It is a sad but universal maxim of human nature that we demonize that which we most fear. Be it the rise of the industrial might of Asia, or the influx of immigrant populations into our communities, or even the building of an Islamic community center near Ground 0, we all denigrate peoples and faiths, corporations and governments, because it helps to justify our prejudices. It is infinitely easier to indulge in thoughtless spite than it is to examine the ugly truths that linger behind our fear. For most of us, this ill will is internal, a mental monologue covered up by a veneer of politeness. But for those few among us who possess genuine power, bigotry can ignite wars from which some people never recover. So it is now; so it has ever been. It is a maxim to which the lost people of Carthage would surely testify.
Raised in what is now modern-day Tunis, Carthage was a powerful, north African state which plied the oceanic waters between Africa and Europe for much of the first millennium BCE. Though it is now best remembered for the mercilessness with which it was exterminated by the Roman Republic during the Third Punic War, Carthaginian power predated Roman might by centuries. In fact, for most of its history, Greek Syracuse was its chief rival and antagonist, not the Romans who would eventually annihilate it. A mighty naval power, Carthage was a magnet for wealth, successfully deploying a powerful, oligarchical council which guided it to Mediterranean prominence. But while its achievements enabled its expansion into Spain, Italy and Greece, it was also its downfall. For it stoked up in prideful and powerful Rome jealousy and envy for which the Roman character was ill-equipped to suffer.
Carthage Must Be Destroyed is, in the main, a treatise on the history of Carthage, the mythology of its founding in ninth century BCE, its rise to mercantile supremacy in the sixth and fifth centuries BCE, its obliteration at the hands of the ruthless Roman Republic in the first century BCE, and the years between in which its great generals, its geographic advantages, and its entrepreneurial spirit made it an immensely successful civilization. But while Mr. Miles details, here, the history of this Phoenician society, now remembered for Hannibal, its greatest and most prodigal son, and for the Romans sowing salt into its soil, it is the fearfulness with which the Romans viewed Carthage that connects this ancient tale to the present day.
Want drives human action: want of stuff, want of emotion, want of power. And so, when Carthage dared to stand before the assembled might of Rome and demand that the Italian state recognize it as an equal, to treat with it on the terms of a worthy opponent, the want of Rome, to be the best, to have no equal, to be supreme in every way, drove it to commit genocide against Carthage, to refuse to stop until it was no more. For only then, in the destruction of an enemy, could the preeminence of the Roman Republic be truly declared.
This is an excellent and scholarly work. Mr. Miles is as detailed in his reconstruction of Carthaginian civilization as he is in sketching out the sociopolitical forces which tied the region together during its reign. But as much as this work teaches the reader about Carthage, it is surprisingly vague on the Roman side of the equation. Yes, there are brief descriptions of some important figures, Marcus Cato, whose famous quote gave this book its title, Fabius the Delayer who was so successful in fighting Hannibal, and Scipio Africanus, the man who eventually destroyed Carthage, but these figures seem like afterthoughts. Perhaps the author considers the Roman side of this story to have already been decisively told. Nonetheless, I required more.
There are lessons here, not only for humans individually but for powerful nations as well. You may, for awhile, assuage your fears by vanquishing those you consider your enemies, but ultimately those fears will end you. For the enemy is ultimately in your own character, not in those who are not like you. And if you must fight the enemy to prove your own worth, then you will only wind up annihilating yourself. (4/5 Stars)
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