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- Plato (one of the greatest philosophers and thinkers of Western culture)

When Hannibal's barracks were in full swing, Oscar's barracks were not idle; Ever since Hannibal himself led four thousand shield cavalry to observe the camp that day, Oscar's army had been more heavily prepared.

In addition to Luquis and Quintus who led their troops to be stationed in the left and right flank camps, the auxiliary army led by Oscar himself was also stationed in the middle and rear barracks; The troops in charge of patrolling and guarding were the 3,000 Numidian javelins under Oscar and the 2,000 Numidian javelins under Licinius.

The 5,000 Numidian javelin cavalry were divided into two parts, the 3,000 cavalry belonging to Oscar were responsible for patrolling from Oscar's camp to the Quintus camp, and the 2,000 cavalry belonging to Licinius were responsible for patrolling from Luquis's camp to Oscar's camp.

The patrolling cavalry were divided into three groups and patrolled every day without interruption; As for the remaining 2,000 ironclad cavalry and 1,000 shield cavalry under Licinius's command, they were hidden in the barracks by Luquisxue for the trump card victory!

Although the combat effectiveness of a thousand shield cavalry is not strong, it is not enough to turn the tide of the battle; However, the role that 2,000 ironclad cavalry can play cannot be ignored. If you can break into the battle formation of Hannibal's army with these two thousand ironclad cavalry at the critical moment and charge back and forth, then the tide of the battle may be completely turned in an instant!

You know, Hannibal's army was not the army of the House of Augustus, and it did not have a large number of hoplites; Even the so-called Punic infantry, its weapons and equipment can only be regarded as pseudo-hoplites at best, not real hoplites.

As an army lacking hoplites, in the face of cavalry onslaught, there was no other way to resist it except to pile it up with the lives of its soldiers; And cavalry, as the king of the era of cold weapons, is not so easy to resist!

It is no exaggeration to say that the army under Hannibal's command, when facing a cluster charge of 5,000 cavalry, needs to pay at least tens of thousands of people to withstand such a large-scale cluster charge; Remember, it's just resisting, not eliminating!

However, the cavalry units of the House of Augustus were obviously not so strong; After all, the five thousand cavalry of the Augustan family are all javelin cavalry from Numidia, which belongs to a kind of long-range strike force, and the actual impact power is still inferior to that of regular cavalry.

However, this is only the javelin cavalry, not the strong, armed ironclad cavalry; The all-out charge of 2,000 ironclad cavalry can definitely destroy more than three times as many non-hoplite enemies in a single instant. Even the hoplites, the ironclad cavalry can kill more than twice as many enemies as they can in a swarm charge!

In the era of Alexander the Great, the most glorious ironclad cavalry, the ironclad cavalry cluster under the command of Alexander the Great could even completely wipe out all the enemy troops in the Greek phalanx! No matter how long the enemy's spears are, how strong the shields are, and how stable the formation is, under the hooves of the ironclad cavalry, they can only cry and beg for mercy.

Although the number of ironclad cavalry of the House of Augustus is simply not worth mentioning compared to Alexander the Great; However, this cannot ignore the huge role they can play! Compared to Hannibal, who believed in war elephants, Oscar's favorite cavalry has always been the ironclad cavalry, and this has never changed.

Therefore, in this decisive battle that decided the fate of the Augustan family, Oscar's most promising army was the two thousand ironclad cavalry, as well as the two thousand Janissaries and one thousand Spartan heavy infantry of the Guards Infantry Legion; These 5,000 troops are the confidence of Oscar's decision to launch this decisive battle with all his might!

Of course, these 5,000 troops alone could not defeat Hannibal's 55,000 army, which is 11 times the size of 5,000 troops! With such a thing as one being ten, that's just in the heroic story; Although this kind of record can often be achieved in reality, the difference between the enemy and the enemy is still not comparable by a factor of ten.

In fact, Oscar's greatest hope for these 5,000 elite aces is that they can play a decisive role on the battlefield; If the 2,000 Janissaries and 1,000 Spartan heavy infantry could play the role of the mainstay, they could stabilize the formation in a frontal decisive battle, and even form a superior position against Hannibal's army.

Once these 3,000 elite ace infantry stabilized the situation at the time of the decisive battle, or helped their own army to form a superior situation; That's when the ironclad cavalry comes into play. As long as Hannibal's army is caught in a scorching battle with his own army, the ironclad cavalry can calmly launch a fierce assault on the flank of Hannibal's army!

