"Alexander's inaugural Theban holocaust puts his murder in league with ethnic obliterations of our own era-Adolf's Hitler wartime retaliatory annihilation of occupied communities, Hafez Assad's erasure of wayward Syrian villages or Saddam Hussein's gassing and butchery of Iraqi Kurds."
-Butcher of Macedon
The writer, Victor Davis Hanson, makes quite the claim when stating that Alexander the Great was in the same league of murderers as Sadaam Hussein and Hitler. Through his utter destruction of Thebes, Alexander sent a message to other city-states that he would take no prisoners. It also showed his pure ruthlessness and lack of respect for anyone or anything except for his army. It is evident that Alexander played by his own rules, blood-thirsty and willing to do anything to secure power.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
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I disagree with the author of that article because he's using outdated figures. Alexander's conquest was something that was done to expand empire and to fulfill his duties as, "a son of god." Men like Hitler who killed nearly exponentially more than Alexander should fall into a whole separate category of killers. Alexander was indeed unnecessarily killing innocents but it wasn't near the extent to which Hitler had reached.
ReplyDeleteNot that I can speak for anyone other than myself, but I get the idea from all the stories we've read that murder and slaughter wasn't such a rare thing back then. If the Athenians hadn't escaped Athens, then Persia would have committed an "Athenian holocaust", just an example.
ReplyDeleteThough I do agree, Alexander the Great seemed to want to take over just because he had the will. It seemed he didn't advocate any better ideas about running the places he took over, other than "just do it."