Roman Invasion of India

Even with the full eight legions and an equivalent number of auxiliaries, he's on a hiding to nothing. Unless he makes (and keeps) alliances with some of the Indian states. The Roman's weren't exactly famous for keeping their word - to give but one example, that's what caused Boudiccas' Revolt...

no, they wont made it.

I think that the Romans could have done it. It might take a while and there will be a lot of setbacks, but I wouldn't write off the chances of the Roman Empire at its peak managing to pacify India - if nothing else the Romans were very, very good at conquest.

However I'd want to see a much larger application of resources than is suggested here. Six to Eight legions is not quite going to cut it unless we are looking at making a gradual conquest of India - just conquering a little bit of it, making sure that bit is nice and properly pacified and some good local connections are made before conquering another bit of it, pacifying that bit, and repeating. This would likely be the best road to ultimate victory, but if Rome's ambitions in this regard are larger then more men will be required. Even Julius Caesar before he set out to make conquests in the East on a scale similar to what we are imagining here made sure he had an army of no fewer than sixteen legions with far more artillery than was the norm, 10,000 cavalry, and numerous assorted auxillaries. To conquer India without the benefit of a military mind of true genius like Caesar's would no doubt require an army at least as great.

Salah ad-Din said:

In the 110's AD, Emperor Traianus briefly expanded Rome's eastern frontier as far as the Persian Gulf, after having managed to conquer large portions of the Parthian Empire. Due to several revolts and the thinly-spread manpower, as well as an outbreak of plague, Trajan was forced to abandon most of these conquests and his new province of Mesopotamia.

Let's say, however, that fortune favored Trajan, and what is now the countries of Iraq and Iran fell firmly under Rome's sway - provinciae Mesopotamia et Persia. Hadrian has now come to the throne, and has decided that conquering yet another eastern land would be much more fun than touring the Empire and drowning his Greek boyfriend in the Nile.

He looks past the new province of Persia - to India...

With a force of six-eight legions - most or all of them newly formed especially for this war - and a smattering of complimentary auxiliary cohorts and cavalry wings - Hadrian and some of his Praetorians go where so far no (Western) man except Alexander have dared to go before.

I think we can agree that in a pitched battle, Hadrian's Romans could probably smash anything that the Indians are going to throw at them. The Romans already have experience fighting war-elephants (Parthia had an elephant corps) - and the Indian infantry is lightly-armed and not very well drilled.

But, from a big-picture perspective, would Hadrian be successful in subjugating an entire sub-continent, full of many great kingdoms with their own warrior traditions? Would disease and attrition wear his army down and force him to withdraw - or perhaps, whilst trudging through some dark, wet jungle and cringing at the sound of roaring lions and howling wolves - would Hadrian's demoralized army be ambushed and suffer the fate of Varus' legions?

Even if Hadrian managed to conquer - or at least subjugate - India - how long would the Romans be able to hold it? What would a Romanized India look like, and what role would it play in the decline of Roman power?

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Indian war elephants were completely different from Parthia's elephants. Indian war elephants had a long history, and Indians knew probably countless tactics vs Northern Africa/ Persia who would just use the elephants as shock cavalry and charge them for melee. Also they probably used 100-200 elephants max.

Lets look at India- Indians were quite experienced at using war elephants VERY EFFECTIVELY, things like attaching an iron flail, or a mace or a poisoned sword to its trunk also happened. Also blades were put on their tusks. Elephants were not melee units mainly, but they were used as 'mobile watch towers' in the battle field. Also ancient Indian armies deployed over 10,000 elephants in battles. How would Romans block em?

Also elephants are more intelligent than horses. Also they were heavily armored plus they have a natural thick hide. Also archers sat on the howdahs carrying steel longbows plus steel tipped arrows which pretty much could shatter and pierce Roman armor.

And we should not forget Indians not only had armies but other divisions in their armies too. Cavalry was not impressive and probably used for other purposes on the battle field. Typical armies had about 50000 of horsemen.

War chariots in India were impressive- They were HUGE chariots, 4-wheeled, pulled by 5+ horses, and the chariots floor was usually a good 6 ft above the ground. So archers had advantage of range here again. These huge war machines were completely different from the sleek, swift and small Egyptian chariots. Typical armies had about 30000 chariots in them.

India fielded HUGE quantity of infantry in battlefields. A typical army had about 2,00,000+ of them. If the Roman soldiers were highly trained, well organised, well armed and armored and professional, so were Indian soldiers. Soldiers in India came from a system of caste where, people were born into their caste's profession, so the soldiers from the Kshatriya caste, and the soldiers had been training from a very young age to be formidable warriors. They were equally highly trained, and armed (exotic pieces of weaponry were used and Indian arrows could penetrate anything), but they were not as highly armored as the Romans, but Indian soldiers also were very well organised, and would execute complex battle formations, advanced than the Roman's simple phalanxes.

Also Indians would employ spies. In short, Indian armies were not war machines, they were 'War Factories' and time tested as India was probably a millenia older than the Romans.

