Caesar: war criminal or hero

[Marcus Furius Camillus]

OK, lad's, the question is simple:: what's your opinion concerning C. IVLIVS CAESAR ? Was he an Classical war criminal or a militairy genius and a Roman hero ?


My opinion: a good (= not brilliant ) commander and war criminal.
I'm not going to write essays concerning my opinion, just search Wikipedia

[Conradus]

I consider him to be one of the greatest military minds of antiquity, one of Rome's finest statesmen at the time and a great orator.

He certainly was a Roman hero and a military genius, seeing how he managed to beat all diferent kinds of armies with his loyal men. On the other hand he sold or killed about a million Gauls, so that makes him a war criminal by modern standards. Perhaps he was more cruel than the normal general back then, but history has remembered him as a hero, and uses his name still.

[Warmaster Horus]

Well, what of the Civil War? The rest of his life before 49BC I find admirable. Being able to move the masses, get elected then conquer a country, raid two others in less than 10 years is fantastic.
The Civil War bothers me a bit. I've read that he had started the Civil War because he had refused to lay down his military command, and return to Rome as a privatus; he did that because Pompey had refused to lay down his command. I can accept that Pompey is partly to blame, but I can't stop thinking Caesar was quite selfish.
The worst though is when he met Cleopatra. Gah! Going on holiday when there's a Civil War going on is not a good idea.

So, for me, Caesar was a great man; but there are ups and downs like everyone.

[Furious Mental]

By modern standards everyone was a war criminal at that time, indeed for most of human history.

[Gurkhal]

I think Caesar was a little of both. You can't deny his successes, or that the late republic political system and such was, not perfect to say the least. But it also comes down to politics, and I'm pretty sure that everything Caesar did was for his own selfish intresst. But then again that was how, to my understanding, the game was played. I doubt any of Caesares Roman opponents were much into idealism or altruism.

As such I'm not sure I would classify Caesar as either a hero or a criminal but as a very talanted power-player, who competed with other power-players in a game to enrich oneself with as much power and riches as possible.

[Warmaster Horus]

Of course, and at the end he got what he wanted: the Senate at his feet, he was rich, Cleopatra with him... The problem for me is that there were too many other problems in the Republic; problems which he didn't deal with.

[Rodion Romanovich]

Definitely no hero. He initiated the roman campaigns in Gaul, Germania and Britannia, throwing away all roman diplomacy and causing hostilities with almost every tribe everywhere north and northwest of the Alps. Although he defeated many, the following simple fact didn't strike me until lately: He defeated fewer tribes than he had created wars with by the time he left Gaul. Then, he had a major role in causing a massive civil war which led to the slaughter of thousands of romans and others alike. Finally, the crown of his "achievements", was turning the declining republic into a devolved dictatorship regime.

His military achievements should be judged while keeping in mind the quality and experience of his veterans, and all the practise he got in Gaul before he begun the civil war. Not many generals get control over 6 legions for so many years. Pompey the great would be the only person that could challenge him in that aspect (long time of experience) - but his experience was from fighting to the east against lighter, less infantry-based forces, so perhaps it's fair to say that he had less experience in dealing with massive infantry clashes, such as any civil war between romans at the time would be based around. Caesar also had more charisma and capability of manipulating people, which created for him the most crucial precondition for his victory in the civil war: that more troops preferred to follow him (though he had allegedly fewer men than Pompey at Pharsalos). Probably because he was a good military leader in the charismatic/inspiring/social aspect - a determined and certain person, but not stern, repressive and abusive of his position, thus gaining popularity. The kind of guy any soldier would trust, and a very good type of person to have as general, as long as he can be kept in check. But there's too little info to claim with certainty that he would be any more clever than Pompey when it comes to strategic, logistical and tactical abilities.

