Explanation: During the Siege of Alesia, Gaius Julius Caesar, of later dictator fame, besieged the Gallic leader Vercingetorix by building a wall around the walled city of Alesia.
When Caesar heard that a massive Gallic army was coming to reinforce Vercingetorix, instead of lifting the siege, Caesar built ANOTHER wall - this one around his siege camp, to keep the reinforcing Gauls out.
When I heard of that chad move it really struck home that the Roman superpower wasn’t their infinite spawning exploit, or the organized military formations. It was the extreme engineering spec.
Deadliest military weapon is a soldier with a shovel, and an angry NCO to make them use it.
Vercingetorix has the best name.
That’s the siege concept of Contravallation: building a wall outside the besieging force to prevent reinforcements from overrunning your positions. I think what made Jules’ implementation remarkable was the speed and complexity of its construction, and his precise maneuvering to hold both walls against considerable hostile forces.
Actually keeping track of how a battle is going without modern communication is extremely difficult if your fastest communication is “Man on horse”, your best surveillance tool is “Good eyesight” and you can’t easily see the actual troops. Caesar was a master at predicting weaknesses and coordinating his reserve troops just so that they could plug the gaps and snatch an unlikely victory. He personally led troops into a breach (where the terrain prevented building a wall), salvaging his troops’ breaking morale while another unit flanked the attackers and drove them off.
Building walls was nothing new. Building good walls quickly, holding them and even holding the point where no walls could be built?
He fought a battle on two fronts and came out on top. That’s why he’s the GOAT.
