Republican Army

[Felix]

Wow! Thanks for all the feedback!

I had already read the Ploybius account of the Roman Army during the Second Punic War, I just wasn't sure if there was elsewhere. And I do also realize that the changes we today call the "Marian Reforms" were not necessarily started (or ended with) C. Marius, but rather are simply called that because he is best known among those that reformed the army.

You see, I'm writing an essay/paper for school concerning this topic, more or less. In it, I am attributing the CARS/Modular Brigade reforms of the U.S. Army to the Marian Reforms of the Roman Army. Let me explain. The U.S. Army through the CARS program transformed the Army from a regiment-based fighting force to a division-based fighting force. In the present, the Army is taking these reforms one step further in making the U.S. Army into a brigade-based fighting force (similar to the British Army) wherein brigades are modular, meaning they can be transferred from one divisional (or higher) command to another, or can operate independantly.

Now, and please correct me if I'm wrong, the so-called "Marian" Reforms did the same thing in taking the Roman Army from an older, less effective fighting formation to a better-suited force. Just as how the cohort was an extraordinary unit, the brigade in the U.S. Army only as recently as World War II and the Korean War was also a rather temporary, unusual unit formed for a specific mission. So the Marian Reforms changed the Roman Army from manipuli-centered legions to cohort-centered legions in the same way the current reforms have taken the U.S. Army from regiment-centered divisions to brigade-centered divisions.

Do you believe this comparison is adequate?


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One caution: I would be careful about saying the older, less flexible formations (in either US or Roman history) were less effective. They were certainly more rigid, but also used in different types of warfare against different enemies. Scipio Africanus was facing forces of equal sophistication and comparable technology; Caesar was not. (This does not mean Caesar's enemies were necessarily easier to beat, but they weren't the same type.) Pershing was facing a massed German army of comparable technology and sophisticated doctrine, not a guerilla army. The means vary to match the obstacles.