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From: michaelm@vax.MCD.3Com.COM (Michael McNeil)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Civil War technology => Scorched Earth
Keywords: Ironclads, Civil War
Message-ID: <1990Oct24.151745.16560@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 24 Oct 90 15:17:45 GMT
References: <1990Oct11.050851.29295@cbnews.att.com* <1990Oct15.034315.14142@cbnews.att.com> <1990Oct17.011127.13242@cbnews.att.com>
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From: michaelm@vax.MCD.3Com.COM (Michael McNeil)

[mod.note: Followups to soc.history. - Bill ]
nak%archie@att.att.com (Neil A Kirby) writes:

}In article <1990Oct15.034315.14142@cbnews.att.com>, woody@eos.arc.nasa.gov
}(Wayne Wood) writes:
}> to the best of my knowledge napoleon never used scorched earth
}> as an offensive tactic.  napoleon didn't try to destroy the
}> economic base of the countries he invaded.  this is what i meant
}> when referring to total war.  corrections welcomed.

}When the Assyrians of Ninevah took the city of Babylon, they did more than
}take the city.  They killed almost (If memory serves, less than a dozen
}survivors) everyone.  They took the city apart so that no two stones were
}left one on top the other.  They threw the topsoil into the Euphrates
}river!  They were arguably more thorough in their destruction than the bomb
}was to Hiroshima; Hiroshima had surviors, buildings partly intact, etc.

If this is true, how could there have been a (revived) Babylonian
Empire for the Persians to conquer?  How could Babylon, with much
of its culture and scientific tradition intact, been thriving on
into Hellenistic times (whereas the ruins of Nineveh were hardly
even recognizable at the time that Alexander's army marched by)?

--
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