Rome's victory in Africa depends in many ways on the position of Numidian tribal leaders. Sipax, the king of the West Numidians, betrayed the Romans and became friends with the Carthaginians over the years. But Scipio found an ally like Masinisa, a young and talented king of the eastern Numidians, and a deadly enemy of Sipax. Admittedly, at first, Masinisa could only help Scipio with a few cavalry units, but later his help played a decisive role.
A, the two sides' strength comparison After Scipio entered Carthage, the two armies fought near Zama. Rome and Carthage each have about 40,000 people. The advantage of cavalry is in Scipio this time, because Masinisa brought 4,000 cavalry and 6,000 infantry, while Hannibal only got 2,000 Numidian cavalry from his friend Sipax. Hannibal's infantry core is his veterans, and Hannibal completely trusts them. Mercenaries in Kyle's army are weak; Libyans and Carthage's civilian army are the most unreliable parts.
At the front, Hannibal placed 80 war elephants. The first battle ranks are composed of mercenaries, the second ranks are Libyans and civilian troops, and veterans are the reserve forces. Therefore, Scipio had to deal with 80 elephants of the Carthaginian army. He gave up the chessboard formation that the Romans usually arranged, but arranged the teams of the second and third fronts directly behind the teams of the first front.
This is done to allow elephants to pass. He filled the gap in the front line with light infantry and ordered them to let go. If forced to retreat by the charge of war elephants, those who have time to retreat will retreat directly to the rear of the whole army, while the troops on the two wings will attack the enemy on the right or left in the gap between the front lines. The two wings are powerful cavalry commanded by Masinisa and Lelius.
Second, Scipio's configuration of the army Scipio arranged all his brigades in columns so that his cavalry could pass through. Before each brigade, he made some people hold heavy stakes in their hands. Most wooden stakes are filled with iron at the top, so that they can shoot at the running elephants like stone bullets on a crossbow car. He ordered these people and other infantry to avoid the impact of these animals, but just ran around them, kept throwing javelins at them and ran out to cut their hamstrings whenever possible. This is how Scipio arranged his infantry; But he arranged Numidian cavalry on the two wings, because their horses were used to seeing the shape and smelling the elephant. Italian horses don't often encounter war elephants. He put the Roman cavalry last, ready to cross the interval of the infantry and attack the enemy when the infantry stopped the first attack of the elephant. Designate some followers to follow each cavalry with many javelins, and prepare to repel the attacks of these animals with these javelins.
He arranged his cavalry like this. Lilio commands the right wing, Octavian commands the left wing, and both he and Hannibal occupy the central position. In order to pay attention to each other, everyone brought a team of cavalry to send reinforcements where they were needed. Hannibal has four thousand cavalry; In addition to the 300 Italians armed in Sicily, Scipio has 2,000 cavalry.
Polybius Records:? What the Carthaginians want is their own right to survive and rule Libya. Can anyone not care about the report of this incident? There has never been such a soldier who has passed the battle test, and there has never been such a lucky tactical commander; Fate never predicted such a precious reward for soldiers. The winner will not only gain the sovereignty of Libya and Europe, but also the sovereignty of all other countries in the world that we just know now. ?
Third, the use of the reserve team Hannibal realized that relying on cavalry could not win, so he also deployed a reserve team that could be used behind the infantry front. As in Canny, this reserve team is still composed of the best troops, except that he changed the position of the reserve team. At Canny, he arranged the reserves in columns on the two wings of the infantry front, ready to push forward and attack the Romans from the flank. But playing against Scipio is too obvious; So he deployed the reserves in front and behind, parallel to the main infantry front. Hannibal intends to surround the Roman infantry front with reserves to win, because the infantry has the advantage.
Fourth, the battle began According to Polybius's records, the elephants started fighting first. They were wearing terrible full armor, and people riding on their backs drove them forward with barbed sticks. But Numidian cavalry kept flying around them, stabbing javelins into their bodies until they were injured and fled, because they lost control and the elephant rider took them away from the battle.
