What if Athens won the Peloponnessian War?

[Hunyadi Mátyás]

The title says it all.

[conon394]

This was just asked about a month ago – its better form to bump something that recent but here was my reply at the time with some additional thoughts appended.…

Hard to say for certain - but I think you have assume the Peace of Nicias demonstrates a couple things:

There was no victory to be found in the Pericles strategy. Sparta could or would not compel Corinth and Thebes to peace. Athenian raids were not likely to affect any of the land powers because Athens did not have a large army alone to hold the field for the time needed to really damage any one. Sparta might have a shift in politics and holding elite prisoners might bring them to the table, but so what Sparta could always go to war a year later when ever Athens had issues or distractions, could still make a deal with Persia and still seems unlikely to to be able to deter Corinth or Thebes from pursuing their own objectives.

So I would say to imagine an Athenian victory you have to imagine an outcome that sees Spartan power fundamentally broken and (or maybe or perhaps) Athenian power significantly increased.

I'll opt for a potentially likely what if - Alcibiades is a bit better had keeping his private life private, and manages to work better with the 'left' (say Hyperbolus) as the peace of Nicias is breaking down. Nicias takes a greater hit to his prestige than in real life and thus before the Athenian alliance with Agos, Ellis and Mantinea - Nicias is the one ostracized and thus Athens acts strongly to support the new Anti-Peloponnese League alliance.

As a result at the Mantinea in 418 Agis found himself facing not 8000 hoplites but an allied army with a Athenian army more in keeping with the effort made a Syracuse so over 12,000. Even though the allied center still collapsed the pugnacious Lamachus saved the day with his novel inclusion of a reserve of Athenian hoplites (he had argued strongly with Alcibaiades that there were to many trembling spears in the center). Once the Agive elite reformed the battle was a disaster for Sparta - Agis dead, a crushing defeat of Spartan pride and myth. Tegae was betrayed to the Allies and with the arrival the late Elean force Sparta northern allies prudently failed to show up. Clearly the Allies would likely move to free the helots, and no doubt the Agives would seek to reclaim lost land from Sparta, and recover any free allies of Sparta in the Argolid. That would likely be sufficient in Athenian eyes - a much weaker Sparta was fine but like everyone else (Epaminondas, Phillip) the value of weak Sparta was too obvious to eliminate it altogether - else a too strong Argos...

With Sparta humbled and no naval defeats to weaken the Athenian ability to oppose Persia I would suspect the biggest losers would be Megara and Thebes. In real life the Argives were a surprisingly loyal source of troops after 318 and the Athenians flirted with hiring Pelopensesian mercenaries for Syracuse. In this version I would imagine both types of troops would be available in greater number such that Athens could redress the result of Delium and also have no real issue with securing Megara – a vital position and one Athens could point to history and myth to support. Similarly I’m sure Athens would restore Plataea and no doubt try to minimize the position of Thebes. However given the need to not offend it new Peloponnesian allies too much I suspect Athens would have to tread lightly and focus on just a few key gains Megara, and recovering Amphipolis.

What would happen than well…

I’d guess Athens would likely either be drawn into Italy – either aiding its old friends against Syracuse or later fighting Carthage. Also if Athens was able to step away from the imperialism of Pericles and look back to it older democratic expansion it might well build quit a powerful unitary state out of Megara, Aigina, Euboea and its other possessions. If it could do that it might well have the manpower to take advantage of the 4th century issues in the Persian Empire to see it rolled back and Egypt, Cyprus, and Asia Minor as free actors. With a strong Athens and one that retained Amphipolis there is far less room for a strong Macedonia to rise…

I would add that there would be a significant impact on Philosophy and Plato.

In this case democracy Athens and its democratic allies – Elis, Mantinea, Argos, Samos, etc would have triumphed and the poster child of 4th century Oligarchical/aristocratic thinkers like Plato would have failed. More interestingly the Athenian democracy would never have experience the tensions of that led to 411 or the thirty Socrates would also certainly thus have never been put on trial… The victory of Athens and the failure of the aristocratic sates would certainly have called into question the assertions of Socrates about what states were best governed.

Plato perhaps may have decided to write poetry and drama and a bright cavalry officer named Xenophon’s economic ideals might have been accepted by his much more robust, wealthy and confident polis. The need to crew all those state owned merchant ships could have been the tipping point to push Athens back to an open inclusive democracy bestowing citizenship on metics and becoming so large and populous no Northern dynast could threaten its independence.

[Asterix]

it wouldn't have changed much-athens would still have been exhausted and ruined afterwards and likely still be swallowed by Philip II of macedon.