It's possible that Caesar thought he was doing good things for Rome during all these events. After all, the senate had grown very corrupt at the time, and according to some sources it's claimed that Caesar after the civil war realized that what was going to come after his death would be bad, and that he wished to prevent it. On the other hand, he also seemed to have forgotten all ideas against anti-despotism that he supposedly held during his youth, during Sulla. He seemed to believe that despotism would be fought by despotism, or had simply given up all belief in the republic. In any case, on the high level his achievements ultimately led to more negative things than positive things, as with most people who take up a lot of space in the history books.

[Marshal Murat]

This is a terrible anachronism, trying to place Caesar in the place of Slovadan Mylosevic (?) or Himmler. The situations are centuries apart, and the moral standards are different.

The OP is absurd from it's conception, and I feel dirty even replying to this.

So, I guess I'll have to reply to Rodion's post.


He initiated the roman campaigns in Gaul, Germania and Britannia, throwing away all Roman diplomacy and causing hostilities with almost every tribe everywhere north and northwest of the Alps. Although he defeated many, the following simple fact didn't strike me until lately: He defeated fewer tribes than he had created wars with by the time he left Gaul.

Caesars first campaign in Gaul was opened up because the Helvetii were going to move through a Roman allies' territory. He was originally going to invade Dalmatia, but he had to move to modern Geneva and prevent the continued movement of the Helvetii.
Caesar added a province to Rome that provided the Roman Republic with manpower, gold, and valuables.


but his [Pompey] experience was from fighting to the east against lighter, less infantry-based forces,
Pompey's experience was varied, much like many Roman generals. Pompey was part of the Social War (infantry based), putting down multiple revolts, and fighting from Spain to Syria. At his age, he had enough experience against multiple foes of many fighting styles.


In any case, on the high level his achievements ultimately led to more negative things than positive things, as with most people who take up a lot of space in the history books.

I'm sorry the Roman Empire and the basis for modern Western culture is a bad thing.

Caesar is not necessarily a hero, but by this standard neither is Alexander the Great.

The same argument, "but his experience was from fighting to the east against lighter, less infantry-based forces," could be applied to Darius of Persia.

"In any case, on the high level his achievements ultimately led to more negative things than positive things, as with most people who take up a lot of space in the history books."
Could be the same about Alexander, whose spread of Hellenistic ideals allowed a new life for the people of Asia Minor and the Middle East.

Don't make presumptions and accusations of Caesar, or define him by a single term or idea. Like I said, this thread will go down-hill, fast, and I feel dirty even responding.

The only difference between tyrants and heroes is that the heroes are the winners.

[Sarmatian]

Slovadan Mylosevic (?)

It's Slobodan Milosevic. And don't go there...

[Mouzafphaerre]

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Yes. Please let's all keep contemporary garbage out of our Monastery. :no:
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[Marshal Murat]

Then how can he be called a 'war criminal' if we have no comparison. We could call Mother Theresa a 'war criminal' and it would mean nothing.

As I said, it's an anachronism to post Caesar as a 'war criminal' if we have no possible comparison, or any relation.

[Mouzafphaerre]

.
Hero: What you call your man when you are the winner. A universal and ages old term.
War criminal: What you call the loser's man when you are the winner. A term coined in modern times.

Well, in its extremity that is. You can be the winner and call a loser hero as well. In principle I agree with you. The terms are useless as applied to Caesar.

If you need modern analogy, there's plenty out there from the WWII etc. Contemporary names and their connotations will rise sensibilities with the potential to ruin this thread.

:bow:
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[Justiciar]

Franco in a toga.

[Rodion Romanovich]

This is a terrible anachronism, trying to place Caesar in the place of Slovadan Mylosevic (?) or Himmler. The situations are centuries apart, and the moral standards are different.

My post contains little moral judgement of Caesar in terms of how he treated victims, i.e. doesn't focus on the question war criminal or hero in that aspect. It focuses on whether he was a hero for his own people, i.e. whether he improved the future for his own faction.



The OP is absurd from it's conception, and I feel dirty even replying to this.

So, I guess I'll have to reply to Rodion's post.