With the cooperation of the two, Hannibal's army could never have been left to chance; Hannibal was able to withdraw his army as much as possible from the battle in such a situation, let alone win. At that time, as long as the army of the House of Augustus can take advantage of the victory to pursue, victory will be within reach!

However, these are just Oscar's beautiful imaginations, and after the real battle breaks out, it will be something that no one can say; Until the outcome of the war is out, no one can know which side the Goddess of Victory and Lady Luck will favor in the battle, and perhaps the smallest mistake can completely reverse the outcome of the war!

Therefore, from the very beginning of this decisive battle, Oscar was making comprehensive preparations; Joining forces with the Carthaginian Senate to deal with Hannibal, benefiting Adheba on the North African continent to contain Carthage's native military power, and completely destroying the Marius fleet off the coast of Rome proper, all of these are Oscar's worries to reduce his worries as much as possible.

Although Oscar is only the leader of the Augustan family who has crossed over, he has also experienced the fiasco of the last decisive battle of Lilibal and the escape of life and death; Such a painful experience made Oscar understand that in order to win a foolproof victory, all the factors that should be considered to affect the situation of the war must be considered, otherwise, the war will be a tragedy!

This is also the key reason why Oscar did not make any co-optation of the ancient city of Syracuse in Greater Sicily before Hannibal returned to Sicily; Perhaps, for Hannibal, the more than 6,000 Greek legions in the city-state of Syractica are better than nothing, at least to strengthen his own forces.

However, Oscar doesn't think so; The shadow left by the last decisive battle on Oscar was too deep. Even today, Oscar often wakes up in his sleep; Oscar always remembered Hannibal's face before the battle broke out, and he also remembered the countless brothers who died by his side, and even more so of the horror when he ran away.

These are not only terrible memories for Oscar, but also the motivation to spur him forward; In addition to these, Oscar's deepest feeling was that the Greek legion had escaped.

Although Oscar is not a famous general, he is also the leader of the Augustan family who has experienced wars and knows military affairs; Who doesn't know that in the decisive battle in the past, if it weren't for the collapse of the Greek legions, the flanks of the Roman army would not have been so porous at all, and the results of the war would not have been so tragic!

It's a pity that these are things that have already happened, and Oscar is powerless to change what has happened; In addition to spontaneous emotion, all Oscar can do is learn from the pain and grow wise.

Therefore, Oscar never thought of pulling the ancient city of Syra into his chariot, let alone letting the Greek army join his army. After learning that Hannibal had made a decisive alliance with the city-state of Syractic, and had drawn more than 6,000 Greek troops from the city-state of Syracuse into his army; In Oscar's heart, he suddenly felt a sense of relief.

In Oscar's view, in the last decisive battle of Sicily, Hannibal won the Roman army with more Greek legions; In this decisive battle in Sicily, Hannibal will also lose in his army, and there are more Greek legions, this is Hannibal's fate!

Of course, Oscar didn't look down on the Greek army in his heart, but the ragtag army formed by the Greeks was too poor in combat effectiveness, and it was really not suitable to participate in this kind of large-scale decisive battle that affected the fate of two countries, or two big forces.

In the intelligence system of the tragic dead soldiers, the standard infantry formed by the Greeks still has good combat effectiveness, at least stronger than the former Roman youth army; As for the elite of the Greeks, the Greek heavy infantry, it was a much more powerful presence than the Roman heavy infantry before the military reform.

Even now, the great Roman families have implemented a new military system and used new legion-standard weapons and equipment; That was not necessarily better than the hoplites of the Greeks. It is not for nothing that the hoplites of the Greeks have been able to dominate from the time of Alexander the Great to the present day; The phalanx composed of its hoplites is still extremely fierce in combat.

However, it is a pity that there are not many Greek city-states that still have these hoplites, and the city-states of Sparta and Athens, as well as the city-states of Pergamon, can still produce a sufficient number of Greek hoplites; The other small city-states, or independent ones, were no longer able to form large-scale Greek hoplites.

In addition to the Greek hoplites, which are known as the top class of the Greek city-states, the Greek city-states also have one of the truly strongest infantry units, and that is the Spartan hoplites! As a person who has used Spartan heavy infantry, Oscar naturally understands how strong the Spartan heavy infantry is; That's one of the strongest infantry in the world!

Thankfully, it was only the Spartan city-states of the Greek city-states that were able to form the Spartan heavy infantry; And the scale has not been very large, otherwise, the Spartan city-state would have been invincible across the Greek peninsula long ago! (To be continued.) )