Best General Of WW2

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   As
others have already said - I vote for Erich von Manstein.  I mean,
how can you go for anyone else?  I am a big historian, and fan, of
von Manstein, and if any of you wish to familiarize yourself more with
him be sure to read his memoirs, Lost Victories - you can
purchase it on Amazon.

In any case, should I summarize his accomplisments?

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During the Polish Campaign his Panzers rolled into Warsaw, where he
found out that tanks and street battles don't go together. 
However, his genius truly flared when the remainders of the Polish Army
which ad been overrung in the West had moved east to threaten the
German Werhmacht from the rear.  Erich von Manstein quickly
disengaged from the Warsaw suburbs and, along with other German units,
quickly and effectively sorrounded this Polish Army and finished it off
- which turned out to be the gravest debacle for Poland in the campaign.

His next largest achievement was the creation of Fall Gelb.  Many
people aren't aware that the invasion plan for France was
written by von Manstein.  

During his operations towards Leningrad his 56th Motorized Corps was
able to sorround and destroy the 2nd Shock Army (which would be
destroyed again near Mosnoi Bor).  He was then transferred to the
Moscow Front, where he did relatively nothing, and then transferred
back to Leningrad, where again he did not have the time to do anything,
and finally he was given a command in the Crimea.  In early 1942
he captured Sevastapol (in which he suffered heavy casualties), and
then he did relatively little until he was given command of Army Group
Don in late 1942.  In what I consider his next work of genius he
opened up on the Soviets and launched Operation Winter Tempest - he
reached within 30 kilometers of the Stalingrad kessel, however,
due to a lack of cooperation from von Paulus, who refused to break out,
he was forced to cancel the operation and recall his men.  In
Febuary 1943 Stalingrad surrendered creating quite the situation as the
Soviet armies turned to fight Manstein's Army Group South. 
However, in March 1943 he preformed his greatest deed and captured
Kharkov using the 2nd SS Panzer Korp, and thereafter he led the attack
into the Kursk salient, beginning July 6th, 1943, and reached the
farthest.  After the Kursk defeat - in which he was a proponent of
continuing the operation - he fought a genius defense in the Ukraine,
until early 1944, when Hitler sacked him - and consequently Hitler lost
the war for himself..although Hitler lost the war forhimself in 1933,
when he became chancellor of Germany.

In this short, and very vague, history of Manstein I conclude, that I
believe Manstein was the greatest general during the Second World
War.  No other general can compare to him.