Scipio Africanus

by B. h. Liddell Hart

  To Hannibal’s overture he pointed out that it was easy to express regret that the two powers had gone to war—but who had begun it? Had Hannibal even proposed them before the Romans crossed to Africa, and voluntarily retired from Italy, his proposals would almost certainly have been accepted. Yet in spite of the utterly changed position, with the Romans “ in command of the open country,” Hannibal now proposed easier terms than Carthage had already accepted in the broken treaty. All he offered, in fact, was to give up territory which was already in Roman possession, and had been for a long time. It was futile for him to submit such empty concessions to Rome. If Hannibal would agree to the conditions of the original treaty, and add compensation for the seizure of the transports during the truce, and for the violence offered to the envoys, then he would have something to lay before his council. Otherwise, “ the question must be decided by arms.” This brief speech is a gem of clear and logical reasoning. Hannibal apparently made no advance on his former proposals, and the conference therefore came to an end, the rival commanders returning to their camps.

  Both sides recognised the issues that hung upon the morrow—“ the Carthaginians fighting for their own safety and the dominion of Africa, and the Romans for the empire of the world. Is there any one who can remain unmoved in reading the narrative of such an encounter? For it would be impossible to find more valiant soldiers, or generals who had been more successful and were more thoroughly experienced in the art of war, nor indeed had Fortune ever offered to contending armies a more splendid prize of victory” (Polybius). If the prize was great, so was the price of defeat. For the Romans if beaten were isolated in the interior of a foreign land, while the collapse of Carthage must follow if the army that formed her last bulwark was beaten. These crucial factors were stressed by the opposing commanders when next morning at daybreak they led out their troops for the supreme trial, and had made their dispositions.

  Scipio rode along the lines and addressed his men in a few appropriate words. Polybius’s s account, though necessarily but the substance and not an exact record, is so in tune with Scipio’s character as to be worth giving. “Bear in mind your past battles and fight like brave men worthy of yourselves and of your country. Keep it before your eyes that if you overcome your enemies not only will you be unquestioned masters of Africa, but you will gain for yourselves and your country the undisputed command and sovereignty of the rest of the world. But if the result of the battle be otherwise, those who have fallen bravely in the fight will be for ever shrouded in the glory of dying thus for their country, while those who save themselves by flight will spend the remainder of their lives in misery and disgrace. For no place in Africa will afford you safety, and if you fall into the hands of the Carthaginians it is plain enough to those who reflect what fate awaits you. May none of you, I pray, live to experience that fate, now that Fortune offers us the most glorious of prizes; how utterly craven, nay, how foolish shall we be, if we reject the greatest of goods and choose the greatest of evils from mere love of life. Go, therefore, to meet the foe with two objects before you, either victory or death. For men animated by such a spirit must always overcome their adversaries, since they go into battle ready to throw their lives away.” Of this address Livy says “he delivered these remarks with a body so erect, and with a countenance so full of exultation, that one would have supposed that he had already conquered.”

  On the other side Hannibal ordered each commander of the foreign mercenaries to address his own men, appealing to their greed for booty, and bidding them be sure of victory from his presence and that of the forces he had brought back. With the Carthaginian levies he ordered their commanders to dwell on the sufferings of their wives and children should the Romans conquer. Then to his own men he spoke personally, reminding them of their seventeen years’ comradeship and invincibility, of the victory of Trebia won over the father of the present Roman general, of Trasimene and Cannæ—“ battles with which the action in which we are about to engage is not worthy of comparison.” Speaking thus, he bade them cast their eyes on the opposing army and see for themselves that the Romans were fewer in numbers, and further, only a fraction of the forces they had conquered in Italy.

  The dispositions made by the rival leaders have several features of note. Scipio placed his heavy Roman foot—he had probably two legions—in the centre; Lælius with the Italian cavalry on the left wing, and on the right wing Masinissa with the whole of the Numidians, horse and foot, the latter presumably prolonging the centre and the cavalry on their outer flank.

  The heavy infantry were drawn up in the normal three lines, first the hastati, then the principes, and finally the triarii. But instead of adopting the usual chequer formation, with the maniples of the second line opposite to and covering the intervals between the maniples of the first line, he ranged the maniples forming the rear lines directly behind the respective maniples of the first line. Thus he formed wide lanes between each cohort—which was primarily composed of one maniple of hastati, one of principes, and one of triarii.

  His object was twofold : on the one hand, to provide an antidote to the menace of Hannibal’s war elephants and to guard against the danger that their onset might throw his ranks into disorder; on the other, to oil the working of his own machine by facilitating the sallies and retirements of his skirmishers. These velites he placed in the intervals in the first line, ordering them to open the action, and if they were forced back by the charge of the elephants, to retire. Even this withdrawal he governed by special instructions, ordering those who had time to fall back by the straight passages and pass right to the rear of the army, and those who were overtaken to turn right or left as soon as they passed the first line, and make their way along the lateral lanes between the lines. This wise provision economised life, ensured smooth functioning, and increased the offensive power—a true fulfilment of economy of force. It may even be termed the origin of modern extended order, for its object was the same—to negative the effect of the enemy’s projectiles by creating empty intervals, a reduction of the target by dispersion, the only difference being that Hannibal’s projectiles were animal, not mineral.

