Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington Quotes
I don't know what effect these men will have upon the enemy, but, by God, they frighten me.
Stanhope, Philip Henry. Notes of Conversations with the Duke of Wellington, 1831-1851. John Murray, 1888, p. 14.
This is not the most common view military view which tends to place the senior officers out of harm’s way as they are “too valuable” to become casualties. Among modern armies, Israel stands out as having the same leadership doctrine as Genghis Khan. Those who attack Israel and lose, never have their commanders at the front of the battle. Israel does.
An example of this was the landing in the beaches of Normandy in WWII. Once on the beaches the allied troops had to win or die. Some of the most heroic fighting in American and English military history occurred on those beaches. Another was the Spanish Explorer Hernando Cortez who after landing in the New World, had his ships burned so that he and his soldiers had to conquer or they would die.
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS was an Anglo-Irish soldier and Tory statesman who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain, serving twice as prime minister. He ended the Napoleonic Wars when he defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.