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What I'm asking about is pretty much defined by the above. To put a few more criterion on it:

-Only actions by human apply
-The standard to apply will the extent to which a "reasonable person" would be astonished at the sheer stupidity of the action under the circumstances (a five year old accidentally setting a ship on fire and thus leading to it sinking is not that big an Epic Fail. The captain of said ship doing so is far more so), given what the actor knew or should have known
-The ultimate consequences of the action are only taken into consideration for helping to determine what consequences the actor should have forseen from their actions (if, in theory, they were acting reasonably)

If you disagree with these criterion, feel free to argue your own.

(As for myself, I really don't know enough history to give any good answers. I've heard Sun Lang of the Three Kingdoms era accidentally burned his own camp, but for an arrogant novice commander that doesn't seem that bad.)

We win...

Austrian army defeats itself

Definitely biggest Epic Fail in history if true, but as mentioned the sources for it are from long after the event is supposed to have taken place.

The Battle of Adowa would rank high on the list; Italian army completely annihilated after attempting to invade a vast country while outnumbered ten to one, and fully aware that said massive enemy had modern weapons.

I would say the whole war of Jenkins ear would qualify. War started for no sensible reason (except naked land grab but not sure if this was more important than propaganda reasons) and war resulting in a massive waste of ships, men and treasure for no gain at all. It was even worse considering those 407 ships lost by the British might just have been useful against the French in the war of the austrian succession.

Just to play Devils Advocate here but:

-Sea Skimmer, isn't it rather easy to explain why the Italians did what they did? A combination of racism and not realising the degree the Ethopians had modernised works quite well. The Italians, like other Europeans at the time, had simply failed to realise "Non-White" does not necessarily mean "Ineffectual at modern warfare."

-Thanas, in theory what evidence should the Brits have seen (if they were thinking reasonably given what they knew) that the War of Jenkin's Ear, or individual measures in it's implementation, were bad ideas? "Picking on" Spain had historically worked well for Britain up to that point, after all. In addition, would both foreign prestige reasons and internal political reasons (for the politicians involved in starting the war) lean towards the war even if it was unproductive from an economic and military standpoint?

The sinking of the Ship-of-the-Line Kronan.

Carinthium wrote:-Sea Skimmer, isn't it rather easy to explain why the Italians did what they did? A combination of racism and not realising the degree the Ethopians had modernised works quite well. The Italians, like other Europeans at the time, had simply failed to realise "Non-White" does not necessarily mean "Ineffectual at modern warfare."

Especially given that "attempting to invade a vast country while outnumbered ten to one, and fully aware that said massive enemy had modern weapons" describes Assaye as well as Adowa. A better example would be Isandlwana - spears vs breach-loading rifles should have been a one-sided massacre.

Eleas wrote:The sinking of the Ship-of-the-Line Kronan.

The Mary Rose is probably up there as well.

And Wasa.

And Camperdown ramming and sinking Victoria in the Med.

Let's see here, why not make it a top 10;

10
Just because it was mentioned above, Vasa's maiden voyage, because building two decks with more firepower than ever without safety margin can result in a very short, 2km, maiden voyage...

9
Complacency and infighting ensuring that the Islamic golden age didn't revive after the Mongol invasion and consequent withdrawal. Somewhat due to replacing the concept of Ijtihadwith Taqlid, but also a lot because of inheritance which also saw the fractioning of the religion.

8
Lets welcome these strangers to our shore and maybe their way of war can lead our rebellion to victory.
Or the history of the conquistadores in south america. (and somewhat north america as well). Because those pale folks will probably leave soon enough.

7
So this Genghis Khan dude, he seems like a righteous kind of person who will likely convert to Islam. Let's give his horse armies something they lack, like state of the art artillery capabilities. Because that could never come back to bite us could it? What do you mean 40 years later?

6
Korea giving up their golden age of technology through Confucianin principles, like lets not continue development of the Hachwa/Turtle ship/etc, instead losing the tech advantage in philosophical debates. Culminating in the anti-gov and anti-foreigner rebellions of 1800's leading to the - yupp that is right - foreign occupation by Nippon. Because isolationism and conservatism is such a great recipe for not being invaded by foreigners.

5
Japan attacking the USA in WWII, because a suckerpunch might make the US go for peace even before there could be a declaration of war...

