The Jugurthine Wars
The Roman Republic of the 2nd century before Christ was the kingmaker of the Mediterranean. They adopted this role after defeating Carthage in the 2nd (218-201 BC) and 3rd Punic Wars (149-146 BC) and conquering Macedon in 3 wars from 215 to 168 BC. Like the modern American Republic, the Roman Republic could support regime change for the right price. Cui bono?
The coastal areas of Numidia were controlled by Carthage during the 1st Punic War (264-241 BC). Numidia is the parts of North Africa extending West from Carthage to the Atlantic Ocean. During the second Punic War, Numidia was split between supporting Carthage and Rome. After Rome won, Numidia was unified under Masinissa.
Masinissa was losing a civil war when Roman General Scipio Africanus invaded North Africa, winning the battle of Zama in 202 BC against Hannibal. Masinissa’s Numidian light cavalry played an important part in the battle, and Rome supported his claim to the throne.[1]
It is the succession of Masinissa’s grandson, that really shows the parallels between the Roman and American Republics. Masinissa died in 148 BC, and when his son and successor, Micipsa, died in 118 BC, Numidia was split in three between his two sons, and his nephew, Jugurtha.
Per the Encyclopedia Britannica Online,[2]
“After Micipsa’s death in 118, Jugurtha shared the rule of Numidia with Micipsa’s two sons, Hiempsal and Adherbal, the first of whom Jugurtha assassinated. When Adherbal was attacked by Jugurtha, he fled to Rome for aid—Rome’s approval being required for any change in the government of Numidia.”
Jugurtha sent envoys to follow Adherbal to Rome with the gold necessary to buy as many Roman politicians as they could.[3]
“Then Jugurtha, when he had carried out his plans and was in possession of all Numidia, having leisure to think over what he had done, began to be afraid of the Roman people and to despair of escaping their anger except through the avarice of the Roman nobles and his own wealth. Accordingly, a few days later, he sent envoys to Rome with a great amount of gold and silver, directing them first to load his old friends with presents, and then to win new ones — in short, to make haste to accomplish by largess whatever they could.
But when the envoys arrived at Rome, and, as the king had commanded, sent magnificent presents to his friends and to others of the senate whose influence at the time was powerful, such a change of sentiment ensued that in place of the pronounced hostility of the nobles Jugurtha gained their favour and support. Induced in some cases by hope, in others by bribery, they went about to individual members of the senate and urged them not to take too severe measures against Jugurtha.”
-The War with Jugurtha, Gaius Sallustius Crispus, page 156-157, originially published in 40 BC, republished in 1921
Jugurtha’s bribes worked, and Numidia was split between him and Adherbal.
Jugurtha then went to war with Adherbal, besieging him in the city of Cirta in 112 BC. Jugurtha won the siege and massacred most of the city, which had a large population of Roman and Italian immigrants. This made the Romans mad. They sent the Consul Calpurnius Bestia to invade Numidia. Romans elected 2 Consuls every year, and they were the equivalent of the President of the USA.
Bestia and his deputy, Scaurus, were bribed by Jugurtha into a favorable peace. Upon returning to Rome, the Tribune of the Plebs, Memmius, made a speech that resulted in the Praetor Cassius being sent to bring Jugurtha to Rome.
Again, according to the Roman historian Sallust,[4]
“Cassius was instructed to bring the king to Rome under pledge of public protection, in order that through his testimony the offences of Scaurus and the rest who were accused of taking bribes might the more readily be disclosed.”
Cassuius arrived in North Africa to find that the Roman army left in Numidia was very corrupt. Many had resorted to banditry and were looting their allies. They had even sold war elephants that had been surrendered by Jugurtha in his peace treaty back to him! Cassius persuaded Jugurtha to return with him to Rome for trial. While in Rome, Jugurtha murdered one of his rivals. Once exposed, he lost his Roman supporters.
Jugurtha fled Rome, allegedly saying,[5]
"A city for sale and doomed to speedy destruction if it finds a purchaser!"
After years of fighting, the Roman general Gaius Marius was sent to defeat Jugurtha. His subordinate, Sulla, captured Jugurtha in 106 BC, ending the war.
However, the corruption and infighting would lead to civil wars and the end of the Republic.* Sulla would rise to power as a result of these wars, notably the Social War (91-87 BC). He was elected Consul in 88 BC. He was given command of an invasion of the Kingdom of Pontus in Asia Minor, modern Turkey. It was ruled by Mithridates.
