Concerning Rome Survives TL's

[Rex Romanum]

You said they were better at administration and it was the improved administration that result in a reduction in rebels. This is an important difference because as you point out in the followup, once that administration starts to crack as it did in 3rd Century it gets pretty crazy.

I'm also saying that the external threats have an even greater role in augmenting rebellions and disrupting administration. Removing them from the equation, then the Emperor (or any general who still loyal to the Emperor) will be able to suppress the rebellions with ease.

In fact it didn't even need to be a long time. Year of the Four Emperors for instance which also a Batavian rebellion. Vitellius and Vespasian for instance were both generals. Any time there was political confusion at the center, rebellions could and did spring up we saw that with the Byzantines. Even if Rome overcame those, it's never a guarantee.

You can't really say that those rebellions were caused by bad administration of the Empire. The Emperors themselves should get a fair share of the blame.
And the Byzantines literally have enemies on every side, yet they controlled smaller population base and wealth, so they can't be used as a comparison.

As you pointed out in regards to the Seleucids, absent threats on the other borders you have a better chance, but there is no guarantee of that. You're now bordering the steppe nomads from the Danube to the Oxus and all the Persian rulers had to deal with incursions from the steppes. What if you get an emperor that's not great or makes a few mistakes?

Then there will be some civil wars and cities that get sacked, and finally one strongest figure emerges as new Emperor.

Anyhow, there's a reason the Byzantines were known as the Greek Empire to the Europeans. They were very far removed from significant aspects of the Roman culture which they had been subordinated to for centuries which is not happening with Persia for a long while.

The Byzantines were known as "Greeks" because they are based on Greece and Anatolia. In an Empire that controlled Italy, Africa, Gaul, and Britain, do you think the Romans will be called as "Greeks"? And in that scenario, Roman cultural aspects won't be really disappeared.

Basically there is a really low margin for error here. Maybe it's possible if everything goes right, but in order to Romanize Persia you are going to need things to go right for a very long time which is why I consider this so unlikely as to be nearly impossible and even if it does happen, you're going to need so many lucky events that it's very hard to have it come off as anything but a wank.

And the same thing can be said to the Macedonians, Arabs, and Mongols.

 

[Chairwoman Roxelana]

there will be some civil wars and cities that get sacked, and finally one strongest figure emerges as new Emperor.

Did this happen when Steppe peoples invaded China? Persia? Russia? No. A little bit for China, and little bit for Persia, but no.

 

[Basileus Giorgios]

Sigh. Let me give some examples:

1. In an ATL where Phillip II of Macedon or Alexander the Great died earlier, will people believe that the Macedonians would be able to conquer the entirety of Persian Empire, all the way to India?

Well, the Macedonians never did really conquer the entirety of the Persian Empire: only Egypt, Anatolia and the Levant were properly consolidated. In addition to this, Alexander did not have to worry about succession crises and rebellions on other fronts, since all of these had been dealt with in the relatively small space of the Balkans, and he had a loyalist regent in Antipatros. A Roman campaign of conquest in Persia will not have this- once the Emperor has crossed the Zagros, some other general will march on Rome: perhaps eager to quit the wild wastes of a conquered Germany, and civil war will break out.

2. In an ATL where Rome were destroyed much earlier, will people believe that one city-state had an ability to dominate the entire Mediterranean, as well as wage war with both Germanics and Persians for so many centuries?

I don't see why not- all Empires come from a small tribe or city state. Whether it's a tiny city kingdom in the Iranian lowlands, group of invading Saxon pirates, or a Turkish warlord in the ruins of Byzantine Anatolia, all of history's great Empires have humble beginnings. So many have risen from this that it's hardly ASB.

3. In an ATL where Muhammad never born and Islam never existed, will people believe that the Arabs would be able to conquer anything from Atlantic to Indus?

Probably not- the Islamic conquests ARE an example of something that AH.com in an alternate universe might proclaim as ASB. Nonetheless, they are not comparable to a Roman invasion and conquest of Persia or Germania- the Arabs had the great fortune of attacking a Sassanid Empire that was collapsing anyway, and a Roman one that was exhausted by a century of plague and near constant warfare and political upheval.

Furthermore, and most importantly, the Arabs had existing political structures to work with. The administrative languages of the Ummayad Caliphate were Greek and Persian well into the eighth century: the Ummayad conquerors could simply slip in, and do much the same things as their Roman and Persian predecessors. Obviously I'm simplifying for the sake of argument, but I think you can see my point.

4. In an ATL where Genghis Khan never born and Mongol tribes never become unified, will people believe that the Mongols could conquer most of Eurasia, including the entire China and Middle East?

