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Post by nomann on Aug 30, 2020 8:51:26 GMT -6
See Red Horse pictographs of 60 dead at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Little_Bighorn#Last_standYet only about 31 are identied by name....also according to above reference Lakota casualites were 136 killed and 160 wounded... roughly nearly equal of the five companies + reno command that died.....1..1 or say about 10% of Lakota present in battle... Yet ive seen diferent estimates....Why? |
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Post by montrose on Sept 5, 2020 6:48:48 GMT -6
See Red Horse pictographs of 60 dead at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Little_Bighorn#Last_standYet only about 31 are identied by name....also according to above reference Lakota casualites were 136 killed and 160 wounded... roughly nearly equal of the five companies + reno command that died.....1..1 or say about 10% of Lakota present in battle... Yet ive seen diferent estimates....Why? It is a typical Army tradition that when you suffer a setback, you claim larger and larger enemy present, and enemy KIA. There are numerous fights where US claims of enemy KIA exceed total number present. (Looking at you, 9th ID in Vietnam). The movie Lone Survivor shows a 4 man US element fighting hundreds of Taliban, and killing dozens. The reality is they fought 8 enemy, killing zero, and wounding zero. How do we know this? The fight was video taped. The bravery of these men is not diminished by telling the truth. (I have conducted missions behind enemy lines, this was my profession). It would be nice if we had a few camcorders at LBH, but the myth makers would still deny hard evidence to support their crazy theories. The 7th Cavalry fought scattered at LBH. This means far fewer enemy casualties than if they fought together. When the 7th finally massed 7 companies, there are still no massive Indian casualties. Because they had competent leadership, and knew they would be butchered if they attacked. So they screened Reno Hill, never tried to take it. The weird thing on LBH, we treat the Indians like some mindless, leaderless enemy Horde, like a video game enemy. Any zombie film represents views of Indians at LBH. Credit is never given for Indian cyclic interaction. The classic rock game drill, you do this, I do that, OODA loop etc. There was talent on the other side. |
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Post by shan on Sept 7, 2020 5:25:16 GMT -6
Montrose,
Excellent post as ever.
Yes, it does seems as if there's some kind of psychological itch in the heads of those who support the losing side, to either inflate things the numbers of enemy who were present, as well as increase the number of them who were actually killed. I guess it makes people feel a little better about the loss, but then we all do it in our way.
I for instance, having always leant to wanting to see the Indian side of things, can find myself becoming a bore as I bang on about the fact that people simply don't pay enough attention to the Indian accounts, especially: and this is a particular passion of mind, to the various pieces of artwork that some of the warriors made about the battle itself.
As a consequence, if I don't watch out, I may find myself favouring a lower estimate of the numbers of Indians killed, or even arguing that the battle was over much quicker than it was.
Having said that, I think that in this case, the Indian estimates of a much lower casualty rate are basically correct.
Shan
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Post by shan on Sept 7, 2020 6:03:38 GMT -6
Incidently, and I know this will sound rather nerdish, I've been examining the S.J. Morrow photograph of the piled up horse bones on the battlefield, the famous one with a soldiers boot stuck on top of one of the posts that marked where someone was buried, and after having looked at it a little more closely than I had done previously, I've noticed that there are at least two more cut off boots in the photo, plus a couple of horse shoes, not to mention that the horse who faces us, was shot in the head just above the eye.
Of course none of this helps us get any nearer to understanding how the battle panned out, but then given that the Indians mentioned somewhere that they cut off the tops of the soldiers boots in order to re~use the leather, here we have at least three examples to indicate that this did indeed happened.
Shan
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Post by noggy on Sept 10, 2020 4:22:26 GMT -6
See Red Horse pictographs of 60 dead at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Little_Bighorn#Last_standYet only about 31 are identied by name....also according to above reference Lakota casualites were 136 killed and 160 wounded... roughly nearly equal of the five companies + reno command that died.....1..1 or say about 10% of Lakota present in battle... Yet ive seen diferent estimates....Why? It is a typical Army tradition that when you suffer a setback, you claim larger and larger enemy present, and enemy KIA. There are numerous fights where US claims of enemy KIA exceed total number present. (Looking at you, 9th ID in Vietnam). And look at GAC too, who had some wild claims about Washita. Normann: As for casulaties, Hardorff and others have put Indian estimates of casulaties in system. You do find the odd "hundreds of KIAs and WIAs", but for the most part they seem to imply around 30 dead. Ofc GAC fan boys will drewl morbidly over the thought of hundreds of killed Native Americans, but it wasn`t the case. If you aren`t too rash and are allowed to shoot at an exposed enemy while you and your friends are in cover for most of the time, the other guys will have greater losses than you. If they in addition are disorganised and ill-prepared, then even better. Noggy |
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