However, Marius used a Tribune to change the law and replace Sulla with Marius while the army was in Italy, waiting to sail. Sulla marched on Rome, exiled Marius, and then invaded Asia Minor. This was the start of the first Roman Civil War (88-82 BC), where the political factions in Rome, the Populists and Optimates, fought each other, and not just their Italian allies.
While Sulla was campaigning against Mithridates, Marius returned to Rome and was elected as one of the two Consuls in 86 BC, his 7th time. Marius then died of natural causes within the month.
Sulla was a Proconsul at the time (87-84 BC). A Proconsul is someone with Consular powers, typically in a foreign theatre of war. Upon his return from Asia Minor, he was elected Dictator for an unspecified time in 82 BC. Roman Dictators were limited to a 6 month term. They were only elected in emergencies. Sulla would be Dictator for 3 years while aslo being elected Consul again in 80 BC, before retiring in 79 BC. He used his power to change many laws, notably neutering the power of the Tribune of the Plebs.
Julius Caesar (Populares) would be the next illegal Dictator from 49 BC until his assassination in 44 BC. He too, rose to power because of civil wars, this time defeating Pompey Magnus (Optimate). Numidia was a client state of Rome until he conquered it in 45 BC. His heir, Octavian, never gave up power and would be known as the first Roman Emperor, Caesar Augustus. He came to power by ending the civil wars, commanding from 27 BC until 14 AD.[6]
The USA of 2024 are much like the Roman Republic of the Jugurthine Wars. Foreign governments and their agents, such as the American Israeli Political Action Committee (AIPAC), bribe politicians to pick winners and losers in foreign wars. Americans don’t know if their Senators represent their state or a foreign state in Congress.[7]
Joe Biden has been connected to bribes in Ukraine. Is that why he supports the current proxy war against Russia?[8]
Indeed, the US House Oversight Committee has an entire webpage dedicated to the Biden family corruption. They write,[9]
“Since taking the gavel in January, the Committee on Oversight and Accountability has accelerated its investigation of the Biden family’s domestic and international business practices to determine whether the Biden family has been targeted by foreign actors, President Biden is compromised, and our national security is threatened. Records obtained through the Committee’s subpoenas to date reveal that the Bidens and their associates have received over $20 million in payments from foreign entities.”
Once we reckon with the debt, will we face a civil war? The solution is to only go to war when Congress votes for it, instead of being dictated into war, like every war since World War II. Otherwise, foreign governments will continue to bribe and blackmail American politicians for control of the world, until the American Republic goes the way of the Roman Republic.
Even then, we’ll have to sort out the domestic corruption, like with Senator Menendez of New Jersey and the Medicare fraud that is being exposed in Mississippi.
New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez (D) is accused of accepting gold as a bribe to represent Egyptians. Per CNN,[10]
“This new case is a complicated affair involving multiple gold bars, envelopes of cash, a Mercedes and a lot more that, prosecutors say, the powerful former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and his new wife (they got married during the alleged bribery scheme) obtained in exchange for helping a halal meat monopoly, granting favors for people from Egypt and Qatar and trying to influence a New Jersey prosecution.”
According to Russ Latino of the Magnolia Tribune, Joe Biden is connected to $51 million if Medicare payment fraud.
In an article entitled, Family Tradition: Keaton Langston pleads guilty in $51 million Medicare fraud, Latino writes,[11]
“A new trail of healthcare corruption that stretches from Mississippi to the mafia raises questions about the Biden family’s involvement in related businesses.”
Fortunately for Americans, the Founding Fathers knew that a weak generation would be born. The Constitution was made for hard times because the Founders studied the fall of the Roman Republic and lived through historic debt, historic inflation, and insurrections during the Founding.
The Roman Republic of the 2nd century before Christ was the kingmaker of the Mediterranean. They adopted this role after defeating Carthage in the 2nd (218-201 BC) and 3rd Punic Wars (149-146 BC) and conquering Macedon in 3 wars from 215 to 168 BC. Like the modern American Republic, the Roman Republic could support regime change for the right price. Cui bono?
*Looking at Roman history from 753 BC to 1453 AD, the author has been persuaded that the Republic did not truly end until the Crisis of the Third Century.
[1]https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0104zzzzzz:entry=masinissa-bio-1
[2]https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jugurtha#ref193076
[3]http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/e/roman/texts/sallust/bellum_jugurthinum/1*.html
[4]Ibidem, page 207
[5]Ibidem, page 213
[6]https://www.britannica.com/place/Numidia
[7]https://www.hamiltonmobley.com/blog/college-protests
[9]https://oversight.house.gov/the-bidens-influence-peddling-timeline/
[10https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/12/politics/menendez-gold-cash-what-matters/index.html
