Fall of Empires, Always Vs The Romans?

In my time of learning about conspiracy theories, or should I say looking into the rabbit hole... I've come to realise one thing and that's how empires are compared to the Romans and how they die. More so, how America is like the Romans and are dying.

It's far from true, even from a social point of view the US isn't governed like Rome, yes we can compare finances and how Tokyo, London or New York are very much like Rome but that is where the comparison ends, in finances. Rome demanded everything and loyalty, those greedy bankers just want your money and they'd be damned if they'll go any other way about it.

Then we have military, the last throws of THE empire, Rome. was 200 years after Jesus and they took their time to die or should I say evolve? The Vatican... Basically the Roman empire became lax this is especially true of their military, go look it up. Fact is the Roman army got shoddy while the price of said shoddiness grew. You cannot compare the two, USA isn't like that.

Even if you scrutinize the grunt on the ground, yes it costs probably 100x and more to equip your average foot soldier in the west but at the same time he is capable of so much more destruction. The average soldier carries enough to put those high street retailers to shame and it's justified in terms of effect.

Nah if anything those empire makers have learned from the past and they've realised a highly capable military always trumps.

Well, yeah, the comparison is imperfect. Even the idea that Rome "fell" is imperfect. It didn't "fall," it moved east and fell a thousand years later. And the fact also is, in a manner of speaking, we ARE the Roman Empire: Europe and the rest of the Western World. The modern Romance languages are off-shoots of Latin. It's just that we know more about the Roman Empire than we do about other empires of the past, so it's an easy target.

Indeed, the phrase "Dark Ages" is little used by scholars these days because a) the age wasn't that dark, and b) the barbarians outside the gate weren't that barbaric--certainly no more so than the Romans. It's just that the centralized control of this geographically vast empire, always a bit tenuous, frayed a bit more and, for that matter, the "Holy Roman Empire" carried it all through the Renaissance. There was a bit of a change at the top, from Emperor to Pope, but it was still there. And it kind of still is. Bottom LIne is that the "Fall of the Roman Empire" has been greatly exaggerated.

Rome fell because it was no longer Roman to begin with. The real Rome used to have a king. It was exactly like EU, made up with different white races and suppressing other cultures and nations. But, unlike EU. It had slaves, and slaves doing arena fighting.

en.wikipedia.org...

Rome was all about slavery. You can say the same with US today. We are all slaves to MIC. You don't see the good tech being released for public usage. The sooner it takes over the East. The more likely the soldiers will come back and suppress the so called civilians. It is all a trap with this corrupt fake democracy. Simply don't play their game and try to stay out. Every country that tried to close its border were forced open by military threat, infiltrated through assassination, etc.

Rome is just like US. Going too far and made all kinds of enemies.

a reply to: RAY1990

Worst Assessment Ever.

There are several reasons for the collapse of the Roman empire, none of which you discussed.

The Roman army was the greatest in the world at the time, the marked decline began when it filled the military ranks with non-Roman people. The makeup of the Roman army shifted from Roman to mostly Germanic, what loyalty does a Germanic army have to the Roman empire?

Rome succumbed to three waves of Germanic migration, destroying Roman culture and patriotism.

Another factor in the destruction of the Roman empire, was amnesty; all peoples in Roman territory became citizens of Rome, regardless of there true loyalty.

Roman culture became obscene, mirroring the decadent liberal culture of today; the Roman bath-houses as one example.

Rome became a very decadent and corrupt society, this is eerily similar to America today. America relying more on mercenaries then patriots, allowing unmitigated immigration, and decadent liberal culture.

Anyways, apparently all empires go through the same phases.

Ask yourself, which one is America in?

1. The age of outburst (or pioneers).
2. The age of conquests.
3. The age of commerce.
4. The age of affluence.
5. The age of intellect.
6. The age of decadence.
7. The age of decline and collapse.

The Life Cycles of Empires

originally posted by: GodEmperor
a reply to: RAY1990


1. The age of outburst (or pioneers).
2. The age of conquests.
3. The age of commerce.
4. The age of affluence.
5. The age of intellect.
6. The age of decadence.
7. The age of decline and collapse.


