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They did in my public school… But I only recently learned about the final fall of Carthage in the second Punic war, when Hannibal had to return to Africa to fa
by dr_dshiv 3y ago
They did in my public school…
But I only recently learned about the final fall of Carthage in the second Punic war, when Hannibal had to return to Africa to face the young Roman general Scipio. The war elephants weren’t so veteran and so the Roman’s were able to scare them off as they charged, breaking the Carthaginian line, leading to a rapid routing.
Great battles were described in fairly great detail —
- borissk 3y agoI've heard the hypothesis that many in the US elite saw the confrontation with USSR as being similar to the Punic wars. With US similar to Carthage being the sea/trading power and USSR similar to Rome being the land power - poorer, but highly militarized. This being one of the arguments for keeping the US military budget high, as one of the reason for Carthage destruction was it's elites had a lot of money, but didn't invest enough into army and navy.
- ffgjgf1 3y ago> the final fall of Carthage in the second Punic war The final (non-metaphorical) Fall happened at the end of the third Punic War about 50 years later.
- fl7305 3y ago> The war elephants weren’t so veteran and so the Roman’s were able to scare them off as they charged Just smear a bunch of pigs with flammable grease, set on fire, and send off towards the elephants who will promptly panic. Super easy, barely an inconvience.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y agoMost war elephants were extensively trained with burning pigs. But they forgot to allocate enough budget for flaming porcine that year, and the mistake was fatal. This is why the Congress never fails to add pork to every spending bill, just in case the Romans return.