[the phantom]

Let's not kid ourselves here, people. A force of hobbits would be useless in roles that required actual combat.

But they clearly made effective ranged troops, armed with short-bows or perhaps slingshots.

That's all fine and dandy if you are going to war against poorly armed and untrained morons, but "short-bows and slingshots" wouldn't cut it against a true military force.

Let's say General Pippin orders his hobbits, "Go over there and pelt that Gondorin army with short-bows and slingshots."

As soon as the arrows starting flying, King Aragorn would say, "Everyone fall back out of their range, get out your longbows, and kill those little hobbits."

And of course, we know how that would turn out. Because of their handicap in the areas of size and strength, hobbits cannot wield weapons that reach as far as those wielded by men and elves. Not only that, but they don't do as much damage either.

So, when you pit long-range+high-damage versus short-range+low-damage, who wins every time?

I don't think I need to give you the answer to that. A group of men or elves with bows would absolutely destroy a group of hobbit archers.

Similarly at the Battle of Bywater, when organised by Merry and Pippin.

We must remember that the Battle of Bywater was not army versus army. If my memory serves me right, it was a collection of dimwitted, outnumbered men walking straight into a trap. The outcome could not have been anything other than a victory for the hobbits. Actually, it is rather disappointing that so many of them died in the victory. I think that shows their inferiority as fighters.

I mean, just imagine for one minute- what if the entire scenario of the Battle of Bywater was kept exactly the same, only instead of hobbits there were Noldorin soldiers fighting against Saruman's men. Heh- you want to talk about a slaughter. I doubt a single elf would get killed.

The fact is, there is not a single military operation that hobbits have ever done that wouldn't have been executed better by elves or men. Scouting is the only thing that hobbits would be good for.