WI: Harold Godwinson tried to get the Bastard and Hadrada to fight each other

So what would have happened if Harold Godwinson decided to stay back and let his enemies weaken themselves fighting each other and then he goes over to defeat the weakened victor?
 
I'm pretty sure that would be hard to wangle without letting foreigners occupy half the country in the meantime.
 
Harold's job is to avoid having foreign armies occupy his country?

But if his overall strategy is to have those foreign armies weaken each other and then evict them from his territory wouldn't it make more sense than fighting two battles in quick succession?
 
But if his overall strategy is to have those foreign armies weaken each other and then evict them from his territory wouldn't it make more sense than fighting two battles in quick succession?

I mean, it might make sense if you were playing Crusader Kings 2, but just letting a bunch of foreigners occupy territory is not something a King can do.
 
But if his overall strategy is to have those foreign armies weaken each other and then evict them from his territory wouldn't it make more sense than fighting two battles in quick succession?

I don't it would work out. Hadrada landed in the North, William would land in the south, they would primarily be gunning for Harold. Also note that Harold nearly won Hastings, so it wasn't as problematic as it seemed.
 
But if his overall strategy is to have those foreign armies weaken each other and then evict them from his territory wouldn't it make more sense than fighting two battles in quick succession?

Harold's army was primarily made up of farmers who had been forced to come fight. Letting two armies run rampant over his land would not go over well with them. When the army melts away to protect their land/family/livelihood he has lost.
 

Redhand

Banned
Feudal kings and the very basis of feudalism is the ability to protect land from invaders. While Byzantine Emperors may be allowed to play the long game, western European kings were not and would have had his nobles depose him for attempting such a thing. Ransacking armies means dead peasants which means less tax revenue which means pissed off nobles.
 
As others have said, his army would melt away and his vassals would lose faith in him. This strategy would be difficult enough in a non-feudal (or semi-feudal) setting but here it's impossible. Even if that were not the case, William is in the south and Harald in the north, which leaves Harold in... the middle, more accessible to Harald and William's armies then they are to each other. Nor would Harald and William be likely to seek battle with one another until they have dealt with the Saxons. Also remember that by doing what he did, Harold the Saxon achieved tactical surprise against the Norwegians and strategic surprise against the Normans, which he could not have gotten had he waited.
 
Hed fail horribly, because that's a terrible plan. Harold has the strength to beat them both as is one after the other (Hastings was a very close wrung affair, had a handful of events gone better for the Saxons they'd have won). Doing this all he's doing is allow enemies deep into his territory for no good reason on the hope they fight each other (which is not a sure thing at all).
 
But if his overall strategy is to have those foreign armies weaken each other and then evict them from his territory wouldn't it make more sense than fighting two battles in quick succession?

He could probably justify waiting to fight William until he can collect more troops, but he's not going to be able to justify avoiding a fight until William and Harald meet. That would just come off as cowardice to the Saxon nobility.
 
Harold's army was primarily made up of farmers who had been forced to come fight. Letting two armies run rampant over his land would not go over well with them. When the army melts away to protect their land/family/livelihood he has lost.

Harold's army consisted mainly of the household troops (Huscarls) of both the royal household and those of his brothers households. Those thegns present on the day would be those sworn to Harold personally or the King along with their own armed retainers. The proportion of poorly armed peasants was small and would have consisted of those either burned out from their lands by rampaging Normans or else those afraid of a similiar fate.

But although not "primarily farmers" (in the sense of pushing a plough or using a hoe) the cohesion of his army would have suffered if he'd failed to take decisive action against invading armies rampaging across the Kingdom. The north especially might have gone over to Harald Hadrada (the former Danelaw and Norse Kingdom of York) leading to a protracted campaign to recover half of the Kingdom. And he was of course stuck between the two of them and would have to concede half the Kingdom to each of them!
 
Harold's army consisted mainly of the household troops (Huscarls) of both the royal household and those of his brothers households. Those thegns present on the day would be those sworn to Harold personally or the King along with their own armed retainers. The proportion of poorly armed peasants was small and would have consisted of those either burned out from their lands by rampaging Normans or else those afraid of a similiar fate.

The huscarls made up only a part of the army, the rest were the landowners called up in the ford, who were not professional soldiers. He had called the ford back up when word of the invasions finally came.
 
The obvious danger is that they would combine against Harold instead of conveniently fighting each other. They both come out with significantly more territory than they started with and have a better chance of winning against what on paper was the strongest of the three.

It's something that Harald had done before -- he had agreed to divide Norway between himself and Magnus the Good rather than fight a civil war. [The agreement held; Harald eventually inherited the whole country when Magnus died without heirs.]
 
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