Phalanx vs. Maniple

[katarn]

Clearly the maniple proved superior after initial battles with Phyrrus, but what were the more specific weaknesses of both systems? The phalanx, when disintegrated, seems to have made for an easy target. What were the drawbacks of the maniple?

[Smitty-48]

The flaw in the Maniplar Legion was class, the Maniplar Legionaries were not professionals, and the structure and organization of the Legion was based on wealth and social standing, with the rich guys doing one thing and the poor guys doing another and never the two shall mix nor switch, and so it wasn't standardized, and so was unwieldy and inflexible, it wasn't agile enough to deal with complex terrain and tactical situations.

What Marius did was invent the first real army, the Cohort Legion was all professional, and it was standardized, so you could break it down into components and manuever them independently, just as we do now, battalion, to company, to platoon, all the way down to the squad level of eight men, so it took everything to a whole new level of capability, literally; revolutionary, down through the ages, to this day in fact.

[TheReal_ND]

Marius simply took over the ideas the manipul... well the phalanx was before the manipul. The phalanx was outdated during the Samite war.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the ... =343455266

[Smitty-48]

Marius didn't "take over the ideas" of the Maniple, he threw them out completely, because the "ideas" of the Maniple were idiotic, in that they were not based on operational imperatives, but again, on social class, the Maniple was nonsensical, basically said "rich guys are good at these sorts of jobs and poor guys are better suited to this blah-blah-blah", Marius chucked that idiocy overboard and said "everybody is the same, everybody will be trained the same, and trained to do any job, and so can be used for any purpose, based on operational imperative", and at that point, it all became modular and scaleable, and for the first time ever, a real army as we know it.

The Maniplar Legion was a "Citizens" Legion, everybody had to serve, but that meant that they projected their civilian social pecking order unto the organization and tactics of the formation, what made sense for operations didn't enter into it, it wasn't based on logic, it was based on politics, Marius shattered that whole convention and built the Cohort Legion from the ground up as an entirely operationalized force of trained professionals; organization and tactics based on operational imperatives and logic, standardized, trained and cross trained therein.

The Maniple could not be broken down into sub units, it was rigid, the lines were always the same, the poor guys in front, the rich guys in the back, it could only be pointed in the direction of the enemy, and then execute one manuever, if something came at you from another direction, you'd have to swing the whole thing around and get lined up again, and then execute your one manuever, which was to try to encircle the enemy with the poor guys and wear them down, so the rich guys could come in and finish them off.

The Cohort Legion could do anything, it could execute complex manuevers, change direction on a dime, change into different formations on the fly, break off into multiple formations simultaeously, it could fight just like armies fight now, it was a whole nother world of warfare, completely different ball game, different ball park in fact.

The problem for the Maniple; was the Germans. The Germans were so formidable, that if you didn't have your shit together, they would eat you alive, if you were basing your operations on politics and social pecking order rather than imperatives, the Germans would hand you your ass, so in order to fight the Germans, the Legions had to get serious, and organized, and professional, no more screwing around, and that's what Marius did.

The Marian reforms and switch from Maniplar to Cohort Legion is the inflexion point of Rome, the army becoming a flexible, mobile, disciplined, professional, operationalized combined arms force, is how they conquered Antiquity and built the Empire.

[katarn]

Marius didn't "take over the ideas" of the Maniple, he threw them out completely, because the "ideas" of the Maniple were idiotic, in that they were not based on operational imperatives, but again, on social class, the Maniple was nonsensical, basically said "rich guys are good at these sorts of jobs and poor guys are better suited to this blah-blah-blah", Marius chucked that idiocy overboard and said "everybody is the same, everybody will be trained the same, and trained to do any job, and so can be used for any purpose, based on operational imperative", and at that point, it all became modular and scaleable, and for the first time ever, a real army as we know it.

The Maniplar Legion was a "Citizens" Legion, everybody had to serve, but that meant that they projected their civilian social pecking order unto the organization and tactics of the formation, what made sense for operations didn't enter into it, it wasn't based on logic, it was based on politics, Marius shattered that whole convention and built the Cohort Legion from the ground up as an entirely operationalized force of trained professionals; organization and tactics based on operational imperatives and logic, standardized, trained and cross trained therein.

The Maniple could not be broken down into sub units, it was rigid, the lines were always the same, the poor guys in front, the rich guys in the back, it could only be pointed in the direction of the enemy, and then execute one manuever, if something came at you from another direction, you'd have to swing the whole thing around and get lined up again, and then execute your one manuever, which was to try to encircle the enemy with the poor guys and wear them down, so the rich guys could come in and finish them off.

The Cohort Legion could do anything, it could execute complex manuevers, change direction on a dime, change into different formations on the fly, break off into multiple formations simultaeously, it could fight just like armies fight now, it was a whole nother world of warfare, completely different ball game, different ball park in fact.

The problem for the Maniple; was the Germans. The Germans were so formidable, that if you didn't have your shit together, they would eat you alive, if you were basing your operations on politics and social pecking order rather than imperatives, the Germans would hand you your ass, so in order to fight the Germans, the Legions had to get serious, and organized, and professional, no more screwing around, and that's what Marius did.