Caesars first campaign in Gaul was opened up because the Helvetii were going to move through a Roman allies' territory. He was originally going to invade Dalmatia, but he had to move to modern Geneva and prevent the continued movement of the Helvetii.
Caesar added a province to Rome that provided the Roman Republic with manpower, gold, and valuables.

The extremely costly campaigns and upkeep of order in Gaul, the Rhine front and Britannia became a necessary consequence of trying to expand in every single direction up through Gaul. So - the Helvetii attacks Rome, and Caesar does the "great" thing to first defeat them (1 enemy), but in the process he creates 3 or more new enemies, all of them much more dangerous, numerous, and spread over a longer frontline. Certainly not worth any gold that could be found in Gaul. You may want to look at some of the cost analyses made about this. Caesar's disproportionate brutality in comparison to the validity of his casus belli also probably had a great part in strengthening unity among the tribes along the new roman borders in the coming 50 years, as well as making Gaul one of the most revolt-filled provinces of the empire - even if it had (if you count the Rhine border garrisons) access to the probably largest amount of roman soldiers of all provinces in the empire. Again, I recommend you to read any economical analysis on the subject.



I'm sorry the Roman Empire and the basis for modern Western culture is a bad thing.

This statement sounds incredibly absurd to me. From where do you get the idea that the roman empire would be the basis for modern western culture? Modern western culture is based just as much on values that are Greek, German and Celtic, as on Roman culture. In fact, the romans really had little own culture during the empire era - most of it was just a mix of outside ideas. The culture that was purely roman during the early republic has unfortunately not left many traces at all on today's society, to be honest. The only culture that can be called purely roman that has left traces today, would be the culture of the Empire era, i.e. the decadence - corruption, sexual perversion, hostility towards free thinking, power abuse and loopholes through the legal system by power and money.



Caesar is not necessarily a hero, but by this standard neither is Alexander the Great.

No, why would Alexander be?



The same argument, "but his experience was from fighting to the east against lighter, less infantry-based forces," could be applied to Darius of Persia.

Yes, of course. Not to mention that Darius didn't have troop equipment for dealing with a Macedonian sarrissa phalanx. It's like trying to fight an EB army of 8 crack phalanx units, 10 peltasts and 2 hetairoi with 30 nizag gund, 10 eranshar arstbara and some missile cavs :wink:



"In any case, on the high level his achievements ultimately led to more negative things than positive things, as with most people who take up a lot of space in the history books."
Could be the same about Alexander, whose spread of Hellenistic ideals allowed a new life for the people of Asia Minor and the Middle East.

I concentrated on the negative things he caused for his own faction. Naturally, there were negative consequences of Caesar's actions for the subjugated as well. But since I focused less on his morality than on his effects on his own faction, that wasn't treated above. That Caesar caused a tremendous weakening of his own faction is not possible to deny, or at least - I haven't seen any strong argument for this rather absurd claim.



The only difference between tyrants and heroes is that the heroes are the winners.
Not true - we have sufficient knowledge of Caesar to judge him as a tyrant today, despite his victories. Victory can't protect you from correct judgement. Don't you also agree, that it would be a shame if we wouldn't dare - even more than 2000 years after his death - give him a correct judgement because we'd still fear his military capabilities???

Besides, victory/successful propaganda is not the difference between heroes and tyrants, but the difference between worshipped tyrants and hated tyrants. Heroes are usually forgotten or given less focus. Neither worshipped heroes nor hated tyrants are heroes.

I think Caesar got the worshipped hero status among some because he happened to get very favorable propaganda after his death, mainly by two things:
1. glorifying Caesar was a practical necessity for later Emperors in their work to justify their position and prevent the attempts to recreate the republic. You could read about all the attempts to reinstate the republic from 48 BC to almost 100 AD, and you will then probably notice how unstable the position of the emperors was during this period, btw.
2. the importance of the misconceptions of lowly educated people during the Italian Renaissance can't be underestimated. After occupations and invasions by French and Germans (i.e. barbarians) they sought rebirth of the antiquity (Renaissance) - a time when Italian peninsula was not the victim. No surprise, they sought for successful military commanders in roman history to glorify. That Caesar came up was not surprising because:
a. he won (they needed someone who didn't lose in the end - the bad consequences of their failures had to be none, or happening after their deaths),
b. he was probably given a lot of room in the sources these Renaissance Italians got hold of, since he was a figure who had a significant impact whether bad or good for his own faction, as he represents the final transition into Empire from Republic.

