What plan did Hannibal have to attack Rome?

Answer 1

Having established a base in northern Italy amongst the Gaulish cities, he tried to detach Rome's Italian allies to his side.

This was partially successful, but sufficient allies remained with Rome to bolster them.

He did not have a seige train to breach the city walls, so he had to remain in the countryside, fighting the Roman forces when they thought themselves strong enough to give battle, when he would win with his superior cavalry.

Roman Fabius Maximus then maintained a strategy of avoiding battle but keeping in the hills as a constant threat. Eventually the Romans twigged at last to copy Carthages' strategy of fighting in the enemy's territory and invaded Carthage in North Africa, using also local allies. Hannibal was recalled to defend the city.

Answer 2

Hannibal invaded Italy. There were three major planks in his strategy; 1) speed and surprise; 2) combined action with the Gauls of northern Italy and 3) support of Rome's allies in Italy.

Hannibal marched form his base in this territories in southern Spain to Italy at an astonishing pace. He also crossed the Alps in the winter, which was thought to be impossible. With this he did manage to catch the Romans by surprise. However, in achieving this feat, he lost half of his infantry and cavalry. He left Spain with 40,000 infantry and 12,000 cavalry and the numbers which arrived in Italy were 20,000 and 6,000. Most of them died when crossing the Alps. Prior to this he had only lost 2,000 infantrymen. The casualties were due to attacks by the locals on the Alps and to the difficulty of the crossing. Another big loss was that of his siege machines. Without these he could not attack Rome. He also lost his war elephants (this was not serious as he managed to defeat the Roman armies four times without them).

The Gauls of Northern Italy had just been conquered by the Romans and were keen to rebel. They must have been in touch with Hannibal and agreed on coordinated action because they rebelled while he was on his way to Italy. This caused great difficulties of the Romans. When Hannibal reached Italy the Gauls supplied him with some 40,000 men.

Hannibal routed the armies of the Romans and their Italian allies twice in northern Italy. He then moved to central Italy and Routed the Romans again at Lake Trasimene, not far from Rome. He did not attack Rome because he did not have siege machines, without which such an attack would have been in vain. Instead, he marched on to Apulia in southern Italy and continued the war there.

The most crucial part of Hannibal's strategy was to persuade Rome's allies in Italy to defect to him. A key part of Rome's power was superiority in numbers. These allies fought in auxiliary troops which supported the Roman legions. They provided 60% of the pool of military manpower available to Rome, which was the largest in the Mediterranean. Rome could mobilise hundreds of thousands of soldiers. In the long run, there was no way that an expeditionary force, such as Hannibal's, could defeat Rome and her allies. Getting the allies to defect was needed to increase Hannibal's troops and weaken Rome.

Hannibal managed to get the support of some of Rome's allies in southern Italy, but this was insufficient. The Romans started pushing back into southern Italy. His brother Hasdrubal brought reinforcements and siege machines from Spain. However he was intercepted by the Romans in central Italy. His forces were routed and he died in battle. This was the end for Hannibal who spent the last years of his campaign stuck on the easily defensible mountains of Calabria (the toe of Italy).