Interlude: Roman Senate

The Senate was in an uproar. The Greeks had an army only one day's march west of Rome, meanwhile, their King and his Samnite Lapdog had their armies at Aquinum, a mere three days march away from the City. If not for the arrival of Winter, they may have been at the Gates of Rome itself already! Multiple Consular Armies had been slaughtered, and both consuls had been slain in the fighting, with Samnicus having been slain at the Battle of Capua and Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus having been slain with the fleet he had assembled in order to stage a counter-invasion along the coast.

Furthermore, Rome was having monetary and manpower issues. With most of the Socii under occupation or in revolt, the Senate had limited amounts of both manpower and funding. Those were two pillars of any war effort, and Rome had been suffering from shortages of both before the war had started to begin with. While Samnicus' brutal tactics had seemed like a gift from the gods for winning the Samnite War, they had left much of Central and Southern Italia denuded of manpower and in ruin. 

It also seemed to further engender Ire among the Italic Peoples and Socii, who quickly threw their lot in with Pyrrhus once the Epirote Warrior-King had proven that he was able to win battlefield victories. Much of the Peninsula had fallen to him or defected, and now Rome's only remaining Socii were the Umbrii, Sabinii, Picenii, and Etruscans. The last of whom were already grumbling about the harsh tributes demanded of them to facilitate the war. If something was not done to salvage the situation over the winter, then Rome could be facing total defeat for the first time since Brennus and his Gauls managed to attack the City!

"This cannot continue! We must have some form of equilibrium if we are to beat back these Greeks and Samnites bearing down upon us! With equilibrium, we can yet turn the tides of this war and force Pyrrhus back south to Sicily!" Demanded Appius Claudius Caecus. 

"Of course, you believe victory is still able to be won! You and your dogs of war were the ones to demand we march to war in the first place! We ought to make peace with Pyrrhus while we still have a chance to avoid total defeat! The Etruscans are already making noises about revolt and they are the richest of the Socii that yet remain within our control! If they go, we will lose a substantial amount of funds for the raising of armies that we can ill afford to lose!" Countered Quintus Aemilius Papus.

"What peace would you propose, Papus? Should we then crawl on our knees like dogs to beg a foreign Tyrant for peace? Rome will never surrender while we can yet fight!" Retorted Appius Claudius Caecus.

"That time is fast approaching, Caecus. Pyrrhus has yet to be defeated or even suffer enough casualties as to make future battles not worth the expense. I would hear Papus' proposal. If it is workable, then perhaps we should offer it to Pyrrhus, if only as a way to gain time to reorganize." Added Gaius Fabricius Luscinus.

"What you and your fellow Olive Eaters don't seem to understand is that Pyrrhus will not stop to consider peace now, not while he is unquestionably winning this war. To have even a white peace with Epirus, we must first gain some measure of battlefield success!" Cut in Decimus Junius Brutus.

"So you agree then that we should not Surrender meekly like slaves? If Brutus of the Junii is for total victory, then surely we must not give in to Papus and Luscinus' talk of peace?" Questioned Caecus.

"You mistake me, Caecus. I do not believe that total victory is plausible. What we must do is to score enough victories to secure a White Peace with Epirus. Only then will we be able to put down our rebelling Socii." Shot back, Brutus.

"And give up the conquest of Magna Graecia? The whole reason we began this war was that Pyrrhus was maintaining unseemly alliances with the Greeks down south!" Spat Caecus.

"That Trireme has sailed, been caught in a storm, and sunk to the bottom of the sea by now, Caecus. We must secure a white peace, so that we may reorganize and rebuild to a level that will permit such a conquest. It may take decades, but this will not be the last war with the Greeks. We can always come back again once we are in a better position. To do that, however, we will have to hand Pyrrhus defeats. That is something that has not yet been accomplished." Refuted Brutus.

"Do you have a plan as to how that may be accomplished?" Questioned Quintus Fabius Maximus Rullianus, father of the slain Samnicus, and Princeps Senatus, the most senior senator in Rome. He had insisted on coming to the Senate session to see what the plans were to turn this mess around, even though at his advanced age, he was well within his rights to send a proxy.

"I do. First, we must elect a Dictator. Once elected, that Dictator must then offer an olive branch to those Socii who yet remain. The Sabini, Umbrii, Picenii, and Etruscans must be offered Citizenship Sine Sufraggio in exchange for their full, unwavering, support. Once they accept, we must levy armies and drill them through the winter. These must be well-equipped and heavily drilled if we are to stand a chance. This means the Senate will have to pay for all of their equipment, rather than the traditional method of raising legions. Drill instructors are thankfully prevalent, as there will be many retired legionaries who can be induced to train troops hard to ensure the quality of our new armies." Informed Brutus.

