Roman Battle Force & Hannibal

According to Polybius, they were under specific instruction by the Senate--perhaps on the suggestion of Fabius--that they were:

On no account to risk a general engagement, but to

skirmish vigorously and unintermittantly so as to train

the lads and give them confidence for a general battle;

for they thought the chief cause of their late reverses

lay in their having employed newly raised and quite untrained levies."

In fact, the Roman force already in the field were at this point by no means raw levies. Although the Fabian strategy meant that they had engaged in no general action, they were by this time veterans of some months of skirmishing action, which seems on the whole to have gone well for the Romans. This action continued, and Polybius says rather contradictorily that

I shall therefore make no further mention of these [skirmishes], for nothing decisive or noteworthy was

. . .
nvolved its own risks. Hannibal might have found himself in a fruitless pursuit of one army, while perhaps being chased himself by the other; in the worst case he might have fought when the armies were close enough for mutual support, and been at risk himself of being attacked in flank or rear. Moreover, in fairness to Hannibal, the armies that Napoleon fought were more closely tied to supply bases, and particularly magazines that could provide powder and shot; they thus had less freedom of movement to slip away from an unwanted engagement. Moreover, Napoleon, like Hannibal, was blessed in part by his opponents; most great generals have made their careers by capitalizing on enemy commanders' mistakes, and have had more trouble when faced by an enemy determined not to blunder. It may be, however, that Hannibal's operational generalship (as distinct from his ability as a leader of men) was essentially tactical. He was a master at choosing the immediate time and place of battle against an eager (often over-eager) opponent, and at enveloping the Romans with flank and rear attacks. As in the campaign against Fabius in 217, however, he seems to have been less effective at arranging circumstances so that the enemy had to fight wh
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Approximate Word count = 8786
Approximate Pages = 35 (250 words per page)

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