Once again, the Mongols had the advantage of being able to use pre-existing power structures to build an Empire: they did not magic one out of nowhere. Mongolian culture is, in any case, so far removed from that of Imperial Rome, that I think it's quite difficult to compare them. And how long did the Mongol Empire last as a single, unfragmented state?

I'm just feel that it is really annoying when people always scream "ASB!!! IMPOSSIBLE!!! NO WAY!!!" to a scenario about things that didn't happen in OTL...yet he didn't realize that many OTL events can be classified as ASB...

Oh, I don't think a Roman conquest of Germania or Persia is any way impossible: Roman technological superiority means that Germania, at least, cannot stand against a determined Roman assault. I do, however, think it's entirely implausible, for a number of reasons which I will lay out below. All of these apply more to Germania than Persia: I'll discuss the problems of conquering Persia in a later post.

People who want to see a Rome conquering Germany need to think of this single, simple fact: what was in Germania to make a conquest worthwhile? Every other Roman conquest, bar Britain, was of societies made up of permanent towns and cities- this goes for Spain, Gaul, Africa, Greece, Dacia, Illyria, Thrace, Anatolia, Syria, and Egypt. Germania does not have this sort of society: prior to the third century crisis, which is when I'm assuming you see the Roman conquest occurring, it was a heavily forested area of tiny hamlets, very loose tribal confederacies, and endless thick forest. There was no coinage, no literacy, no kind of specialised economic activity whatsoever.

Even Britain, that other major drain on Roman finances, was a better bet than this. At least in Britain the Romans had a Celtic aristocracy to deal with, one that, after a century of contact with conquered Gaul, had adopted at least a few semi-Roman characteristics. In addition to this, Britain had the valuable resource of tin mines. Despite this, Britain was never anything other than a headache for the Roman authorities: distant, prone to rebellions, difficult to defend, never fully Romanised. A Roman Germania provides all the problems of Britain, with none of the advantages.

So, why not simply have the Romans build up a new political structure from the ground up? To my mind at least, this idea seems implausible: the Romans never did this anywhere else, so why should they in Germania? Large empires do not simply build up new power bases in areas: they tend to rely on local elites. This goes not only for Rome, but also for the Caliphate, the Mongols, the Ottomans: even the British and French in the modern era. In first and second century Germania however, a local elite simply does not exist- in a world based on stark subsistence farming without settlements, there is no way for a local elite to form itself. The Romans do not have anyone to "divide and rule", in a world where everyone is divided anyway. Conquest is easy- actually governing and developing a Germanic province is what I find to be ASB.

Lastly, there is the argument that a shorter frontier would be of considerable advantage to the Romans. At a first glance, the whole Rhine/Danube line does seem to be ridiculously spread out across seemingly the widest possible line across Europe. However, this ignores the issues of supply, and the whole dynamic of the Roman world, which, as I have argued before, was more of an alliance of Mediterranean cities than a hegemonic European superpower. The Rhine can easily be supplied from the central Mediterranean via the River Moselle- this also makes communications far easier. Similarly, the lower Danube is within striking reach of the Black Sea, which we can also consider to be a thoroughly Roman lake. It is, in my opinion, hardly surprising that the regions furthest away from here - Noricum and Pannonia - remained relatively undeveloped strategic backwaters.

Seen from the perspective of a second century Roman there were, anyway, no real reasons to try to find a shorter frontier. The Germanic barbarians were no more threatening to the existence of the central state than the tribes of the Amazon were to the Portuguese Empire at its height. The mismatch of resources between them and the Empire was too great for them ever to concievably become a serious danger to it, so, for Roman purposes, a long frontier did not particuarly matter. In any case, I suspect Roman knowledge of European geography was so sketchy that they would have little idea that a shorter frontier was there to be obtained.

To summarise then, a Roman Germany has precisely zero advantages, ignoring the benefit of hindsight, to attract any Roman Emperor into an attempted conquest. I do not doubt that, should they have desired, Tiberius or Claudius could have extended the frontier to the Elbe, or beyond. But they would find governing such an area to be all but impossible, and the region would be a gigantic net drain upon the Empire.

 

[TyranicusMaximus]

This being the same Caliphate that dissolved itself into independent states before all that long, yes?

I detect a pattern.

Indeed. They had little in the way of external pressures, and they still crumbled apart.

I'll say this again for the edification of Romanowankers (Or anyone who wanks a nation, esp. the Megali Idea folks): History is not EU3. Just because you took some territory doesn't automatically mean that you can go ahead and take some more.

EDIT: Nor does that preclude it. Obviously the wealth of Carthage's empire contributed to Rome's rise. My point is, every Empire has a limit. There's no rule behind it of course.