The Life Cycles of Empires

1. Corrupt Influence
2. War
3. Black Market
4. Greed
5. Suppression
6. Tyranny
7. Division

a reply to: GodEmperor

It's ironic a general considered "the last of the Romans" by some wasn't even of true Roman decent, Flavius Aetius was likely of Gothic decent. He did a lot of fighting against "barbarians" and was influential against Atilla.

Rome was a land of many gods too, belief has a big effect on societies and yes Rome was always flooded with slaves and the wealthy of all the lands it conquered.

I also think the Roman senate and high society were always more sordid than the public could ever achieve with "liberal" freedoms. It's well noted the filthy ways of the upper tier. Don't bother with the bath houses, look to the senate to see inbreeding, murder and sodomy.

If the decadent nature of today is comparable to the decadent nature of Rome then I could argue that it doesn't matter who the people are if they are becoming free like those above then that is more of a sign of the downfall of what was.

We could compare the societies but in terms of technology we are not comparable, Rome slowed down and saw less need for technological innovation, especially when it came to the military. The US demands to be the forefront of technological innovation and even from a societal point of view if the "watered" down tech civilians have is anything to go by then we live in a golden age.

The US has a huge military, it isn't relying on mercenaries. From what I gather on the subject of hired hands it's more of a case of "legitimate" action. Standing armies are for sovereign nations and when two sovereign nations fight we call it war. The US military isn't at war at this moment, it runs bombing operations within Syria & Iraq.

Using mercenaries is more comparable to the "letter of marque" concept, or when or when Elizabeth I endorsed privateers,sometimes navies or armies don't have the manoeuvrability of a hired hand.

Do you really believe society is becoming so dirty as to bring a downfall? or are you shouting about evil like a puritan in the 17th century?

a reply to: RAY1990

Yes, private military use is on the rise. I don't know where you get your facts, probably from nowhere.

The United States is the world's largest consumer of private military and security services

psm.du.edu...

The normalization of deviant behavior is a major indicator in the collapse of a civilization. Deviant behavior will always exist, it becomes a destructive force when it is promoted as normalcy.

a reply to: GodEmperor

I never said the US doesn't and I didn't state any facts about private militaries, so yes I got no facts from anywhere.


Normalization of what deviance exactly?

The French became deviant in the 17th century, a nation that had a 1000 years of Catholicism. It changed drastically and some would say for the better. Sometimes nations evolve other than collapse. I can think of plenty of scenarios where change, forced or not has had a positive influence on nations and thus their brand of civilization.

You keep mentioning the decadent nature of today but have brought forth no examples... Divorce? Gay marriage?

a reply to: RAY1990

There were varied reasons for the collapse of Rome. Number one being the sheer preponderance of civil wars. Quite simply, by the time of the Gothic and later Hunnic invasions, there were hardly any border troops left. Master General Aetius, for example, commanded a Western Field Army that numbered around 25'000 troops. He was up against Attila with somewhere between 250'000 - 500'000.

Compare that to earlier Roman forces - Germanicus for example on his punitive raids against Varus and the Germanic tribes commanded somewhere approaching 100'000 men.

This constant grinding down of military forces had an appalling effect on the Roman military effectiveness. Whilst the Eastern Empire had a much larger Field Army, they were not as skilled as the Western forces. Bad leadership and truly inspirational propaganda from Attila meant Est and West didn't trust each other and could be picked apart piecemeal.

Added to that is taxation. By the time of the later Emperors, the Senate by and large weren't paying tax. Emperors didn't like to force the issue too much as they had developed a nasty habit of having accidents like being slaughtered by the Praetorians! For anyone who really wants to understand what it was like then, i highly recommend reading some Harry Sidebottom (his fact rather than fiction books). Back stabbng galore and protection of of your interests was the name of the game, rather than service to the Empire. This lack of tax meant there were no funds for rebuilding, either infrastructure or maintaining the army.

As to the Germanic issue, that started with Augustus (1st Emperor). Quite simply, he didn't trust some of the Roman units (much civil war before he became Emperor), so he recruited Germanic bodyguards. This set a pattern for future emperors to follow.