  The Carthaginian had eighty elephants, more than in any previous battle, and in order to terrify the enemy he placed them in front of his line. Supporting them, in the first line, were the Ligurian and Gallic mercenaries intermixed with Balearic and Moorish light troops. These were the troops with whom Mago had sailed home, about twelve thousand in number, and it is a common historical mistake to regard the whole force as composed of light troops.

  In the second line Hannibal placed the Carthaginian and African levies as well as the Macedonian force, their combined strength probably exceeding that of the first line. Finally Hannibal’s own troops formed the third line, held back more than two hundred yards distant from the others, in order evidently to keep it as an intact reserve, and lessen the risk of it becoming entangled in the mêlée before the commander intended. On the wings Hannibal disposed his cavalry, the Numidian allies on the left and the Carthaginian horse on the right. His total force was probably in excess of fifty thousand, perhaps fifty-five thousand. The Roman strength is less certain, but if we assume that each of Scipio’s two legions was duplicated by an equal body of Italian allies, and add Masinissa’s ten thousand, the complete strength would be about thirty-six thousand if the legions were at full strength. It was probably less, because some wastage must have occurred during the earlier operations since quitting his base.

  The First Phase.—The battle opened, after preliminary skirmishing between the Numidian horse, with Hannibal’s orders to the drivers of the elephants to charge the Roman line. Scipio promptly trumped his opponent’s ace, by a tremendous blare of trumpets and cornets along the whole line. The strident clamour so startled and terrified the elephants that many of them at once turned tail and rushed back on their own troops. This was especially the case on the left wing, where they threw the Numidians, Hannibal’s best cavalry wing, into disorder jus
t as they were advancing to the attack. Masinissa seized this golden opportunity to launch a counter-stroke, which inevitably overthrew the disorganised opponents. With Masinissa in hot pursuit, they were driven from the field, and so left the Carthaginian left wing exposed.

  The remainder of the elephants wrought much havoc among Scipio’s velites, caught by their charge in front of the Roman line. But the foresight that had provided the “ lanes ” and laid down the method of withdrawal was justified by its results. For the elephants took the line of least resistance, penetrating into the lanes rather than face the firm-knit ranks of the heavy infantry maniples. Once in these lanes the velites who had retired into the lateral passages, between the lines, bombarded them with darts from both sides. Their reception was far too warm for them to linger when the door of escape was held wide open. While some of the elephants rushed right through, harmlessly, and out to the open in rear of the Roman army, others were driven back out of the lanes and fled towards the Carthaginian right wing. Here the Roman cavalry received them with a shower of javelins, while the Carthaginian cavalry could not follow suit, so that the elephants naturally trended towards the least unpleasant side. “ It was at this moment that Lælius, availing himself of the disturbance created by the elephants, charged the Carthaginian cavalry and forced them to headlong flight. He pressed the pursuit closely, as likewise did Masinissa.” Both Hannibal’s flanks were thus stripped bare. The decisive manœuvre of Cannæ was repeated, but reversed.

  Scipio was certainly an artist in tactical “ boomerangs,” as at Ilipa so now at Zama his foresight and art turned the enemy’s best weapon back upon themselves. How decisive might have been the charge of the elephants is shown by the havoc they wrought at the outset among the velites.

  The Second Phase.—In the meantime the infantry of both armies had “slowly and in imposing array advanced on each other,” except that Hannibal kept his own troops back in their original position. Raising the Roman war-cry on one side, polyglot shouts on the other—this vocal discord was a moral drawback,—the lines met. At first the Gauls and Ligurians had the balance of advantage, through their personal skill in skirmishing and more rapid movement. But the Roman line remained unbroken, and the weight of their compact formation pushed the enemy back despite losses. Another factor told, for while the leading Romans were encouraged by the shouts from the rear lines, coming on to back them up, Hannibal’s second line—the Carthaginians—failed to support the Gauls, but hung back in order to keep their ranks firm. Forced steadily back, and feeling they had been left in the lurch by their own side, the Gauls turned about and fled. When they tried to seek shelter in the second line, they were repulsed by the Carthaginians, who, with apparently sound yet perhaps unwise military instinct, deemed it essential to avoid any disarray which might enable the Romans to penetrate their line. Exasperated and now demoralised, many of the Gauls tried to force an opening in the Carthaginian ranks, but the latter showed that their courage was not deficient and drove them off. In a short time the relics of the first line had dispersed completely, or disappeared round the flanks of the second line. The latter confirmed their fighting quality by thrusting back the Roman first line—the hastati —also. In this they were helped by a human obstacle, the ground encumbered with corpses and slippery with blood, which disordered the ranks of the attacking Romans. Even the principes had begun to waver when they saw the first line driven back so decisively, but their officers rallied them and led them forward in the nick of time to restore the situation. This reinforcement was decisive. Hemmed in, because the Roman formation produced a longer frontage and so overlapped the Carthaginian line, the latter was steadily cut to pieces. The survivors fled back on the relatively distant third line, but Hannibal continued his policy of refusing to allow the fugitives to mix with and disturb an ordered line. He ordered the foremost ranks of his “ Old Guard ” to lower their spears as a barrier against them, and they were forced to retreat towards the flanks and the open ground beyond.