War elephants- youtu.be/mBPtIyfd1No

Salah ad-Din said:

I would hardly call the Trajanic legions "simple phalanxes". That said, a "simple phalanx" of Makedonians gave Porus and his Indians hell...

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Porus was just a warlord.... he was a small king on the eastern edge on India and he was outnumbered to Alexander's forces. That said, do you think if Alexander had kept marching into India, he would have survived the powerful Indian kingdoms like Nanda empire, Magadha etc?

If India and Italy weren't so far apart I'd give this to the Romans hands down.

The romans would have been at their peak, they'd have been making money from the warfare in the East and could have subjugated India if they could get there intact. They would have had better armour quality than later centuries and better organization. This was the Roman Empire that smashed apart the European world, forming one of the biggest empires the world has ever seen centuries before the Mongols or the British. The dicipline of the Romans would ..... Indian numbers, the legions would be able to defeat a large amount of troops. As Salah mentioned the Romans had seen and defeated war elephants before it makes no difference how smart they were. Elephants were super weapons designed to scare opposing enemies, they would not have this effect on Romans. Just like when Hannibal tried to entertain his troops on his vengeful campaign with a Roman solider fighting an elephant for amusement. The solider won, he had seen elephants before and he knew how to kill them, he was not terrified.

If they could have invested a lot of troops, they would have done it. IF disease and the environment crippled them too much it would have been quite difficult though. The Romans had no issue with devoting powerful, well equipped, well organized, well led troops into battle in any environment, any location.

If it was conquered, when Rome began to lose the ability to project its will across the Empire the Indians would revolt and gain independence. There is little the Romans could do in India if they could not secure the borders in Italy. But Perhaps the Byzantines make India a target, and send their troops there. Maybe instead of paying off the eastern powers, Justinian seeks to reconquer the Indian lands!

imperialmen said:

Porus was just a warlord.... he was a small king on the eastern edge on India and he was outnumbered to Alexander's forces. That said, do you think if Alexander had kept marching into India, he would have survived the powerful Indian kingdoms like Nanda empire, Magadha etc?

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First of all,he was on the WESTERN edge.And no,he was not outnumbered.Recent scholarship gives Alexander less soldiers than was previously thought.
Alcibiades

Salah ad-Din said:

I didn't say the Romans could conquer India. I'm only implying that the Romans were worth more than you give them credit.

And I think the "thumbs down" symbol is a little harsh

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Sorry... its just a smiley man!! Take it easy

Inflames said:

If India and Italy weren't so far apart I'd give this to the Romans hands down.

The romans would have been at their peak, they'd have been making money from the warfare in the East and could have subjugated India if they could get there intact. They would have had better armour quality than later centuries and better organization. This was the Roman Empire that smashed apart the European world, forming one of the biggest empires the world has ever seen centuries before the Mongols or the British. The dicipline of the Romans would ..... Indian numbers, the legions would be able to defeat a large amount of troops. As Salah mentioned the Romans had seen and defeated war elephants before it makes no difference how smart they were. Elephants were super weapons designed to scare opposing enemies, they would not have this effect on Romans. Just like when Hannibal tried to entertain his troops on his vengeful campaign with a Roman solider fighting an elephant for amusement. The solider won, he had seen elephants before and he knew how to kill them, he was not terrified.

If they could have invested a lot of troops, they would have done it. IF disease and the environment crippled them too much it would have been quite difficult though. The Romans had no issue with devoting powerful, well equipped, well organized, well led troops into battle in any environment, any location.

If it was conquered, when Rome began to lose the ability to project its will across the Empire the Indians would revolt and gain independence. There is little the Romans could do in India if they could not secure the borders in Italy. But Perhaps the Byzantines make India a target, and send their troops there. Maybe instead of paying off the eastern powers, Justinian seeks to reconquer the Indian lands!

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Pretty overrating for Romans you got there.... Indian war elephants were completely different from Hannibal's. I have explained to you in the earlier post. Also, Indian elephants were trained to fight against other Indian kingdoms and NOT foreign kingdoms. So obviously, Indian war elephants had a MORE COMBAT ROLE than a canon fodder role. I mean, Indian troops were more accosted to elephants than Romans, than why create units just to scare the enemy Indian troops??!! No, they were created for battles against other Indian kingdoms, which also consisted of war elephants and anti-elephant tactics.
When you say Roman's disciplined armies could beat a large number of soldiers, you are not talking about small disorganised, untrained armies of barbarians in Europe, you are talking about India, which was 2000 years years old than Rome, and her soldiers were more battle tested than Romans.

Indians also had longbowmen who fired steel tipped arrows which could easily pierce Roman armor, thus rendering their tight phalanx formation useless in front of Indian archers. Also, 10,000 elephants could trample plough through phalanxes pretty easily, also to be considered- 30,000 chariots, 60000 cavalry, and 2,00,000 infantry are still there to protect the 10000 elephants.... Now how does that sound??

