms and knowledge, and I think Sauron even had more knowledge (especially about the thing that only mattered to him: the One Ring). As for elves having keen eyesight (whatever he may want that for), he didn't need eyesight. He had the nine to purchase the Ring by a far deadlier sence, they were just attracted to it because they felt it.

In my opinion Sauron really did not need any elves for his army or any counsel. The only thing that made 'the good guys' win was luck, pure luck. A few examples:
- The tower of Cirith Ungol where Sam finds that most of the orcs are killed already for him.
- When Frodo and Sam are dressed as orcs and running along with that company of orcs and with great luck they came out of disaster.

Sauron was in all ways superior to the Fellowship and their friends (except maybe knowledge), but he should have thought of them wanting to destroy the Ring. That was the only fault he made and it was partly disastrous to him.

were there any elves stuck on "the wrong side of the mountains", so to speak, when Sauron conquered Mordor?

In the Silmarillion it is said that on the way of the elves to Valinor every now and than elves would stop and stay there or wander in other directions (the Avari), and their is the story of Lenwë and his people (the Nandor), who turned southward at the great River Anduin and they dwelt in the south. Denethor, son of Lenwë, again came up to the north with lots of that folk, but many elves stayed in the South.
I think their are elves in most parts of ME, except in the most evil places as Mordor, but south and east of it I guess there are elves. In the east their are elves for sure, for many of the first elves were frightened of Oromë and refused the summoning of the Valar. They might have been corrupted and have become orcs, but I guess there's some of them left.