 

[MNP]

I'm also saying that the external threats have an even greater role in augmenting rebellions and disrupting administration. Removing them from the equation, then the Emperor (or any general who still loyal to the Emperor) will be able to suppress the rebellions with ease.

You can't really say that those rebellions were caused by bad administration of the Empire. The Emperors themselves should get a fair share of the blame. And the Byzantines literally have enemies on every side, yet they controlled smaller population base and wealth, so they can't be used as a comparison.

Then there will be some civil wars and cities that get sacked, and finally one strongest figure emerges as new Emperor.

The Byzantines were known as "Greeks" because they are based on Greece and Anatolia. In an Empire that controlled Italy, Africa, Gaul, and Britain, do you think the Romans will be called as "Greeks"? And in that scenario, Roman cultural aspects won't be really disappeared.

And the same thing can be said to the Macedonians, Arabs, and Mongols.

I guess we'll just never ever see eye to on this.

Paragraph 1. This is obvious. Rebellions look better when the emperor has lost to some foreign threat and his legitimacy as well as his manpower reserves are weakened. Other things can also provoke rebellions and there's always an element of uncertainty. But rebellions of *Persia* are a very different situation that say, something like the Jewish revolt and you're going to have enemy on the borders the Romans always had difficulty facing, hell that all civilized societies had difficulty facing, until gunpowder.

Paragraph 2. I didn't say it, you did. "Rome have much better administration system than Macedon, thus make rebellious generals much less common [than Macedon]." The Byzzies were smaller so that makes them invalid? If anything it's easier to keep control of areas in a smaller territory rather than have to run from London to Herat or something. I understand your point about resources but those same resources can easily be put to use supporting larger rebellions.

Paragraph 3. Once again, it's the problem of scale. Anything that large with technology prior to industrial revolution is hard to keep together for very long and this is why. A strong man emerges in the east, but in the west someone else emerges. They can't overcome each other. Empire splits. The distance, resources and challenges all strengthen that idea.

Paragraph 4. Can't even pretend to understand your response, sorry.

Paragraph 5. Yes, and a lot of things went right for Rome ALREADY and they still didn't get Persia.

I stand by my original statement. 9/10, 99/100 or maybe 999/1000 any Roman rule over Persia is going to be fleeting and transitory. You can't rule it out because you can't really rule anything out, but you'll have to be a good writer to do so and not have it come off as a Mary Sue Roman Empire Wank. If you want to do that I'm sure you can with enough work. Just remember you're going very far in the direction of improbable.

 

[Rex Romanum]

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Fair enough. Both of you did have some very good points.
And since most of the posters here seem opposing my arguments...so hereby I'm officially declaring my surrender in this debate.

But I'd like to pointed out, however, that I won't change either my user title or location...

 

[MNP]

Fair enough. Both of you did have some very good points.
And since most of the posters here seem opposing my arguments...so hereby I'm officially declaring my surrender in this debate.

But I'd like to pointed out, however, that I won't change either my user title or location...

Hey who doesn't love Rome? We're all a little Roman deep down!

 

[Hörnla]

- IMHO, Rome could have conquered Germania.

But only by a careful expansion at a time, not trying to take the whole chunk in one generation. That would have made a lot possible. Pushing the LIMES to Ems and Lippe, later to the Weser, then adding the Hessian region to link the North and the Agri Dec. Imagine one of these steps taken from Germanicus onwards each ca. 20 years and you get a good deal of progress during OTL's Pax Romana.

The same strategy might apply to the whole Britain/Ireland.

Why go there? It may sounds simple and Eurofedsih, but for expansion's sake.
Until 9AD, it was a clear belief for the Romans that, like the universe, their imperium would spread out more and more to the benefit of Rome and those ruled by it.

On shortening of borders - I stand corrected. A closer look at a map of Europe tells me that Rhine and Danube are hard to match as borders. The oddity comes through Trajan, though. Dacia is untenable in the borders of the province as we know it.

Maybe it is because I am German, but every mile the Rhine frontier moves eastwards is still an asset for Rome IMHO.

It gives you more "people within" and less "people without" when the Great migration starts. During conquest, it is a source of slaves, afterwards, of recruits.

It also takes pressure off Britannia once Rome controls the coast of today's Netherlands and Northern Germany.

Germania was not undevelopable as OTL showed and the more we learn about the non-Mediterranean regions of Europe, including Germania, the more careful we have to be about the crassness of Med-superiority.
I also doubt Germanic general harmlessness. The Romans remembered the Cimbern and Teutones as well as Varus' defeat and were well aware that garrisoning almost half the standing army on Rhine and Danube was necessary to maintain the Pax Romana.

