The Greatest Warrior in the past 1,000 years

Carl Gustaf Mannerheim. 1867-1951.

Commander-in-Chief of the Finnish army

1939-1946

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The man who saved us from the communists, and from the fate that applied to other Baltian countries.

Used cunning tactics to repel Russian army who had over two times bigger attacking army.

Erwin Rommel
proabaly one of the best military comanders ever.
also any one who won the victoria cross cause thats probably the hardest medal in the world to achieve. and there's only enough metal for 85 more.

I know this thread has probably been dead but I read the first two pages and got bored but what do you guys think of the Knights of the Templar? I mean I now Saladin whooped their butts but were they some prettydamn good warrior's in all of your guy's opinons

The greatest warrior in history would have to be bub from bubble bobble. He could blow bubbles over all these guys. Then pop them like the poofs they are.

First, I'd like to thank "micktheman" for actually searching for this thread as opposed to simply starting a new thread with the same topic. Too often, it seems, people don't search to see whether or not a thread already exists. Nevertheless, it's nice to see.

Anyway, after reading through this thread, I would have to agree that all of the people mentioned are, indeed, great warriors. But no one seems to have mentioned a general who led his army against a vastly superior force and walked away with minimal losses while inflicting a devastating blow to the enemy. I am, of course, talking about Grand Duke Vytautas the Great. What? You never heard of Vytautas the Great of Lithuania? Don't tell me you have never heard of the Battle of Grunwald either?

In July 15th, 1410, Vytautas the Great led a combined force of, primarily, Lithuanians and Poles against the Teutonic Knights. Vytautas led his troops against a vastly superior force -- in numbers, training and experience and soundly defeated them. In the aftermath, the Battle of Grunwald has been called one of the greatest battles in history as well being a deciding military action which, ultimately, shaped the political and geographical face of Europe.en.wikipedia.org...

I know this is out of the 1000 year timeline we are supposed to be working in but the 300 Greek Spartans who fought the whole of the Persian army at Thermopylae gets my vote for greatest warriors.

300 vs anywhere from 3 to 5 MILLION Persians (accounts vary).

en.wikipedia.org...

Give me 300 of those guys vs any force past or present.

Achilles, was a great warrior also. he killed many men and was afraid of nothing. but he did die by a wound to the achilles. dang.

personnaly i think you are all wrong.
indeed you have all quoted great fighters, but none great. Mainy of what all of you have said are great leaders and military tactians, using their skills to conquer or defend what is there's.
i agree to that the likes of 'khengis kahn' , 'alexander the great' , 'napoleon' , 'sun tzu' were all simply amazing leaders and knew what they were doing but who's to say they were THE greatest fighter physically, undoubtably they would have been good and taught well because of their rank however there were probably better fighters physically in their own army.
my personal recommendation to who would be the greatest fighter, no weapons, would be 'Masutatsu Oyamo', Founder of Kyokushinkai Karate.
This korean moved to japan to become an aviator in the early 1940's, and dreamed of being a great marshall artist, he was shamefully defeated and later in 1946 entered the mountains to train himself. In 1947 when he returned he had created Kyokushinkai Karate and became the champion of All Japan Karate-Do tournement. He then studied Goju-ryu Karate extensively under Master Gogen Yamaguchi, and became Vice Chairman in the organization, holding 9th Dan degree. In 1948 he returned to the mountains for a further 18 months self-training.
In 1950 oyama started training against live bulls, living beside the cattle butchery. Out of 47 bulls, all were killed with his bare hands often by removing the horns with a technique called 'shuto strike' (knife hand), 4 bulls were killed in an instant.
In 1952, he travelled the United States for a year, demonstrating his karate live and on national televison. During subsequent years, he took on all challengers, resulting in fights with 270 different people. The vast majority of these were defeated with one punch! A fight never lasted more than three minutes, and most rarely lasted more than a few seconds. His fighting principle was simple — if he got through to you, that was it.
If he hit you, you broke. If you blocked a rib punch, you arm was broken or dislocated. If you didn't block, your rib was broken. He became known as the Godhand, a living manifestation of the Japanese warriors' maxim Ichi geki, Hissatsu or "One strike, certain death". To him, this was the true aim of technique in karate. The fancy footwork and intricate techniques were secondary (though he was also known for the power of his head kicks).
After oyama had bin to train in the mountains no-one had ever defeated him.
In 1956 he opened a small Kyokushinkai school which is now the biggest karate organisation in the world with students numbers of 12,000,000 students in 140 nations worldwide. He is also noted for starting the Full-Contact, Bare-Knuckle tournament system.
In 1964 Thai Boxing challenges Karate-do, where Oyama Dojo alone accepts. 3 matches, 2 wins, 1 draw.
Kyokushinkai karate was also adopted by the japanese police force.
April 26, 1994. Dies of lung cancer at the age of 70.

