Helmuth, count von Moltke summary

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Helmuth, count von Moltke, (born Oct. 26, 1800, Parchim, Mecklenburg—died April 24, 1891, Berlin, Ger.), Prussian general. He joined the Prussian army in 1822 and was appointed to its general staff in 1832. After a stint as adviser to the Turkish army (1835–39), he traveled widely and wrote several books on history and travel. In 1855 he served as personal aide to the Prussian prince Frederick William (later Frederick III), then was selected as chief of the Prussian general staff (1857–88). Highly intelligent and militarily creative, he reorganized the Prussian army and devised new strategic and tactical command methods for modern mass armies. He directed the strategies that produced victories in the Prussian and German wars against Denmark (1864), against Austria in the Seven Weeks’ War (1866), and against France in the Franco-Prussian War (1870–71). He was created count in 1870 and field marshal in 1871.

army Summary

Army, a large organized armed force trained for war, especially on land. The term may be applied to a large unit organized for independent action, or it may be applied to a nation’s or ruler’s complete military organization for land warfare. Throughout history, the character and organization of

Franco-German War Summary

Franco-German War, (July 19, 1870–May 10, 1871), war in which a coalition of German states led by Prussia defeated France. The war marked the end of French hegemony in continental Europe and resulted in the creation of a unified Germany. Prussia’s defeat of Austria in the Seven Weeks’ War in 1866

Prussia Summary

Prussia, in European history, any of certain areas of eastern and central Europe, respectively (1) the land of the Prussians on the southeastern coast of the Baltic Sea, which came under Polish and German rule in the Middle Ages, (2) the kingdom ruled from 1701 by the German Hohenzollern dynasty,

strategy Summary

Strategy, in warfare, the science or art of employing all the military, economic, political, and other resources of a country to achieve the objects of war. The term strategy derives from the Greek strategos, an elected general in ancient Athens. The strategoi were mainly military leaders with