In war, when the chips are down and the odds
are against a military unit, it can be time to defy common sense and get creative. Of course real life has been full of many
instances of small, overpowered armies trying unusual tactics and getting destroyed, but
since there’s no novelty value they quickly get forgotten by history. Which just makes it all the more amazing when
some comparatively small or ill-equipped band of soldiers wins the day against what seems
like an overwhelming force. 10. Battle of Gaugamela This 332 BC battle was the last one between
the Persian empire under the dominion of Darius III and Macedonia’s own Alexander the Great. Although those who’ve seen the films from
the 300 series might be inclined to think that the Persian armies were overconfident
and incompetent, Darius had at least planned this battle well. He chose a big, open area where his army of
over 240,000 would not be cramped in any way and had the ground swept to help his 200 chariots
function at peak capacity. When Alexander’s 47,000 person army approached,
Alexander was intimidated enough that he called a halt for a day to plan his strategy. The next day, the Greeks approached the Persians
at a forty-five degree angle with the left wing jutting towards the Persians, knowing
that it would entice the Persians to try to send all their cavalry around that wing, which
they promptly did. Darius also sent his chariots at the Greeks,
which were dealt with by the simple but effective method of literally stepping out of the way
of them, waiting for the charioteers to stop and try and turn around, then descending on
them en masse. Alexander left his camp with all of his supplies
and booty unguarded, which induced much of the Persian cavalry to go raid it instead
of fighting the Greeks, so Darius was drawn over to the left wing of the Greek army where
hopefully he could regain control. When he was within range, Alexander and his
famous personal guard, the Companions, charged Darius’s personal guard and overwhelmed
them, throwing such a scare into Darius that he personally fled the battle and sapped the
Persian army of its fighting spirit, effectively turning control of the Persian Empire to Alexander. 9. Battle of Chancellorsville During this 1863 American Civil War battle,
the Northern army had 134,000 soldiers while the Southern Army had 62,000. As if that wasn’t enough advantage, bear
in mind that this Southern Army was full of troops that were constantly hungry and a lot
of them were barefoot. The two armies faced off across the Rappahannock
River in Virginia (a few dozen miles north of the Southern capital of Richmond and basically
instant victory for the North if they captured it). Then the Northern commander, Joseph Hooker,
decided that he would keep half of his huge army in their current position to distract
the southerners while 70,000 went far downriver, crossed in secret, then came up the rear of
the Southern lines to hit them on the flank. Lee’s response was basically to use Hooker’s
own strategy against him. He sent about a third of his already tiny
army to go behind the 70,000 soldiers that had just been coming up behind him. To convince the Northerners that their tiny
flanking unit was actually the whole army retreating, the Southerners looped around
and marched down the same route before making the twelve mile trek into the Northern army’s
rear. When they attacked, it so unnerved Hooker
that by the next day his army was already mostly in retreat. It’s worth noting that the results of this
battle were that it cost the life of Stonewall Jackson, one of their three best generals,
and made General Robert E. Lee dangerously overconfident for the Battle of Gettysburg,
where he effectively ruined the South’s last hope of victory. Sometimes the worst thing an army can do is
be wildly successful. 8. Battle of Muret Alexander’s strategy of drawing the enemy
commander into a position of personal vulnerability was taken to another level during this 1213
battle near the city of Muret, between French under Simon Montfort and invading Spanish
soldiers under Peter II. Since there were only less than French knights
and more than 34,000 on the opposing side, conventional tactics were out of the question,
so Montfort decided to go a much more direct route. He ordered his knights that they could not
linger, no matter how stiff the resistance was, that they must constantly press forward
until they had killed Peter II himself. While Peter II spread his forces out for a
conventional battle, Montfort went straight for Peter in a do or die proposition that
paid off when the Spanish army melted around them after he killed the enemy king. 7. Battle of Singapore At the start of the Japanese war with Britain
during World War II in 1941, the group of islands called Singapore was considered impregnable
against Japanese forces. It had a much larger defensive force (90,000)
than the Japanese could throw at it (65,000, though some sources put it at much smaller). On December 9, 1941, Japanese land forces
snuck onto the island through jungles and swamps while the main British force was expecting
an air and sea attack and had placed their troops on the other side of the island, expecting
a naval invasion. To maintain speed at the risk of looking silly,
their infantry travelled on bicycles when they reached solid land, stripping down in
many cases to sports jerseys. They also found an abandoned British armored
car which listed all their defensive positions in it, allowing the Japanese to hit their
targets perfectly and capturing all their targets much earlier than they expected, including
the valuable British airfields. When they did that, the Japanese planes were
easily able to sink the warships that were sent to bolster the island defenses. As the Japanese rode along, they quickly wore
out the tires on their bikes and started riding on the rims, and even that worked to their
advantage because the sounds of clattering, rimless bikes sounded to the British like
tanks, and assuming that more Japanese tanks were coming led to more retreats. Ultimately, tens of thousands of British soldiers
were taken prisoner and one of their most important bases was lost. 6. Battle of Sabine Pass II For this 1863 American Civil War battle on
the Texas coast, the North brought 4,000 troops and four ships with eighteen cannons. The South, by contrast, had six cannons and
44 troops, which was less an army than a chorus line. Also one of those cannons was in such bad
shape that it was quickly out of commission. And the Northern cannons were powerful enough
that they could bombard the tiny fort while staying out of range of the Southern artillery. The Southerners went out and put out markers
around the field where they knew the enemy was coming meaning for the Southerners could
aim with uncanny accuracy. It wasn’t an act of clever planning but
just because the Southerners were bored. It hugely increased the accuracy of their
