Fabian strategy

The Fabian strategy is a military strategy where pitched battles are avoided in favor of wearing down an opponent through a war of attrition. While avoiding decisive battles, the side employing this strategy harasses its enemy to cause attrition and loss of morale. Employment of this strategy implies that the weaker side believes time is on its side, but it may also be adopted when no feasible alternative strategy can be devised.

History

This strategy derives its name from Quintus Fabius Maximus, the dictator of the Roman Republic given the thankless task of defeating the great general Hannibal of Carthage in southern Italy during the Second Punic War (218-202 BC). At the start of the war, Hannibal boldly crossed into Italy by traversing the Alps during winter-time and invaded Italy. Due to Hannibal's skill as a general, he repeatedly inflicted devastating losses on the Romans despite the quantitative inferiority of his army — quickly achieving two crushing victories over the Romans at the Battle of Trebbia and the Battle of Lake Trasimene. After these disasters the Romans appointed Fabius Maximus as dictator. Well-aware of the military superiority of the Carthaginians and the ingenuity of Hannibal, Fabius initiated a war of attrition which was designed to exploit Hannibal's strategic vulnerabilities.

Hannibal suffered from two particular weakness. First, he was as a commander of an invading foreign army on Italian soil, effectively cut off from the home country by a lack of seaborne resupply ability, his only hope of destroying Rome was by enlisting the support of her allies. As long as the Italians remained loyal to Rome, then there was no hope that Hannibal would win; but should the Romans keep on losing battles to him, their allies’ faith in them would weaken. Therefore, Fabius calculated that the only way to defeat Hannibal was to avoid engaging with him in pitched battles, so as to deprive him of any victories. He determined that Hannibal's extended supply lines, and the cost of maintaining the Carthaginian army in the field, meant that Rome had time on its side. Rather than fight, Fabius shadowed Hannibal's army and avoided battle. While seeking to avoid battle, Fabius instead sent out small detachments against Hannibal’s foraging parties, and always maneuvered the Roman army in hilly terrain, so as to nullify Hannibal’s decisive superiority in cavalry. Residents of small northern villages were encouraged to post lookouts, so that they could gather their livestock and possessions and take refuge into fortified towns. He used interior lines to ensure that at no time could Hannibal march on Rome without abandoning his Mediterranean ports, while at the same time inflicting constant, small, debilitating defeats on the North Africans. This, Fabius knew, would wear down the invaders’ endurance and discourage Rome’s allies from going over to the enemy, without having to challenge the Carthaginians to a decisive battle.

Secondly, much of Hannibal's army was made of mercenaries from Gaul and Spain, who had no great loyalty to Hannibal other than pay, although they disliked Rome. Being mercenaries, they were unequipped for siege-type battles; they had neither the equipment nor the patience for such a campaign. The mercenaries desired quick, overwhelming battles and raids of villages for plunder, much like land versions of pirates. As such, Hannibal's army was virtually no threat to take Rome, a walled city, which would have required a long siege, hence why Hannibal never even attempted it. Hannibal's only option was to beat Roman armies in the field quickly before plunder ran out and the Gauls and Spaniards deserted for plunder elsewhere. Fabius's tactics of delaying battle and attacking supply chains thus hit right at the heart of Hannibal's weakness; time, not energy, would cripple Hannibal's advances.

The strategy, though a military success, was a political failure. His inactive policies, while tolerable among wiser minds in the Roman Senate, were deemed unpopular, because the Romans had been long accustomed to facing their enemies in the field. The strategy was in part ruined because of a lack of unity in the command of the Roman army. The magister equitum, Minucius, was a political enemy of Fabius, who is famously quoted exclaiming, "“Are we come here to see our allies butchered, and their property burned, as a spectacle to be enjoyed? And if we are not moved with shame on account of any others, are we not on account of these citizens... a Carthaginian foreigner, who was advanced even this far from the remotest limits of the world, through our dilatoriness and inactivity?". In fact, the more the Roman people recovered from the shock of Hannibal’s initial victories, the more they began to question the wisdom of the Fabian strategy, which had given them the chance to recover. Fabius’s strategy was especially frustrating to the mass of the people, who were eager to see a quick conclusion to the war. Moreover, it was widely believed that if Hannibal continued plundering Italy unopposed, the terrified allies, believing that Rome was incapable of protecting them, might defect and pledge their allegiance to the Carthaginians. Since Fabius won no large-scale victories, the Roman senate removed him from command. Their chosen replacement led the Roman army into the debacle at the Battle of Cannae. The Romans, after experiencing this catastrophic defeat and losing countless other battles, had at this point learned their lesson. They utilized the strategies Fabius had taught them, and which, they finally realized, were the only feasible means of driving Hannibal from Italy.

This strategy of attrition earned Fabius the cognomen "Cunctator" (the Delayer).

Later usage

Though at first it proved a political disaster for Fabius, eventually the Fabian strategy proved itself.

The strategy was used by the medieval French general Bertrand de Guesclin during the Hundred Years War against the English following a series of disastrous defeats in pitched battles against the Edward, the Black Prince. Eventually de Guesclin was able to recover most of the territory that had been lost.

The most noted use of Fabian strategy in American history was by George Washington, sometimes called the "American Fabius" for his use of the strategy, but, in fact, this strategy's application was originally championed and pressed on Washington by his trusted strategic advisor General Nathanael Greene and the other generals in the Councils of WarFact|date=June 2007. While Washington had initially pushed for traditional direct engagements and victories, he was convinced of the merits of using his army to harass the British rather than engage them both by the urging of his generals in his councils of war, as well as after the pitched-battle disasters of 1776, and especially the Battle of Long Island.

However, as with the original Fabius, Fabian strategy is often more popular in retrospect than at the time. To the troops, it can seem like a cowardly and demoralizing policy of continual retreat. Fabian strategy is sometimes combined with scorched earth tactics that demand sacrifice from civilian populations. Fabian leaders may be perceived as giving up territory without a fight, and since Fabian strategies promise extended war rather than quick victories, they can wear down the will of one's own side as well as the enemy. During the American Revolution, John Adams' dissatisfaction with Washington's conduct of the war led him to declare, "I am sick of Fabian systems in all quarters!"

Later in history Fabian tactics would be employed all over the world. Used against Napoleon’s Grande Armée the Fabian tactics proved to be a decisive strategy in the defense of Russia.

ee also

*Attrition warfare
*Scorched earth