The Daily Reckoning PRESENTS: Today, we take a break from looking at the world of finance and instead dissect an ancient war, that between Athens and Sparta. Using Thucydides (known as the first historian) as his guide, Byron King examines the Peloponnesian War - a war that would not end… WAR AND EMPIRE, PART I
by Byron King By 416 B.C., democratic Athens and oligarchic Sparta had been fighting for 15 years. The war had commenced in 431 B.C., when the Spartans took to the field in an effort to put a stop to the imperial expansions of Athens. But 15 years may as well have been a lifetime, because it was a time of pain that did not cease. Certainly, those 15 years had cost the lives of many thousands killed in battles on land and sea, or by the deadly plague that struck Athens in 429 B.C. In battle after battle, the armies collected their dead and raised the traditional funeral pyres. The bones of the deceased made their way back to the home state, there to be interred in crypts of honor and to the accompaniment of fine speeches. But was there some end in sight? Conflict raged across the lands that are now Greece. Life was austere, even for the wealthiest families. Travel was difficult, and certainly dangerous. Social norms were breaking down. Nothing was safe. Few things were even sacred. "What have we done?" the people must have thought. "Into what pit have we fallen?" A few people recalled the warnings of Sparta's leader Archidamus, who had counseled against the original expedition against powerful Athens. "I fear," he said, "that it is more likely that we shall be leaving (this war) to our children after us." Anticipating an aspect of waging successful war that Carl von Clausewitz would write down 22 centuries later in his great work On War, Archidamus was forecasting no quick decisive victory. Yet still, the Spartans invaded. The Peloponnesian War: Pericles' Error The Athenian leader Pericles also wanted to avoid a war with Sparta. But if war came, Pericles had counseled caution, and a strategy of defense. Pericles explained that "if the Athenians would remain quiet, take care of their fleet, refrain from trying to extend their empire in wartime and thus putting their city in danger, they would prevail." But this strategy relied on the enemy Spartans to fail, and not on the Athenians to take some move toward victory. In all likelihood, Pericles had never read, let alone heard of, the military scholar Sun Tzu. But in Chapter 4 of Sun Tzu's great work, The Art of War, the Chinese master had stated that "invincibility lies in the defense; the possibility of victory in the attack." In a great strategic error, Pericles had set forth only half of the equation. So after 15 years, the war had cost much, but at the same time had reached no outcome. There was no point in sight that could mark a real termination of fighting and hostilities. All of the blood and treasure, which had been poured into bitter combat, had not served to effect a fundamental change in the power relationships between Athens and Sparta. The war was ongoing. As Clausewitz would have said, the centers of gravity of each state remained intact. Sparta still possessed its powerful army, and Athens maintained its dominating navy. There had been no culminating engagement, and neither side had won a decisive victory over the other. Skirmishing continued at the periphery of each state, as did each side's attempts to form new alliances to the detriment of the other. But both sides faced the daunting prospect of their war with each other continuing for an indeterminate number of years. Something had to change. Consciously or subconsciously, the Athenians were prepared to adopt a new strategy. And it was a man named Alcibiades, a dynamic young officer, who came up with a bold plan to expand the war in a manner that, he claimed, would ultimately benefit Athens and weaken Sparta. Alcibiades proposed to invade Sicily and assist a group of smaller city-states in attacking Spartan-related colonies there, specifically Syracuse. Although Sicily was 1,000 miles from Athens, the Athenian thinking was that bringing down Syracuse would lead to a serious weakening of Spartan power. The operational plan of Alcibiades was to send a contingent of 60 Athenian ships, called "triremes," and a modest number of troops to Sicily. Once there, they were to form alliances with groups of Sicilian cities and tribes that were presumed to be friendly to Athens. Then, leveraging these local parties, the Athenian plan was to take over Syracuse and gain control over a main source of food and supplies that were being exported to Sparta. With Sicily in the Athenian alliance, it would be possible for Athens to use its naval power to blockade the regions around Sparta until the Spartans were starved into submission. It was a plan with relatively low material risk to Athens, yet potentially high strategic payoff. The Peloponnesian War: Intelligence Failure One of the key Greek leaders, Nicias, was opposed to the Sicilian plan of Alcibiades as a costly and distant diversion. But rather than oppose the Alcibiades plan directly on its merits, Nicias pretended to support it while pointing out its dangers and immense cost. In the tumult of the debate, the Athenians turned logic on its head and voted to send 100 triremes on the expedition instead of the 60 proposed by Alcibiades. The formerly low-risk plan was beginning to become a higher-risk play. The Athenians also appointed Nicias as well as Alcibiades and another military leader named Lamachus as generals. In what we would today call an "intelligence failure," Athens apparently did not realize that Syracuse was a large and powerful city and, having been founded as a colony of Athens' traditional competitor and Spartan ally Corinth, a probable enemy. Did the Athenians truly understand the scope of effort that would be required in Sicily? The