Third Punic War ends in a draw.

Rakhasa

What would be the effects if Carthage and Rome survived the Punic wars?

Instead of the destruction of Carthage, or the usual AH inversion of Attila restroying Rome, both nations survive. It does not really matter that much who wins the Third War; nations waxes and wane so the loser would revover and win the next war, or the third next, and then lose again. But le'ts have then always to eventually recover for at least a handful of centuries more. We would have a prolongues stated of Roman-Punic warfare as it happened with the Persians.

What effect would this have on the Roman Empire? Gaul seens clearly set to fall to Rome, and the African Med to Carthage.

The western border would settle somewhere in Spain -but the mediterranean spanish coast does not really have any clear geopraphical boundary, so it would go up and down. In fact, apart form sea battles and coastal raids, that region would be the battlefield. Who would get "Castille" (Lusitania and Western Tarraconensis)? This land does have boundaries, and could go either way... or a third nation of Celtiberians might arise and try to play both nations...

East is even harder. Greece, Dalmacia and possibly Anatolia are Roman, but furter east we met a third power, the Persians, to add to the pot. In fact Rome has a new problem. The grainbasket of the Empire, Egypt, is the new border of the Punic, Roman and Persian spheres. Its (Roman) conquest is no longer assured, much less keeping it afterwards. It could even survive further than OTL playing one nation against another.
 

Typo

Banned
Carthage was already a defacto defeated state by the third punic war, there was no way Rome weren't going to win

You need to draw on the first or second one.
 

Rakhasa

Typo said:
Carthage was already a defacto defeated state by the third punic war, there was no way Rome weren't going to win
Click to expand...

"Win" is not the same as "utterly destroy the Punic nation and culture, raze down the capital and salt the ground" Roma did win most of its wars againt the Persians, after all.

So Rome wins the third war, slaps those uppity carthaginenses around, and retund back loaded with loot and a harsher tribute. But in, say, fifty years there will be (yet another) Roman Civil war at the most inconvenitent moment, and Hanibal the second (which I just noticed wnet byt he allias of "Attila on my origianl post... ooops) sees the perfect oportunity to get a small empire, his armies rush north until they take Barcino or even Massilia, a lucky raid burns the Roman fleet in Ostia, and Carthage is back. Until the next generaion Romans recover and push back...
 

mailinutile2

I Think Typo is right here.
by the third PW, Cartage was reduced to being an almost-vassal (Numidia-like), had no fleet and no oversea territories.
The "war" was almost an intenal affair to orient Roman politics, on the same line of the the Albania invasion in the "wag the dog" film
On the other hand, with a 2nd PW POD, we could have an interesting situation, leading to something similar to OTL Roman-Parthian situation
 

robertp6165

Rakhasa said:
"Win" is not the same as "utterly destroy the Punic nation and culture, raze down the capital and salt the ground" Roma did win most of its wars againt the Persians, after all.

So Rome wins the third war, slaps those uppity carthaginenses around, and retund back loaded with loot and a harsher tribute. But in, say, fifty years there will be (yet another) Roman Civil war at the most inconvenitent moment, and Hanibal the second (which I just noticed wnet byt he allias of "Attila on my origianl post... ooops) sees the perfect oportunity to get a small empire, his armies rush north until they take Barcino or even Massilia, a lucky raid burns the Roman fleet in Ostia, and Carthage is back. Until the next generaion Romans recover and push back...
Click to expand...

But why would Rome want to do that? Look at it from their perspective...they've fought two major, hugely costly wars against Carthage. In the second one, Hannibal scared the living daylights out of them (so much so that Roman mothers would frighten their children by telling them 'Hannibal will get you' for centuries afterward). Now they are fighting a third war against the city. Why would they choose to be merciful? Why would they NOT choose to put an end to this business, once and for all?

No, if you want a surviving Carthage, you've got to have a much earlier POD. Possibly even before the First Punic War. The biggest problem Carthage had was that it relied too much on mercenaries to do it's fighting for them on land. Rome had a huge reserve of home-grown manpower. It could afford to lose 50,000 men in a single day at Cannae, and still send an army to Spain to eat the heart out of Carthage's empire and Hannibal's source of reinforcements, while still raising more armies locally to deal with Hannibal. If Hannibal had ever suffered a comparable loss, he would have been done for. You've got to get Carthage a much larger population base to provide the reserve of manpower it needs to defeat Rome. If Carthage had been more successful in it's wars with the Greeks of Sicily, that might have been possible, as the manpower of Sicily would have been at their disposal. But absent that, I just don't see it. Much as I admire Hannibal, I just don't think defeating Rome was in the cards.
 
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Lysandros Aikiedes

I think its a case of: either Rome is destroyed, or Carthage is.

Carthaginian society was similar to the Greek city-states in that only people of Phoenician birth or those whom could trace their ancestry to the founding of the city could be counted as citizens. Not like Rome, where anyone freeborn thats born in the city, or both their parents were citizens living in a colonia, were perforce citizens. Rome, due to its exceptionally inclusive citizen membership, had a large patriotic demographic. For this reason, they possessed more manpower than other Italian states, and were able to force them to submit, pay tribute and draft even more soldiers to serve Rome. And if they couldn't force an area to submit, they'd sack the area, enslave the survivors, and re-populate the region with veterans.