- I do not see a necessity to conquer Mesopotamia or the whole of Parthia for a "surviving Rome" timeline. Rome would IMO be stronger if it takes
a defensive stance where its borders most of the time where - as a strategic doctrine. Additionally, always ensure the existence and good relations to an Armenian buffer state.

- Of course, a longer surviving Rome seems easier if you wank it. But how about the a more realistic approach not to let Rome lose too much territory. IMO, a surviving Byzantine Empire with a pre-1071 POD is not too far fetched and ignoring butterflies, such a nation could well fit into our OTL-2010, member of EU and NATO, territory consisting of most of OTL's Turkey, Greece, Cyprus...and depending on your taste slightly more of the Balkans.

It needs more imagination when it comes to the Western Roman Empire. But I always had the thought that with a few good decisions in the 5th century, a consolidation with Italia, Africa and/or most of Hispania, maybe also Narbonensis in Rome's hands might have been possible.

- Arabia Felix...I just think it is a bit out of focus and remote for the Romans, honestly.

- If you want to play with a surviving Rome, please give thought to developments in society and technology - but do not overdo it. Small changes can already have great impacts over time. Don't steampunk our Latin friends!

- On the Arabs. They have to move exactly after Byzanz and Persia have battled each other to death. And they have to move as Muslims. Otherwise,the most I can see is control over Palestina and Mesopotamia, maybe Egypt and Syria, temporarily.

Have a look at the battle at the Yarmuk - it is not an automatism that the Arabs would have won that one under any circumstances.

 

[Eurofed]

To everyone that thinks Rome was bound to stay squatted on the shores of the Med:

Rome had no technological or cultural hard reason to be so, and actually in its day expanded to lands (northern Gaul, western Iberia, Britannia, Pannonia, Dacia) that were not tied to the Med. One may well argue that the remaining focus on the Med was due to the failure to conquer and develop Germania, not the other way around. As history of Middle Age Europe shows, Germania was far, far from undevelopable, and when it gets developed, the demographic and economic balance of Europe shifts to a much more equal one between Northern and Southern Europe.

After Roman conquest, Germania shall not stay a howling wilderness for long. Within a few generations, roads and cities shall be built, local Germanic and Slavic tribes and Roman colonists shall be settled down. The heavy plough was known in the Levant in Roman times, and its spread to Northern Europe shall allow to make it as agriculturally profitable for Rome as the Med lands, and greatly accelerate its development. Plus the region had some valuable natural resources, such as amber and iron. Within a few centuries, the region shall come to resemble High Middle Ages Germany.

While roads are yet to be built, and to a degree even after that, Romans can easily maintain logistic links with a Vistula-Dniester border by sailing along the European coasts of the North Sea and the Baltic, and of the Black Sea, respectively. Despite the crass clichè to the contrary, Romans had no technological or cultural barrier to do so, Greeks had sailed the Atlnatic to trade with Britannia since before the rise of Rome, and Rome kept a strong presence in Britannia for centuries.

A similar reasoning can be made for Mesopotamia, except that place is already quite developed, and only needs to be linked to the Roman logistical system, hardly a difficult task for Roman administrators and engineers.

Holding Germania and Mesopotamia is quite doable for the early empire once the political decision to conquer and keep them is made, something that almost happened IOTL, and by doing so, the empire gradually makes itself much stronger, while making present and future enemies much weaker.

 

[Snake Featherston]

The problem with ensuring TLs where the Empire of Caesar Augustus survives is that the Roman Empire's prosperity rested on two circumstances that collapsed the OTL Western Empire and ultimately did in the Eastern one, too: the Roman idea of a line of succession was whoever won the civil wars sparked by power vacuums. This was tolerable so long as only one enemy, be it Parthia, or be it various tribal confederacies, attacked the Empire as a whole at a single time.

If both of them did the civil war problem was rather likely to bite the Empire in the ass, which is what happened IOTL. If the Roman Empire is to survive, Caesar Augustus must come up with some variation of a workable succession plan.

 

[Eurofed]

The problem with ensuring TLs where the Empire of Caesar Augustus survives is that the Roman Empire's prosperity rested on two circumstances that collapsed the OTL Western Empire and ultimately did in the Eastern one, too: the Roman idea of a line of succession was whoever won the civil wars sparked by power vacuums. This was tolerable so long as only one enemy, be it Parthia, or be it various tribal confederacies, attacked the Empire as a whole at a single time.

If both of them did the civil war problem was rather likely to bite the Empire in the ass, which is what happened IOTL. If the Roman Empire is to survive, Caesar Augustus must come up with some variation of a workable succession plan.