night before the expedition was to leave Athens, someone (probably enemy saboteurs) mutilated numerous statues of gods throughout Athens. Alcibiades was accused of profaning these god-images, a very serious crime against religion in that era. He wanted to answer the charges. But a significant number of Athenian allies and fighting auxiliaries had agreed to join in with the expedition to Sicily solely due to the presence of Alcibiades. Athens could not lose this key man, who was the architect of its strategy, so his trial was postponed. In the winter of 415 B.C., the Athenians embarked for Sicily on 134 triremes with over 5,000 ground troops and a total force of more than 30,000. Logistically, it was an undertaking of immense scale. And also, in an early case of what we today call "mission creep," the original "low-risk" plan of Alcibiades had more than doubled in scope. Initially in Sicily, the cautious strategy of Nicias and Alcibiades to use diplomacy and small engagements won over some small cities, and led to the establishment of an Athenian base camp. The plan of Alcibiades was beginning to take shape. The Peloponnesian War: Betrayal of and by Alcibiades Then suddenly and summarily, Alcibiades was recalled to Athens to stand trial for impiety. This cost this major Athenian expedition its true leader, its original planner, its prime architect. At home in Athens, the political leadership utterly misunderstood the implications of its obligation, and certainly its failure, to support the military leadership in the field. By way of comparison, this would have been the equivalent of President Lincoln firing General Grant based on rumors of Grant's excessive drinking, instead of offering to send a barrel of Grant's favorite whiskey to each of his other generals in the field. Alcibiades sensed that treachery and political intrigue in Athens was the cause of his recall. So Alcibiades took an opportunity to escape while en route to Athens, and in an act of utter treason, went over to the Spartans. Alcibiades made a plethora of self-serving justifications for his defection, that he "loved his country" and hence was obliged to resist the evil leaders who were driving Athens to ruin. But in the end, Alcibiades went on to explain in detail the Athenian plan to the Spartans. In Chapter 13 of his work, Sun Tzu writes of the use of spies in war, and the necessity of understanding what is going on in the enemy camp: "Spies are a key element in warfare. On them depends an army's every move." But Alcibiades was more than a spy and turncoat. He provided the Spartans with a complete tutorial on Athenian weaknesses and helped Sparta to develop a strategy for defeating Athens. Among other key insights, Alcibiades urged the Spartans to take and fortify a strategic region on the approaches to Athens, as well as to reinforce Syracuse. This was all but a road map to the heart of Athenian power. The Athenians condemned the absent Alcibiades to death, and his property was confiscated. But the damage was done. Despite the loss of Alcibiades and probable compromise of not just operational security but the entire strategic plan, the Athenians continued to execute his strategy in Sicily. This was utter foolhardiness on the part of the Athenians. It was as if events on the ground in Sicily had taken on a life of their own, and the Athenians were incapable of re-assessing their situation, let alone of regaining control of their own destiny despite the defection of Alcibiades. Initially, the Athenians won some small battles against forces allied with Syracuse, but Nicias failed to press his advantage. The Athenians had received promises of support from many smaller Sicilian cities before they set out. But when the Sicilians saw the tremendous size of the Athenian force, they became more afraid of the foreign Athenians than the local masters of Syracuse and refused to help. Good will began to break down between the Sicilians and Athenians as the former began to question the motives of Athens in its pursuit of objectives in Sicily. In a debate with one Sicilian tribe, the local leader accused the Athenians of trying to win another empire. The Athenians admitted that they held their empire by fear but claimed they were concerned about security, not enslaving anyone. This tribe decided to remain technically neutral, but later supported Syracuse. Thus were events turning against the Athenians. Still, the Athenians were confident that their army was powerful enough to besiege Syracuse without the need for local forces, and so they commenced this effort. The siege of Syracuse started promisingly enough. Generals Lamachus and Nicias took strong positions near the harbor of Syracuse and began to confront the walls of Syracuse. Within days, Athenian general Lamachus was killed in the fighting. But the Athenians pressed on with their siege. Regards, Byron King
for The Daily Reckoning P.S. The history of empires is a history of things great and sad, wise and foolish, filled with tales of error caused by human nature that is immutable. If you want to read more about the folly of empires past and present, please purchase a copy of a book that is so new that the ink is not even dry. Empire of Debt: The Rise of an Epic Financial Crisis Editor's Note: Byron King currently serves as an attorney in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He received his Juris Doctor from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law in 1981 and is a cum laude graduate of Harvard University. He is a regular contributor to the free e-letter, Whiskey and Gunpowder, which covers resources, oil, geopolitics, military history, geology and personal freedom. We'll have the second part of Byron's essay tomorrow, but to tide you over until then, (and for your free subscription), see here: Whiskey and Gunpowder
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