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Warfare: Generals Who Shaped How Battles are Fought From Ancient Times Through the Gunpowder Age

Khalid Elhassan January 26, 2025 15 min

Warfare - Hannibal Barca — Hannibal Barca. Pinterest

16. Fighting the Spartans With Elite Gay Warriors

Warfare - Epaminondas defends fellow Theban leader Pelopidas — Epaminondas defends fellow Theban leader Pelopidas. Plutarch’s Lives for Boys and Girls

Spartan policy was lebensraum writ small – the Nazis actually looked to Sparta when they drew their plans to conquer Eastern Europe and enslave the locals. The end result of Sparta’s policy was an elite Spartan phalanx unmatched in discipline and toughness. By the fourth century BC, Sparta was Greece’s scariest state, and the Spartan phalanx was one that nobody wanted a piece of. Then Epaminondas showed up, and broke the spell of Spartan invincibility by breaking the Spartans at the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC. There, he led a Theban army of 7000 hoplites, plus 600 cavalry, against a bigger Spartan army of 10,000 hoplites, plus 1000 cavalry. In the rival armies, Thebe’s elites were a unit of 300 warriors known as The Sacred Band, comprised of 150 pairs of homosexual lovers. Sparta’s elites were a unit of 1000 full Spartan citizens, trained for war since childhood.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.