The Marian reforms and switch from Maniplar to Cohort Legion is the inflexion point of Rome, the army becoming a flexible, mobile, disciplined, professional, operationalized combined arms force, is how they conquered Antiquity and built the Empire.

I definitely agree with the social class point, but I'm not convinced on flexibility. The lack of maneuverability was one of the main reasons Rome left the phalanx and adopted the maniple, and that staggered arrangement should be able to have individual maniples move independently.

[Smitty-48]

I definitely agree with the social class point, but I'm not convinced on flexibility. The lack of maneuverability was one of the main reasons Rome left the phalanx and adopted the maniple, and that staggered arrangement should be able to have individual maniples move independently.

Should have, but didn't, because it was flawed by the social pecking order. Based on your social standing, you would train to do one job and one job only, doing a lesser job was beneath you, and you would always be in your position in the ranks, being in another position was beneath you, and they literally took that political dynamic to the battlefield, so you ended up with the best trained best equipped guys actually being REMF's who avoided the tough assignments, and the formation had to adhere to this heirarachy, it wasn't modular and scaleable, it was almost a ceremonial formation, based on class.

In the Maniplar Legion, you basically bought your position, you paid for your own traning and equipment, and operationally, the whole thing was set up to use the lower class guys as cannon fodder in order to spare the upper class guys, even though the upper class guys were the best trained and equipped. If you said, ok upper class guys, we need you to take the lead here, we're giving you the tough position in the line, they'd say no, send in the cannon fodder, we don't do that sort of shit, and since they were politically connected upper class guys, there's nothing you could do, they had the juice to refuse, the inmates were running the asylum.

Think of the Maniplar Legion as being like the National Guard, and your position would be based on how much money you made and/or your social and political connections, and the higher up you were, the better soldier you were, but the less fighting you did, and basically they tried to angle it so that they least trained worst eqipped guys from the ghetto did all the fighting and suffered all the casualties, so it was ass backwards, due to class and patronage.

And the thing is, you couldn't change it up, even if you were the General, didn't matter, because it was all based on patronage, like the Mafia, so you had to take care of your guys, you couldn't order them to do something outside of the pecking order, because you'd have a mutiny on your hands if you did, even on the battlefield, but also when you got back to Rome.

Marius was a social reformer first and foremost, a middle class guy, who rose to the highest levels through the military, and in order to reform the army operationallty, he had to reform it socially, decouple it from the class system, professionalize it, so in the Maniple they went to war as a Mafia, but in the Cohort, they went to war as an army for the first time, at which point, they started kicking everybody's asses.

The Romans were the first ones to ever do this, this was their edge, this was why they were so successful, Marius invented the army as we know it, we're still using his basic structure to this day; Legion = Regiment, Cohort = Battalion, Century = Company, etc, and his modular, scaleable, flexible, all purpose Cohort, we call that "Combined Arms".

Don't tunnel vision on the tactics, the tactics didn't change much from Phalanx to Maniple to Cohort, throw a spear, stab a guy with a sword, not much to it really, but the weakness wasn't at the tactical level, tactical level everybody was about the same, the weakness was at the operational level, and so the big change had to be at the operational level, and when the operational level was professionalized, that is what led to strategic dominance.

Operationally, the Romans became totally dominant, tactics didn't matter, didn't matter how big you were, didn't matter how tough you were, didn't matter how good you were with a sword, the Romans could throw their army in against anybody and win, because the Romans were not going to beat you with tactics, they were going beat you at the operatonal level, professional army, in combined arms.

Up until the Cohort, everything was Spartan, wars were won or lost based on the physical and mental attributes of your soldiers, how big were they, how tough were they, how brave were they, how good were they with a sword, the Germans for example, were bigger, and tougher, and braver, and very good with their swords, but the Romans rigged it so that none of that mattered anymore, you might win a tactical engagement, but it didn't matter, that wouldn't save you, because operationally, the Romans were going to break it all down to win the battles, and so strategically, the war.

The Roman Legions, they weren't big guys, on average, just over five feet tall and just over a hundred pounds, they weren't that tough, most of them were farmers by class, they weren't that brave, the Germans were crazy brave in comparison, cray cray recklessly brave, and they were huge, like giants, but the Cohort rendered all that irrelevant, the Romans had the operational edge, rendering the tactical a non issue, at which point, the Germans didn't stand a chance.

The Germans, the Celts, the Norse, these were tribal warriors, they were the big bad dudes, they were the ones bred to fight, the Romans in comparison, were "civilized", now we would say "bourgeois", they weren't bred to be warriors, they were bred to be merchants, farmers, tradesmen, to drive the Roman economy, so tactically, man to man, pound for pound, they didn't match up well with these tribal warriors in a close quarters fight, but when the Romans invented the army, close quarters fights no longer decided the outcome, the operational art decided the outcome, and for all intents and purposes, the Romans invented that paradigm, which is still how wars are fought and won today.

