The Second Roman War was in its most immediate aspect a clash of armies, and its form and ultimate outcome were determined in large part by the capabilities of armies, Hannibal's own and that of his Roman opponents. It is true that war is "politics by other means," and that the results of war depend depend more than the results of individual battles. Indeed, Cannae demonstrates almost perfectly the limitations of a "decisive battle." It is hard to imagine a battle more decisive in its purely military aspect, yet Rome survived the defeat and went on to finally win the war. Had Hannibal lost at Cannae, however, the Second Roman War would almost certainly have followed an entirely different course, and probably would have ended very much earlier, with incalculable effects on the future. While the clash of armies was thus not by itself the absolute arbiter of the war, it still played a central role, and to understand the war it is necessary to understand the armies that fought it. This chapter will be devoted to a consideration of the armies that each side brought to the war, and to the nature and tactics of the battles they were intended to fight. The actual experience of battle in the Second Roman War will for the most part be reserved for the narrative of the war itself in subsequent chapters; the purpose of this chapter is to provide the groundwork for that narrative. The chapter is divided into three main sections; the first deals with Hannibal's army, the second with the Roman army, and the third with the general state of the art in Hellenistic warfare, including Roman warfare.
It may be taken for granted that Hannibal knew all about his own army: its strengths and weaknesses; the tactical styles and combat characteristics of its varied components; its material and logistic requirements on the march and in battle; and the moral and psychological factors that made it capable of sustaining years of campaigning in a largel...