What can we learn about the enduring nature of war from Scipio Africanus? In other words, what does he have to say to us about the art and science of war? Is it relevant to modern war?Scipio Africanus teaches several lessons on the enduring nature of war. Through his example Scipio teaches us that soldiers need to know that their leaders believe in something. “Scipio similarly made the men under his command more sanguine and more ready to face perilous enterprises by instilling into them the belief that his projects were divinely inspired .” By displaying strong religious convictions Scipio’s men would not only be led to believe that he was following what their deities desired, but that he was accountable and responsible to a higher power. In the modern day military you see this being instilled in leaders and soldiers alike through the seven Army Values, which seek to build morality. Liddell Hart touches on Scipio’s moral strength and how it contributed to his success in military campaigns several times throughout the book. In a modern day military manual, FM 6-22, we learn the importance of establishing morality in both soldiers and leaders. “The army values firmly bind all Army members into a fellowship dedicated to serve the Nation and the Army .” Moral stature is extremely important. From the reports of his valet Marcius we know that Scipio was a moral person and that he had the respect of not only his men but also those that knew him personally.General of the Army George C. Marshall said “you have to lead men in war by bringing them along to endure and display qualities of fortitude that are beyond the average man’s thought of what he should be expected to do. You have to I inspire them when they are hungry and exhausted and desperately uncomfortable and in great danger. Only a man of positive characteristics of leadership with the physical stamina that goes with it can function under those conditions .”Scipio also teaches us that a leader must have confidence. “The secret of his sway, extraordinary in one so young, over the crowd mind, especially in times of crisis, was his profound self confidence which radiated an influence to which the stories of his divine inspiration were but auxiliary. Self-confidence is a term often used in a derogatory sense, but Scipio’s was not only justified by results but essentially different, a spiritual exaltation which is epitomized by Aulus Gellius as “conscientious sui subnixus” –“lifted high on his consciousness of himself .” There is much to say about being confident and being justified in that confidence. No soldier wants to be lead by someone who lacks confidence. Young officers are taught that it doesn’t matter so much what you say, but how you say it. One of the fundamental principles of modern day offensive operations is the principle of audacity. “Audacity is a simple plan of action, boldly executed .” This principle also lends itself to violence of action. George S. Patton said, “A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week”. With out confidence no leader will be able to convince their man to be audacious nor will they be able to overcome the fear that every soldier faces in combat. Napoleon’s maxim “The whole art of war consists in a well ordered and prudent defensive, followed by a bold and rapid offensive. One of the 9 principles of war is Objective. The principle of objective means to “direct all efforts toward a decisive, obtainable goal .” You have to give men an objective. Scipio even when his men were in the depths of despair he spoke to their fighting spirit and gave them an objective. “To the soldiers suffering under defeat he made no reproaches, but aptly mingled an appeal to their reason and to their spirit, reminding them how often in Roman history early defeat had been the presage to ultimate victory, how the sure tilting of the balance had already begun the initial disaster found their counterpoise and in Italy and Sicily everything was going prosperously…His first step was to restore and fortify the confidence of his own troops and allies, his next to attack that of his enemies, to strike not at their flesh but at their moral Achilles heel ?” Scipio understood the concept of attacking the center of gravity. “Strategy besides indicated the decisive points of a theater of war, requires two things: 1st, that the principal mass of the force be moved against fractions of the enemy’s, to attack them in succession; 2nd, that the best direction of movement be adopted, that is to say, one leading straight to the decisive points already know .”Scipio shows the military science is better called the art of war. “For the highest part of the art of war is inborn, not acquired or why did not later captains, ancient and modern, profit more by Scipio’s demonstrations .” Many times in battle it can come down to a split second decision and there is not doctrine that tells the leader what they should decide. The modern day Army places confidence and trust in its officer corps to use their intuition and trust their gut in those critical moments. Several of the tactics that we use today reflect maneuvers made by Scipio. He showed that a penetration must be promptly widened before it is deepened - a principle which in the war of 1914-1918 was only learnt after hard lessons, at loos and elsewhere .” As stated even in modern warfare armies had to learn the hard way in World War I a lesson that had already been thought. Generosity, mercy and empathy are essential characteristics of a commander. Scipio “won new allies for himself by his kindness to the Spanish hostages, for instead of retaining