[katarn]

I see what you're saying, but Romans didn't base it just off class. Yes, class determined your ability to buy training, weapons, and armor, but experience also was used to determine the place in line- the Hastati were not just those rich enough to afford armor, but were also the youngest and greenest. AFAIK, wealth was why you were in the combat line at all, experience was where you were where you were.

[Smitty-48]

I see what you're saying, but Romans didn't base it just off class. Yes, class determined your ability to buy training, weapons, and armor, but experience also was used to determine the place in line- the Hastati were not just those rich enough to afford armor, but were also the youngest and greenest. AFAIK, wealth was why you were in the combat line at all, experience was where you were where you were.

You're missing the forest through the trees, the only way to become "experienced", was to survive for a long time, the only way to survive for a long time, was to avoid being in the ranks with the cannon fodder, the way you stayed out of the cannon fodder, was to either buy your way out, or through patronage, you're Patrone kept you out of the breach, so you would be his loyal Mafioso back in Rome, so the most experienced guys, were the best soldiers, who actually did the least amount of fighting, and basically just came in to mop up after the cannon fodder took the brunt.

"Experienced" is a euphemism for "protected from the breach", because in the end, how "experienced" you are means jack shit when you're in a melee, within the melee, who lives and dies is really just random, you never see the one coming that kills you, so your "experience" ain't gonna save you, the only way to be "experienced", is to stay out of the breach as much as possible for as long as possible, until the enemy is worn down, and then just come in to mop up for the coup de grace.

The rich kids were there to basically make their bones, get their tickets punched as "warfighters", so they could be politicians, can't be a politician unless you've got your war record, been to see the Elephant, and they had the best armour, weapons, and training, to make sure they were the most survivable, but they were also kept out of the breach, because they could still be easily killed at random if they were in the melee, and the connected middle class guys with patrons were there to be loyal Mafiosos, but the Patrones needed those Mafiosos back in Rome, so they didn't want them getting killed neither, so the best trained, best equipped, most experienced soldiers, were doing the least amount of actual fighting.

See, the Greek Phalanx was actually egalitarian, the fathers and sons came from their farms and they all fought shoulder to shoulder in one big formation, the assumption that the Maniple was invented to be more manueverable or flexible or whatever, is not the case, the Maniple was invented to organize it by class, so you could better determine who was going to get killed and who was going to survive to become "experienced", so in fact, the supposedly "experienced", were really just the protected classes.

In the Maniple, you hold your best troops back, you don't send them in until the enemy has been worn down by the cannon fodder, once the skirmishers have boxed them in, and the cannon fodder has worn them down, only then do you send in your "experienced" guys to finish them off.

This was OK, so long as you were fighting your tactical peers, other Greco-Roman armies, like Carthage, but once you started to drive into Germania, now you're facing a whole new level of tactical opponent, who could sweep the cannon fodder aside like it ain't no thang, and then threaten to overrun you, once the opposition started to get bigger and badder, the National Guard was no longer able to handle them, at which point, Rome needed a Regular Army.

[Frandoka]

Damm this is some good stuff Smitty. If i read that correctly the marian reforms introduced standardized equipment and training for there entire army. So that is what made them different from caste warriors like the spartans or the persian immortals? And if thats true am i correct in assuming that the roman army had the first real soldiers?

[Smitty-48]

Damm this is some good stuff Smitty. If i read that correctly the marian reforms introduced standardized equipment and training for there entire army. So that is what made them different from caste warriors like the spartans or the persian immortals? And if thats true am i correct in assuming that the roman army had the first real soldiers?

Exactly, the Marian Roman Army is the worlds first real army, as far as the Western definition of army goes, in the East, they have the Mongols as the model, so there are two model armies, so like in Vietnam, you have the Western Roman US Army, fighiting an Eastern Mongol Asiatic style hit and run army, but in the West, what the Greeks did, was invent decisive warfare, they had to tend the fields, but the farmers were also the soldiers, so they had to fight decisive wars, they would basically agree to meet each other on the field of battle, and decide it all in one day, the Romans were Greeks to start off, so they maintained that system, until it wasn't enough to get the job done anymore, because as they became an empire by default, they needed sustained decisive warfare, couldn't get it done in one day, had to be able to fight long campaigns in a state of permanent war, so they had to split tending the fields and whatnot, and fighting wars, into two seperate full time jobs, and thus created the first "Standing Regular Army".

So every region of the Republic and then Empire, had to provide a certain number of their sons to be professional soldiers, and they would be signed up for twenty years, just to be soldiers and nothing else, not as warrior caste, nor citizen soldiers, but full time professionals, which no state had ever really done before, because as they began to conquer the entire Mediterranian World, the Romans were starting to grow to a scale which hadn't really been reached before, at least in the West that is, China is a whole nother thing on the other side of the world, the Eastern military philosphy isn't Greco-Roman in origin.

In broad strokes, nothing has changed in the West in two thousand years, we are still employing Greek Decisive Warfare and Roman Standing Armies, to this day, and all our armies are still basically structured, organized, trained, and doctrinally, Marian Armies to a tee.