The main point is that if you apply any economical analyses, Caesar's actions weakened his faction, despite all his tactical, campaign and war victories, he made his faction take one step back in terms of grand strategy. Thus he is definitely no hero, because a good hero needs not only be good to others but also be good to his own faction. It is sufficient to establish that he lacked the latter ability to deny the claim that he was a hero.

[Gurkhal]

The problem for me is that there were too many other problems in the Republic; problems which he didn't deal with.

Please correct me if I misunderstand you. But couldn't that be explained by the fact that Caesar was murdererd rather fast. And that in the time he was in power did begin several projects to help with problems from the Republic. Even if, again to my understanding of them, also had populistic purposes.

I also strongly disagree with Rodion Romanovich in most, although not all, the things he've said.

[Warmaster Horus]

Yeah, but you forget that he went on a cruise on the Nile with Cleopatra for a long time! I understand that she could have been attractive, but you've got to admit, a few months off duty because of a woman is unacceptable when you're trying to become the leader of the Roman Republic. I mean, Hispania, Asia and Africa were still against him...

You (the community in general) should read Caesar, by Christian Meier. It's a big book, detailing his life, but it's interesting.

[Marshal Murat]

Im reading Caesar by Goldsworthy

[Gurkhal]

Yeah, but you forget that he went on a cruise on the Nile with Cleopatra for a long time! I understand that she could have been attractive, but you've got to admit, a few months off duty because of a woman is unacceptable when you're trying to become the leader of the Roman Republic. I mean, Hispania, Asia and Africa were still against him...

I do agree that it probably wasn't the most ethical (or smart) thing to do. But the question might also be if it were to take controll over Egypt and ensure the grain supply, or if he was just horney (sp?). Personally I think that it was a bit of both. But I do agree that he did spend more time there than was probably necissery.

[L.C.Cinna]

Im reading Caesar by Goldsworthy


Meier's book as sugested by Warmaster Horus is really worth a read. Goldsworthy is...well...Goldsworthy :stupido2:

[ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88]

By modern standards everyone was a war criminal at that time, indeed for most of human history.


Modern standers yes, he was a War Criminal, but they did what they thought was right.

It sounds sick to kill 1,000,000 Gauls, and the number is high, but I do understand the point. To try to beat your enemy into submission and decrease his numbers I guess.

Anyhow, He was a good Ruler/General. Not the Best, but one of the Best. He ranks in my Top 10 lists of the Best Generals in the World, just for his brains in some of his battles.

[IrishArmenian]

One man's hero is another's criminal.
Caesar is both, depending on one's perspective. If anyone thinks strongly of him one way or another, I want to ask you him regarding his vitality and longevity.

[TinCow]

The answer is simple. By today's standards, he is war criminal, along with most successful generals that have ever lived. By the standards of his time, he was no such thing. People considered him a dictator and a criminal for violating Roman law, but not for his actions on the battlefield.

You should judge a man by the standards of the world that created him. Otherwise you are imposing unrealistic conditions that few people ever meet.

[Hound of Ulster]

If your a person of the Celtic persuasion (like moi), Caeser is a base criminal. If a fan of the Imperium (or Italian for that matter), Caeser was the best thing since, um, amphorae.

One man's heroic conquerer is another man's despolier of the land of my ancestors.

The Romans in general could be very nasty, at least in comparision to the Greeks and Persians.