them in his custody as unwilling guarantees, he sent them home to their own state .” Repeatedly Scipio was extremely generous to the enemies he conquered. Had modern military and political leaders practiced this it is possible that World War II could have been avoided? The following are many other things that we learn from Scipio, which is both practical and important in modern day art of war:•tScipio’s military motto would seem to have been “every time a new stratagem” •tIn regards to reconnoiter Scipio said, “He who brings danger upon another has more spirit than he who repels it. Add to this, that the terror excited by the unexpected increased thereby. When you have entered the territory of an enemy you obtain a near view of his strong and weak points. •tThe tactical key to victory lay in the possession of a superior mobile arm of decision – cavalry. •tInform your people. “The led put the worst construction on the silence of the leaders, that they assume no news to be bad news, despite all the proverbs. •tThe victory is essentially one due to superior training and discipline. •t“The contract must be reasonable; For to compel a beaten foe to agree to terms which cannot be fulfilled is to sow the seeds of a war which one day will be declared in order to cancel the contract ”•t“In war we cannot separate the moral from the mental or physical spheres, so also in assessing characters. We cannot separate the nobility of Scipio’s moral conduct throughout his career from the transcendent clearness of his mental vision- they blended to from not only a great general but a great man. •t“Gaining and retaining the initiative ”Scipio Africanus showed the world what a true genius commander could accomplish. While there were many good commanders throughout history many of their maximums and lessons no longer apply to modern day warfare. Scipio is different in this regard, and yet he is not ever really mentioned. A study of the methodology used by Scipio show that his foresight more than 2000 years ago still apply to us today. BibliographyScipio Africanus, B. H. Liddell HartFM 6-22, Army Leadership Competent, Confident, and Agile, Oct 2006Army Officer’s guide, LTC Keith E. BonnFM 3-21.8, The Infantry Rifle Platoon and Squad, March 2007http://www.civilwarhome.com/principle..., 15 February 2009Jomini, The Art of War
Mr. Liddell Hart's biography of Scipio is intriguing and full of the facts and doubtless factoids that survive from Hannibal's era. Yet Mr. Liddell Hart is also clearly in love with his subject; in love in the same way that a schoolboy often is with a great sports hero (as is clear from the boastful title alone). This in itself presents a problem if one were to claim this book to be a serious scholarly work. Hero worship and hard, factual history ought not to mix. When they do the former becomes far too silly and obvious and the latter far too soft and lacking. I don't want to give the impression that I didn't like this book (because I did immensely), but any book about the Second Punic War that focuses exclusively on Scipio is bound to be skewed and lop-sided.I feel that Liddell Hart early on lost sight of the unarguable position that Scipio was but a small facet in Hannibal's eventual failure to overmaster Rome. Many things were working against Hannibal from the moment he took over his command in Spain. He had to contend with the legacy of a brutal peace that the Roman senate had imposed after the First Punic War. The terms of this peace all but castrated Carthage's power at sea while simultaneously making off with whole chunks of her dominions on land. Rome was also very quick to make "alliances" with miniscule cities and powers on her periphery in order that should these "friends" be attacked a pretext for Roman intervention would not be lacking. We see such a case with the belligerent little town of Saguntum in Spain. Hannibal could no more leave this pocket of Roman-engineered resistance in place than the Romans could afford not to foster it.Beyond this, what the author seems to neglect is the fact that Hannibal had been fighting successfully in Italy for years while Scipio was being kept busy by Carthaginian subalterns in Spain. When Hannibal was enjoying the fruits of his massive victories at Trasimene and Trebia it seems unlikely that he even knew of young Scipio. The man with whom Hannibal had to contend in Italy, rather, was mainly Fabius Maximus Cunctator. Through Fabius' wise policy of guerilla tactics rather than set piece battles (which the Romans lost over and over against the Carthaginians and Numidians) Hannibal found it difficult to crush Roman resistance fully.What Liddell Hart also chooses to ignore is that Hannibal's greatest enemies were himself and his countrymen back home. Although Hannibal had successfully pressed the siege of Saguntum he failed to even attempt one of the city of Rome. This grave mistake cost him dearly and gave the Romans a second wind. Also, Hannibal had always to fight for supplies and reinforcements from Carthage where his political enemies stymied him at every turn. If given proper support it is quite doubtful that Rome would have remained an independent city state.When Scipio finally met Hannibal for the first time on the battlefield the young, lucky Roman was facing a veteran, but a veteran who had been worn down and betrayed by his fickle, ungrateful peers.I do not see the Second Punic War as a struggle between "civilization" and "barbarism". Both societies were civilized and advanced. Both were expanding powers. Conflict was inevitable. Victory, on the other hand, could have easily gone either way.
