Julius Caesar Of Ancient Rome
January 20th, 2010
Question: If Ancient Rome had developed biological or chemical weapons to use, how would that have affected history?
At the time of Julius Caesar, what if Rome had developed biological or chemical weapons to use for war, how would that have changed history?
Question written on January 12, 2009
I was asking, what if Rome developed biological or chemical Weapons of Mass Destruction?
Answer: to fully understand this question you first need to understand the nature of technology of the time, the methods of war and the enemy they faced.
to begin with, technology is more than just something of necessity as is said. it is the expression of people who want to build somethign they have thought about. for example, the catapult is not designed to throw an object overhead, but more like an arrow.
the romans had the equiviant of 17th century cannons in these weapons and the technology they were using was advanced mathematics. the catapult used cubed roots to determine the mass and the power that they needed. the throwing arms were massive oak or other hard woods that could withstand the thousands of pounds of pressure put on them in pulling them back.
next was the method of warfare. the romans were able to kill individual men (say in a tower) with their catapults from ranges outside of a longbow. figure that distance to be at least 450 feet or further. the only way an opposing army could even try to defeat the romans was to engage in physical contact by attacking with massive men.
the roman defense was to uparmour its troops with large sheilds, spears swords and defensive knives for close combat.
lastly, the enemy was well prepared for combat, but they did not have the numbers and certainly not the financing to have the weapons that the roman soldiers had. their only option was to fire from protected positions and hit and run on small elements of soldiers in transit.
strait on combat without a fort to fight from was frequently a losing proposition.
now add your elements of weapons of mass destruction.
the romans were out to plunder and dominate the land. their army was almost unstoppable. the only place that WMD could have been used was in scotland where the Scotts stomped the romans every time.in plundering and domination, they wanted the riches of the land as well as the people for a slave labor force.
assuming that the romans understood what WMD actually did, i think they would have been hesitant to use them, since their armies were capable to handle any situation, even when facing strong armies.
if they had used them, it would have had to be on limited use, since combat was always very close.
i can't remember the complete history of this, but dead animals used to put in wells to poison the water supply to kill off or drive off people in an area to help preserve order. that is a simple weapons of mass destruction, but it was effective.
if i can remember the link to the history of wmd, i will post it in edit mode or in comments, but don't hold your breath, i'm about to be driving for 8 hours to where i live, i'm spending some time with friends.
The Learned Extremist: Juan de Mariana
Juan de Mariana possessed one of the most fascinating personalities in the history of political and economic thought. Honest, gutsy and fearless, Mariana was in hot water almost all of his long life, even for his economic writings.
Voyage of discovery - Ancient Rome - Julius Caesar
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