[conon394]

it wouldn't have changed much-athens would still have been exhausted and ruined afterwards and likely still be swallowed by Philip II of macedon.

That depends very much on how Athens won and when as I noted above. The Rise of Phillip is not some fixed historical event and it very much required the situation in the 4th century that resulted from Athenian defeat, without that defeat it not clear that Macedonia could have been more than it was in the 5th century. If Athens won 418, or perhaps after a successful siege of Syracuse allowed Athens to deploy money and mercenary resources sufficient to defeat Sparta circa 415 its difficult to see how Philip's Macedonia could come to being: No Athenian defeat at Syracuse -> no Persian intervention and no collapse of Athenian Empire. Any Athenian victory would allow Athens to reassert her control of Amphibious (*) and so Athenian finance better than 4th century, Macedonia worse in turn since it would face a not distracted Athenian empire for control of the place not a comparatively small Olythian/Chalcidic league. Athenian victory means the relative power of Athens is not so dramatically reduced not the say that of Thebes increased, nor with Athens suffer systemic and very expensive structural losses like it navy and naval infrastructure which took the bulk of the 4th century to reestablish. Besides that a decisive victory by Athens would of course impact the view of Athenians and it foes.

It also useful to not loose sight of the fact that Athens was potentially a much stronger victor than Sparta. Sparta won by becoming more or less a tool of Persia and as the 4th century shows it could not break that mold it failed whenever it tried to break away form that paradigm. BY comparison the Athenian state proved much more able to reform its economic policy and or it relations with allies (thus the second Athenian League).

*Even say consider a slightly more stable peace of Nicias (ie the Pericles strategy victory):

Sparta is a bit more willing to pressure it allies -It puts it foot down and Corinth and Thebes agree to the peace, Thebes hands of Panactum intact, Amphibious is still not handed over but Sparta handles it a bit more adroitly perhaps a few trials and some apologies etc. Athens is still aggravated but not enough to go to war. The status of Sparta would be reality much weaker it would have more or less failed it promise to free the Greeks and earned the ire or Thebes and Corinth, and face the freedom of the Argives from treaty neutrality. While Athens would be a bit weaker from the looses in Thrace and a marginally stronger Thebes it would have reaffirmed it right to empire and Greece would remain a bi polar arena one not very friendly to the rise of Macedonia.

[cottontail]

Thebes would defeat Athens instead of Sparta.

Then Macedon would come down and defeat them all again.

Then space aliens, disturbed by the change in the time warp contimuim, would kill Alexander the Great, and give the Inuits modern weaponry so they could conquer the world.

edit: forget about this post. I know little about the war. conon seems to know what he's talking about though.

[conon394]

edit: forget about this post. I know little about the war. conon seems to know what he's talking about though

Funny thing the inevitability of Philip is an easy mental trap to fall into even in a very lengthy and well argued look at counter factual history I think Ian Morris shades into (over his own objections) the tenancy to see Balkan despots as a given.

http://www.princeton.edu/~pswpc/pdfs/morris/120508.pdf

Morris is correct on one point Athens needed to sit tight because history was about make thing easy for it in the 4th century. Civil war in Persian the revolt of Egypt an the emergence of Evagoras of Salamis all opened the possibility of an Athenian empire successfully tipping the scales and breaking the Persian Empire (at least in the west an independent Asia Minor Cyprus and Egypt would have saved Athens of it biggest worry a single wealthy and vengeful polity with cash to hand to give to its enemies).

Thus in many ways Pericle's grandest failure was correct ideal but horrible execution. On the one hand given the brittle imperialism he presided over Athens needed to avoid war at all cost to reap the long term gain he sought, or if he wanted a state that could win a passive war attrition he needed to at least push for a more inclusive empire - at least maybe the Ionians and Euboea need to to see a two way street more rights and the potential to glean more benefits (citizen right in Attica, inter marriage and similar opportunities to own property across the empire...). But I have to say I question the Pericles strategy even than - compare with Fabius he might have advocated passivity toward Hannibal but Rome was highly aggressive where he was not, Pericles allowed passivity in Attica and only pinpricks elsewhere.

[Athenian Alexandros]

Athens may have been able to assert a more wider control over the Mediterranean and prevent a strong Macedonia. I think thebes would not have beaten athens because athens would control more men and money than sparta did when it was beaten. Athens could have kept a large empire and allow citizenship too the former subjects. It would be interesting to see how a powerful athenian empire would have faced the roman republic.

[ValkyrieQueen]

It'd be interesting to consider how the Achaemenid Empire might have turned out had a stronger Athens managed to curb the rise of Macedon.