Roman History Rome v. Carthage

Roman History

Rome v. Carthage III: Return of the Empire

There can be no doubt that the Roman Empire was central to the shaping of Western civilization and our modern world. Arguably no nation before or since the Roman Empire has been as successful in large scale civic planning and widespread infrastructure, a fact that is made all the more amazing given the technological and energy limitations the Romans were working with compared to the innovations made in the last few centuries. Certain examples of Roman architecture and engineering remain unparalleled -- the Colosseum remains one of the most iconic buildings in the world, and the fact that it is still largely intact despite centuries of wear without any attempt at upkeep is a testament not only to the Romans' ability to plan, coordinate and carry out such massive projects, but to their skill and efficiency at such projects, too. The entertainments that took place here included flooding it to reenact naval battle, and being able to drain it for gladiator fights soon after. Such feats were indicative of the culture of the Roman Empire both in terms of the scale of the undertaking and in the violence that was an inherent part of much of Roman civilization's constituent parts.

Other civic undertakings were of an even larger scale, and of greater practical benefits to the inhabitants of the Roman Empire and successive generations of occupants on Romanized lands. Bridges, roads, and aqueducts connected large swathes of the Empire, and many of these structure remained in used for centuries after Rome's fall. In fact, many modern roads exist on top of ancient Roman ones -- the saying "all roads lead to Rome" was a reference to the massive and widespread transportation infrastructure undertaken by the Empire during its heyday. These facilitated trade and ensured security during travel to a far greater degree. This too, however, was only possible because of Rome's dedication to militancy.

The Roman concepts concerning the creation and implementation of a widely deployed standing army is perhaps, for better or worse, the feature of the Roman Empire that subsequent Western nations and societies (including modern ones) have been most willing and even eager to emulate. Many subsequent empires -- in fact, all of them -- have found it necessary to employ the same or similar military methods in order to retain control of the disparate lands under their dominion. From European holdings in Africa and South America, to the United States' appropriation of land from the Native Americans and even arguably to many of the international military installations and actions taken by Western nations and organizations today, retaining the political and economic cooperation of large geographical areas and disparate groups of people and/or civilizations has required a standing military presence.

It is not only in the presence of an occupying military force that more modern events could be seen to reflect ancient Roman techniques of empire construction and maintenance. Some of the strategies employed by superpowers in regions outside their own domestic boundaries, and at home to garner support for such efforts, are also remarkably similar. At its heart, war is always about control, usually of wealth and power (which generally work and exist in tandem). This was just as true during the time of the Romans as it is now, but it was also just as unpopular and untenable to state the thirst for power or greed for another nation's wealth as the purpose for war. Instead, other motives needed to be created to justify such action.

Without drawing any direct comparisons to modern military actions, the similarities in the main falsified justifications of war made by both the Romans and more modern empires and nations can easily be seen in the Roman's third war against Carthage in 149 B.C.E. With little real basis, Roman officials decided after a visit to Carthage that the Carthaginians presented a very real and growing threat, and that their proximity to Rome and the Empire was simply to close to allow for a hostile enemy. Because of the supposed threat that the Carthaginian city-state presented to Rome, the Empire made a pre-emptive attack on the city in order to prevent any military action by Carthage on any part of the Roman Empire or its allies. The ethical and political validity of a pre-emptive attack is a major matter of debate, perhaps more in the modern era than it was then, but such esoteric quibbles are of little importance when the more practical elements of military prowess and overall wealth are considered.

It is difficult to believe that the official powers in Rome truly felt threatened by Carthage. In his Roman History, Appian notes that after Cato's trip to Carthage, during which he and his fellow ambassadors noted the growing prosperity and immense resources of the region, that he "continually expressed the opinion in the Senate that Carthage must not exist."

Appian does not mention Cato noting any explicit threat that he perceived during his visit to Carthage. Instead, it was the wealth of the city-state that inspired fear in Cato and the others -- if the fear itself was even real. It is true that wealth is necessary for the waging of war, and Carthage would present more of a threat simply by being more prosperous, but it is perhaps more likely that Cato saw the opportunity to appropriate a greater share of the Carthaginian wealth for the Roman Empire and its nearby allies, and was motivated by greed more than fear.

There is a great deal of evidence to support this theory on many different levels. The Third Punic War, the final installment of the century-long conflict between Rome and Carthage which ended in the utter destruction of Carthage, came fifty years after the Second Punic War. These fifty years of nearly uninterrupted peace were hugely prosperous for the area despite militarily restrictive components of their treaty with Rome.

At the same time, the Romans were consistently supporting the Numidians and their King Massinissa in territorial disputes with Carthage, which not only created a sense of unfairness and imbalance in the region, but also made the Carthaginians much less trusting of their Roman neighbor's intentions.

Rome's closer relationship with Massinissa necessarily had economic benefits for the Empire, especially after the expiration of Carthage's fifty-year tribute that came as a condition of the end of the Second Punic War.

Carthage's persistent growth and prosperity in the face of the limitations and unfairness imposed upon them could have been a thorn in Rome's side.

There are other reasons to question the logic of Rome's claim to feel threatened by Carthage's success and growing wealth. Most importantly, Massinissa's taking of Carthaginian lands, which met with tacit support from the Roman emissaries sent to arbitrate the issues, made him quite prosperous as well.

Yet far from going to war with Numidia, Rome continued to help the kingdom prosper. It cannot, then, be any threat, real or imagined, that Carthage posed due its prosperity that was the driving force behind Rome's decision to go to war.