4
Ending of the eunuch faction and thus the treasure fleets of China, because tradition dictates that trade, research and international relations are against Confucian principles.

For the top 3 I got to be a little eurocentric, sorry about that.
3
Let's invade Russia, its not that far and not that cold part 1.
Charles the XII, defeats the Russians in 1700 but refuse to invade while they have no army, instead of opting to invade after they have rebuilt a new one with more troops, better weapons, nice fortifications and also with little to no supplies in winter. Because the kossacks will help us...

2
Let's invade Russia, its not that far and not that cold part 2.
When Napoleon decides that the best way to prevent the russians to ally with the brits is to launch a full scale war on Russia. Because winning every battle but not getting a surrender might be pretty tough on supplies when the inevitable russian winter sets in...

1
Let's invade Russia, its not that far and not that cold part 3.
Operation Barbarossa because the failure in Finland proved that the Russkies could easily be defeated in a year or so. So why needs to think about supply lines for multiple years in russian winter...

I'll do a bit more in the way of objections later, but pointing out that the Muslims HAD TO obey their inheritance laws or they'd be complete hypocrites.

Eleas wrote:The sinking of the Ship-of-the-Line Kronan.

If you have no idea what happened, how do you know it's a case of "epic fail?" Sure, the ship spontaneously exploded, but explosions and accidents happen all the time.

Spoonist wrote:Complacency and infighting ensuring that the Islamic golden age didn't revive after the Mongol invasion and consequent withdrawal. Somewhat due to replacing the concept of Ijtihadwith Taqlid, but also a lot because of inheritance which also saw the fractioning of the religion.

Normally, "epic fail" involves some particular, easily identified act of gross stupidity. Where's the gross stupidity here?

Korea giving up their golden age of technology through Confucianin principles, like lets not continue development of the Hachwa/Turtle ship/etc, instead losing the tech advantage in philosophical debates. Culminating in the anti-gov and anti-foreigner rebellions of 1800's leading to the - yupp that is right - foreign occupation by Nippon. Because isolationism and conservatism is such a great recipe for not being invaded by foreigners.

The Hwacha was basically a box full of firework rockets- a dead end compared to conventional artillery pieces. The turtle ship likewise; it was basically a traditional oared galley, with some modest innovations in the way they protected the deck from boarding actions.

Also, again, where is the specific act of stupidity?

5
Japan attacking the USA in WWII, because a suckerpunch might make the US go for peace even before there could be a declaration of war...

Now here, you have identified a single act of gross stupidity...

Let's invade Russia, its not that far and not that cold part 1.
Charles the XII, defeats the Russians in 1700 but refuse to invade while they have no army, instead of opting to invade after they have rebuilt a new one with more troops, better weapons, nice fortifications and also with little to no supplies in winter. Because the kossacks will help us...

To be fair, that wasn't entirely Karl's fault; the anti-Swedish alliance was between Denmark, Russia and Poland, so trying to get Peter to back off would leave him vulnerable to the Poles. As far as cock-ups go, the Great Northen War has the Danish king getting Copenhagen captured because he forgot to fortify his island, one of Karl's generals setting out to resupply him and losing the supplies and half his soldiers in a mutiny, and also... uh... the entire Norwegian campaign of 1718.

On the subject of epic fails, I give you... 1204. So you become the (well, east) Roman Emperor, and you suck at it. After you get deposed and spend a few years in prison, you call on some Latin assholes to come to the city, kill the usurper and put you back on the throne. You even let them stay in the city. Despite not having the money to pay them with. Despite having no army to hold them back if they get pissed off at you. Well, then, here you go.

Carinthium wrote:-Thanas, in theory what evidence should the Brits have seen (if they were thinking reasonably given what they knew) that the War of Jenkin's Ear, or individual measures in it's implementation, were bad ideas? "Picking on" Spain had historically worked well for Britain up to that point,

No, it had not, not when trying to attack Spanish forces on their own turf and in heavily armed fortresses or trying to intercept spanish flotas/heavily armed convoys, which never had worked out so well for the brits. They also had past experience regarding the futilty of attacking Spanish fortresses ranging all the way back to Francis Drake and his failure in the English Armada. In fact, a previous attempt to blockade a port and prevent a Spanish treasure fleet from leaving (Battle of Porto Bello) had failed spectacularly just 10 years earlier.

