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It’s interesting that his analysis of war elephants has a lot of parallels to his thoughts about chemical weapons. In the hands of a sufficiently advanced milit

It’s interesting that his analysis of war elephants has a lot of parallels to his thoughts about chemical weapons. In the hands of a sufficiently advanced military, both are an expensive, complicated solution in search of a problem, and both are easily neutralized by a peer competitor. https://acoup.blog/2020/03/20/collections-why-dont-we-use-chemical-weapons-anymore/ https://acoup.blog/2020/03/20/collections-why-dont-we-use-ch...

padobson 6y ago
both are easily neutralized by a peer competitor. This is what I was thinking the whole time. Rome was surrounded by peer competitors, and OP says their most effective use of elephants was against non-peer competitors like Spain or Gaul. So why would competitors continue to use elephants? Not because Roma was susceptible, but because THEIR boarder competitors were susceptible. Elephants were not worth it to defeat well-trained troops, but were more than worth it to defeat smaller, less disciplined armies/militias. My guess is that Rome's peers were often using elephants to keep smaller competitors in check, and only used them against Rome because they happen to have them anyway.
- dddddaviddddd 6y ago
  > So why would competitors continue to use elephants? Not specifically for Rome's competitors, but elephants were kept also for prestige reasons in other regions, as described in this follow-up article: https://acoup.blog/2019/08/09/collections-war-elephants-part-iii-elephant-memories/ https://acoup.blog/2019/08/09/collections-war-elephants-part...
- mcguire 6y ago
  IIRC, horses. Cavalry can't be used around elephants unless the horses are specifically trained to be around elephants. Rome itself of the Republican/early Imperial era didn't use cavalry, although some of their allies did. As a hypothesis, those using elephants may have been fighting entities that used cavalry.
- setr 6y ago
  Perhaps not coincidentally the same can be said of chemical warfare -- not so great in large scale war, but fairly effective against poor, untrained militia and enforcing order through fear on civilian populations
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
sandworm101 6y ago
>>in order to produce mass casualties in battlefield conditions, a chemical attacker has to deploy tons – and I mean that word literally – of this stuff. While I do agree with much of what this guy has to say about elephants, he is totally wrong about chemical weapons. We don't use mustard gas because it would indeed require tons of gas and be ineffective, but chemical weapons have evolved in the last 100 years. Modern chemical weapons do not need tons. Novichok literally translates to "new thing". Such nerve agents were developed in the 60s/70s/80s. Infinitesimal amounts of this stuff will kill. Hazmat suits and gas masks are irrelevant when one gram might contain 5000 lethal doses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok_agent#Effects_and_countermeasures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok_agent#Effects_and_cou...
- smogcutter 6y ago
  The wikipedia article for sarin gas is also extremely frightening, but the example Bret gives of the Tokyo subway attack shows that it’s probably less effective than advertised in a modern military context. The bar isn’t “is this stuff deadly”, it’s is it deadly enough to overcome the expense, complication, and incompatibility with highly mobile modern doctrine to make it worth using on a militarily relevant scale over conventional options. I’m certainly no expert, so I’m not going to go any further with “is this poison poisonous enough”, but that wikipedia article at least doesn’t seem to make the case.
  - sandworm101 6y ago
    The tokyo attack was unprofessional. A military attack would be exponentially more effective. Sarin is also tame compared to some of the more nasty stuff out there.
    - jcranmer 6y ago
      How would militaries be exponentially more effective? As far as I'm aware, the military can't magically change the laws of gaseous diffusion.
      - 6y ago
thaumasiotes 6y ago
> It’s interesting that his analysis of war elephants has a lot of parallels to his thoughts about chemical weapons. Well, both technologies find themselves in the same situation; they are well understood by the militaries of their day, and those militaries have no interest in using them. It's not surprising that the same results might come about for the same reasons.

padobson 6y ago

both are easily neutralized by a peer competitor. This is what I was thinking the whole time. Rome was surrounded by peer competitors, and OP says their most effective use of elephants was against non-peer competitors like Spain or Gaul. So why would competitors continue to use elephants? Not because Roma was susceptible, but because THEIR boarder competitors were susceptible. Elephants were not worth it to defeat well-trained troops, but were more than worth it to defeat smaller, less disciplined armies/militias. My guess is that Rome's peers were often using elephants to keep smaller competitors in check, and only used them against Rome because they happen to have them anyway.

dddddaviddddd 6y ago
> So why would competitors continue to use elephants? Not specifically for Rome's competitors, but elephants were kept also for prestige reasons in other regions, as described in this follow-up article: https://acoup.blog/2019/08/09/collections-war-elephants-part-iii-elephant-memories/ https://acoup.blog/2019/08/09/collections-war-elephants-part...
mcguire 6y ago
IIRC, horses. Cavalry can't be used around elephants unless the horses are specifically trained to be around elephants. Rome itself of the Republican/early Imperial era didn't use cavalry, although some of their allies did. As a hypothesis, those using elephants may have been fighting entities that used cavalry.
setr 6y ago
Perhaps not coincidentally the same can be said of chemical warfare -- not so great in large scale war, but fairly effective against poor, untrained militia and enforcing order through fear on civilian populations
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

sandworm101 6y ago

>>in order to produce mass casualties in battlefield conditions, a chemical attacker has to deploy tons – and I mean that word literally – of this stuff. While I do agree with much of what this guy has to say about elephants, he is totally wrong about chemical weapons. We don't use mustard gas because it would indeed require tons of gas and be ineffective, but chemical weapons have evolved in the last 100 years. Modern chemical weapons do not need tons. Novichok literally translates to "new thing". Such nerve agents were developed in the 60s/70s/80s. Infinitesimal amounts of this stuff will kill. Hazmat suits and gas masks are irrelevant when one gram might contain 5000 lethal doses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok_agent#Effects_and_countermeasures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok_agent#Effects_and_cou...

smogcutter 6y ago
The wikipedia article for sarin gas is also extremely frightening, but the example Bret gives of the Tokyo subway attack shows that it’s probably less effective than advertised in a modern military context. The bar isn’t “is this stuff deadly”, it’s is it deadly enough to overcome the expense, complication, and incompatibility with highly mobile modern doctrine to make it worth using on a militarily relevant scale over conventional options. I’m certainly no expert, so I’m not going to go any further with “is this poison poisonous enough”, but that wikipedia article at least doesn’t seem to make the case.
- sandworm101 6y ago
  The tokyo attack was unprofessional. A military attack would be exponentially more effective. Sarin is also tame compared to some of the more nasty stuff out there.
  - jcranmer 6y ago
    How would militaries be exponentially more effective? As far as I'm aware, the military can't magically change the laws of gaseous diffusion.
    - 6y ago

thaumasiotes 6y ago

> It’s interesting that his analysis of war elephants has a lot of parallels to his thoughts about chemical weapons. Well, both technologies find themselves in the same situation; they are well understood by the militaries of their day, and those militaries have no interest in using them. It's not surprising that the same results might come about for the same reasons.