Re armed Rome

I have seen a number of threads about Roman guns, which I don't think possible but it got me thinking. If gun powder had been discovered, and I can see no reason why it couldn't I could see the use of rockets and catapolts lobing primitive bombs. I have also seen a documentry showing the discovery of what was interpreted as part of a hand held balister, at a Roman garrison sight in Germany. This would in my opinion be both too heavy and fragile for use. My theory is it was part of a model in the C.O's office or a prototype. If it was a prototype I could see it been developed into a more conventional crossbow. Now if these weapons had been put into wide spread service could the Empire have survived longer in the west. A competant crossbow man could be trained in a few weeks square bashing which would ease the man power situation, and could allow for more effective local militias easing the demands on the legions. The use of rockets and gun powder bombs would at least initialy terify the germanic tribes. Also a legion drawn up in three ranks shooting off controled vollies and supported by rocket fire and cavelry is going to ruin anyones day.
 
Well, there's more issues to address than just better arms if you want to save Rome. By Atilla's time the feared Roman Legions were mostly half-trained barbarian mercs, not the all-purpose citizen-soldier badasses of earlier. Then there's the degenerating internal and external political atmosphere, the tax problems, chronic corruption, a drained treasury...you'd need to reverse or prevent that downward trend above all else.
 
Well, there's more issues to address than just better arms if you want to save Rome. By Atilla's time the feared Roman Legions were mostly half-trained barbarian mercs, not the all-purpose citizen-soldier badasses of earlier. Then there's the degenerating internal and external political atmosphere, the tax problems, chronic corruption, a drained treasury...you'd need to reverse or prevent that downward trend above all else.

For the political, curuption & tax issues, whats needed is a competant and ruthless emperer. As for the quality of the legions as I said you can train crossbowmen in a few weeks. Also these arms would also be taken up by the eastern empire which was in alot better shape and would affect how far west the Huns got. On their own the weapons wouldn't save the western empire but could delay the final colapse. THe question then becomes how long do they have to hold to moderate or preferable prevent the Dark age. Also would slowing the colapse allow the survival of a Britainian successor state.
 
For the political, curuption & tax issues, whats needed is a competant and ruthless emperer. As for the quality of the legions as I said you can train crossbowmen in a few weeks. Also these arms would also be taken up by the eastern empire which was in alot better shape and would affect how far west the Huns got. On their own the weapons wouldn't save the western empire but could delay the final colapse. THe question then becomes how long do they have to hold to moderate or preferable prevent the Dark age. Also would slowing the colapse allow the survival of a Britainian successor state.
Might allow the easterners to secure more of the west earlier so we might end up with an eastern Empire that includes parts of Spain, Africa and Italy right from the outset.
 
For the political, curuption & tax issues, whats needed is a competant and ruthless emperer. As for the quality of the legions as I said you can train crossbowmen in a few weeks. Also these arms would also be taken up by the eastern empire which was in alot better shape and would affect how far west the Huns got. On their own the weapons wouldn't save the western empire but could delay the final colapse. THe question then becomes how long do they have to hold to moderate or preferable prevent the Dark age. Also would slowing the colapse allow the survival of a Britainian successor state.

Kinda missing the point. Wanking the imperial weaponry will only help the empire to a certain extent. Crossbows weren't exactly in use in europe, and handing a bunch of peasants crossbows does not a strong army make. As for a strong emperor, one man may not be enough (not sure what ruthlessness has to do with this either). What is needed is a series of systematic reforms. Finally, it wasn't the huns who dealt the death knell to the romans, so stopping them probably doesnt change things much (as IOTL).
 
As for a strong emperor, one man may not be enough (not sure what ruthlessness has to do with this either).

Official curuption is greatly reduced when curupt officials find themselfs nailed to crosses outside their offices and their families sold into slavery, and those giving the bribes get the same treatment.
 
For the political, curuption & tax issues, whats needed is a competant and ruthless emperer. As for the quality of the legions as I said you can train crossbowmen in a few weeks. Also these arms would also be taken up by the eastern empire which was in alot better shape and would affect how far west the Huns got. On their own the weapons wouldn't save the western empire but could delay the final colapse. THe question then becomes how long do they have to hold to moderate or preferable prevent the Dark age. Also would slowing the colapse allow the survival of a Britainian successor state.

You're really not going to get a good, even half-way Roman British successor state. The thing is, Britain was always the western periphery of the empire. It had a lot of tin and copper but it was essentially a backwater. Rome is what the Roman Empire is all about. If barbarians start flooding into Italy, the Romans aren't going to cut their losses and support remnant states where Roman rule still exists, they're going to pull back all of their troops and important persons from the remnant areas for one glorious last stand around Rome. You're always going to be left with what happened OTL - a somewhat unified country with a mix of Roman citizens and a far more numerous local population, albeit with a fair amount of cross-breeding between the two, but lacking a significant government presence to command the area, and with no military presence whatsoever to defend itself from threats, which is going to encourage the tribes to revert to ruling themselves both for leadership and because it's far easier to defend themselves that way than by trying to painstakingly agree on a universal government over all of the Britannic Roman provinces.
 
Official curuption is greatly reduced when curupt officials find themselfs nailed to crosses outside their offices and their families sold into slavery, and those giving the bribes get the same treatment.
Tricky, that-- corrupt politicians tend to spread money around themselves, and bribers will want to protect their investments. The loyalty of the army would be questionable, at best, in these sorts of affairs, since many generals and other officers are probably knee-deep in embezzlement schemes themselves. To insure the loyalty of the army, you'd have to offer more money, better treatment, and more benefits than your enemies, but then that brings up the tax issue...
 
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