Also not to be forgotten- India's GDP constituted 30% of the world's GDP... In short, Imperial India was more advanced than the Romans in every way....

In short, Imperial India was more advanced than the Romans in every way....

Oh I see!

Factionalism would probably be a massive factor, the Romans would likely reach out to a rival kingdom of an enemy and either diplomatically pressure them or buy them off. Everyone likes a powerful ally and a mountain of gold to go with it.

I believe that they could have conquered India but not for long because as soon as the emperor who conquered all those new territories would die everything would fall a part, in my opinion problem of many roman emperors was that they wanted to stay remembered as great war leaders so they just conquered and conquered without worrying about how it would be to protect such a large fast gained territory in the close future

even if hadrian could conquer india he should not hold it to much. it would be like alexander the greats conquest of india which lead to no result and no affection on it. IT WOULD BE LOST IN A FEW YEARS.

Inflames said:

They would have had better armour quality than later centuries and better organization.

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India had superior quality steel/iron (wootz) compared to the Romans, that the Romans having better armour is a rather moot point. India's metallurgy was much better than what Rome had.

Either way, I don't think the Romans would have had an easy time dominating the Kushan's of the time. They had horses from the Da Yuan kingdom, which were renowned for their endurance and strength, they had cataprhact armies, elephants used as mobile towers rather than for shock value, horse archers, Greek, Iranian, and Saca infantry, and they had knowledge of the terrain, which was quite mountainous and rugged. It would be a hard fought battle for the Romans, being that the area is largely unsuited for infantry combat.

I would be horribly biased if I said the Romans would utterly smash the Indian kingdoms.

Thegn Ansgar said:

India had superior quality steel/iron (wootz) compared to the Romans, that the Romans having better armour is a rather moot point. India's metallurgy was much better than what Rome had.

Either way, I don't think the Romans would have had an easy time dominating the Kushan's of the time. They had horses from the Da Yuan kingdom, which were renowned for their endurance and strength, they had cataprhact armies, elephants used as mobile towers rather than for shock value, horse archers, Greek, Iranian, and Saca infantry, and they had knowledge of the terrain, which was quite mountainous and rugged. It would be a hard fought battle for the Romans, being that the area is largely unsuited for infantry combat.

I would be horribly biased if I said the Romans would utterly smash the Indian kingdoms.

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Give them an alliance with one of the stronger factions with a grudge, would this change things in your opinion?

I dont give much credence to claims of vast numbers, the effectiveness of the Indian Longbow, or the quality of their armor or weapons. I know very little about Indian history and their armies mainly influenced by a long experience of figure ancient wargaming (WRG rules).

Chariots were phased out everywhere when effective cavalry were developed. Chariots were inferior to decent cavalry.

the Indian longbow was developed in a region where armour was almost non-exisistant. There is no reason to develop serious penertation at the cost of a slower rate of fire. (I dont buy into anti-elephant all steel arrows being a terribley viable weapon)

Indian foot was incapble of standing up against Roman legions , and would be butchered in battle.

All that said, India was a populous, developed, rich land, a pretty hard task for a Roman force that was a long way from home, supply bases, reinforcements. In the long term such venture could only be sucessful through massive local division, and substantial help for the invader.

Roman armies (like greek/macedonian before them) really would have been upset at being that far from home, and for a serious long term effort, would be virtually exiles and the support of troops, officers was likely to be pretty poor.

I'm pretty convinced that Romans would have sucessfull adapted top fighting Elephants the only real Indian arm that was any major threat. That the Romans would have been pretty sucessfull in battle. While I totally discount the large numbers for Indian Armies quoted elsewhere, the region had very large reserves of manpower, and the Romans would not have had anywhere near the numbers of troops to effectively garrison the region. (Spreading out would have invited being picked off) Winning one or ten pr twenty battles would not have been enough. While I doubt the numbers the could be effectively put into one battle, I thinking large armies could have been almost endlessly put into the field.

imperialmen said:

Also, 10,000 elephants could trample plough through phalanxes pretty easily, also to be considered- 30,000 chariots, 60000 cavalry, and 200000 infantry are still there to protect the 10000 elephants.... Now how does that sound??

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I think those numbers are over exagerated, take a 0 off each of them and you have an army that can be believed a marching army of 2,000,000 men and 10,000 elephants is rediculous they'd starve to death long before they got im contact with the enemy.

I will have to agree that there is no chance in hell Indian rulers would be able to gather 10.000 elephants in one place.Most they could gather(and even that is stretching) is 1.000.As has been said numerous times,that number of elephants could not be fed.They would very quickly eat through the food resources(in less than a month,and that only because its India;in any other place,resources would be gone in less than a week).I mean,do you have any idea how much elephants eat?And what about other troops?Where's the food for them?

With that being said,I just don't see Romans conquering whole of India.Logistical and organizational problems(not to mention climate and weather) would simply be too huge,even for masters in such catagories as Romans.
Alcibiades