I present you the Khwarezmid Empire, who, upon receiving a trade delegation from a bunch of smelly, flea-bitten, horse nomads, decided they were spies and had them executed. They subsequently refused demands for reparations from their leader, some nobody by the name of Genghis Khan.
So, after the retaliation, an empire that encompassed modern-day Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and a few other places; which

...stretched from the Syr Darya to the Zagros Mountains, and from the Indus Valley to the Caspian Sea.

became somewhere that many people now have never heard of, and I only heard of because of Medieval Total War 2.

How were the Khwarezmids supposed to realise Genghis Khan was THAT effective? It would be a tricky calculation to make- certainly not Epic Fail material.

Carinthium wrote:How were the Khwarezmids supposed to realise Genghis Khan was THAT effective? It would be a tricky calculation to make- certainly not Epic Fail material.

AFAIK the situation went a little different. A governor of a town executed the ambassadors and did all the other shit, and upon learning what had happened and that Genghis was coming his way the Shah depaired and fled into an island in the Caspian sea rather than face the Mongols with his massive army(although to be fair the Mongolians had already destroyed the Chinese who had an even larger army, and were likely better organised and led than the Shah's Turkish mercenaries).

Sea Skimmer wrote:The Battle of Adowa would rank high on the list; Italian army completely annihilated after attempting to invade a vast country while outnumbered ten to one, and fully aware that said massive enemy had modern weapons.

I would argue Italy's stillborn invasion of Egypt during WW2 makes Adowa look like something worthy of Sun Tzu. Just how did the Italians lose a 150,000 man Army to an inflated 30,000 man garrison? The world wonders.

Carinthium wrote:... but pointing out that the Muslims HAD TO obey their inheritance laws or they'd be complete hypocrites.

You don't have to divide the domain the same way you'd divide wealth. There were several constructs to fix such results.
But since it was tied to religion it was seen as good, so in a way you are right, but we see solutions to this all over the muslim world today and back then. So some muslim dynasties did use constructs, but those who were in power during the fading golden age didn't. Even though they were well aware of the potential side-effects.
If we look at the early days of islam we can see that the principle was for the ruler-caliph to be elected. So the inheritance would be the land and wealth but not the position of power. Instead the position of power/rulership would transfer back to the electing group of scholars.

Simon_Jester wrote:

Spoonist wrote:Complacency and infighting ensuring that the Islamic golden age didn't revive after the Mongol invasion and consequent withdrawal. Somewhat due to replacing the concept of Ijtihadwith Taqlid, but also a lot because of inheritance which also saw the fractioning of the religion.

Normally, "epic fail" involves some particular, easily identified act of gross stupidity. Where's the gross stupidity here?

A good point. My take was much more generic than that so it wasn't in the spirit of the OP. The gross stupidity of abandoning the Ijtihad in favor of Taqlid isn't a single decision or a single person, its a lengthy process over time, so I shouldn't have included that.
Although I personally think it is an epic fail, because it meant less looking for and testing answers as per empiricism/tabula rasa, and instead substituting that with predestination and hadith infallability.

Simon_Jester wrote:

Spoonist wrote:Korea giving up their golden age of technology through Confucianin principles, like lets not continue development of the Hachwa/Turtle ship/etc, instead losing the tech advantage in philosophical debates. Culminating in the anti-gov and anti-foreigner rebellions of 1800's leading to the - yupp that is right - foreign occupation by Nippon. Because isolationism and conservatism is such a great recipe for not being invaded by foreigners.

The Hwacha was basically a box full of firework rockets- a dead end compared to conventional artillery pieces. The turtle ship likewise; it was basically a traditional oared galley, with some modest innovations in the way they protected the deck from boarding actions.

Also, again, where is the specific act of stupidity?

Again, a good point. Its the same concept/principle as above, not in spirit with the OP.
But the specific act of fail would be believing that isolation and looking backwards is the answer to external threat.

However I'd disagree strongly on the tech bits. Neither specific example nor the general principle the Koreans had was scientific dead-ends. Instead both specific examples could easily lead to new innovation and considerations.