Oh absolutely, this is very important, too. IMO, the most important things to secure Rome's lasting success are, in rough order of importance:

A) Assimilate all of Germania up to the Vistula-Dniester line.
B) Achieve a largely stable succession method.
C) Conquer Mesopotamia (and hence cripple Parthia).
D) Develop a counterbalance to the dominance of the professional army and the landed aristocracy, such as a Chinese-style professional bureaucracy, or a power-sharing agreement between the Emperor and a Senate that has representatives of the empire's various provinces and main cities.

The latter point is pretty important (also because it greatly helps fulfill B), but if the empire is prevented from entering a decay spiral, its socio-economic system shall gradually complete the transition to a protocapitalist market economy, which shall marginalize slavery and provide such a counterbalance in the urban trading elites and middle classes. So to a degree, D) is self-fulfilling if the empire endures and remains strong thanks to A-C.

 

[Snake Featherston]

Oh absolutely, this is very important, too. IMO, the most important things to secure Rome's lasting success are, in rough order of importance:

A) Assimilate all of Germania up to the Vistula-Dniester line.
B) Achieve a largely stable succession method.
C) Conquer Mesopotamia (and hence cripple Parthia).
D) Develop a counterbalance to the dominance of the professional army and the landed aristocracy, such as a Chinese-style professional bureaucracy, or a power-sharing agreement between the Emperor and a Senate that is has representatives of the empire's various provinces and main cities).

The latter point is important (also because it greatly helps fulfill B), but if the empire is prevented from entering a decay spiral, its socio-economic system shall gradually complete the transition to a protocapitalist market economt, which shall marginalize slavery and provide such a counterbalance.

I'd switch it so that B and D are A and B and put C over A. Defeating the Germanic tribes is rather harder than defeating the more centralized Parthian state. The best chance for the Imperial system to survive is eliminating its internal weaknesses while it's at its strongest next to both rivals, ensuring that when a future crisis happens the system as a whole would be much more intact than per OTL.

This would also in some extent lead to a consolidation of Imperial rule itself, which would mitigate dislike of the Emperors by the Senators. It would be very difficult to preserve a single state unchallenged, China's history as a single civilization is not the same as that of a single state, the Ottomans are the only ones who preserved a state more or less intact with a single type of dynastic-administrative structure for centuries.

Where the Medieval Roman Empire alternated between near-collapse and revival, to the point its continuity as a single state can be questioned. Essentially the Romans need a leadership luck-string of the sort possessed by the Prussians.

 

[TyranicusMaximus]

Nevermind. Arguing over this would be counter-productive.

 

[Eurofed]

Defeating the Germanic tribes is rather harder than defeating the more centralized Parthian state.

I disagree. Taken on its own, Teutoburg need not be any worst than the occasional setbacks that Rome suffered while it was subduing Gallia or moreso Iberia. Germanic tribes surely weren't any tougher to defeat than Celtic ones.

The best chance for the Imperial system to survive is eliminating its internal weaknesses while it's at its strongest next to both rivals, ensuring that when a future crisis happens the system as a whole would be much more intact than per OTL.

True. But conversely, if Rome cripples both its enemies early in its history, it ensures that they won't be there or in the position to assault Rome during an internal crisis and so multiply its effects. So the crisis may become an occasion to reform away its weaknesses instead of the start of a death spiral. Therefore, it's a chicken-and-egg argument, the virtous cycle that saves Rome can either become with key military successes or key political reforms, as long as the one paves the way to the other or viceversa.

However, although D) is pretty much important on its own, if the empire endures, it is very likely to spontaneously evolve in a direction that fulfills it, with less need for direct reforms.

This would also in some extent lead to a consolidation of Imperial rule itself, which would mitigate dislike of the Emperors by the Senators. It would be very difficult to preserve a single state unchallenged, China's history as a single civilization is not the same as that of a single state, the Ottomans are the only ones who preserved a state more or less intact with a single type of dynastic-administrative structure for centuries.

Well, IMO China-style occasional dynastic crises do not prevent the fulfillment of the "Rome survives" challenge. After all, nobody questions that Rome endured through the civil wars that marked the end of the Republic. What really needs to be prevented is the civilization breakdown and substitution. And this is why I so often remark the importance of assimilating Northern Europe. With both the Med and and the North in the same civilization, the remaining barbarians shall never have the power to enforce a civilization collapse and replacement.

