Alexander the Great was antiquity\'s greatest commander

[Spartan JKM]

Looks like this thread is one of the best I have ever been involved in! Very astute posting Paul.

I'll soon address plenty when I have time, but I would like to give mention to one of the better (seemingly) TIER 3 commanders - one that always caught my attention when reading of the Second Punic War; it was a tragedy for Hannibal's cause.

Though Syracuse had fallen to the Romans in 212 B.C., Hannibal fully understood the strategic importance of Sicily (a simple glance at the map reveals the island's strategic importance in the Mediterranean). He sent a letter to Carthage convincing them not to give up on Sicily (they still held much of the western part of Sicily); they responded by sending some 11,000 men (8,000 foot and 3,000 Numidians) to the island. Hannibal sent the brilliant Muttines from southern Italy to aid in the command of operations there. As Theodor Mommsen tells us, in his classic work of Roman history, Book III, Chapter VI,

"Sicily thus appeared lost to the Carthaginians; but the genius of Hannibal exercised even from a distance its influence there. He dispatched to the Carthaginian army, which remained at Agrigentum in perplexity and inaction under Hanno and Epicydes, a Libyan cavalry officer by the name of Muttines, who took the command of the Numidian cavalry, and with his flying squadrons, fanning into an open flame the bitter hatred which the despotic rule of the Romans had excited over all the island, commenced a guerilla warfare on the most extensive scale and with the happiest results; so that he even, when the Carthaginian and Roman armies met on the river Himera, sustained some conflicts with Marcus Marcellus himself successfully. The relations, however, which prevailed between Hannibal and the Carthaginian council, were here repeated on a small scale. The general appointed by the council pursued with jealous envy the officer sent by Hannibal, and insisted upon giving battle to the proconsul without Muttines and the Numidians. The wish of Hanno was carried out, and he was completely beaten. Muttines was not induced to deviate from his course; he maintained himself in the interior of the country, occupied several small towns, and was enabled by the not inconsiderable reinforcements which joined him from Carthage gradually to extend his operations. His successes were so brilliant, that at length the commander-in-chief, who could not otherwise prevent the cavalry officer from eclipsing him, deprived him summarily of the command of the light cavalry, and entrusted it to his own son. The Numidian, who had now for two years preserved the island for his Carthagnian masters, had the measure of his patience exhausted by this treatment. He and his horsemen, who refused to follow the younger Hanno, entered into negotiations with the Roman general Marcus Valerius Laevinus and delivered to him Agrigentum. Hanno escaped in a boat, and went to Carthage to report to his superiors the disgraceful high treason of Hannibal's officer; the Carthaginian garrison in the town was put to death by the Romans, and the citizens were sold into slavery..."

This event echoes what some of you mention regarding the contention between the Barcids and much of the Council of 104. A year or so earlier, while a Carthaginian fleet, the largest they mustered in the war, was set in an attempt to supply Syracuse, the admiral Bomilcar pusillanimously sailed away rather than fight Marcellus' fleet off Cape Pachynon; the Romans were numerically smaller and, as we know, the corvus had long been abandoned. This is something Hannibal probably thought was imminent: he saw the Carthaginian navy by his time was a broken reed, and could not be counted upon to deliver in a time of extreme importance. Sir Bernard Montgomery is certainly incorrect, in his History of Warfare, in stating Hannibal didn't understand the importance of sea-power. No, with respect Sir Bernard, he understood it all too well.

Livy tells us, in the clash around the River Himera, when Marcellus learned of Muttines' arrival, Book 25.40,

"...Marcellus promptly moved up and encamped about four miles from the enemy with the intention of waiting for any action he might take. But no time was allowed him for either delay or deliberation; Muttines crossed the river and charged his enemy's outposts, creating the greatest terror and confusion. The next day there was almost a regular battle and he drove the Romans within their lines..."

The ultimate result was an ugly and unfortunate turn for the Carthaginian cause, and another case of Hannibal not benefitting from events that could have been different - events he had no personal control over. Entrenched Romans could not have been dislodged, but Muttines could have run roughshed over the Romans throughout most of Sicily, assuming he would have been supported. As it was, he was insulted - probably a case of racism. It has been suggested that one of Hannibal's mistakes was not going to Sicily himself in 211 B.C. But the situation regarding Capua was too intense; his personal presence was needed. Perhaps Hannibal was simply smarter than his critics.

Thanks, James