Dr. Trainwreck wrote:

Let's invade Russia, its not that far and not that cold part 1.
Charles the XII, defeats the Russians in 1700 but refuse to invade while they have no army, instead of opting to invade after they have rebuilt a new one with more troops, better weapons, nice fortifications and also with little to no supplies in winter. Because the kossacks will help us...

To be fair, that wasn't entirely Karl's fault; the anti-Swedish alliance was between Denmark, Russia and Poland, so trying to get Peter to back off would leave him vulnerable to the Poles.

Acutally it was mostly Karl's fault. But some should be blaimed on the British as well who wanted him going west.
a) the gov in sweden had started negotiations with Poland about peace - which would have let the reinforcements of 1701 to march on Russia - but since Karl couldn't stand August he wanted to defeat him in battle specifcly.
b) Stenbock, Rhenskiöld and Vellingk all wanted to march on Peter, but Karl dismissed their advice. Ackording to Stenbock this was because the you king lusted for battle which a campain in Poland would provide, while a campain in Russia would be mostly a mopping up operation.
c) The Turkish almost allies was willing to join if they marched at this time. The letters from the king in the Riksarkivet is quite telling.
d) the plan was not to march with the whole army, so reserves could be placed to defend against any Polish attack on the Baltics.
etc
It was an epic failure.

CaptHawkeye wrote: I would argue Italy's stillborn invasion of Egypt during WW2 makes Adowa look like something worthy of Sun Tzu. Just how did the Italians lose a 150,000 man Army to an inflated 30,000 man garrison? The world wonders.

The British force was very heavily armed with artillery compared to its size, while the Italian force was not, had tanks immune to almost any Italian weapon at point blank range, and sea superiority which allowed them to neuter the Italian supply lines by shelling the coastal road night and day and forcing them into static position from which they had no mobility owing to a near complete lack of motor transport. It actually made a fair bit of sense, and such one sided battles we kinda expect today. It just wasn't typical for the Second World War. Its not like the battle ever actually involved 150,000 men against 30,000. Defeat in detail.

I don't think either invasion of Russia can really count as an "epic fail"; both were pretty sensible moves considering the situation and in WWII especially, was essentially a forced move not a choice. There is some crowd that thinks Russia is invincible so ever attacking them in any situation is evidence of stupidity, but this doesn't stand up to the slightest scrutiny. They afterall lost hard to Germany in WWI despite Kaiser's position being much worse on paper than either Napoleon or Hitler's.

Japan's entire foreign policy of the pre-1945 Showa era has to qualify as the most baffling series of actions undertaken by a major power in modern history. Simply inexplicable. Like Commodus, they took a fairly healthy Empire, closed their eyes, and simply crashed it into a mountain.

War of Jenkins' Ear was quite a disaster, but maybe not a predictable disaster given the precedent. If the causus belli hadn't been so utterly trumped up by Britain it wouldn't seem like such poetic justice that Britain's war effort crashed so hard.

While probably not the Russia decision particularly, Hitler's decision to ever start WWII doesn't look at all sensible if you only judge by the information of the day, ie. France probably wasn't going to be defeated in a few weeks and the Entente would simply build up a huge material advantage. Then Stalin would probably switch sides when it looked like he could win an easy victory.

energiewende wrote: Like Commodus, they took a fairly healthy Empire, closed their eyes, and simply crashed it into a mountain.

energiewende wrote:I don't think either invasion of Russia can really count as an "epic fail"; both were pretty sensible moves considering the situation and in WWII especially, was essentially a forced move not a choice. There is some crowd that thinks Russia is invincible so ever attacking them in any situation is evidence of stupidity, but this doesn't stand up to the slightest scrutiny. They afterall lost hard to Germany in WWI despite Kaiser's position being much worse on paper than either Napoleon or Hitler's.

...snip...

While probably not the Russia decision particularly, Hitler's decision to ever start WWII doesn't look at all sensible if you only judge by the information of the day, ie. France probably wasn't going to be defeated in a few weeks and the Entente would simply build up a huge material advantage. Then Stalin would probably switch sides when it looked like he could win an easy victory.

Care to elaborate on your reasoning here?
Which one would be 'sensible' and why wouldn't they be epic fails regardless of intentions?
Each of the defeats was the demise of the respective attackers.