 

[Basileus Giorgios]

Rome had no technological or cultural hard reason to be so, and actually in its day expanded to lands (northern Gaul, western Iberia, Britannia, Pannonia, Dacia) that were not tied to the Med. One may well argue that the remaining focus on the Med was due to the failure to conquer and develop Germania, not the other way around. As history of Middle Age Europe shows, Germania was far, far from undevelopable, and when it gets developed, the demographic and economic balance of Europe shifts to a much more equal one between Northern and Southern Europe.

All of the areas you mention were based on fairly strong local monarchies and a system of towns and large villages. They had reasonably sophisticated trade networks too, and connections to the Roman world through them. First century Germania did not. Germania did, of course, develop once in contact with the Empire, especially in the fourth and fifth centuries, but a conquest then seems unlikely with the Roman state effectively working flat out to contain the Sassanid threat.

After Roman conquest, Germania shall not stay a howling wilderness for long. Within a few generations, roads and cities shall be built, local Germanic and Slavic tribes and Roman colonists shall be settled down. The heavy plough was known in the Levant in Roman times, and its spread to Northern Europe shall allow to make it as agriculturally profitable for Rome as the Med lands, and greatly accelerate its development. Plus the region had some valuable natural resources, such as amber and iron. Within a few centuries, the region shall come to resemble High Middle Ages Germany.

How will this happen? Who will do the building? Who will "settle down" tribes? Which Romans would be at all interested in settling in Germania?

While roads are yet to be built, and to a degree even after that, Romans can easily maintain logistic links with a Vistula-Dniester border by sailing along the European coasts of the North Sea and the Baltic, and of the Black Sea, respectively. Despite the crass clichè to the contrary, Romans had no technological or cultural barrier to do so, Greeks had sailed the Atlnatic to trade with Britannia since before the rise of Rome, and Rome kept a strong presence in Britannia for centuries.

Well yes, they could, but how many major Roman power centres were located on the Atlantic coasts of Europe to supervise these fleets? How long are ships going to take to sail all around the coast of northern Europe to deliver orders from the Imperial centre?

The Romans never did have a particuarly "strong presence" in Britain: it was the only region of the West that was never Latinised at a local level, it required four legions for defence and keeping down revolts, and even then, was prone to revolt on a regular basis.

Holding Germania and Mesopotamia is quite doable for the early empire once the political decision to conquer and keep them is made, something that almost happened IOTL, and by doing so, the empire gradually makes itself much stronger, while making present and future enemies much weaker.

But why would such a decision be made in the first place? A conquered Germania is going to be Britain writ large. I repeat: it has no settlements- not even villages- for the Romans to start "civilising". The process of Romanisation depended upon local town elites gaining Latin rights for their towns, and setting up local councils. In a world with neither elites, nor towns, there is simply nowhere for Romanisation to begin. Again, you can get around this problem by having a Roman conquest of Germania in the fourth century (something I've never seen done), but such a scenario is bordering on ASB anyway.

I would estimate Germania is going to take at least six legions to pacify, which means taxes are going to have to be raised in genuinely productive provinces like Spain, Africa, Asia and Egypt: this will prompt revolts and rebellions there in regions that are vital to the interests of the central government in Italy. More resources invested in Germania is going to mean less for a possible invasion of Mesopotamia, and less to hold the eastern frontiers against Parthian attacks and Jewish, Cilician and Isaurian revolts.

I do not dispute that the Romans could, if they really desired it, take and hold Germania. The reason I have a problem with the Roman Germany scenario is that they have little reason to want to do so for more than a generation. The Romans did not think of regions as resources to be nurtured and developed: instead, they saw what could be taken out of regions to fund the army, and that was that. I agree that there is the desire of early Emperors to win themselves millitary glory, but in the first century, there are plenty of better candidates for this: Dacia, Bosporus, Arabia, Armenia. After this, the Imperial office was stable enough for conquests to be unneccesary.

 

[Basileus Giorgios]

Fair enough. Both of you did have some very good points.
And since most of the posters here seem opposing my arguments...so hereby I'm officially declaring my surrender in this debate.

But I'd like to pointed out, however, that I won't change either my user title or location...

It is a rare pleasure on AH.com to see a calm and reasonable discussion settled in an amicable manner without resulting to childish insults!

 

[Sandmannius]

Again, you can get around this problem by having a Roman conquest of Germania in the fourth century (something I've never seen done), but such a scenario is bordering on ASB anyway.

I think the Romans conquering Germania after the first century AD already is ASB.

 

[Rex Romanum]

It is a rare pleasure on AH.com to see a calm and reasonable discussion settled in an amicable manner without resulting to childish insults!

Don't you think that declaring our own surrender is worse than childish insults?

 

[Snake Featherston]

I disagree. Taken on its own, Teutoburg need not be any worst than the occasional setbacks that Rome suffered while it was subduing Gallia or moreso Iberia. Germanic tribes surely weren't any tougher to defeat than Celtic ones.

