Thucydides

Thucydides was an Athenian historian of the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BCE). The conflict between Athens, Sparta, and their allies convulsed the entire Hellenic world and inspired him to compose the first analytic contemporary military history in Western literature. His work is not only a primary source for the military and political events of the 5th century BCE but also a fundamental text for the study of political science and international relations.

What little is known of Thucydides personally is derived almost entirely from his own work in which he figures as an actor. Born about 460 BCE, he was an unabashed admirer of Pericles and his political and imperial policies. In 424 BCE, Thucydides entered into office as one of Athens’s 10 annually elected generals. While serving in the north Aegean, he had the misfortune to find himself pitted against Brasidas, one of the most capable Spartan commanders of the war. Failure on campaign led to his exile by the Athenian assembly, and he presumably spent the remainder of his life working on his history, which breaks off with the events of 411 BCE.

An experienced soldier, his history may be read with profit by those interested in operational detail. Above all, however, it is his higher level strategic and political analyses that have remained timeless. As it has come down to us, his history consists of eight books. It details the background and outbreak of the war, the inconclusive first 10 years of fighting in the so-called Archidamian War, the unstable peace brokered by Nicias, Athens’s catastrophic expedition to Sicily, and the opening years of the renewed hostilities that eventually resulted in Athens’s final defeat. Methodologically, Thucydides explicitly favored rigorous autopsy with a didactic purpose. He notes that his work is “a possession for all time” and that, human nature being what it is, future statesmen among his readers would likely find themselves in situations similar to those it describes. His treatment is therefore mainly restricted to serious analysis of politics and war with little room for ethnographic or mythological digressions.

His multilayered analysis of the outbreak of the war includes the note that the “truest” cause was the growth of Athenian power and the fear it inspired in the Spartans. This structural and psychological explanation accords well with the modern Realist theory of power transition crises leading to hegemonic war. However, Thucydides’s narrative is not simply deterministic. Fear, honor, and self-interest on the part of even second-tier powers such as Corinth, Corcyra, and Thebes led to decisions and policies that mattered and affected the course of events.

In his analysis of strategy, Thucydides emphasizes the need for preparation and husbanding of resources for war. He commends rational and careful planning and condemns analysis based on hope or wishful thinking. He approves of Pericles’s Fabian policy of avoiding pitched battle with the superior [Page 1417] Peloponnesian army and minimizing risk in favor of asymmetric reliance on the fleet, massive financial resources, and city walls. While the Spartans could and did repeatedly devastate Attica, they were unable to starve Athens into submission until they achieved naval superiority with Persian backing.

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