Who know? In history they will have been so many great fighters, many unknown, (many of the greatest chinese monks prefered to remain in the mountains unknown) but all i can say is, to date, and of all time Masutatsu Oyama is one of the greatest fighters (not leaders).

As to with a weapon, just learn china's history, they are and will have been an unlimited amount of great sword fighters there. As asia is the best continent of martial arts and china of sword fighting.

achilles is also meant to be one of the greatest fighters ever however we do not know an awful lot about him

The best warrior in the past 1,000 years: GW Bush

fighter03 Id have to disagree about the chinese being the greatest swordsmen, the Japanese (Samurai) were the greatest swordsmen and had some of the greatest warriors ever seen in the last 1000 years!! Heres just a few names for you, Miyamoto Musashi and Minamoto Yo#sune.

And heres a name no one has mentioned yet Vlad Tepes, a great defender of Europe, even though he got a bad name for himself!!!!!!! lol

First of all, whoever said that the mongols were only powerful because of superior numbers and superior weapons is completely wrong. The Mongols were powerful because of their superb fighting ability. The Mongols were capable of traveling and average of 60 miles a day, which is an unheard of speed in the middle ages, they also where some of the best riders in the world, the mongols of today still practice the same stlye of warfare that thier ancestors did, a mongol rider is capable of riding at full speed and are able to bend down (while riding) and pick up a dollar bill off of the ground. The Mongols were also almost always outnumbered in battle, they used their superb bowmanship and riding ability, not to mention their incredable endurance, to outmanuver their enemy. The mongols weaponry and armor was not superior either. Their armor was composed of mostly hard leather and silk, only the soldiers of high rank wore steel. The knights of eastern europe had far superior armor and weaponry, the average medieval heavy knight wor so much armor that they had to be lifted by pulleys onto their horses, don't sit their and tell me that the mongols had superior armor. It was also said that Ghengis Kahn was simply a savage killer who used fear as a weapon. That is only half true, he did use fear, as fear is one of the most effective weapons. He was ruthless because he had to be. The mongol empire would not have been great if it's leaders werent stern. What you probably did no know is that Ghengis Kahn allowed religious freedom in his lands, established one of the first postal systems, established highly successful trade routes (which spread wealth throughout the known world). He only killed those who resisted. Those who surrendered were granted mercy (most of the time). If a ruler resisted him and fought poorly he was put to death after his defeat, if a ruler resisted and fought well and bravely, he was spared. The horses of the mongols were not superior either, in fact the were not horses at all, they were ponies, small and light. The horses of medieval europe were heavy, large, and strong. The mongols were also skilled in things besides war. Every soldier was required to keep all of his nacesities with him: needle and thread, tenor shelter, food, sextra clothing, wife children, all necesities traveled with the army. The women were also trained to fight because when their husbands were off in battle the encampments were undefended, so the women defended them. As far as the samurai, they were no match for the mongols. Most people think that the mongols attempt to invade japan was a complete slaughter. This is untrue. The only reason the mongols were unsuccessful in their invasion of japan was because a massive storm sunk the mongol fleet (twice). The mongols did however battle the samurai on the small neighboring islands offshore of japan. The samurai were no match for the superb mongol warriors. I hope is set some facts straight about the mongols. Oh, by the way, Saladin was also an awsome ruler.

Another great conqueror was Vlad Tepes (also known as Vlad the Impaler). He was the prince os Wallachia. He recieved his fame in his war against the Ottoman Empire and it's Sultan Mehmed II. After the fall of Constantinople (the last and largest city of the byzantine empire) to the Turks, Europe was opened up to the powerful Ottomans. The only thing standing in the way of the Turks was the serbian kingdoms and the kingdom of wallachia and beyond wallachia was the hungarian empire. Vlad Tepes, fearing the invasion of his land, launched a premptive strick against the turks. Vlad was best known for his battle tactics, he favored battles in the night. He often sent out forces of cavelry on raiding missions against his enemies encampments. The greatest soldier in the Ottoman army was the Jannisary. The Jannisary was a highly trained, most of the time rich lord, well armed soldier. They wore fine armor and clothing and they were capable of beating the odds. They were archers and shock troopers. The turks also possed great cavelry armies (the arab cavelry, which had been used since the crusades, were the only ones who could stand up to the great mongol cavelry) were able to fire arrows while riding, which ment that in order to fire correctly one had to fire at the precise time when all 4 hooves of the horse were touching the ground, this took imense skill. Vlad Tepes was know for his brutality to prisoners. Vlad's favorite method of execution was impaling, the process of impaling is when the still alive victim is placed on a tall spike and slowly slides down the pole, allowing the spear to slowly pierce the torso. Vlad was also known do dine in the midst of this carnage. There is a famous picture depicting this horrific site, the picture is titled "The Feast of the Impaler". Vlad was eventually betrayed by his former ally and arrested for his brutal war methods, the man responsible for his capture was Matthias Corvinous the king of Hungary.

