Certainly one would assume Seleukid armies dealing with the annoying horsemen of the Inner Asian plains made like most largely infantry-based armies have done in such situations - took along buttloads of missile troops and cavalry of their own, and used their superior heavy infantry as a solid base for those to operate around. (Seemed to work well enough in the Romans' later, post-Carrhae, wars with the Parthians anyway...) Both of the former should've been readily available from the native populations and military traditions of the eastern provinces after all, and not in the least as those have had lenghty practice in fending off nomadic raiders...
Heh, you've actually been making exactly the correct conclusions, young padawan.Originally Posted by Dayve
That's ever been the strategy combatants strong in infantry have adopted against opponents markedly superior in cavalry and mobility; for example, when the Swedes warred with the Poles in the early 1600s their field armies had a bad habit of getting pulverized by the formidable and numerous Polish cavalry - so they preferred to make the war one of sieges, where their much more infantry-heavy armies had an advantage.
It is, after all, by controlling the cities and fortresses that you actually rule a territory.
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