Originally Posted by
Pompeius Magnus
@Cocroach
you can't find THE reason for the blame at Yarmuk. There are of course many reasons. But the argument that the poor muslimic soldiers were bad equipped - and still able to win - is just a "fairy tale".
And as I said in the upper post - the superior number of soldiers was a huge disadvantage for the Romans. That has simply psychological reasons.
First of all I must make a rectification of my last post. I said the Romans underrated the muslimic army. That is only half-correct. We know that the Roman High Command (politicians, officers, the emperor, etc) were fully aware of the importance of the battle. The high command committed itself to a decisive battle.
But what happens to the regular soldiers now if he march on a battle field with a superiority of 1:2 - against desert people?
We know that many auxillaries (Socii / Symmachoi) fought with little enthusiasm like the Lakhm and Judham tribes. But it would be too easy to blame just auxillaries for the defeat. Also some Roman troops fought with little enthusiasm.
This is a normal reaction of soldiers if you march in full order, fully equipped to the battle field - with the knowledge that the right and left hand side is safe and protected by other roman units. The regular roman soldier don't saw the need to fight with 100% - nobody want risk his own life in a battle which is won "automatically" (you know what I mean).
I personally believe that if the Romans had fought on this day against a huge Sasanian army - including thousands of Savaran - than the result would probably somewhat different.