I disagree for a reason that seems counter-intuitive. The Germanic tribes weren't that well organized enough to be a simple conquest, but were organized enough a sufficiently well-trained warlord like Arminius could make the Romans hurt badly for an attempt to conquer. For the Romans that was the worst of both worlds. If they'd been organized on the level of Dumnotorix or Vercingetorix's armies then there'd be much less trouble with conquering them.

True. But conversely, if Rome cripples both its enemies early in its history, it ensures that they won't be there or in the position to assault Rome during an internal crisis and so multiply its effects. So the crisis may become an occasion to reform away its weaknesses instead of the start of a death spiral. Therefore, it's a chicken-and-egg argument, the virtous cycle that saves Rome can either become with key military successes or key political reforms, as long as the one paves the way to the other or viceversa.

This might be true in the short term. The problem is that trying to stop a revival of Persian military power is like Canute holding back the tides. Classical-Age states had not the ability to be perpetually vigilant in that sense any more than modern ones did, IMHO far less so.

However, although D) is pretty much important on its own, if the empire endures, it is very likely to spontaneously evolve in a direction that fulfills it, with less need for direct reforms.

Without B the rest of the points are moot as it is, so.......

Well, IMO China-style occasional dynastic crises do not prevent the fulfillment of the "Rome survives" challenge. After all, nobody questions that Rome endured through the civil wars that marked the end of the Republic. What really needs to be prevented is the civilization breakdown and substitution. And this is why I so often remark the importance of assimilating Northern Europe. With both the Med and and the North in the same civilization, the remaining barbarians shall never have the power to enforce a civilization collapse and replacement.

In other words the Western Empire has to be flexible on par with the "Byzantine" Empire is what you mean.....

 

[Hörnla]

To everyone that thinks Rome was bound to stay squatted on the shores of the Med:

...ask Julius Caesar. The guy changed everything. It is his historical accomplishment to have thoroughly linked Northwestern Europe to the Antique World.

If Octavian had succeeded in conquering Magna Germania, the same would have applied to Central Europe (regard his other acquisitions in the Alpine/Danube region).

and by doing so, the empire gradually makes itself much stronger, while making present and future enemies much weaker.

This is an understanding of international relations the Romans were quite familiar with.

The problem with ensuring TLs where the Empire of Caesar Augustus survives is that the Roman Empire's prosperity rested on two circumstances that collapsed the OTL Western Empire and ultimately did in the Eastern one, too: the Roman idea of a line of succession was whoever won the civil wars sparked by power vacuums. This was tolerable so long as only one enemy, be it Parthia, or be it various tribal confederacies, attacked the Empire as a whole at a single time.

If both of them did the civil war problem was rather likely to bite the Empire in the ass, which is what happened IOTL. If the Roman Empire is to survive, Caesar Augustus must come up with some variation of a workable succession plan.

*sigh* It is not as if nobody tried. Octavian was frantically searching for a legitimate and able heir and messed his whole family up in order to do so. Of course, his aim was to establish a dynasty to rule for.....a long time. This failed with Nero. And again, for the Flavians, with Domitian.

The concept of the "Adoptive Empire", created out of sheer despair by Nerva, could have been fine for a far longer time than three generations (not bad by modern standards either), had there have been a way to enforce and acknowledge such an adoption (e.g. through the Senate or the Priesthood), akin to the US amendment, IIRC, which doesn't allow a president to work without a vice-president. Such a procedure would have ruled out the historical and most other Commoduses.

Then Diocletian tried again with the 2.0 version of the concept, this time written in law but again only working in theory. Allowed him a damn fine retirement, though.

My point: civil war was not the ideal order of succession. Romans were not Clingons.

Oh absolutely, this is very important, too. IMO, the most important things to secure Rome's lasting success are, in rough order of importance:

A) Assimilate all of Germania up to the Vistula-Dniester line.
B) Achieve a largely stable succession method.
C) Conquer Mesopotamia (and hence cripple Parthia).
D) Develop a counterbalance...

I would like to add E), to institutionalize centres of higher learning which should not only encompass the classical virtues of education such as rhetorics and philosophy, but also allow for a professionalisation of the theory of engineering, shipbuilding, manufacturing, military doctrine and equipment, administration, architecture.

This is not a progess one IMPERATOR can achieve at his will, but would need a long-term committment and acceptance of society (also in the form of stipendiae for the gifted, but less wealthy). But imagine maybe 10 or 12 such centres throughout the empire! What a possibility for slow but steady technological progress! What a mass of professional cadres in all fields!