  The Third Phase.—The curtain now rose on what was practically a fresh battle. The Romans “ had penetrated to their real antagonists, men equal to them in the nature of their arms, in their experience of war, in the fame of their achievements....” Livy’s tribute is borne out by the fierceness and the for long uncertain issue of the subsequent conflict, which gives the lie to those who pretend that Hannibal’s “ Old Guard ” was but a shadow of its former power in the days of Trasimene and Cannæ.

  The Romans had the moral advantage of having routed two successive lines, as well as the cavalry and elephants, but they had now to face a compact and fresh body of twenty-four thousand veterans, under the direct inspiration of Hannibal. And no man in history has shown a more dynamic personality in infusing his own determination in his troops.

  The Romans, too, had at last a numerical advantage, not large, however—Polybius says that the forces were “ nearly equal in numbers,” —and in reality still less than it appeared. For, while all Hannibal’s third line were fresh, on Scipio’s side only the triarii had not been engaged, and these represented but half the strength of the hastati or principes. Further, the velites had been so badly mauled that they had to be relegated to the reserve, and the cavalry were off the field, engaged in the pursuit. Thus it is improbable that Scipio had at his disposal for this final blow more than eighteen or twenty thousand infantry, less the casualties these had already suffered.

  His next step is characteristic of the man—of his cool calculation even in the heart of a battle crisis. Confronted by this gigantic human wall—such the Carthaginians would appear in phalanx, —he sounds the recall to his leading troops, and it is a testimony to their discipline that they respond like a well-trained pack of hounds. Then in face of an enemy hardly more than a bow-shot distant he not only reorganises his troops but reconstructs his dispositions! His problem was this—against the first two enemy lines the Roman formation, shallower than the Carthaginian phalanx and with intervals, had occupied a wider frontage and so enabled him to overlap theirs. Now, against a body double the strength, his frontage was no longer, and perhaps less than Hannibal’s. His appreciation evidently took in this factor, and with it two others. First, that in order to concentrate his missile shock power for the final effort it would be wise to make his line as solid as possible, and this could be done because there was no longer need or advantage for retaining intervals between the maniples. Second, that as his cavalry would be returning any moment, there was no advantage in keeping the orthodox formation in depth and using the principes and triarii as a direct support and reinforcement to his front line. The blow should be as concentrated as possible in time and as wide as possible in striking force, rather than a series of efforts. We see him, therefore, making his hastati close up to form a compact centre without intervals. Then similarly he closes each half of his principes and triarii outwards, and advances them to extend the flank on either wing. The order from right to left of his now continuous line would thus be half the triarii, half the principes, the hastati, the other half of the principes, the other half of the triarii. He now once more overlaps the hostile front. To British readers this novel formation of Scipio’s, inspired by a flash of genius in the middle of a momentous conflict, should have a special interest. For here is born the “ line ” which the Peninsular War and Waterloo have made immortal, here Scipio anticipated Wellington by two thousand years in revealing the truth that the long shallow line is the formation which allows of the greatest volume of fire, which fulfils the law of economy of force by bringing into play the nre—whether bullets or javelins—of the greatest possible proportion of the force. The role of Scipio’s infantry in the final phase was to fix Hannibal’s force ready for the decisive manœuvre to be delivered by the cavalry. For this role violence and wideness of onslaught was more important than sustenance. Scipio made his redistribution deliberately and unhurriedly—the longer he could delay the final tussle the more time he gained for the return of his cavalry. It is not unli
kely that Masinissa and Lælius pressed the pursuit rather too far, and so caused an unnecessary strain on the Roman infantry and on Scipio’s plan. For Polybius tells us that when the rival infantries met “ the contest was for long doubtful, the men falling where they stood out of determination, until Masinissa and Lælius arrived providentially at the proper moment.” Their charge, in the enemy’s rear, clinched the decision, and though most of Hannibal’s men fought grimly to the end, they were cut down in their ranks. Of those who took to flight few escaped, nor did the earlier fugitives fare any better, for Scipio’s cavalry swept the whole plain, and because of the wide expanse of level country, found no obstacle to their searching pursuit.