What do You think about Scipio Africanus (1994)?
Lidell Hart makes the case for Scipio's greatness as a general. What he does not do, however, is make the case that Scipio is greater than Alexander, Caesar, Belisarius, Heraclitus, or Genghis Khan, much less greater than Napoleon. One suspects that this book was boldly titled in order to ruffle the feathers of the orthodox military officers/historians who were its target audience. David Chandler has called Napoleon "History's greatest soldier"; Martin van Creveld has referred to Bonaparte as "perhaps the most competent person who has ever lived." Lidell Hart's effusive (and justified) praise of Scipio Africanus does not contradict those sentiments in any meaningful way.
—Justin
Scipio Africanus, to the extent he is remembered, is remembered as a Great Captain. Hart goes farther, proudly proclaiming him in the title as “Greater than Napoleon.” Not bad for someone who tends to be overshadowed by his arch-nemesis, Hannibal (who in turn is overshadowed by an Anthony Hopkins, but that’s hardly his fault), despite having decisively defeated him at Zama. This is likely in part due to a paucity of material on Scipio, something Hart sets out to remedy with admirable success.Hart is a military historian. Unsurprisingly, it is on Scipio as a soldier that he focuses. By the first paragraph of the preface he has asserted his hypothesis that Scipio’s “military work has a greater value to modern students of war than that of any other great captain of the past.” Napoleon employed tactics to great effect that are no longer viable; Scipio’s stratagems are timeless. Hart was a WWI veteran and wrote this book in 1926, but I venture he would say the same today.Hart’s philosophy shows. Frequent mentions are made of WWI and of, in particular, another Hart object of study—T.E. Lawrence (it was this book that led me to Seven Pillars of Wisdom: it deserves a good review for that alone). For someone with only a tepid interest in military history, I was as interested in what Hart’s book says about the Lost Generation as what it says about war and Roman history.Why will study of Scipio prove more fruitful to a student of war than study of other great captains? For one, unlike Napoleon or Alexander, Scipio was the employee of a republic. He needed, and had, an understanding of the interplay of military, economic, and political forces that was no less necessary for a general in WWI or for a general today. Consequently, although the bulk of the book is devoted to Scipio’s major battles and campaigns (sadly, with fewer maps than I would prefer), Hart also spends time on Scipio’s patrician bearing, his fondness for Greek culture, and his political career.
—H.