I'd switch it so that B and D are A and B and put C over A.

Fine point. First, bring your house in order before you try anything funny.

the Ottomans are the only ones who preserved a state more or less intact with a single type of dynastic-administrative structure for centuries.

In the end, not to their advantage. Systematical changes over time won't harm the empire if they mean more effective governance. Also, a change of dynasties isn't necessarily bad.

Essentially the Romans need a leadership luck-string of the sort possessed by the Prussians.

The Romans outdo the Prussians on that field already. How about Caesar / Octavian? Or Trajan - Markus Aurelius? I would even argue that throughout the whole era of the Pax Romana Rome was ruled rather skillfully for more than 200 years with the spectacular exceptions of Caligula (4 years) and Nero (14 years+1 year of civil war) - I even count Domitian among the competent, despite his paranoia.

The Prussians? Friedrich Wilhelm I plus Friedrich II, that makes a succesful (though personally ...err.....distant) father/son-combination. Apart from that, I do not give my blessings to the Hohenzollern except for the ability not to stand in the way of two perfect storms of talent, the badly needed reformers of 1806-15 and the Bismarck/Roon/Moltke-combo.

How will this happen? Who will do the building? Who will "settle down" tribes?

Errr....the same Roman specialists who inflated settlements into towns in Northern Europe in a way that one could say they built them from scratch?

The German tribes will settle down themselves. They are comparable mobile, but not purely nomadic. They are not genetically hindered from taking the opportunities contact with the Med-civilization allows them.

I would say, within Magna Germania, the network of cities would initially have to be looser than in other places. There are hardly places where cities like Col. Claudia Ara Agrippinensium (Cologne, 20,000 inhabitants) or Aug. Treverorum (Trier, 80,000 inhabitants) are imaginable for the first centuries.

There would be a handful of Col. Ulpia Trajana (Xanten, 10,000 inhabitants)- sized cities as seats of provincial administration, but rather characteristical would be small places for merchants and tradesmen with few small typically Roman installations (a moderate bath, a cosy forum, a theatre unlike the one in Xanten or Trier, but rather like the African one in "Gladiator"), with maybe 2-3,000 inhabitants.

What is far more important is the network of roads to be built.

But why would such a decision be made in the first place?

Megalomania?

Good point. Ask Augustus who pursued such a policy for 20 years and IMHO would have continued to do so, would he not have been a very old man when 9AD came.

it has no settlements- not even villages-

You argumentation on the process of Romanization is altogether valid. But along with Tacitus you probably exaggerate the beloved isolation of people living in Germania.

Also, there must have been stratification in society already in the 1st century - where else would someone like Arminius have come from? As elsewhere, Rome also in Germania relied on pro-Roman factions for support (ultimately failing in this case); but there were people who favoured Roman contact and who would have been willing to be agents of Romanization.

On the conquest in the 3rd/4th century - scenario. Why not? If we take into account a Roman Empire which made internal progress in order to avoid or mitigate the 3rd century crisis (at least not making everything worse by a breakdown of succession-systems), one could imagine a decision to break the crisis by a return to expansion. Or if the crisis is avoided, Rome just simply could do it. Even around OTL 235AD, Roman forces got engaged in a battle near the Harz mountain which is rather closer to Berlin than to Cologne.

I would estimate Germania is going to take at least six legions to pacify,

6 is easy. I would estimate 11.

On the other hand, reduce the legions on the Rhine from 5 to 2, the Pannonian legions from 4 to 2, re-distribute the 6 Legions in Moesia and Dacia in order to man the border on the Dnjestr and to control "Dacia Magna" (the whole region between Dnjestr, Danube and Carpathes).

This already gives you 5 Legions to control the area between Rhine and Vistula. 5 are IMHO for a long time only sufficient for the area between Rhine and Elbe/Moldau. For the rest I would estimate and additional 6, so your count suits again. For most of the "Pax Romana", this would mean a rise from 28 to 34 legions. In the longer run, this number could be slightly reduced again.

Now that means a rise by 25%. This is a lot, but not wholly out of order for the rise and fall of number of regions during the first two centuries AD.


In the end, again, I point out that the task is imaginable to be solved, but there is not much probability for it to happen for the reasons Giorgios to
ferverntly pointed out. To make Rome more durable,
it is far more important to make changes in its society than to expand it further (because, come on, it is pretty big already). If Rome would have
conquered Germania Magna and still would have fallen, we would debate now whether a Limes on the Volga River would have saved it, maybe.

The funny thing, though, is, when I imagine Rome even more wealthy, internally more stable and a bit more technologically progressive (I am not talking
gunpowder or railroads here, but stirrups, better agricultural methods e.g.)