The elephants on the two wings are like this, but the elephant in the middle stepped on the Roman infantry because they were not used to this kind of fighting, and because their armor was heavy, they could not easily avoid or chase. Until finally, Scipio came up with Italian cavalry. They were guards, only armed, and ordered them to jump off their panicked horses, run around and shoot at elephants. He jumped off the horse first and hurt the elephant in front. His example encouraged others. They attacked elephants from all directions, so they retreated.
After these elephants were destroyed on the battlefield, only infantry and cavalry were fighting. The right wing of the Roman army commanded by Lilio defeated the Numidians who opposed him, and Masini threw down the Numidians' prince Mathassis with a javelin, but Hannibal quickly came to their aid and restored their front.
The left wing under Octavian's command and the hostile Croste and Liguria stationed there all met with difficulties. Scipio sent Demos, the general of the Legion, to reinforce there with a good soldier, but Hannibal reorganized the left wing and quickly ran to support the Croste and Ligurians, bringing up the second line composed of Carthaginians and Africans.
When Scipio saw this, he mobilized his other army, parallel to Hannibal's army. When two of the world's most famous generals met in hand-to-hand combat, the soldiers of both sides fought for each other and showed respect for their generals. Both armies are full of enthusiasm, cheering enthusiastically while fighting. Under the command of Hannibal and Masinisa, their cavalry attacked each other fiercely. Masinisa pierced Hannibal's shield with a spear, and Hannibal injured his opponent's horse.
Masinisa was thrown off his horse and rushed to Hannibal on foot. The Numidian cavalry threw a javelin at him, but it was stopped by his shield. He pulled out the javelin on the shield and threw it at Hannibal, but he missed Hannibal and only hit a cavalry beside Hannibal. He hurt his arm when he pulled out another javelin, so he temporarily quit the battle. After Scipio knew it, he was very worried about Masini Sa and hurried to help him, only to find that Masini Sa had bandaged the wound and started fighting on another horse.
Then, heavy infantry from Rome and Carthage were forced to take part in the battle. Meanwhile, the cavalry of Rome and Numidia have driven Hannibal's cavalry out of the battlefield. Instead of turning to infantry, they chased the enemy cavalry away from the battlefield.
This often happens in combat. A commander can't control his cavalry, and the cavalry will naturally pursue the defeated enemy. In Canny, Hannibal's disciplined and powerful professional cavalry immediately turned back and attacked the rear of Roman infantry, but in Zama, the cavalry of Rome and its allies failed to implement this key maneuver immediately.
All the cavalry left the battlefield, and Hannibal began to fight purely infantry. He acted quickly, taking advantage of his superiority in the number of infantry and the good cooperation provided by reserve veterans. He transferred the infantry formation behind him, stretched its front, and prepared to surround the two wings of the Roman infantry. However, Scipio discovered this motive in time and used the reserve of its rear front to expand its front. In this way, the infantry of the two armies had to be interwoven to carry out a head-on battle with unpredictable results.
Later, the infantry fighting entered a critical stage, and the Romans and their allied cavalry returned to the battlefield and began to attack the rear of the Carthaginian infantry, which was relatively weak and was fighting with all its strength. This action decided the outcome of the battle.
5. As a result of the fighting, the number of Carthaginians killed was about 1 10,000, while the number of people captured was almost the same. Rome's loss is only one tenth of theirs. Hannibal escaped with a small group of cavalry.
The role of Roman cavalry in the victory of Zama campaign shows that Rome has accepted the Alexander system. But both sides used the reserve team and achieved it with excellent cooperation, indicating that the art of war has surpassed Alexander at this time. Neither Hannibal nor Scipio took part in the battle directly, but they were both in the position of commanding the whole battle, and used the reserves at key locations and times. This is a sign that Alexander's pre-planned battle has made great progress.
Similarly, the concept of special reserve without pre-assigned tasks and the improvement of infantry coordination made the reserve mobile on the battlefield, which was also an improvement after Alexander. The excellent cooperation of the Roman army is very important. It enabled Scipio to command all the troops on the battlefield, instead of just some like Alexander.