Carthage, as a major commercial hub and the centre of an empire, had large resident population, but very few of them were actually citizens, hence one reason they relied on mercs and subjected peoples to fight their battles. Poorer citizens and urbanites, though, were a source of recruits in Carthage's navy, their first-line of defence.

Gaul, by the end of the Third Century BCE, was virtually ruled by a military alliance led by the Arverni tribe (Auvergne). They possessed wealth from trade routes and mining operations. The Arverni military dominance ended in Gaul in 120 BCE, twenty-six years after the Third Punic War. This resulted in the political instability in Gaul that was prevelant in Julius Caesar's time. If Rome still had a powerful foe in the south (not that Carthage could be described as powerful at that juncture) would they have the time or resources to face down a wealthy Gallic political force?

If Rome fails to defeat Carthage in the First or Second Punic Wars, the Seleucid Empire stretching from Turkey to Afganistan, may still be fairly dominant in the east, along with Ptolemiac Egypt and the Attalid Kingdom of Pergamon/Pergamum.
 
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Praeses

Lysandros Aikiedes said:
Carthaginian society was similar to the Greek city-states in that only people of Phoenician birth or those whom could trace their ancestry to the founding of the city could be counted as citizens. Not like Rome, where anyone freeborn thats born in the city, or both their parents were citizens living in a colonia, were perforce citizens. Rome, due to its exceptionally inclusive citizen membership, had a large patriotic demographic. For this reason, they possessed more manpower than other Italian states, and were able to force them to submit, pay tribute and draft even more soldiers to serve Rome. And if they couldn't force an area to submit, they'd sack the area, enslave the survivors, and re-populate the region with veterans.
Click to expand...

It's also important to note that the Romans had a rather unique system (for that time) of alliances for their vassals/conquered Italian states that had them contribute their men for service in the Roman army. Note only did this significantly increase their manpower, but it also allowed them to create organized, unified armies.

Just something to note considering how hodgepodge Hannibal's army became, and important compared to Carthage's mercenaries.

Carthage just doesn't have the gas to win a long war w/Rome with how its Empire is organized, especially given the remarkable stubbornness of the Roman government (NO other state would've not at least considered negotiation/surrender after a disaster like Cannae). For them to stand a chance at a real victory, they either need:

A) A completely differently organized Empire that mirrors the Roman system of alliances - unlikely as they are a trading empire
B) Carthage has real allies unlike the useless Philip V...maybe a war when Pyrrhus is alive or in a ATL where Pyrrhus is a bit more successful so they can have some Greek allies or something in Italy.
 

Larrikin

Banned
Lysandros Aikiedes said:
I think its a case of: either Rome is destroyed, or Carthage is.

Carthaginian society was similar to the Greek city-states in that only people of Phoenician birth or those whom could trace their ancestry to the founding of the city could be counted as citizens. Not like Rome, where anyone freeborn thats born in the city, or both their parents were citizens living in a colonia, were perforce citizens. Rome, due to its exceptionally inclusive citizen membership, had a large patriotic demographic. For this reason, they possessed more manpower than other Italian states, and were able to force them to submit, pay tribute and draft even more soldiers to serve Rome. And if they couldn't force an area to submit, they'd sack the area, enslave the survivors, and re-populate the region with veterans.

Carthage, as a major commercial hub and the centre of an empire, had large resident population, but very few of them were actually citizens, hence one reason they relied on mercs and subjected peoples to fight their battles. Poorer citizens and urbanites, though, were a source of recruits in Carthage's navy, their first-line of defence.

Gaul, by the end of the Third Century BCE, was virtually ruled by a military alliance led by the Arverni tribe (Auvergne). They possessed wealth from trade routes and mining operations. The Arverni military dominance ended in Gaul in 120 BCE, twenty-six years after the Third Punic War. This resulted in the political instability in Gaul that was prevelant in Julius Caesar's time. If Rome still had a powerful foe in the south (not that Carthage could be described as powerful at that juncture) would they have the time or resources to face down a wealthy Gallic political force?

If Rome fails to defeat Carthage in the First or Second Punic Wars, the Seleucid Empire stretching from Turkey to Afganistan, may still be fairly dominant in the east, along with Ptolemiac Egypt and the Attalid Kingdom of Pergamon/Pergamum.
Click to expand...

If it ended in a draw there would have been a 4th Punic War, and a 5th, etc, until Rome destroyed Carthage. The best result you can hope for Carthage is the Romans not pulling it down and sowing it with salt. Aside from that, survival is not going to be an option given them by the Romans.

The Roman Republic did total victory, and kept hammering at it until they got it, or were really, really distracted elsewhere. Then they put total victory on the back burner, and came back to it later.
 
Cook

Cook

Banned
Carthage is a bit of a strange one isn’t it?

Rome had won already in the 2nd war, and extracted all the terms they’d wanted.

Carthage posed no potential threat and made no overtly warlike action.

Case of Cathago delenda est, wether it was a threat or not.

Same story for Corinth at the same time.
 

MNP

I am pretty sure we've tossed around a Barca usurpation of Carthage and giving citizenry to the people who fought in their army. I want to say it was something to do with how the Mercenary War shook out.
 
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