Publius Cornelius Scipio (236–183 BC)Publius Cornelius Scipio, better known to history as Scipio Africanus (the Elder), was very likely the greatest general the Roman Empire ever had, entering the written record at the age of seventeen when he led a cavalry charge that saved his father's life (the commander of the Roman forces) at the battle of Ticinus, the initial encounter of Hannibal's forces with the Roman army on Italian soil. The Romans lost that battle and almost all of the subsequent battles until Scipio was elected commander of the Roman forces in Spain at the age of twenty-four. Scipio Africanus: Greater Than Napoleon (1926) is an account of Scipio's life with an interesting twist.Basil Henry Liddell Hart (1895–1970) was a soldier and military theorist and historian who in the 1920's and 30's urged upon the British military establishment a reliance on the air force and navy that relegated to the army a secondary role in which the armored branch was pivotal. In ground actions he argued against direct attacks on well-made defensive positions, preferring what he called the Indirect Approach.What gives Liddell Hart's Scipio Africanus additional interest above and beyond his careful use and extensive quotation of the Roman sources(*) is that he uses Scipio's strategies and tactics to illustrate his idea of the Indirect Approach, which may be suggested briefly with "Those who exalt the main armed forces of the enemy as the primary objective are apt to lose sight of the fact that the destruction of these is only a means to the end, which is the subjugation of the hostile will." He does not do so overbearingly, for the text is certainly focused on Scipio's career, but again and again he points up what he views as lessons for (then) modern warfare.(**)As an illustration of this Indirect Approach, consider what Scipio did when he took command of the Roman forces in Spain shortly after both his father and uncle - the previous commanders - had been defeated and killed. The Carthaginian forces were split and active in three different places, and instead of attacking them directly one at a time,(***) Scipio (after carefully collecting information from all kinds of sources and then making thorough preparations) decided to attack Carthago Nova (now Cartagena), which was the Carthaginians' primary port linking to Africa and contained most of their provisions and operating funds. Cartagena fell quickly, along with the goods, ships, treasury and hostages, both Celto-Iberian and Roman, within its walls. By releasing the hostages and treating them well, he soon had the Iberian tribes back on his side. And now the Carthaginian armies were effectively cut off from Carthage.After grinding up the Carthaginians and their remaining allies in Spain, instead of turning against Hannibal in Italy, whose primary source of reinforcement he had blocked, he chose to attack the Carthaginian homeland, but not without a great deal of resistance from the Roman Senate led by Fabius Cunctator and his pendant, Marcus Porcius Cato (the future Censor and foe of the "degenerate" Hellenization of Roman culture, not to mention the embodiment of conservative self-righteousness who sold his old and sick slaves so they would not be a burden on him and regarded his wife as little better than a servant - see Carl Christoph Burckhardt's Cato der Censor: Ein akademischer Vortrag).Leading only volunteers he had carefully trained and outfitted and two legions disgraced at Cannae, he wrought enough havoc in North Africa to make the Carthaginians sue for peace. But they were split into those who truly wanted peace and the rest for whom the peace was, once again, to be a time of preparation for war. They drew their forces out of Italy and Gaul and had already violated the peace treaty as it was being ratified in Rome. Now at an even greater disadvantage, after clever maneuvering (both military and psychological) Scipio faced Hannibal at Zama. Hannibal had the numerical advantage and eighty war elephants - more than he had had in any previous engagement. Fortunately, this part of Polybius' history has survived, and we have many details of the action which are given to us by Liddell Hart with great relish. Suffice it to say here that in this meeting of invincible generals, Scipio triumphed.Once again his peace terms were generous, but there were many in the Roman Senate who wanted more vindictive terms or who envied the young man's successes. They had no choice but to ratify the treaty, but Scipio had subsequently a contingent of powerful enemies in the Senate. Unlike later famous Roman generals, when the Roman people offered to make Scipio perpetual consul and dictator, he declined. Scipio's later career is complicated, but I'll mention that he played a crucial role in Rome's domination of the Greek speaking world, where once again he exercised his far-seeing moderation and generosity after victory. But this was too much for the Senate faction led by Cato, and they went after his family and then him with apparently trumped up charges of corruption and abuse of power. He was acquitted but was so disgusted that he never returned to Rome, soon dying in voluntary exile on his country estate. Not satisfied with this, his accusers went after his brother again, and though they managed to damage him, when they confiscated the Scipios' estates they found no money. This caused a revulsion in the public feeling, and, as Livy put it, "the public hatred which had been directed against the Scipios recoiled on the praetor, his advisers and the accusers." Cato was far from being finished, however, but that is another story...(*) The most useful is Polybius' history of the Second Punic War, written almost contemporaneously with the events. Polybius personally visited the sites of the major battles with witnesses and was friend to Gaius Laelius, Scipio's right hand man.(**) Noteworthy is Liddell Hart's emphasis on Scipio's generous peace terms after his victories, for the British author contrasted Scipio's wisdom in that regard with the onerous burden placed upon the German speaking world by the Treaty of Versailles. Liddell Hart understood as early as 1926 that such a peace could not last.(***) Actually, each of those three contingents was numerically superior to the manpower Scipio had at his disposal, at least at the outset. 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—Steve
