# CHAPTER 12 — Why a Prudent Commander Must Impose on His Troops the Absolute Necessity to Fight, While Taking It Away from Those of the Enemy

On other occasions we have discussed how useful necessity is in human actions and the glory to which it has brought them; and how some moral philosophers have written that the hands and the tongues of men, two most noble instruments that ennoble mankind, would not have functioned perfectly nor brought human endeavours to that height that they have attained had they not been driven on by necessity. Since the ancient commanders of armies understood the power of such necessity, as well as the extent to which it made the spirits of their soldiers stubborn in combat, they made every effort to ensure that it would constrain their soldiers, and on the other hand, they took great pains to free their enemies from such constraint. For this reason, they often opened to the enemy a path that they could have closed to him, while to their own troops they closed a path they could have left open. The commander who, therefore, desires a city to defend itself stubbornly or an army in the field to fight stubbornly, must, above everything else, strive to place such necessity in the hearts of those who are to fight. Hence, a prudent commander who has to march out to seize a city must measure the ease or difficulty in the seizing of it by recognizing and considering what necessity will force the inhabitants of that city to defend themselves, and whenever he discovers that a great necessity forces them to defend it, he will judge the city difficult to capture; otherwise, he will judge it easy. Thus, it happens that after a rebellion cities are more difficult to capture than they are during the first conquest, because in the beginning, lacking a reason to fear punishment since they have not given offence, they surrender easily, but later, having rebelled, they feel they have given offence, and fearing punishment for this reason, they become difficult to defeat. This stubbornness is also produced by the natural hatreds that neighbouring princes or republics harbour for each other; this arises from the ambition to rule and the jealousy of their states, especially if they are republics, as occurred in Tuscany, where conflict and competition have made and always will make the capture of one city by another difficult. Consequently, anyone who gives careful consideration to the neighbours of the city of Florence and the neighbours of the city of Venice will not be amazed, as many are, that Florence has spent more on its wars and acquired less than Venice. This results from the fact that the Venetians have not had nearby cities so stubborn in their own defence as Florence has had, since all the cities near Venice are accustomed to living under a prince and not in liberty, and those cities used to living in servitude think nothing of changing their master frequently, indeed, many times they desire to do so. Thus, although Venice had more powerful neighbours than Florence, finding nearby cities less obstinate, it was able to overcome them more quickly than Florence, which was surrounded by nothing but free cities.

To return, then, to the beginning of this discourse, when a commander attacks a city he must employ every means available to eliminate such necessity on the part of its defenders and, as a consequence, such stubbornness, promising pardons if the defenders are afraid of punishment, and if they are fearful of losing their liberty, demonstrating how he will act not against the common good but only against a few ambitious citizens in the city; this approach has on many occasions facilitated such undertakings and the seizures of cities. Although such ruses are easily recognized, especially by prudent men, they have, nevertheless, often deceived people who, eager for immediate peace, close their eyes to any other trap concealed beneath such generous promises. In this way countless cities have become enslaved, as happened to Florence in recent times; and as happened to Crassus and his army. Although he recognized the vain promises of the Parthians, which were made to deprive his soldiers of the necessity they felt to defend themselves, he was still unable to keep them obstinate, since they were blinded by the offers of peace which had been made to them by their enemies, as can be seen in greater detail by reading the life of this commander. *

Let me say, therefore, that when the Samnites, breaking the terms of the agreement because of the ambition of a few, raided and plundered the lands of their allies and then sent ambassadors to Rome to sue for peace, offering to restore the property plundered and to imprison those who had caused the rioting and plundering, they were rebuffed by the Romans. Upon returning to Samnium without any hope of an agreement, Claudius Pontius, then commander of the Samnite army, in a noteworthy oration demonstrated that the Romans wanted war at all costs, and although the Samnites, for their part, wanted peace, necessity forced them to turn to war, and these were his words: ‘War is just, Samnites, when it is necessary, and arms are righteous for those whose only hope remains in arms’; * on this necessity he and his soldiers founded their hopes for victory.

In order to avoid returning to this subject later, it seems advisable to cite those examples from Roman history that are most worthy of being noted. Gaius Manlius * and his army faced the opposition of the Veientes; when part of the army of Veii had invaded Manlius’ fortifications, he went swiftly with a company of men to the assistance of these troops; and so that the Veientes could not escape, Manlius occupied all the exits of the camp. For this reason, when the Veientes realized they were trapped they began to fight with such ferocity that they killed Manlius and would have overwhelmed all the rest of the Romans if the prudence of a tribune had not opened to them a path for escape. Here it is evident that when necessity forced the Veientes to fight, they fought most fiercely, but when they saw the path of escape open, they gave more thought to escaping than to fighting.

With their armies, the Volscians and the Aequi had invaded Roman territory. The consuls were sent to oppose them. As the battle wore on, the army of the Volscians, whose commander was Vettius Messius, suddenly found itself trapped between its stockades, occupied by the Romans, and the other Roman army and realizing that they had either to die or to cut their way through with their swords, Vettius spoke these words to his troops: ‘There is no wall of earth or stone to stop you—but armed men like yourselves; in courage you are as good as they— in the ultimate and most powerful weapon of all—desperation—you have the advantage!’ * Livy calls this necessity the ‘ultimate and most powerful weapon of all’. Camillus, the most prudent of all Roman commanders, was already inside the city of Veii with his army when, in order to facilitate its capture and to deprive his enemies of the ultimate necessity of defending themselves, he gave the command, in such a way that the Veientes heard that no one would be harmed who was without a weapon, so that the Veientes threw their arms to the ground, and the city was taken almost without bloodshed. This method was later employed by many commanders. *