This makes me want to read The Gallic Wars again. Nothing quite like reading Julius Caesar talk about his own deeds in third person. It doesn't take long to understand how someone listening to him brag like that would want to go straight to stabbing. No, Julius, we didn't need a long section on the wonders of a bridge you constructed across the Rhine where you acted like it wasn't you who did it, but some other dude named Julius Caesar. Followed it up with how only the awesome Caesar could do something so awesome as to thwart the enemy's plans is just, well, excessive.
Moving in a single column thru a forest is a bad move. The British made this same mistake in Western Pennsylvania under General Braddock in the French and Indian War
And that’s why you’ll never make history. As dictator of the world my troops would not only March in single columns… they March in single file line with at least 10 feet of space between each soldier. It would be a miles long line of easily attacked and isolated military blunder waiting to happen. But it wouldn’t happen. Cause no one could ever look at that, then glance down at their own pants and think “yeah, my balls are that big” Besides. That column is just bait anyway. If anyone was man enough to attack It, the ICBMS aren’t far behind.
I don't think that the various wars of Europe can be blamed on the Germans winning in the Teutoberg forest. After all, there have been plenty of wars between the various descendants of those the Romans conquered. There have been plenty of wars between the various peoples who were not conquered by the Romans.
Why in hell would you hand the coins in even if it was the law I still wouldn't have handed them in unless you got full market value and you got to keep a few for yourself but in no way would I give the government a bloody thing
The reason they lost so badly was that they weren't able to deploy because of where the trap was sprung they were kept single file and not the way they were trained to fight it was a slaughter because of a failure of leadership of the troops
That one guy implies that the world would somehow be a better place if Rome conquered Germany. The Roman empire was the nazi Germany/soviet union of the ancient world. Is that really a world we want to live in?
While the Roman empire was highly authoritarian, it was never as bad as the Nazis nor the Communists. Areas under Roman control generally became richer than they had been before. Wars between near neighbors were greatly reduced. The Western portion of the empire gained literacy, Latin and Greek, and nearly everything written in those languages. Germans, at least those past the Rhine River, had to wait for the fall of the empire and the arrival of St. Patrick's monks, unless they had joined the empire voluntarily.
I respect your opinion but let me ask this. Would you want to be part of a civilization that could enslave you, crucify you, burn you alive, feed you to animals, etc. I wouldn't.
Life in the Empire was significantly better than most that lived outside. They spent centuries as a Republic, their culture and morals derived from greek philosophy. Same as their pantheon. Romans as a whole weren’t evil, not even by contemporary standards. This is 9 AD, your modern morals and narrow world view don’t have any correlation with life in the early first century.
Dear Mr. Fuller (now long dead of course) may you be reminded that: "Had Arminius been supine or unsuccessful, our Germanic ancestors would have been enslaved or exterminated in their original seats along the Eyder and the Elbe. This island would never have borne the name of England, and "we, this great English nation, whose race and language are now overrunning the earth, from one end of it to the other," would have been utterly cut off from existence. [Matthew] Arnold may, indeed, go too far in holding that we are wholly unconnected in race with the Romans and Britons who inhabited this country before the coming over of the Saxons; that, "nationally speaking, the history of Caesar's invasion has no more to do with us than the natural history of the animals which then inhabited our forests." There seems ample evidence to prove that the Romanized Celts whom our Teutonic forefathers found here influenced materially the character of our nation. But the main stream of our people was and is Germanic. Our language alone decisively proves this. Arminius is far more truly one of our national heroes than Caractacus; and it was our own primeval fatherland that the brave German rescued when he slaughtered the Roman legions eighteen centuries ago, in the marshy glens between the Lippe and the Ems." - Edward Shepherd Creasy, "Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World" Chapter V. Victory of Arminius over the Roman Legions under Varus, AD 9"
