Veni, Vidi, Vici!

I'm an unabashed Caesar fan. Join The Punch Die in a moment of silence today to mark the anniversary of the murder of Gaius Julius Caesar, cut down in an assassination plot lead by Gaius Cassius Longinus and Marcus Iunius Brutus on this date, March 15 - "The Ides of March, in 44 B.C.

It is hard to overestimate the degree to which Caesar's later life was dominated by warfare. Before assuming command in Cisalpine Gaul, he had but a year's actual military experience, as propraetor in Hispania Ulterior (for which he was awarded a triumph.) Yet he was involved in major military operations not only in Gaul, but throughout Europe, Asia and Africa in every year except two between entering the province in 59 B.C. and his death in 44 B.C. (in 50 B.C. Gaul was conquered and he was busy settling the aftermath, and in 44 B.C. he was, as is well known, assassinated. But what is not well known is that Caesar had planned major military campaigns against Dacia and Parthia to begin just days before his murder.) In most of those fourteen years, Caesar fought at least one, and often more, major battles and/or sieges. According to Pliny the Elder, in his Natural History, Caesar "fought fifty pitched battles, the only commander to surpass Marcus Marcellus, who fought thirty-nine." Appian tells us that over half of these were fought in Gaul. Compare this number to that of Alexander the Great, who, despite engaging in many smaller skirmishes, only fought five pitched battles, and conducted only three major sieges. Whether or not Caesar actually fought in fifty battles is not as important as the fact that ancient writers believed he had been involved in more combat, with more consistent success, than any Roman commander before or since.

Caesar's greatness, I think, is found in several different aspects of his generalship, namely, his tactical brilliance and his engineering genius.

Caesar was a tactical genius. To be sure, he suffered occasional and very serious tactical setbacks, for instance at Gergovia and Dyrrachium, and often his setbacks were of his own creation. Indeed, his genius was often displayed in extricating himself from his own mistakes. Yet, his tactical brilliance is undeniable, and is borne out in his stunning successes, most notably his astonishing circumvallation and contravallation of Alesia in 52 B.C.; his rout of Pompey’s numerically superior forces at Pharsalus; and the complete destruction of Pharnaces' army at Zela (which was so swift a description of it was emblazoned on a placard during his Asia triumph and forever etched into Western consciousness with the words: "I came, I saw, I conquered.") Caesar also successfully campaigned in any terrain and in any weather. His four triumphs (not to mention a fifth – his first – which he forsook to stand for the consulship in 59 B.C.) were celebrated in commemoration of his victories on the continents of Europe, Asia, and Africa. This was owed not only to his tactical greatness, but to the strict discipline and intense loyalty he was able to inculcate in his troops, often through the sheer force of his character alone.

Perhaps the greatest factor in Julius Caesar's genius was his engineering abilities. Again, one need only look to the siege of Alesia to see this, but it is also evident in another famous Caesar engineering exploit: the bridge over the Rhine, constructed in a matter of days (the first bridge was built and the legions across in just ten days ten days), not once, but twice. It was an engineering masterpiece, and in his characteristic beautifully simplistic Latin that even great orator Cicero praised, Caesar tells us:

The plan of the bridge was as follows. Pairs of piles eighteen inches thick and sharpened at the end were measured to suit the depth of the river and joined together with a two-foot gap between them. Rafts and cranes were used to lower the piles into the river-bed and rams to drive them home—not vertical and straight down like stakes, but lying at an angle so that they leaned into the current. Opposite these, and forty feet away on the river-bed, more pairs of piles were joined in the same way and set at an angled slope, this time against the force and flow of the current. From above, crossbeams two feet thick were fitted into the opposing pairs of piles to fill the gap and join them together to form trestles. Twin braces at the ends of each pair of piles kept them apart. Thus the main piles were arranged in an opposing manner, both held apart and bound together: as a consequence, the structure was extremely secure, and of such a nature that the greater the force of the water pressing upon it, the more firmly its joints were held in position. The trestles were covered over with planks which joined them lengthways, and also with poles and bundles of rods. Even so, more piles were driven in at an angle further down stream to serve as props for the bridge: attached to the entire structure they absorbed the force of the current. Finally, more piles were driven in a little way upstream: if the barbarians launched logs or ships to demolish the bridge, these would protect it from being damaged by weakening the impact of such objects.

Construction of the bridge took ten days, a feat of astonishing speed, and probably spanned a distance of approximately 390 yards, an incredible distance. Moreover, his crossing of the Rhine over a bridge of his own creation, rather than in boats his Gallic allies offered to provide, was a strategic achievement in itself. Germanic tribes who had been raiding eastern Gaul had been using the Rhine as convenient natural protection against Roman reprisals. By deciding to confront the Germans, and in bridging the Rhine, Caesar demonstrated to the Germans that he could travel unimpeded – no one was safe; Roman might could go anywhere. The Germans were indeed impressed and afraid, for when Caesar arrived on the Rhine's east bank he found that the tribes have moved further east. He spent over two weeks ravaging the land, burning farms and villages; as he so coolly says himself in his Commentary on the Gallic War: "Caesar lingered a few days in their territory, set fire to all their settlements and buildings, and cut down the corn." Two years later, when Caesar bridged and crossed the river a second time, he again encountered no resistance and found that the Germans had retreated eastward.

Alexander is the general Caesar is most often compared to, both by modern and ancient historians. The scope and breadth of the opponents Alexander faced is impressive: he battled steppe archers and beat them, he fought heavy cavalry and was victorious, he met barbarians and defeated them, he went up against Indian elephants and won. Caesar's achievements are often de-emphasized because it was Gauls and Germans that he fought. But the Gauls and Germans were no slouches: Germanic armies defeated Roman legions in the late second century BC, and the Gauls sacked Rome in the early fourth century BC. Both inflicted serious psychological wounds on the Romans as well. And while Alexander conquered nearly the known world at the time, his was primarily a land enterprise. Caesar was forced to rely much more on naval support, and had to create a navy from scratch as his campaigns dictated. Though they ultimately served little purpose and almost got Caesar and his legions annihilated, the two invasions of Britain that Caesar launched were no small feats. Neither was managing the crossing from Brundisium in pursuit of Pompey. Would Alexander have beaten Caesar? I don't know; Alexander never went up against the Roman legions. We do know, however, that Caesar did go up against the greatest fighting force up until that point: fellow Romans, including legions under the command of the foremost Roman general of the age, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, and was victorious.

Caesar is often derided by detractors as a "political jerk." But to call Caesar strictly a political jerk betrays, well, quite frankly, an ignorance of ancient Rome. The distinction between "politician" and "general" had no real meaning in Rome. A Roman senator was trained in, and given responsibilities in, both political and military affairs. The tendency to impose this distinction on Caesar by modern investigators is a chief reason for underestimating Caesar's military achievements.

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