If you had read what I actually wrote, you would have realized that I never claimed that using only cannons would have solved the logistical problems.
Cornelius,
I never suggested you did write that, because I know you wrote this...
The problems would have been minor and easier to cope with.
... which still proves you've no idea the size and scope of the problem at hand.
What is more difficult: supplying 20 or more legions spread over the whole empire or few artillery trains from time to time?
Both are equally difficult because the legions won't being using muskets exclusively. Firearms will be part of a "mixed arms" force, just as they were for centuries in Europe between the introduction of gunpowder and the invention of the bayonet.
Muskets consume far less powder, of course, and during a battle usually you could shoot between 10/15 rounds, true. But in your calculations you're forgetting training (legionnaires have to learn the proper handling of the weapon, haven't they?)
Score a laugh point. Do you have any idea of how infrequently musketeers "trained" by firing their pieces? Or how infrequently infantry trained by firing their pieces up through the Napoleonic era? Here's a hint, you can count the number of monthly training rounds on one hand.
... and once issued to legions, muskets are going to be used far oftier than any cannon.
No, they won't. You're making the mistaken assumption that the Romans will immediately have bayonets
again. Initially Roman firearms will see limited use just as was seen in OTL Europe.
Skirmishes were frequent on all the borders and so greater engagements, while sieges were really infrequent in comparison.
And those skirmishes will be fought almost exclusively with hand weapons just they were in the OTL up until the mid 1800s.
I agree completely with the idea that the guns development could be slower than OTL...
And yet your statements regarding the use of Roman firearms in both skirmishes and battle assumes the presence of
bayonets.
Early 1700s if I remember well...
1600s actually because your memory is faulty.
... but gunpowder has been seriously in use in Europe from 1400s on, isn't it?
Seriously in use, but not in the quantities you automatically assume it was. Battles were still primarily decided by
shock and not
fire well into the 18th Century and the number of rounds used by personal weapons and cannon on the battlefield or in skirmishes was quite limited.
And, despite that, Europe still had to import saltpeter.
Again you are understimating the roman organisation.
Underestimating the people who built those roads, aqueducts, fortifications, harbors, and other structures that still exist nearly 2000 years later? Please.
The troops stationed on the borders were routinely supplyied.
Supplied, yes. But not in the amounts or goods you're blithely assuming.
If the use of guns is not widespread the logistic problem could be coped with.
Not widespread? And you have them in every fortress and the legions routinely skirmishing with them? Make up your mind.
IIRC, Charles VIII army, when he invaded Italy in 1494, had a little more than one hundred pieces of various caliber. And that was the biggest artillery park in Europe.
You recalled the number of cannon correctly. However you failed to realize that France invading Italy is just the equivalent of one Roman province invading another. Forget about Europe and her tiny nations and look at the size of the Empire.
Besides the saltpeter problem is only one, there are others such as the casting techniques (it's difficult to cast a bronze cannon properly)
Yeah, I suppose the people who routinely cast bells and statues in a variety of metals wouldn't have the first idea how to cast a thick walled tube with one end plugged.
... and the trasportations of said cannons: ox teams were painfully slow, while horse teams needed suitable breeds.
Along with given them the bayonet immediately, now they'll have battlefield mobile pieces too? What happened to
"I agree completely with the idea that the guns development could be slower than OTL"? I've been talking about siege cannon cast in place and cumbersome firelocks fired from rests while you're giving them bayonets and artillery trains.
Personally I don't subscribe the idea that the roman empire armed with guns would have lasted forever.
Who ever said it would?
Bill