[Furious Mental]

Caesar lived over 2,000 years ago. It's bad enough that the study of modern history is plagued by nationalists and ideologues- now apparently there's a Celtic interpretation of Caesar's campaigns? Of course, the whole notion of calling Caesar a "base criminal" because he slaughtered Celts is ridiculous. A "criminal" is someone who violates laws or at least accepted standards of behaviour. At that time it was perfectly acceptable to slaughter and enslave whole nations; as I said above, pretty much all generals and politicians of the ancient world were war criminals by modern standards. If anyone had put it to him that it was wrong to massacre Celts he would have pointed out that he wasn't being any more ruthless than other Romans or indeed than the leaders of the people he was slaughtering. Caesar behaved as others did in his era; that means he lived in a backwards age when human life was held in low esteem, but it doesn't make him a criminal.

[TinCow]

If your a person of the Celtic persuasion (like moi), Caeser is a base criminal. If a fan of the Imperium (or Italian for that matter), Caeser was the best thing since, um, amphorae.

One man's heroic conquerer is another man's despolier of the land of my ancestors.

Do you consider Boudicca to be a war criminal for her massacres of Roman civilians?

[Gurkhal]

Caesar lived over 2,000 years ago. It's bad enough that the study of modern history is plagued by nationalists and ideologues- now apparently there's a Celtic interpretation of Caesar's campaigns? Of course, the whole notion of calling Caesar a "base criminal" because he slaughtered Celts is ridiculous. A "criminal" is someone who violates laws or at least accepted standards of behaviour. At that time it was perfectly acceptable to slaughter and enslave whole nations; as I said above, pretty much all generals and politicians of the ancient world were war criminals by modern standards. If anyone had put it to him that it was wrong to massacre Celts he would have pointed out that he wasn't being any more ruthless than other Romans or indeed than the leaders of the people he was slaughtering. Caesar behaved as others did in his era; that means he lived in a backwards age when human life was held in low esteem, but it doesn't make him a criminal.

Wasn't Caesar's enemies in the senate planning to accuse him of war crimes committed during the Gallic wars? I don't really think that everything Caesar did was fully according to the view of the Roman morality regarding war. Even if I would agree that much was.

[Warmaster Horus]

Caesar's enemies would have found any reason to incarcerate him - and that's putting it mildly. Kind of like Al Capone. Wasn't it tax fraud that got him inside? But that's another debate. And Caesar was not like Al Capone, and vice versa.

[Hound of Ulster]

Roman politics was a blood-sport, and Caeser was simply acting accordingly.

Yes Boudicca was a war criminal, but so were the Roman soldiers who raped her daughters.

[Furious Mental]

The optimates were planning to prosecute him for irregularities of his consulship, not his Gallic campaign. His proconsular command was itself a way for him obtain immunity from prosecution. Like I said, Caesar did not act any different to Romans or indeed any culture at that time. To the extent that Romans criticised Caesar it was because the campaigns were a naked exercise in personal aggrandisement, not because they had any sympathy for the Celts. Remember this is a culture that celebrated completely erasing a whole civilisation (Carthage) from existence. It also celebrated slaughtering Celts, as demonstrated by Caesar's immense popularity following his campaign (which also meant that prosecuting him for it would have been counter-productive for optimates anyway).

[L.C.Cinna]

The optimates were planning to prosecute him for irregularities of his consulship, not his Gallic campaign. His proconsular command was itself a way for him obtain immunity from prosecution. Like I said, Caesar did not act any different to Romans or indeed any culture at that time. To the extent that Romans criticised Caesar it was because the campaigns were a naked exercise in personal aggrandisement, not because they had any sympathy for the Celts. Remember this is a culture that celebrated completely erasing a whole civilisation (Carthage) from existence.


True but the last sentence there is incorrect. Te Carthagenians were not erased. Town was refounded, with the biggest part of its former population living there. The destruction of Carthage was much more symbolic than anything else. Besides all other former Carthaginian/Punic towns were not touched at all. They recieved the status of independent allies and (like Lepcis Magna for example) stayed in this position until joining the Empire in the 1st century. Punic was still used throughout the imperial period. Only a few years after they were "erased" Carthage is the 2nd biggest town in the western Med.