cannon fire when four Northern gunboats came within range and in only half an hour, they
had sunk two of the attacking vessels and convinced the other two to retreat, which
was enough to convince the Northern commander to call it off landing the rest of their troops. So the Southerners took three hundred prisoners. It was a good thing the thirty-six Southerners
didn’t suffer any casualties or they probably wouldn’t have been able to handle so many. 5. Battle of Leuthen Frederick the Great was one of Germany (then
Prussia’s) most effective generals in addition to his abilities as a king. It was vital to the survival of Germany to
this day since in Seven Years War in the 1750s Prussia was at war with Austria, Sweden, Russia,
and France at once and his armies were outnumbered more than three to one. In this 1757 battle he defeated an Austrian
army twice the size of his through a method as simple on paper as it would be difficult
to pull off in practice. He began by arraying his army in a long line,
then marching towards the north wing of the enemy, compelling the Austrians to move much
of their army up there despite their massive numerical advantage. Frederick then ordered his soldiers to turn
to their right effectively as one, and then run down to the south in formations that instantly
became columns, then run around the enemy on their left flank, catching the Austrians
completely off guard with how fast they moved in formation. The Austrian army was so large and bewildered
that as they attempted to fold their line in half, their troops became a confused mess,
which Prussian artillery could easily cut down. The victory in this battle was vital to keeping
Prussia alive to the end of the war. 4. Battle of Longewala While there certainly have been larger scale
battles described in this list, the situation in this 1971 battle was no less dramatic than
any of the others. It pitted thousands of Pakistanis with dozens
tanks as part of a surprise invasion of India against less than 120 unprepared Indian soldiers
with a jeep. The only hope the Indians had was a chance
of air support if they held out overnight. One of the tricks the Indians used to halt
the advance of the Pakistanis was to lay phony “minefields” in the form of areas hastily
ringed with barb wire, which was conventionally how minefields were designated. This allowed the Indians to funnel the Pakistanis
into deep sands, which bogged down their tanks so much that some of them caught fire. These tactics combined to stall the Pakistanis
until an air strike in the morning. The Indians only suffered an incredibly light
two casualties while the Pakistanis lost hundreds of vehicles, completely halting their advance. 3. Battle of Auerstadt Although Napoleon Bonaparte hogged pretty
much all the glory the French military won in the first few decades of the nineteenth
century as far as the public knows, their victory won at longest odds was won by his
subordinate, Field Marshal Davout. In October 1806, Napoleon was preparing to
attack what he thought was the main Prussian army while he sent Davout north with 26,000
men to cut off any desperate retreats by the Prussians towards the Russian army. It turned out he had it backwards, because
the main Prussian army of 63,000 men was coming for Davout, with odds of much more than two
to one. Initially the French troops dug in as best
they could and held off initial assaults, but after some time, Davout realized that
if the Prussians were not attacking with their full force, there must be something with their
organizational structure. So Davout ordered his final reserve troops
instead to attack, which would have seemed like suicide at such great odds. But instead, it caught the Prussians by surprise
and routed them. Napoleon repaid Davout for his trouble by
dismissing his victory. He claimed Davout had exaggerated the size
of the Prussian army by saying he “saw double” (he didn’t, the Prussians own records attested
to it) then taking years to give his best general any honors. Some people it just doesn’t pay to be loyal
to. 2. Battle of Alesia In 52 BC, the Roman Army numbering 50,000-60,000
under Julius Caesar confronted the 90,000 Gaulish (French) army under King Vercingetorix
(who was sufficiently skillful that he united a bunch of Gaulish tribes for the first time
in history) around the community of Alesia atop a big round hill. Vercingetorix had beaten Caesar during a previous
battle, so Caesar was not about to just attack the Gauls in their stronghold. But the Gauls did not want to press the attack
either as legions had also beaten them in numerous other battles. And anyway, Alesia was basically unassailable,
so why risk it? So Caesar instead built an array of defensive
towers (as much as ten feet high), trenches, and obstacles around the village that stretched
eighteen kilometers, as if Caesar had brought WWI to France a couple millennia early. Before the fortifications were completed,
a group of Gaulish cavalry escaped and Caesar knew inevitably they’d be back with a large
relief army. So he built a second, fifteen mile outer ring
of defenses facing the other way, like a general trying to hold a castle while only controlling
the outer wall with a huge army outside and the inner sanctum controlled by the enemy. When the 100,000 strong relief army showed
up and attack the Romans at the same time the ones inside the ring of defenses tried
to attack as well. Each time it looked like the Gauls were about
to break through, Caesar sent German cavalry to attack the attacking forces at any point
of the line on the flank and rear until the Vercingetorix’s supplies were exhausted
and he surrendered. 1. Battle of Saragarhi This battle will be much different from the
others, for in this case it ended up costing the outnumbered everything. But it was a huge, nearly impossible victory
in a larger sense. It won a war. During an 1897 uprising in Pakistan, Saragarhi
was a communications outpost defended by twenty-one Sikh soldiers. It stood between Fort Gulistan, an undermanned
but vital stronghold for the British presence in Pakistan and an army of 10,000 Pashtun
rebels that were very determined to take Gulistan. After refusing offers to surrender at 9:00
a.m., they held off the attackers until well into the afternoon, when a breach in their
defenses opened and the few surviving defenders had to retreat to a blockhouse. The Pashtuns ultimately didn’t finish off
the final Sikh soldiers, needing instead to resort to burning the building down. But at the end twenty-one soldiers had held
off 10,000 long enough the at the main fort and prize was reinforced and defeated the
attackers, meaning that overall the last stand had won the Sikhs the day even at the cost
of their lives. Reports of the number of casualties the Sikhs
inflicted vary, but the lowest of them is 180 and it came from their enemies who’d
have little reason to exaggerate how effectively the Sikhs had fought against them.