"How do you intend to pay for all of this? It will be hugely expensive and our coffers are not what we might wish them to be." Queried Papus.

"We must issue proscriptions. There are always men who seek to shirk the tax collectors, I myself know of one who has amassed fortunes in this manner. Marcus Fonteius of Tusculum had been declared incensus before the war, yet I know for a fact that his estate rivals that of some minor patricians. We ordinarily don't punish the incensus who live in other Latin cities but at a time like this, can we truly afford to turn a blind eye?" Explained Brutus.

"And I suppose that if we elect you Dictator then you will order these proscriptions and see to it that we come out of the Winter with armies that can inflict defeats on Pyrrhus?" Mused Luscinus.

"It is a better plan than simply continuing to do what has not worked, as Caecus wishes, or kowtowing to the demands of a Pyrrhus that has not yet tasted defeat. It has a reasonable chance of working." Insisted Brutus.

"Very well, shall we put it to a vote? All those in favor of Decimus Junius Brutus' election as Dictator raise your hands." Commanded Quintus Fabius Maximus Rullianus. 

As the censor tallied those in favor on a wax tablet, Rullianus could already see that Brutus had swayed a large portion of both Caecus' War Dogs and Papus' Olive Eaters to his side with his well-reasoned plan. It was perhaps the middle approach between peace and war to the pugio, and that was why it had a decent chance of working. Just from a cursory glance at the hand count, Rullianus realized that Brutus' motion would carry.

He hardly had to call for votes against, but it was important to do things properly, especially when appointing a Dictator. As it stood, Caecus and Papus' combined remaining dissenters had only a third of the votes that Brutus had. The Censor tallied up the actual number and called out the votes once the appropriate amount of time had passed for tallying.

"Three-hundred-twenty votes in favor, one-hundred-fifty-four against. The motion carries, Decimus Junius Brutus will stand and be invested as Dictator for the Conduct of the Matter." Informed the Censor.

"Thank you, I shall strive to carry out the best plan possible to secure us the best peace possible. Peace with Honor that will allow us to rebuild and bring to heel those revolting Socii who side with Pyrrhus." Nodded Brutus.

With that, the Senate broke up into individual groups and Brutus went forth to carry out his mandate. Within a fortnight, he had issued his proscriptions and made his offers to the Umbrii, Sabinii, Picenii, and Etruscans. All of these Socii accepted as Brutus knew they would. The proscriptions went a touch bloodier than Brutus had expected, with various prominent men in Tusculum, Tiber, Gabii, and other, smaller towns having been put under proscription due to being Incensus, with their assets and estates seized in a purge. 

Brutus had been hoping to catch all of them unawares, but two, Marcus Fonteius of Tusculum and Aulus Gabinius of Gabii had been forewarned and fled north to the Ligurians with their families and mule trains, hoping to take a ship to a comfortable exile in Masillia. Their estates and businesses would be seized regardless, including a number of stone quarries and lumber camps, which were always large money-makers.

Armed with new sources of revenue and agreements with the Socii that yet stood loyal to Rome, Brutus set about levying new forces, purchasing weapons and armor from Carthage with his new revenues, and bringing older retired veterans back to help drill his new forces. The manpower pool was only slightly improved now that the Socii were no longer holding back, but it was sufficient to raise three armies of forty-thousand troops each. 

Now, however, Rome was scraping the bottom of the barrel for manpower. Two bloody and disastrous wars in such a short time had emptied much of Central Italy of available manpower for the raising of troops. If these armies were destroyed, Rome would not be able to raise their like again. They would in fact struggle to raise thirty thousand green boys and old men should these armies be slaughtered as Samnicus' had. Brutus was gambling much on one last throw of the knucklebones and hoping things went his way.

One way or another, the next few battles would largely decide the fate of the War. . .

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AN: So yeah, the Senate has gotten spooked enough to elect a Dictator for the Conduct of the Matter, that is to say for the duration of the military emergency. Brutus' plan is actually fairly radical, essentially using proscriptions to seize the fortunes of those wealthy men who refused to report for the Census in order to hide their wealth from tax collectors and offering the remaining Socii Citizenship Sine Suffragio in exchange for their unconditional support.

He's using both to raise a few more armies that are well equipped and well drilled enough to be able to hopefully give Pyrrhus a bloody nose and force peace negotiations on good enough terms for Rome that they can rebuild and come back at Magna Graecia later when they've rebuilt.

It's actually a plan that someone like Augustus might have come up with, and Augustus actually did use proscriptions of political opponents to fund the Civil War against Antony. Whether it works out for him as well as it did for Augustus remains to be seen.

At any rate, next will see how Carthage is reacting to all this.

Stay tuned. . .