PC/AHC : Carthage looses the Mercenary War

What if Carthage, instead of eventually winning the Mercenary War looses it?

How can the city can loose it in first place? Is a sack of Carthago needed and plausible, or a Mercenary victory can be translated as the establishment of a mercenary state in Africa?

Then, what would be the consequences? Mercenaries entering in roman sphere of influence seems possible, and at least tentatives of take-over of Carthagian non-african lands (as Spain) could happen earlier as IOTL.
As for Carthage, the successful war made the city a bit more "democratic", less traditionally aristocratic at least.
Would a more conservative merchant republic, without the same impetus to go in Spain, be crushed earlier than Rome, if a defeat in Mercenary War can weakened it significantly?
 
The problem with the mercenaries winning the Mercenary War is that Rome had a vested interest in keeping Carthage alive, because of the indemnity Rome forced upon it in the treaty after the First Punic War. While, yes, Rome did take advantage of Carthage's weakness to annex Sardinia during the war, it also rejected an opportunity to annex Utica, and nominally helped Carthage by returning nearly 3000 prisoners to it during some of the darker days of the war. So if the mercenaries become successful enough to besiege Carthage itself, you might see Rome intervening on Carthage's behalf, just so that they can ensure they're going to get their money. Rome being responsible for Carthage's salvation could have all sorts of implications....

However, assuming Rome stays completely out of it...

I think a good POD for Carthage losing the Mercenary War might be the Battle of the Bagradas River - there, Hamilcar Barca pulled a risky maneuver where he feigned retreat, urging the much larger rebel army to give an undisciplined chase, before turning his forces around and slaughtering them. Here we'll say the maneuver fails and Hamilcar's army is crushed, and just to add the cherry on top Hamilcar dies as well, thus depriving Carthage of its best general.

I think you do need to have Carthage sacked for the mercenaries to win the war, and I think you can define a mercenary victory as the establishment of a mercenary state in Africa. Its captains had went past the point of no return; the mercenaries were minting their own coins, and a huge part of its strength was built on the Libyan peasantry trying to gain some power. A victory like the one I described might bring more of Carthage's allies to the mercenaries' side. Maybe they could get a slave rebellion going to? (Miles mentions that it was "striking" that the mercenaries never tried to incite a slave rebellion) Sacking Carthage would be very difficult for the mercenaries to accomplish, but I think it can be done, provided the rebels are willing to wait out the year or two it would take to see the siege through, and that Rome doesn't bail Carthage out.

Some kind of arrangement would need to come between the mercenaries and Rome. I doubt that the rebels would take on Carthage's debt. Maybe Rome is allowed free reign over Spain as compensation? I could see the Punic cities in Spain asking for Roman protection without Carthage anyways. That in turn probably leads to Rome trying to conquer all of Spain during the period of OTL's Second Punic War. Sans Carthage, we might not see a Roman conquest of Africa for a long time... maybe an earlier conquest of Gaul instead? As for the mercenaries, I have no idea what such a state would look like. Matho declaring himself king? Some kind of republic? Either seems possible. Regardless of its government, I think it would be confined to just Tunisia though. I don't see Carthage going on as an independent state if the mercenaries have their own state.
 
The Mercenaries might be interested in getting involved in the lucrative pirate business if they win....Carthage would make as good a base as any to do it from I suppose.
 
The problem with the mercenaries winning the Mercenary War is that Rome had a vested interest in keeping Carthage alive, because of the indemnity Rome forced upon it in the treaty after the First Punic War. While, yes, Rome did take advantage of Carthage's weakness to annex Sardinia during the war, it also rejected an opportunity to annex Utica, and nominally helped Carthage by returning nearly 3000 prisoners to it during some of the darker days of the war. So if the mercenaries become successful enough to besiege Carthage itself, you might see Rome intervening on Carthage's behalf, just so that they can ensure they're going to get their money. Rome being responsible for Carthage's salvation could have all sorts of implications....

However, assuming Rome stays completely out of it...

I think a good POD for Carthage losing the Mercenary War might be the Battle of the Bagradas River - there, Hamilcar Barca pulled a risky maneuver where he feigned retreat, urging the much larger rebel army to give an undisciplined chase, before turning his forces around and slaughtering them. Here we'll say the maneuver fails and Hamilcar's army is crushed, and just to add the cherry on top Hamilcar dies as well, thus depriving Carthage of its best general.

I think you do need to have Carthage sacked for the mercenaries to win the war, and I think you can define a mercenary victory as the establishment of a mercenary state in Africa. Its captains had went past the point of no return; the mercenaries were minting their own coins, and a huge part of its strength was built on the Libyan peasantry trying to gain some power. A victory like the one I described might bring more of Carthage's allies to the mercenaries' side. Maybe they could get a slave rebellion going to? (Miles mentions that it was "striking" that the mercenaries never tried to incite a slave rebellion) Sacking Carthage would be very difficult for the mercenaries to accomplish, but I think it can be done, provided the rebels are willing to wait out the year or two it would take to see the siege through, and that Rome doesn't bail Carthage out.

Some kind of arrangement would need to come between the mercenaries and Rome. I doubt that the rebels would take on Carthage's debt. Maybe Rome is allowed free reign over Spain as compensation? I could see the Punic cities in Spain asking for Roman protection without Carthage anyways. That in turn probably leads to Rome trying to conquer all of Spain during the period of OTL's Second Punic War. Sans Carthage, we might not see a Roman conquest of Africa for a long time... maybe an earlier conquest of Gaul instead? As for the mercenaries, I have no idea what such a state would look like. Matho declaring himself king? Some kind of republic? Either seems possible. Regardless of its government, I think it would be confined to just Tunisia though. I don't see Carthage going on as an independent state if the mercenaries have their own state.

I'd say it seems likely that the Mercenaries would set up a Tyranny (in the classical sense), probably something similar to Agathocles' Syracuse. At the very best, you might see something similar in structure or geographic function as the Vandalic state in North Africa, at worst you might find North Africa completely fracture into a series of city-states.

I'd wonder less about how long it would take for Rome to conquer the region, and more about Numidia.
 
I'd say it seems likely that the Mercenaries would set up a Tyranny (in the classical sense), probably something similar to Agathocles' Syracuse.

I can see that.

At the very best, you might see something similar in structure or geographic function as the Vandalic state in North Africa, at worst you might find North Africa completely fracture into a series of city-states.

And this.

I'd wonder less about how long it would take for Rome to conquer the region, and more about Numidia.

I'm not so certain Numidia would be a threat. The Numidians were split into several different kingdoms/tribes, and there's not much reason to think they would or could unify into one kingdom. After all, a large part of why the Numidians unified IOTL was because Rome wanted a strong, friendly African state to ensure that Carthage wouldn't "rise again". It's possible and maybe even probable it would have happened naturally (especially if this were in a vacuum), but would it have happened in time for such a state to become enough of a factor to seek such a major conquest? I guess I doubt it. Plus (and this is a weaker reason) a lot of Numidians supported the mercenaries. It is possible, but I would tend to think of Rome as the greater threat to the hypothetical mercenary state in the long run.
 
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