This does not mean that the perception of a threat could not be used to stir people to war. Appian is not the only Roman historian to cite the importance of Cato's impassioned diatribes against Carthage as cementing support for military action; Pliny tells a more explicit version of Cato's beliefs, stating that he was "burning with a mortal hatred of Carthage," and citing a specific instance in which Cato produced a very fresh looking fig at a house in Rome and exclaimed that "it was picked the day before yesterday at Carthage -- so near is the enemy to our walls!"

This type of argument, stressing not only the prominence but also the proximity of Carthage to Rome, was no less effective at stirring up sentiments against Carthage for its insincerity, at least according to the Roman historians looking back at the incident.

Even the explanations given by Pliny and Appian concerning Cato's rather baseless rabble-rousing have been called into question by modern scholars, however. Some even maintain that "it may be doubted whether Cato really went to Africa at all," and that the historians who first recorded such a trip and Cato's attitude towards Carthage in its aftermath were themselves attempting to justify similar military actions.

Fear mongering has remained a popular way for garnering public support for otherwise unjustifiable wars, and these historians shows that it was popular even as a retroactive measure two thousand years ago. When war against a particular enemy or region is desired but no reasonable and ethical motive presents itself, most nations in history have not found a great deal of repugnance in creating a feeling of threat or injustice in order to justify their actions, and they may (like these historians) even believe it.

This is almost certainly what was occurring in the run-up to the Third Punic War. In fact, in the early part of the war, the Carthaginian territories feel with little struggle to the massive Roman force, and even gave up their weapons in huge numbers (over two hundred thousand separate pieces of hand weaponry and at least two thousand catapults, by some accounts) when this was demanded by the Romans.

After this, there could have been very little perceived threat left; not only were the Carthaginian's surrendering rather peacefully, but they were even giving up their means of waging war effectively. The giving up of weapons in an age when manufacture and shipping -- the two methods by which any commodity, military or otherwise, can be obtained -- took an extended period of time meant that the Carthaginians were showing themselves to desire peace not only in the short-term, but as a general social principle.

Their submission to the Romans, then, should have been the end of the war. If the reason behind Rome's military invasion of the Carthaginian territory was the possible threat the area presented to Rome, then its disarmament would have solved that problem. The Romans refused to let the issue go, however, demanding that the entire city of Carthage be destroyed right to the ground.

It was the Carthaginian refusal to do this that led to the prolonged siege that formed the bulk of the Third Punic War. It is also this demand of Rome's that makes the true motive behind this war clear; it is politically much more complex than simply having a threatening neighbor in close proximity, but also comes down to simple greed.

It of course seems unfair that the Romans should demand the utter destruction of what at the time was an incredibly large, populous, and prosperous city. It might also seem like the Romans could have little practical reason for desiring this. Even a basic understanding of the mercantile realities of the time, however, can make it very clear why Rome wished to remove Carthage from the map. Ports are incredibly important even today, handling a huge quantity of imports and exports in countries around the world, and facilitating trade by serving as points of entry (or exit) for the vast amount of goods not directly available in any given area. Today, air shipping and railway systems are also able to move large quantities of goods, but in Roman times boats were the only efficient way to move a large amount of cargo from one area to another . This made waterways and the cities on them important commercial and financial centers due to the control they could exert on trade, and Carthage was one of the biggest ports on the North African side of the Mediterranean -- and Rome didn't like not being a part of it.

One of the offers Rome made to Carthage was to have the city moved ten miles inland, which would have been just as bad as a destruction of the city as its usefulness as a port and therefore trading center would be ruined.

It is also fairly clear that Rome did not expect Carthage to comply with this request, as they had never made any similar demands.

Either way, the real reason the Romans went to war with Carthage was to remove it from competition.

At this point in the progress of Western civilization, the Roman Empire was still on the rise. The Republic was still strong, but the Triumvirate and eventual dictatorship that typified the latter half of Roman rule were only a century away. This was a period when Rome was consolidating not only the vast territories and peoples of the known world, but also the power that had over them politically, militarily, and perhaps most importantly economically. In order to increase this dominance, it was willing to employ virtually any tactic available. Such tactics included, in the case of the Third Punic War, overtly stating their ultimate aim in the form of a demand that, at least to some, justified the continuation of the war for an additional three years of siege that culminated in razing a vast city to the ground after a bitter house-by-house battle. That is, the Romans very possibly demanded that the Carthaginians destroy and/or move their city knowing that they would not comply with this component of a peace agreement, and could then justify their own destruction of Carthage.

The complex interplay between Rome, Carthage, and the Numidians under King Massinissa also cannot be disregarded when considering the lead up to the Third Punic War. The situation between the three powers interested in the North African region does not really affect the motives of Rome's war, but it does strengthen it. Rome already had basic imperial dominion over the area, as evidenced by their ability to create the terms of peace and arbitrate disputes. But the power structure here was not solidified, and various factions existed in Carthage and its environs that supported the various competitors for dominance.

Reading into the complex political situation created by these factions and Rome's desire to continue increasing its consolidation of power allows one to pick out even stronger reasons for Rome to go to war.

The newest of these powers, and in many ways the one with the fastest gains in the area, was Massinissa. His continued appropriation of Carthaginian lands and agricultural techniques during the period between the Second and Third Punic Wars provided him with large surpluses in grain and other commodities, which were made into gifts to the roman Empire -- specifically going to feed the massive and widely dispersed Roman army -- making him a definite favorite of the Romans.