Hi everyone and welcome to another episode of ancient warfare answers with me, Murray, your host.

And very soon I'm going to be trying to answer a question from Kurt and we'll get there.

But of course, you can ask us a question.

You can support us on Patreon forward slash ancient warfare podcast. You can back us at the level of legionary for a dollar

a month, Optio for $5 a month, and Centurion for $10 a month. If you pay at the top level, you get

a print copy of the magazine. If you pay at the $5 level, you get a digital copy of the magazine.

And of course, you can ask us a question, or you can ask us a question anyway.

Now, this question is fascinating because I get to refer to another scholar's work in the pages of ancient warfare magazine. So that's pretty cool. Now, Kurt asks, why did Alexander

the Great not look westwards starting with Rome during his conquests?

And this is also a question that David's question kind of gets to.

I have a question for your ancient warfare answers.

Lots of ifs here.

But if Alexander's empire had remained whole after his death and the generals had agreed upon

a single successor and supported him and the generals had agreed upon a single successor

and supported him and the Macedonian Roman worlds eventually collided, but sooner rather than later.

Do you think that the existing Macedonian approach to warfare, primarily cavalry and Sirissa

Hammer and Anvil, would still have been used against the Romans, or would larger and larger phalanxes

adopted by the successes be inevitable? So, are both dealing with what would have happened if

they'd gone west? Now, fascinatingly, what we've got is, of course, there is talk in the sources

of Alexander, considering moving westwards against the Romans after the conquest of Persia

and of course Alexander's death stops that from happening and then the immediate infighting of

the successes and the division of Alexander's empire into the successor states stops it from

...