Another awsome warrior, not conqueror, was Sampson, who is depicted mostly in the Bible. Sampson was given immense strength through God. God commanded Sampson to allow his hair to grow long and that as long as his hair was long, his strength would remain. Sampson managed to kill an army of around 2-3 thousand men with the jaw bone of a goat, by himself. When he was tricked by a wicked women named Delila, who cut his hair while he slept, he lost his strength. Sampson, who was deeply saddned by his ignorance and failure to God traveld to a great temple of those who offended God and , with one last show of faith and love for God, stood between two massive pillars and singlehandedly collapsed the entire temple killing everyone inside including himself.

zymeth, You stole my thunder lol I was waiting to see if any one asked who it was i picked,Vlad Tepes being Dracula lol

3 words, WANG FEI HUNG!!!!

peace-lovin' hippie types need not apply for warrior status.

and i say the baddest warrior/leader of them all was Geiseric...that is, if you're willing to extend that cutoff by 500 or so years.

How could anyone argue against Ann Coulter?

Kormy says:

"Carl Gustaf Mannerheim. 1867-1951."

Why not Vainamoinen himself?

Also great in history, not to mention a major icon in the arab world today, is Saladin. Saladin is most famed for recapturing Jerusalem from the Christian crusaders, who butcherd everyone in the city upon it's capture. Saladin was a commander under the great arab leader Nur adin who ruled Damascus. Saladin studied war tactics and grew in his knowladge of combat during his time under Nur adin. Eventually Saladin succeeded in the defeat of the Fatimid Caliphate. Saladin was given the difficult task of defending Egypt from the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, under Amarlic I. Through a power struggle, Saladin took the role as Sultan of Egypt. He began to assemble armies. His former leader Nur adin was infuriated with this and sought out to crush Saladin however, Nur adin "conveniently died" of some unknown illness. Saladin rushed to take his thrown but was too late Nur adin's son had already been declared ruler. The new ruler was only 12 years of age. Saladin went to stay in the city but the young ruler would not allow him inside the walls. Saladin's army was forced to camp outside the walls. Saladin would not leave until he was ruler. The young ruler employed men to kill Saladin, these men would go down in history as some of the deadliest assasins. These assasins were known as Hashishin, the reason for this is because hashish is better known as the drug mariwhana. The assasins would drug themselves out of their minds in order to kill, they were very effective. Saladin was attacked by the assasins in the night. He managed to kill them but was left with a minor cut to the cheek. Saladin was forced to leave and return another year. He returned the next year and doubled his guard, yet again his defences were penetrated this time a lofe of bread was left. Saladin returned the next year and tripled his guard, yet again the hashishin managed to attain entry to his tent this time leaving a note stating that if he didn't leave he would die. Saladin's conquest would have been halted but Nur adin's son, now 16, "conveniently died" of an unknown illness. Saladin's conquest was complete he now ruled, and united the arab lands around Jerusalem and the Crusader states. He made peace with the crusaders but this peace was broken when a violent man took over the thrown of jerusalem. THe new king along with his ascosiate Reynald of Chatillon attacked a caravan of Saladin's and traveling with the caravan was Saladin's Sister. Saladin's revenge was harsh. He vowed to collect the head of Reynald. When the crusaders foolishly ventured away from water in order to attack Saldin, who was safly campted near the village of Hattin near a lake, they were slaughtered by Saladin's skilled Saracen warriors. Saladin captuered both king Guy of Lusignan, king of jerusalem, and Reynald of Chatillon. Saladin personally beheaded Reynald, Guy was terrified and thought Saladin would do the same to him but Saladin calmly told king guy that he would be spared and that reynald was evil and deserved his fate. Saladin attacked jerusalem. The chrisian defenders threatened to burn the Al arsca mosque so Saladin allowed them to leave the city safely and took Jerusalem without bloodshed. Saladin would later fight against Richard the Lionheart of England. Saladin defeated Richard, but the two rivals had almost an admiration or friendship with each other during the war, and a short time later died of exaustion from the war. Saladin was the only arab leader liked and respected by the Europeans in medieval times. The Christians thought of him as a chivalrous knight. The Arabs, still today, think of him a a great warrior, hero, and diplomat.