Why may i ask would any army land in the center of Italy? If we charge into Sicily then Carthage would support its troops in Sicily with reinforcements and not mount a time consuming expedition by sea to Rome. Would you do this in Carthage's position? No. It would be a foolish alocation of forces when all of sicily stands on the brink of collapsing.

The greeks then. They hate us right? Not enough to divert forces away from their wars with Macedon who threatens them on their own soil. Would you send forces off on overseas expeditions when war rages around your own capital? If the Greeks find any reason to send troops in our direction it will be to Syracuse where they at least have some stake in keeping the city alive and in their hands.

The Gauls then. No i wont even waste my tongue disproving any Gaulish seaborne invasion when they are only a two season march from Rome as it is.

So I say that this army should be assigned to one of the two fronts. Personally i dont believe that so few troops as you state could hold off a Gaulish invasion and therefore I think some reinforcements to the north would be very well placed. I also believe that a Consular army with reinforcements is more than adequate to conquer Sicily.

Now I return to Senator Tiberius' argument that we are not currently at war with Carthage or Gaul and therefore we do not need to begin auxiliary assimilation. How many times do i need to repeat myself that i know this. WE DO NOT NEED THE EXTRA TROOPS NOW. But in 15 seasons (4 years) we will. Alot can happen in 15 seasons. Indeed in 15 seasons we may be landing on the shores of Carthage herself. In 15 seasons we may be in the heart of the Gaulish empire. In 15 seasons we may have landed another army onto the shores of Greece. This is all possible because 15 seasons is a huge amount of time. What will you do then when we are forced to divide our meager three reinforcements between Gaul and Carthage? What will you do then when those same reinforcements are forced to undertake a journey of several years just to reach the front line? You speak of wasting money. I think it is a huge waste of money to pay our troops every season to march 2 years and never once lift their swords just to reach the front line.

But again I am thinking of the future and you are thinking of only the present.

Where will the money come from? Do you really expect our armies to sit around for four years languishing in dissuse? No. They will be conquering more provinces in Sicily and northern Italy. We will agin our funds from all of these new holdings which will literally double the size and income of our empire. Suddenly a few thousand denari isnt as big an expense when our treasury makes an income of in excess of 10,000 denari every season!

Or we could wait until our treasury reaches this amount and begin the auxiliary assimilation then. And then we can have the money and then we can wait the 4 years. But by the time they are done only one of two things could have happened. The first being that the war is completely over. The second and far more probable being that our stingy reinforcements were not sufficient to withstand the entire military weight of the Carthaginian empire and were decisively defeated resulting in a fearful stale mate or worse a complete loss of the war.

We must begin now so that we can reap the benefits before it is too late for them.

Im sure that there are buildings in many of the previously Greek cities which are of no use to us and can be disassembled or sold for more money.